Thanks to the staff and students of the School of Religion, Philosophy and Classics at the University of KwaZulu-Natal who took the time to encourage me. Framed within a qualitative and critical research paradigm, this study sought to interrogate gay Christians' articulation of their identities and sexuality and the role of religion and culture in the construction process.
Introduction
This chapter also shows that data for this study was produced using focus group discussions, in-depth individual interviews and observational methods before going on to provide a summary of the chapter and study chapters.
Background and Location of the Study
However, the term gender and gender issues have been understood in the Zambian context as synonymous with women. It notes that "since homosexuality is illegal in Zambia, little is known about HIV prevalence in the Zambian gay community" (SIDA 2008:30).
Male Identities in the Zambian Heteronormative Context
The question raised by the debate is: what form of masculine identity is considered acceptable in the Zambian context. It is these grand narratives of masculinity in the Zambian context that this study sought to interrogate by illuminating other ways of being male by highlighting same-sex identities and sexualities (chapters five, six and seven).
Motivation for Undertaking the Study
In this, a gap from my Master's study was identified regarding how gay Christians "self-construct" their identities and sexualities and the role that religion and culture play in this construction. However, there remains enough room for further questioning of how gay Christians formulate their identities and sexualities and the influence of religion and culture on such formulation.
Problem Statement and Objectives of the Study
Additionally, I noticed a gap in the research on gay identities and sexualities in Africa in general and Zambia in particular. Considering the above research problem and research question, and to achieve the objectives of the study on the formulation of gay Christian identities and sexualities and the role of religion and culture, I had to use theoretical frameworks from the disciplines of social psychology and gender.
Theoretical and Methodological Underpinnings
This study was also theoretically framed within feminist and queer theories that helped interrogate the sexual and gender identities of the study participants. Following this, I present below how the data for this study was produced with the study participants.
Data Production Methods
During the data production process, the study participants 'owned' the discussions as my role remained facilitative. The study's intentions were discussed with the participants before they were asked to sign consent forms.
Summary
To achieve validity in this study, I ensured that questions raised during data production were related to the study's objectives. After the data was transcribed, I identified themes from the transcribed data and organized findings according to the identified themes.
Outline of Chapters
Chapter five discusses how study participants articulate their identities and sexuality and the role of the Zambian Christian context in this process. The chapter also shows that gay identities and sexuality are barely articulated within some families.
Introduction
The literature in this chapter was analyzed according to four overarching themes: the history of studies of gay identities and sexuality, the Christian construction of gay identities and sexuality, the cultural construction of gay identities and sexuality, and the interface of Christianity and culture in the construction of gay identities and sexuality.
Tracing Gay Identities and Sexualities Studies
Currently, there is a scarcity of comprehensive literature on gay identities and sexuality from an African perspective. Furthermore, this study recognizes the place of culture and religion in the construction of gay identities and sexuality.
Christianity, Gay Identities and Sexualities
In this article, he discusses the role of religion in shaping nationalist ideologies that seek to regulate homosexuality. The discourse on homosexuality in Zambia is involved in issues of Western imperialism, religion, eschatological orientations, among other things, so “defending the purity of Zambia becomes both a nationalist duty and a religious obligation.
Gender and Culture
Public Image
In other cultures, gay identities and sexualities are constructed and maintained in secret as long as they do not unravel heteronormativity. Implicitly, marriage takes center stage in the constructions of gay identities and sexualities within Indian culture.
Male Initiation Rites of Passage
Another site for the construction of gay identities and sexualities within culture is male initiation rites as part of cultural practices. Male initiation rites of passage fall under rites of transition, which van Gennep adds are "border rites."
Gay Identities and Sexualities and the Supernatural
It is believed that homosexual identities and sexuality give some homosexual men supernatural powers as fortune tellers, healers, priests and prophets. Gay identities and sexuality are revered as supernatural in some cultures and Conner gives an example of “the isanus of the Xhosa (South Africa)”.
An Interface between Christianity and Culture in the Construction of Gay Identities and Sexualities
In cases where cultural and religious constructions of gay identities and sexualities are inconsistent with how gay men. These studies are vital as they show that religion and culture combine to influence and construct gay identities and sexualities.
Summary
The interface between religion and culture has shown that both are systems of transmission of norms about constructions of gay identities and sexuality. Religion and culture determine the social construction of same-sex identities and sexuality, as religion and culture influence each other in one way or another.
