Does it get better? LGBTQ social work students and experiences with harmful discourse

Abstract

Though the field of social work is grounded in social justice, the social work educational experience, including classrooms, may not live up to this value, especially forLGBTQ students. Using a qualitative phenomenological approach, this study examined the experiences of harmful discourse in social work classrooms for LGBTQ students.Findings indicate that students experienced being misgendered, tokenized, and erased through cis-/hetero-normative language and classroom teachings. Though social work is guided by frameworks of social justice, microaggressions and discrimination may be vaguely glossed over, if addressed at all. This study highlights the gap between the values social work teaches and how social work education is delivered.

Religious‐based negative attitudes towards LGBTQ people among healthcare, social care and social work students and professionals: A review of the international literature

“…Atteberry‐Ash et al. (2019) study of 12 LGBTQ social work students in the United States reported that nine of them described experiences of ‘being excluded, dismissed, or minimized based on other students’ religious identification’ (p.230). By contrast, Barker’s (2013, p.17) study of Christian social work students in the United States reported that they themselves felt excluded by liberal political ideology in social work programmes.…”

HeteroCorpus: A Corpus for Heteronormative Language Detection

“…While Smits et al (2020) analyzed heteronormative speech and casual use of homonegative slurs in young men in sports and found that this language was used almost devoid of meaning except to express lack of masculinity, disapproval, and negativity, concluding that this use of speech attributes to the preservation of heteronormative discourse in spite of growing acceptance of non-heterosexual male athletes. Another study finds that many LGBTQIA+ social work students experience an overwhelming amount of discrimination, mostly perpetuated through harmful discourse (Atteberry-Ash et al, 2019). Lastly, King (2016) finds that heteronormative speech and policing of gender roles in children lead to hypermasculine and violent men, concluding that violence to the queer community can all be connected to heteronormativity in everyday life.…”

Proceedings of the 4th Workshop on Gender Bias in Natural Language Processing (GeBNLP)

“…While Smits et al (2020) analyzed heteronormative speech and casual use of homonegative slurs in young men in sports and found that this language was used almost devoid of meaning except to express lack of masculinity, disapproval, and negativity, concluding that this use of speech attributes to the preservation of heteronormative discourse in spite of growing acceptance of non-heterosexual male athletes. Another study finds that many LGBTQIA+ social work students experience an overwhelming amount of discrimination, mostly perpetuated through harmful discourse (Atteberry- Ash et al, 2019). Lastly, King (2016) finds that heteronormative speech and policing of gender roles in children lead to hypermasculine and violent men, concluding that violence to the queer community can all be connected to heteronormativity in everyday life.…”