A shift from home to the market: The marketization of reproductive labor in India

Commercial surrogacy marketizes life's work. In the era of neo-liberalism, women's work, which is often intimately performed within a heterosexual marriage in exchange of support, now remains a principal avenue to earn money. This form of feminization of labor has led to the emergence of markets for women's reproductive capacities. The present study stems from my ethnographic journey into the lives of the women who work as surrogate mothers in India. The narratives presented in the paper emerge from my prolonged fieldwork in Anand, Gujarat. It engages with the experiences, understandings, and the voices of these women, who I term reproductive laborers, in order to examine the notion of putting one's reproductive capacities in this intimate market for money.

"You all are sisters! We are all family!" The construction of parenthood in 'RuPaul's Drag Race'

Drag queens epitomise gender fluidity, where the heteronormative binarism male/female is blurred and parodied. Their unconventional nature is reflected in the structure of their community, where they have created alternatives to the heteronormative family, which is historically based on heterosexual marriage and parenthood. Drag families are to be seen as places of personal and financial support, a refuge for young gay men who have been rejected by their “real” families and have financial problems. This study seeks to give prominence to the construction of parenthood in RuPaul’s Drag Race (2009-2021) by analysing the discourse – i. e. the system of statements – around drag family, parenthood and sisterhood in a corpus of 174 episodes. The research is carried out in the light of Corpus Linguistics, with the use of #Lancsbox, a software for the analysis of language data and corpora.

What could Paul have meant by ‘against nature’ (παρὰ φύσιν) as written in Romans 1:26? Striving for the well-being and health of all people

The point of departure of this article is postmodern philosopher Michel Foucault’s ‘archaeological analysis’ of the history of sexuality, seen from the lens of the South African philosopher Johann Beukes. Foucault points out that since the circulation of the so-called handbooks on penance in the 6th century CE, same-gender sex was seen as a punishable sin. With regard to perspectives before this period, Foucault reflects specifically on the contribution of the Christian theologian Augustine (354–430 CE), and particularly Augustine’s interpretation of the Greek expression para phusin (παρὰ φύσιν) as ‘against nature’ as written in Paul’s letter to the Romans (1:26). He argues that this interpretation by Augustine represents a trend in contemporaneous thinking of non-Christian writers such as Plutarch and Themistios. The aim of this article is to demonstrate that a much more influential stimulus from another non-Christian thinker, namely Artemidorus of Daldis (2nd century CE), created a common context that influenced Augustine’s views and subsequently those on same-gender sex, sexual identity, and heterosexual marriage within the Christian tradition.Contribution: The article shows how modern-day homophobia and aversion in same-gender sex do not have its primarily ground in Paul’s use of para phusin, but that Augustine and present-day homophobes in the Christian (including the Reformed) tradition do have their roots in a non-Christian conviction without realising its intercultural and non-Christian origins.

“If I Don’t Allow Him to Have Sex With Me, Our Relationship Will Be Broken”: Rape, Sexual Coercion, and Sexual Compliance Within Marriage in Rural Cambodia

Rape, sexual coercion, and sexual compliance within marriage are major components of gender-based violence globally. This article examines a range of non-consensual sexual experiences within heterosexual marriage in Aoral and Thpong districts in Kampong Speu, Cambodia. Interviews were conducted with 11 married women and thematically analyzed from a critical realist and feminist perspective. Four categories of non-consensual sex were identified and analyzed (rape/forced sex, sexual coercion, sexual compliance, and internalized pressure). These are discussed in detail, alongside the need for educational efforts that disrupt traditional gender norms that create a context conducive to women’s non-consensual sex in Cambodia.

Public sex, private intimacy and sexual exclusivity in men’s formalized same-sex relationships

This article revisits the personal stories that younger male civil partners told about their sexual practices, in what most termed their ‘marriage’, to generate insights into the extent to which they succumbed to the dangers that critics of same-sex marriage foretold. It provides a baseline analysis against which the findings of future studies of both heterosexual and same-sex marriages and civil partnerships can be compared. The data we discuss are comprised of joint ( n = 25) and individual ( n = 50) interviews with couples. Participants’ stories about ‘public’, ‘private’ and ‘exclusive’ sex can appear to support the predictions of some key critics. Participants tended to make commitments to sexual monogamy and link their sexual practices to deepening couple intimacy. However, viewed as stories of socioculturally shaped and biographically embedded sexual practices, they offer insights into the more complex relationships between civil partnership, marriage, sexual exclusivity and intimacy. On closer examination, they suggest it is not simply the case that civil partnership or same-sex marriage (and marriage more generally) ‘imposes’ heteronormative sexual conventions but that relational biographies are significant in shaping simultaneously conventional and deconstructive approaches to married sexuality. Partners in formalized same-sex relationships do not simply follow heterosexual norms. Rather, they juggle the often contradictory norms of mainstream and queer sexual cultures. Understanding the implications for marriage as an institution requires approaches to analysis that do not pose heterosexual marriage as the ‘straw man’ of queer analysis.

Gender-Stratified Labor Market, Heterosexual Marriage Expectation, and LGBQ Young Adults’ Career Plans in Contemporary Japan

Previous U.S. studies showed that many lesbian, gay, bisexual, and queer (LGBQ) young adults hold optimistic views about their occupational careers, despite their risk for facing labor market disadvantages as LGBQ workers. The present study uses Japan as a comparison case and illustrates how young LGBQ people plan their careers in a different national context. Analysis of in-depth interviews shows that many LGBQ young adults in Japan anticipate financial insecurity and consequently prioritize stability over pursuit of personal interests in their career planning. Their career concerns vary by gender and represent their responses to high levels of occupational gender segregation and earnings inequality as well as strong social expectations for heterosexual marriage and gendered division of household responsibilities. Overall, the study endorses ongoing efforts to understand occupational and economic disparities across sexuality groups from global perspectives by paying close attention to macro conditions.

The Limits of Americanism

This chapter highlights the emergence of the radicals, feminists, black separatists, free love advocates, and antiwar protesters who huddled under the banner of the New Left. It looks at the conflict that erupted during the 1960s, in which normative America stood for hard work, personal responsibility, individual merit, delayed gratification, social mobility, heterosexual marriage, well-defined gender roles, and national greatness. It also discusses Democrats, establishment Republicans, and conservatives that disagree about the responsibilities of the federal government and its programs. The chapter illustrates the protest culture that arose on college campuses during the 1960s and eventually found a home in the Democratic Party. It elaborates how the New Left embraced a transgressive outlook that challenged all sides of the American way.