Introduction
Social Constructionism
Social Constructionism in Education
While Freire (1970) focuses on largely political domination in the process of knowledge construction, Giroux (2016) focuses on the dominance of corporations in the process of knowledge production. This argument emphasizes the hegemony inherent in the process of knowledge production in cases where an upper class participates in the knowledge production that the lower class engages in.
Social Constructionism in Social and Development Psychology
Being a widely used theory in the fields of education and social and developmental psychology, the question remains: can social constructionism be adopted in religious studies.
Social Constructionism in Religious Studies?
Knowledge Production as a Social Construct
Social Construction as Relational and Dialectic
Language is a useful tool in the construction of social belief and social reality, which in turn informs the construction of identities and sexualities. This study considered religions and cultures as points of social interaction and production of knowledge about identities and sexualities.
Self-Verification Theory
- Routine Self-Verification
- Crisis Self-Verification
- Self-Conception
- Self-Verification through Selective Affiliation
Routine self-verification is undertaken within the opportunity structure that is viewed as people and situations that confirm one's identity (Swann 1983:46). Furthermore, self-concept is strengthened by validation of an individual's self-views, and is strengthened by selective affiliation as part of self-verification.
Synchronizing the Use of Social Constructionism and Self-Verification Theories
Through selective association, people perform their identities and sexualities with a backlog of feedback from their affiliation groups, which is done for the purpose of self-validation. This element within self-verification theory was cardinal to this study, as the pre-existing target groups to which the participants belong are part of selective affiliation, offering positive feedback that reinforces their identities and sexualities.
Feminist Theory
Feminist theory focuses on the marginalization of women, and this study interrogated one of the forms of societal marginalization due to gender and sexual identity. Feminist theory was useful on three counts: highlighting the power of patriarchy that dictates gender roles as detrimental to equality; its emphasis on the contextually situated experiences of individual women; and its focus on the marginalization of women based on gender and sexual differences.
Queer Theory
Queer theory challenges essentialist understandings of gender and sexual identity by highlighting social and power dynamics that dictate normativity. In other words, the readers' gender and sexual identity is part of engagement with the Bible.
Synchronizing the Use of Feminist and Queer Theories
Appropriation of the Theories
Summary
The way in which they negotiate social constructs of identities and sexualities and strive to maintain self-views is explored in the next three chapters. After discussing the theories that led to this study, in the next chapter I continue to explore the research design and methodology used.
Introduction
Qualitative and Critical Research Paradigms
I relied heavily on the language used by the participants and their performance of their identities and sexualities as important sources of data. By reflecting on and discussing how they ―self-construct‖ their identities and sexualities, the participants demonstrated agency in the midst of religious and cultural forces regarding identities and sexualities.
Research Design
The emphasis in the multi-method design is on using more than one research method in the production of data to capture a phenomenon from as many positions as possible. Therefore, my research met the requirements of the multi-method research design through the use of focus group discussions, in-depth interviews and observation methods.
Sampling
Focus group discussions and interviews were held in "safe rooms" by agreement with the participants. In this connection, the focus group discussions proved to be instructive for both the participants and me.
Methods of Data Production
In the focus group discussions, I indicated that those willing to participate in in-depth interviews could write down their cell phone numbers so that I could call them for interviews. I used both audio recordings and notes during focus group discussions, in-depth interviews and observation.
Reflexivity
The transgender men, women, and lesbians confirmed the views of the gay Christians and therefore offered unintentional triangulation during this study. Some of the views of transgender men, women and lesbians have been captured in this study for verification and triangulation.
Methods of Data Analysis
I listened to recordings of the focus group discussions and interviews, and read over the notes I had taken during the data production process immediately after each session. I aligned the data to the research questions in my study and then categorized it accordingly.
Reliability and Validity
I identified, categorized and named these themes as such based on the articulation of the study participants. The rigor of the study was achieved through the use of four theoretical frameworks that were combined.
Ethical Consideration
I sought participants' permission to audio record and take notes during the data production process. However, my ethical responsibility to the participants forced me not to use four of the internal codes they shared with me during data production.
Summary
As this study was designed with the well-being of the participants in mind, it was imperative that their views and discomfort were taken into account at every stage. I have also shown the reliability, rigor, credibility and validity of this study before discussing the ethical aspects of this study.
Introduction
Incipient Theologies as Analytical Framework
The participants' embodied theologies are hardly given sufficient expression or space for articulation, especially in light of prevailing Christian theological positions on gay identities and sexualities. Participants offered theology and religious views that arose from their everyday experiences of their identity and sexuality.
