Ex-Gay, Post-Gay, Still GayThe Ex-Gay Movement in South Africa and the United States
Panel discussion The ex-gay movement is a complicated and at times contradictory phenomenon. A bastion of conservative sexual values and politics, it is also the site of gender and sexual innovation (of a particular sort). Its efforts at healing people from homosexuality range from the strictly therapeutic to the intensively spiritual. And the movement both reflects and engages with the national political environments within which it finds itself. This panel will bring a transnational perspective to the ex-gay movement, with speakers who have undertaken intensive field work in ex-gay ministries in South Africa and the United States. It will look at the gender, racial and bodily practices and perspectives the ministries promulgate, their relationship to sexual and religious politics, and their impact on the lives of people attempting to change their sexual orientation. Speakers Lynne Gerber is a Research Fellow at the Religion, Politics, and Globalization Program at the University of California, Berkeley. Her research interests include evangelical Christianity and contemporary American culture, Jewish-evangelical relations, and religion and sexuality. She is currently working on a manuscript titled Ruling the Unruly Body: Losing Weight, Becoming Straight and Being Christian in Evangelical America, a study of evangelical weight loss ministries and ex-gay ministries. Lynne holds a Ph.D. in Ethics and Social Theory from the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley and an M.T.S. from Harvard Divinity School. She has also worked as a consultant for numerous philanthropic foundations. Melissa Hackman is a PhD candidate in cultural anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She is currently writing her dissertation “Born-Again Masculinity: Ex-Gay and Pentecostal Identities in Post-Apartheid South Africa,” which is based on 15 months of intensive fieldwork at an ex-gay and sexual addiction ministry in Cape Town. She has an M.A. in Anthropology from UCSC and a Masters of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School, where she focused on religions of the African Diaspora and gender/sexuality. Melissa received her BA in Women's Studies from Temple University and is originally from Philadelphia. Organized by: The Religion, Politics and Globalization Program Co-sponsored by: Beatrice Bain Research Group, The Center for Comparative Study of Right Wing Movements, The Center for Race and Gender, and the Center for the Study of Sexual Cultures |
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