Wednesday, February 22, 2017
12:00pm – 1:30pm
Joukowsky Forum, Watson Institute, 111 Thayer Street.
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.