LGBTQIA+ Pride Month: LGBTQIA+ Rights

In 2015, when the Supreme Court declared that gay and lesbian couples were entitled to the "equal dignity" of marriage recognition, the concept of dignity became a cornerstone for gay rights victories. In "Disrupting Dignity", Stephen M. Engel and Timothy S. Lyle explore the darker side of dignity, tracing its invocation across public health politics, popular culture, and law from the early years of the HIV/AIDS crisis to our current moment. With a compassionate eye, Engel and Lyle detail how politicians, policymakers, media leaders, and even some within LGBTQ+ communities have used the concept of dignity to shame and disempower members of those communities.

In this thorough analysis, Leigh Moscowitz examines how prominent news outlets presented this issue from 2003 to 2012, a time when intense news coverage focused unprecedented attention on gay and lesbian life. During this time, LGBT rights leaders sought to harness the power of media to advocate for marriage equality and to reform their community's public image. Building on in-depth interviews with activists and a comprehensive, longitudinal study of news stories, Moscowitz investigates these leaders' aims and how their frames, tactics, and messages evolved over time.

How did gay marriage--something unimaginable two decades ago--come to feel inevitable to even its staunchest opponents? Drawing on over 95 interviews with two generations of Americans, as well as historical analysis and public opinion data, Peter Hart-Brinson argues that a fundamental shift in our understanding of homosexuality sparked the generational change that fueled gay marriage's unprecedented rise.

In his gripping new book, Walter Frank offers an in-depth look at the court cases that were pivotal in establishing gay rights. But he also tells the story of those individuals who were willing to make waves by fighting for those rights, taking enormous personal risks at a time when the tide of public opinion was against them. Chronicling the past half-century of gay and lesbian history, "Law and the Gay Rights Story" offers a unique perspective on familiar events like the Stonewall Riots, the AIDS crisis, and the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

Examining the crucial relationship between sexuality, race, and class, Beyond the Politics of the Closet highlights the impact gay rights politics and activism have had on the wider American political landscape since the rights revolutions of the 1960s.

In the last two decades, the LGBT movement has gained momentum that is arguably unprecedented in speed and suddenness when compared to other human rights movements. This book investigates the recent history of this transnational movement in Europe, focusing on the diffusion of the norms it champions and the overarching question of why, despite similar international pressures, the trajectories of socio-legal recognition for LGBT minorities are so different across states.

This book is an outcome of a five-year international collaboration among partners that share a common legacy of British colonial laws that criminalise same-sex intimacy and gender identity/expression. The project was unique, combining research and writing with participatory documentary filmmaking.The chapters are bursting with invaluable first hand insights from leading activists at the forefront of some of the most fiercely fought battlegrounds of contemporary sexual politics in India, the Caribbean and Africa. As well, authors from Canada, Botswana and Kenya examine key turning points in the advancement of SOGI issues at the United Nations, and provide critical insights on LGBT asylum in Canada.

This ethnography explores what transnational LGBT human rights advocates actually do on a day-to-day basis. Drawing on thirteen months of field research at the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC), the book explores how the first transnational LGBT human rights NGO formed and evolved, who is engaged in this work, how they conceptualise LGBT human rights, what they do to promote LGBT human rights transnationally, and how they have institutionalised their views at the UN and elsewhere.

In recent decades, a more formalized and forceful shift has emerged in the legislative realm when it comes to gender and sexual justice in Africa. This rigorous, timely volume brings together leading and rising scholars across disciplines to evaluate these ideological struggles and reconsider the modern history of human rights on the continent. Broad in geographic coverage and topical in scope, chapters investigate such subjects as marriage legislation in Mali, family violence experienced by West African refugees, sex education in Uganda, and statutes criminalizing homosexuality in Senegal. These case studies highlight the nuances and contradictions in the varied ways key actors make arguments for or against rights.

Europe is a popular destination for LGBTQ people seeking to escape discrimination and persecution. Yet, while European institutions have done much to promote the legal equality of sexual minorities and a number of states pride themselves on their acceptance of sexual diversity, the image of European tolerance and the reality faced by LGBTQ migrants and asylum seekers are often quite different. To engage with these conflicting discourses, "Queer Migration and Asylum in Europe" brings together scholars from politics, sociology, urban studies, anthropology and law to analyze how and why queer individuals migrate to or seek asylum in Europe, as well as the legal, social and political frameworks they are forced to navigate to feel at home or to regularise their status in the destination societies.