Religious Perspectives of Gay Christians
Infallible Bible, Fallible Biblical Hermeneutics
For this particular Christian expression that Diva refers to, the Bible is a tool to fight gay identities and sexualities. These answers indicated how the Bible is regarded as an infallible text that should not be questioned.
Belonging and/or not Belonging
Rutledge argues that “the crucifixion is the touchstone of Christian authenticity, the unique feature by which everything else, including the resurrection, takes on its true meaning” (2015:44). Resolve trans: My identity and sexuality is not an issue in my church...I sing a lot in the choir...the way I am is not an issue...even when I miss church/choir they ask me to participate).
Parlance: Self-identity and Social identity
Participants‘ Use of Personal Pronouns
The table shows the relationship between sexual orientation and gender identity and the use of personal pronouns among study participants. However, what this table shows is that these study participants, despite being assigned the masculine gender and gender by society, frame their identities and describe themselves using both masculine and feminine personal pronouns.
Parlance: Self-identity and Christian Identity
Some participants insisted that Christianity or the church has a positive impact on how they construct their identities and sexualities. The participants in the Kanyama study unanimously agreed that Christianity, or their churches, are very welcoming of their identities and sexualities.
Performance
Dressing
The priest ran after me when I entered the Cock Pit (night club) and I was wearing skinny jeans...then I stopped singing in church...the priest followed me into the pub). Teta: More straight men are imitating the way gay men dress...the short pants raise questions...girly attire and sitting pose all raise questions.
Sexual and Gender Roles
Some participants also indicated how sexual roles and identities were related to gender roles in their sexual relationship. Based on these answers, Christianity frames gender roles along heteronormative binaries of male and female.
Summary
Chipobabz adopts feminine gender roles within its family setup, reflecting a supportive father who loves his cooking. The participants' identities and sexuality are showcased through performances such as clothing, mannerisms, positional identities, sexual roles, and gender roles.
Introduction
The Concept of Borderland Gender and Sexualities
Borderline gender and sexuality are therefore used to critically explore the ambiguities that contradict how participants ―self-construct‖ their identities and themselves as sexual beings and the role of Zambian culture in this process. Nor do all homosexuals have similar experiences regarding their identity and sexuality.
Feminist Cultural Hermeneutics
I want to take her critique of African cultures further by analyzing them in relation to gay Christians, acknowledging that there are many. Nevertheless, African feminist cultural hermeneutics offers new possibilities for the inclusion of gay Christians as it questions the notion of stable, all-encompassing African cultures.
Borderlands and Borderland Theory
Therefore, they experience their identity and sexuality as an intermediate binary, but remain outside the categorical stipulations of the binary. The participants of the study are on the border between countercultural forms of identity and sexuality and dominant cultural forms of identity and sexuality.
Borderland Gender and Sexualities
Of interest to my research findings were the tensions between genders and gender identities, as manifested in the concept of borderline gender and sexuality. The participants of the study openly or covertly live on the border of gender and sexuality by deconstructing and reconstructing the boundaries around gender and sexuality.
Borderlands as Sites of Power
Similarly, the identities and sexualities of the study participants are constructed in places that create spaces for the subversion of gender and sexual normativity, thereby enabling their reformulation. I go on to show that the study participants continue to create their identity and sexuality within the border.
Borderlands as Sites of Structure and Surveillance
Within the discourses and practices of sexual and gender identities, boundaries are marked and physically enforced not only metaphorically, but also by heterosexuals, who typically police gay men and other sexual minorities. To relate this argument to my study, in many cases, heterosexuals as a majority within the Zambian context exert power over the sexual and gender identity of the participants by defining their unacceptability and acceptability.
Borderlands as Sites of Resistance and Agency
Summary
Introduction
Perspectives on Indigenous Worldviews
Ancestral Incarnates
Traditional Leaders as Custodians of ―Cultural Public Opinion ‖
Parlance within Zambian Culture
Daily Family Life
Adages, Dance and Songs
Performance – Gay Christians and Zambian Culture
Gender Roles
Homo-patriarchy
An Interface of Christianity and Culture from Participants‘ Perspectives
Summary
Introduction
Summary of the Chapters
Study‘s Contribution
Theoretical Contribution
Conceptual Contribution
Methodological Contribution
Possible Areas of Future Research
Conclusion
