Summary Identity, Diversity & Inclusion (2021/2022) S_IDI

Identity, Diversity & Inclusion
2021
Lectures, readings & notes



Contents
Week 2...................................................................................................................................................1
Woodward, K. (2003): Chapter 1 - Questions of identity..................................................................2
Hoskin, R.A. (2021): Can Femme be a theory?.................................................................................2
Cooper, B. (2015): Intersectionality...................................................................................................4
Lecture 1 (09.11.21) - Introduction, what is identity..........................................................................4
Lecture 2 (11.11.21) - Queer, Trans & Femme Identities & Activism - Fabian Holle.......................5
Lecture 3 (12.11.21)- Intersectionality - Alexandra Greene...............................................................6
Week 3...................................................................................................................................................9
De Anstiss, H. & Ziaian, T. (2010): Mental health help-seeking refugee adolescents.....................10
Marnell et al., (2021): Family, friendship, and strength among LGBTQ+ migrants in Cape Town,
S.A...................................................................................................................................................10
Lecture 4 (18.11.21): Migration and health - Fiona PhD candidate.................................................11
Lecture 5 (19.11.21): Migration and Identity - Miriam Ocadiz........................................................12
Week 4.................................................................................................................................................15
Haile, A.G. & Siegmann, K.A. (2014): Masculinity at Work..........................................................15
Crul, M. (2015): Super-diversity vs assimilation: how complex diversity in majority-minority cities
challenges the assumptions of assimilation......................................................................................17
Lecture 6 (25.11.21) - Marina de Regt: Care work and migration: Migrant domestic labour..........19
Lecture 7 (26.11.21) - Superdiversity..............................................................................................20
Week 5.................................................................................................................................................24
Young, I.M. (1990): Social Movements and the Politics of Difference...........................................24
Lecture 8 (02.12.21) - De Voorkamer: Salma..................................................................................25
Lecture 9 (03.12.21) - Social Movements and the politics of difference..........................................26
Week 6.................................................................................................................................................30
Underhill, M.R. (2019): White parents and exposure-to-Diversity parenting practices...................30
Beeker, D. & Schrijvers, L.L. (2020): Religion, sexual ethics, and the politics of belonging: Young
Muslims and Christians in the Netherlands......................................................................................31
Lecture 10 (09.12.21) - Parenting and exposure to diversity............................................................33
Lecture 11 (10.12.21)- Religious identities: Marina de Regt...........................................................35
Week 7.................................................................................................................................................37
Q&A................................................................................................................................................37

Week 2

,Woodward, K. (2003): Chapter 1 - Questions of identity

o What is an identity?
 Identity exists through active participation, it is thus different to personality
because we have to actively take it up
 It is a link between the personal and the social
 We need to mark ourselves as similar or different to others: in-group or out-
group
 We often use a symbol and representations to identify these things
 Identities thus combine how I see myself and how I see others
 Internal, subjective, and external
 Conflicting identities can result in tensions (multiple identities)
 Passports can reveal the tension between how I see myself
and how others see me
 Tension in how much control I have and how much control is exercised over
me when it comes to forming identities
o How are identities formed?
 When we construct an identity, we imagine ourselves and how we want to be
 We visualise ourselves, and think in symbols (what do things say
about me)
 What your identity is, is dependent on how others see you and how you
imagine yourself
 All performances of our identity and our roles are for an audience
 Information about ourselves can be given intentionally or given-off
(unintentional)
 What is given-off is often the result of the unconscious mind
 Unconscious mind: repository of all repressed feelings and
desires, can influence our waking life
 Identities we take up can be a result of unconscious feelings, and thus the
identity is fluid, and constructed of the past and the present
 Also the result of a series of conflicts
 To identify with a group or nation is a collective identity, could be with a
nationality, a sexuality, etc.
 Gender and sexuality is a vital part in our identities, as are nationalities and
race
o How much control do we have in shaping our identities?
 Institutions play a large role in shaping our identities (passports for instance)
 Their categories don't include everything and overlook a lot of what
makes us us
 We define ourselves both individually and through collective action
 Collective action allows us to influence the social structures that can
constrain us, but there are limits to how much we can change them
 We do have some level of negotiating and redefining ourselves, but the way
in which we are expected to act and think is for a large part structurally
determined
 They are embedded in culture, economy, and society
 Identity formation illustrates the interplay between structure and age

Hoskin, R.A. (2021): Can Femme be a theory?

