Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs
CLACS

Andrea Allen - Violence, Passion, and Power: Lesbian Women and Cultural Ideologies in Brazil

Wednesday, February 22, 2017

12:00 p.m. - 1:30 p.m.

Juokowsky Forum

In this presentation, I will discuss the ways in which Brazilian lesbian women both disturb and reinscribe Brazilian cultural mores surrounding sexuality, gender roles, and violence. Based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Salvador da Bahia, I will argue that unlike heterosexual women, Brazilian lesbian women are able to embody cultural norms that emphasize sexual dominance and sexual freedom as integral aspects of Brazilian male authority, privilege, and even Brazilian identity as a whole. Nevertheless, they are also made invisible as citizens who are deemed worthy of full protection and consideration when they are victims of intimate partner violence and seek redress from the state.

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