Disclosure, discrimination and desire: experiences of Black and South Asian gay men in Britain

Using findings from a qualitative investigation based on in-depth email interviews with 47 Black and South Asian gay men in Britain, this paper explores the cross-cutting identities and discourses in relation to being both gay and from an ethnic minority background. Taking an intersectional approach, detailed accounts of identity negotiation, cultural pressures, experiences of discrimination and exclusion and the relationship between minority ethnic gay men and mainstream White gay culture are presented and explored. The major findings common to both groups were: cultural barriers limiting disclosure of sexuality to family and wider social networks; experiences of discrimination by White gay men that included exclusion as well as objectification; a lack of positive gay role models and imagery relating to men from minority ethnic backgrounds. Among South Asian gay men, a major theme was regret at being unable to fulfil family expectations regarding marriage and children, while among Black gay men, there was a strong belief that same-sex behaviour subverted cultural notions related to how masculinity is configured. The paper concludes by highlighting the importance of social location, particularly education and income, when examining the intersection of ethnicity and sexuality in future research.

Effect of preventive interventions in mentally ill parents on the mental health of the offspring: systematic review and meta-analysis

Mental illness in parents affects the mental health of their children. A systematic review and a meta-analysis of the effectiveness of interventions to prevent mental disorders or psychological symptoms in the offspring were performed.

"Hey, Hey, He Gay, He Gay . . . Okay" . . . Or Is It?: The Sociological Importance of Bruno

Sacha Baron Cohen is a British comedian who has garnered a great deal of controversy over the years. Through his characters, Ali G, Borat, and Bruno, he attempts to trick people into letting down their guards and revealing any prejudices (racism, anti-Semitism, homophobia, misogyny, et cetera) that they may have. In doing so, each of his three characters has sparked a debate concerning the different issues they bring up: with Ali G, it was whether the character was racist or exposed racism; with Borat, it was whether the character was anti-Semitic or revealed anti-Semitism; and with Bruno, it is whether the character reinforces homophobia or mocks it. I am concerned with the last of these three debates, specifically in relation to Baron Cohen's film Bruno. Many say the film reinforces gay stereotypes and is thus harmful for the gay community, while a seemingly equal number of people say it effectively mocks homophobia and is thus beneficial for the gay community. Using the data I collected from thirty-one interviews conducted after five separate screenings of the film, I argue that Bruno is not harmful for the gay community as audiences understood that the Bruno character is based on exaggerated stereotypes of homosexuals. That is, the film did not reinforce any negative stereotypes. But, I also explain that the film did not change any opinions on homosexuality either. Also in this work, I argue that within the world of cinema, Bruno fails to fit into any pre-existing genre, including the 'mock-documentary' genre where it is most commonly placed. Rather, I suggest the film is better categorized as what I call a Real Fake Mock-documentary. While 'mock-documentaries' are made up of fictional characters in fictional situations, this new term encompasses the fact that Bruno involves a fictional character placed into real situations. I conclude by noting that the content, release, and debate surrounding Bruno all reveal that it is still difficult to bring up the issue of homosexuality in American society, even forty years after the Civil Rights era.

Do Zebra Finch Parents Fail to Recognise Their Own Offspring?

Individual recognition systems require the sender to be individually distinctive and the receiver to be able to perceive differences between individuals and react accordingly. Many studies have demonstrated that acoustic signals of almost any species contain individualized information. However, fewer studies have tested experimentally if those signals are used for individual recognition by potential receivers. While laboratory studies using zebra finches have shown that fledglings recognize their parents by their “distance call”, mutual recognition using the same call type has not been demonstrated yet. In a laboratory study with zebra finches, we first quantified between-individual acoustic variation in distance calls of fledglings. In a second step, we tested recognition of fledgling calls by parents using playback experiments. With a discriminant function analysis, we show that individuals are highly distinctive and most measured parameters show very high potential to encode for individuality. The response pattern of zebra finch parents shows that they do react to calls of fledglings, however they do not distinguish between own and unfamiliar offspring, despite individual distinctiveness. This finding is interesting in light of the observation of a high percentage of misdirected feedings in our communal breeding aviaries. Our results demonstrate the importance of adopting a receiver's perspective and suggest that variation in fledgling contact calls might not be used in individual recognition of offspring.

Impact of copper mine tailings (stamp sand) on survival and development of aquatic organisms near Gay, Michigan

Heavy metal-rich copper mine tailings, called stamp sands, were dumped by mining companies directly into streams and along the Lake Superior shoreline, degrading Keweenaw Peninsula waterways. One of the largest disposal sites is near Gay, Michigan, where tailings have been moved along the shoreline by currents since mining ceased. As a result, the smallest sand particles have been washed into deeper water and are filling the interstitial spaces of Buffalo Reef, a critical lake trout spawning site. This research is the first to investigate if stamp sand is detrimental to survival and early development of eggs and larvae of lake sturgeon, lake trout, and Northern leopard frogs, and also examines if the presence of stamp sands influences substrate selection of earthworms. This study found that stamp sand had significantly larger mean particle sizes and irregular shapes compared to natural sand, and earthworms show a strong preference for natural substrate over any combination that included stamp sand. Additionally, copper analysis (Cu2+) of surface water over stamp sand and natural sand showed concentrations were significantly higher in stamp sand surface water (100 μg/L) compared to natural sand surface water (10 μg/L). Frog embryos had similar hatch success over both types of sand, but tadpoles reared over natural sand grew faster and had higher survival rates. Eggs of lake sturgeon showed similar hatch success and development over natural vs. stamp sand over 17 days, while lake trout eggs hatched earlier and developed faster when incubated over stamp sand, yet showed similar development over a 163 day period. Copper from stamp sand appears to impact amphibians more than fish species in this study. These results will help determine what impact stamp sand has on organisms found throughout the Keweenaw Peninsula which encounter the material at some point in their life history.