,o Parts of her identity were seen at odds with each other: femininity and lack of
interest in boys
 If you are queer you look a certain way, and it is not feminine
 It is important to value and prize femininity in a subworld where
masculinity is standard
 There is a division between gender, sexuality and feminism, that is
often seen as the way for it to be, but that is an oversimplification
 Her goal: conceptualize femme as a process of “inviting in” – an open
invitation to DIY femininity
o "as described by Gomez (1998), “the act of moving deliberately between
society’s prescribed roles, in opposition to the gender categories, even if only
in wardrobe, remains a profound political statement” (p. 103). In other
words, femme esthetics can be a political act in that they help to imagine a
world wherein meaning is rearranged, that affects and effects a “reordering
of the world” (Rice et al., 2017, p. 214)." p.6
o Femme voices have been overlooked and devalued because they tend to write
about the self and not be stoic which is what the (masculine) academic norm is
 It is seen as a view from nowhere, which it obviously isn't
o Contemporary uses of the word femme are much broader than they were in the
past, but fundamentally it remains the same
 "Indeed, I believe that the very quality that makes femmes a
heterogenous identity is what makes them perpetually resistant and
queer— their failure to conform, even to their own ostensible identity,
while continuously challenging, reworking, and reimagining the norms
of feminine classification (Hoskin & Taylor, 2019)." p.8
 There is a lot of pushback and resistance to forms of femininity that
have historically excluded
o Theoretically femme is "femininity with "mistakes", with a deviance to the
expectations"
 Femininity becomes a focal axis in the analysis of treatment of queer
identities and women
 Femme theory is vital for dilogding expectations of femininity
o As a theoretical framework it requires: (main points really)
 Bringing feminine multiplicities and feminine devaluation into focus
within interdisciplinary and intersectional research.
 Recognizing feminine intersections as central to understanding the
ebbs and flows of power.
 Questioning the assumptions made about femininity and seeking to
understand how these assumptions are informed by way of intersecting
aspects of identity, or modes of oppression.
 Situating femme subjectivities in order to unpack anti-femininity and
femmephobia
 Connecting experiences based on shared femininity, or perceived
femininity.
 Recognizing that current assumptions about femininity and feminine
inferiority are rooted in colonization
 Decolonizing understandings of femininity by looking to the past in
order to imagine the future
 Consider the possibility that femininity is not the source of oppression,
but the assumptions and associations attributed to femininity itself.

, Cooper, B. (2015): Intersectionality

o Intersectionality coined in Black women academics
o Lots of critique on the term because it "excludes" other voices
 But so does all other academia (usually cis white (men))
o What is it?
 “Intersectionality investigates how intersecting power relations
influence social relations across diverse societies as well as individual
experiences in everyday life
 As an analytic tool, intersectionality views categories of race, class,
gender, sexuality, nation, ability, ethnicity, and age among others as
interrelated and mutually shaping one another
 Intersectionality is a way of understanding and explaining complexity
in the world, in people, and in human experiences
 This working definition describes intersectionality’s core insight:
namely, that "in a given society at a given time, power relations of
race, class, and gender, for example, are not discrete and mutually
exclusive entities, but rather build on each other and work together;
and that, while often invisible, these intersecting power relations affect
all aspects of the social world.”
o Link to identity
 “Intersectionality is not an account of personal identity but one of
power” Cooper
o Key takeaways
 Race, class, and gender (as systems of power) are interdependent
 Intersecting power relations produce complex social inequalities
 Intersecting power relations shape individual and group experiences
 Solving social problems requires intersectional analyses

Lecture 1 (09.11.21) - Introduction, what is identity

o How are identities formed
 The difference between identity and personality is the matter of choice,
you don't take up a personality but you do take up an identity (in a
particular time and place)
 Social categorisation: is the difference or link between the personal and
social
 Who do i belong to, what group am i now a part of
 Social comparison: being the same as some but different to others
 Social identification: as active engagemtns
 Agency and stucture is the tension between my choices and the control
that is exercised over me
o Social sciences accounting for identity (slide 10)
 G.H. Mead: we construct our identity by imagining thereby using
symbols
 Job interview we may imagine ourselves in a suit
 This is where we have agency to construct our identity
 E. Goffman: identity is us acting out a role in a play where the scripts
have already been written