6 Queer Books to Start Off With in The New Year
Like all of the 9000+ books in our library, they are free to check out at any time, unless somebody snags them first!
1. Being Gay and Lesbian in a Catholic High School Beyond the Uniform
By Michael Maher Jr.
The only study of its kind, Being Gay and Lesbian in a Catholic High School: Beyond the Uniform offers compelling evidence to Catholic educators, clergy, and laypeople that their superb academic institutions are not fulfilling the clear mandate of the Church on inclusive-loving behavior toward sexual minorities. Yet, the facts presented in Being Gay and Lesbian in a Catholic High School prove that too often they encourage or allow stereotyping, homophobia, and anti-gay violence.
2. Adventures in the Mainstream: Coming of Age With Down’s Syndrome
By Greg Palmer
Like many parents, Greg Palmer worries about his son’s future. But his son Ned’s last year of high school raises concerns and anxieties for him that most parents don’t experience. Ned has Down’s Syndrome; when high school ends for him, school is out forever. The questions looms: What’s next? How will Ned negotiate the world without the structure of school? Will he find a rewarding job in something other than food service? To help him sort out these questions and document his son’s transition from high school to work, Palmer, an award-winning writer and producer of PBS documentaries, keeps a journal that is the basis of this thoughtful and entertaining book.
3. Male Bodies, Women’s Souls: Personal Narratives of Thailand’s Transgendered Youth
By LeeRay Costa and Andrew Matzner
The Thai term sao braphet song (a “second type of woman”) describes males who reject the gender of masculinity for femininity. Male Bodies, Women’s Souls: Personal Narratives of Thailand’s Transgendered Youth uses the narrative method, telling stories in the words of these “second type of women” to analyze these transgender experiences. This previously ignored perspective of the Thai sex/gender system gained through this theoretical and methodological approach offers students and general readers a rich, more readily accessible foundation of knowledge about gendered subjectivity and sex/gender systems.
4. Same Sex Marriage: The Moral and Legal Debate
By Robert M. Baird and Stuart E. Rosenbaum
On May 17, 2004, Massachusetts began performing marriages of same-sex couples. That state’s Supreme Judicial Court had ruled in Goodridge v. Massachusetts Department of Public Health that “barring an individual from the protections, benefits, and obligations of civil marriage solely because that person would marry a person of the same sex violates the Massachusetts Constitution.” Fearing that courts in other states would follow suit, President George W. Bush called for a federal constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman. More than a decade ago, the Hawaii Supreme Court came to a decision similar to Goodridge in Baehr v. Lewin, which prompted the passage of the Defense of Marriage Act.The issue of same-sex marriage has attracted the attention of the nation and has become one of the most heated social controversies. This completely revised and updated second edition of Same-Sex Marriage presents a balanced selection of the latest, the most diverse, and the most clearly argued positions advocated by academics, politicians, journalists, attorneys, judges, and activists
5. Straight: The Surprisingly Short History of Heterosexuality
By Hanne Blank
Like the typewriter and the light bulb, the heterosexual was invented in the 1860s and swiftly transformed Western culture. The idea of “the heterosexual” was unprecedented. After all, men and women had been having sex, marrying, building families, and sometimes even falling in love for millennia without having any special name for their emotions or acts. Yet, within half a century, “heterosexual” had become a byword for “normal,” enshrined in law, medicine, psychiatry, and the media as a new gold standard for human experience. With an eclectic scope and fascinating detail, Straight tells the eye-opening story of a complex and often contradictory man-made creation that turns out to be anything but straight or narrow.
6. Under A Falling Star
By JAE
Falling stars are supposed to be a lucky sign, but not for Austen. Her new job as a secretary in an international games company isn’t off to a good start. Her first assignment—decorating the Christmas tree in the lobby—results in a trip to the ER after Dee, the company’s second-in-command, gets hit by the star-shaped tree topper. Dee blames her instant attraction to Austen on her head wound, not the magic of the falling star. She’s determined not to act on it, especially since Austen has no idea that Dee is practically her boss.