Efforts and Models of Education for Parents: the Danish Approach

The report examines the relationship between day care institutions, schools and so called “parents unfamiliar to education” as well as the relationship between the institutions. With in Danish public and professional discourse concepts like parents unfamiliar to education are usually referring to environments, parents or families with either no or just very restricted experience of education except for the basic school (folkeskole). The “grand old man” of Danish educational research, Prof. Em. Erik Jørgen Hansen, defines the concept as follows: Parents who are distant from or not familiar with education, are parents without tradition of education and by that fact they are not able to contribute constructively in order to back up their own children during their education. Many teachers and pedagogues are not used to that term; they rather prefer concepts like “socially exposed” or “socially disadvantaged” parents or social classes or strata. The report does not only focus on parents who are not capable to support the school achievements of their children, since a low level of education is usually connected with social disadvantage. Such parents are often not capable of understanding and meeting the demands from side of the school when sending their children to school. They lack the competencies or the necessary competence of action. For the moment being much attention is done from side of the Ministries of Education and Social Affairs (recently renamed Ministry of Welfare) in order to create equal possibilities for all children. Many kinds of expertise (directions, counsels, researchers, etc.) have been more than eager to promote recommendations aiming at achieving the ambitious goal: 2015 95% of all young people should complement a full education (classes 10.-12.). Research results are pointing out the importance of increased participation of parents. In other word the agenda is set for ‘parents’ education’. It seems necessary to underline that Danish welfare policy has been changing rather radical. The classic model was an understanding of welfare as social assurance and/or as social distribution – based on social solidarity. The modern model looks like welfare as social service and/or social investment. This means that citizens are changing role – from user and/or citizen to consumer and/or investor. The Danish state is in correspondence with decisions taken by the government investing in a national future shaped by global competition. The new models of welfare – “service” and “investment” – imply severe changes in hitherto known concepts of family life, relationship between parents and children etc. As an example the investment model points at a new implementation of the relationship between social rights and the rights of freedom. The service model has demonstrated that weakness that the access to qualified services in the field of health or education is becoming more and more dependent of the private purchasing power. The weakness of the investment model is that it represents a sort of “The Winner takes it all” – since a political majority is enabled to make agendas in societal fields former protected by the tripartite power and the rights of freedom of the citizens. The outcome of the Danish development seems to be an establishment of a political governed public service industry which on one side are capable of competing on market conditions and on the other are able being governed by contracts. This represents a new form of close linking of politics, economy and professional work. Attempts of controlling education, pedagogy and thereby the population are not a recent invention. In European history we could easily point at several such experiments. The real news is the linking between political priorities and exercise of public activities by economic incentives. By defining visible goals for the public servants, by introducing measurement of achievements and effects, and by implementing a new wage policy depending on achievements and/or effects a new system of accountability is manufactured. The consequences are already perceptible. The government decides to do some special interventions concerning parents, children or youngsters, the public servants on municipality level are instructed to carry out their services by following a manual, and the parents are no longer protected by privacy. Protection of privacy and minority is no longer a valuable argumentation to prevent further interventions in people’s life (health, food, school, etc.). The citizens are becoming objects of investment, also implying that people are investing in their own health, education, and family. This means that investments in changes of life style and development of competences go hand in hand. The below mentioned programmes are conditioned by this shift.

Sexuality and the ‘Relations of Ruling’: Using Institutional Ethnography to Research Lesbian and Gay Foster Care and Adoption.

This article makes use of institutional ethnography to research foster care and adoption by lesbians and gay men, drawing on the work of the feminist sociologist Dorothy E. Smith in order to demonstrate the investigation of social work institutional categories and the ‘relations of ruling’. Through an analysis of the ways in which ‘gender’ and the idea of the ‘gender role model’ is used within the assessment of gay and lesbian foster carers and adopters, the author shows how these categories are produced and used to police relationship forms and to identify ‘deviant instances’.

Posttraumatic Growth in Parents of Childhood Cancer Survivors

BACKGROUND: When a child is diagnosed with cancer, parents are confronted with the potential fatality of the disease. This traumatic stressor is often followed by additional stressful events during treatment. However, once their child is cured many parents also reported experiencing psychological growth. We aimed to describe post-traumatic growth (PTG) in parents of adolescent childhood cancer survivors, compare it with PTG in existing samples experiencing stressful events, and describe characteristics of parents who report PTG.