The Toughest Indian in the World is in the Closet

Andrew Sullivan, author of, What is a Homosexual, portrays his experience growing up; trapped in his own identity. He paints a detailed portrait of the hardships caused by being homosexual. He explains the struggle of self-concealment, and how doing so is vital for social acceptation. The ability to hide one’s true feelings make it easier to be “invisible” as Sullivan puts it. “The experience of growing up profoundly different in emotional and psychological makeup inevitably alters a person’s self-perception.”(Sullivan)This statement marks one of the many reasons for this concealment. The main idea of this passage is to reflect on those hardships, and too understand true self-conscious difference. Being different can cause identity

Above all, his theme was curiosity about the recesses of other men’s and women’s beings. About this theme he was always ambivalent [my italics], for he knew that his success as a writer depended upon his keen psychological analysis of people he met, while he could never forget that invasion of the sanctity of another’s personality may harden the heart even as it enriches the mind (548).

At first glance, the documentary Meet the Patels could easily be billed as a real-life My Big Fat Greek Wedding. Centered on Ravi Patel – a first generation Indian-American man – and his quest for love, it certainly displays all the trappings and inner workings of a riveting romantic comedy. However, beneath the exterior mesh of a typical boy-meets-girl frame story, as well as Ravi’s interactions within his branch of the Patel clan, one can also detect various allusions to the struggles of American homosexuality and gay marriage within the plot.

In the analysis of the language used by the speaker, the nature of the poem is written from a professional standpoint using medical terminology, such as parts of the anatomy. Based on the speaker, it suggests that the poem could be written in support of gay pride due to the lack of shame that he described in the patient. The patient is projected as calm and collected throughout the poem and does not seem

hedonistic urges. Later on Dixon points out “We are facing the loss of our generation…gay men lost to AIDS. What kind of witness will you bear? What truth telling are you brave enough to utter and endure the consequences of your unpopular message?” (Dixon 73-74).

1) Opposing Forces This film displayed two opposing forces which were represented as the transsexual community verses society. The weaker force in the film was displayed as the transsexual community while the stronger force was society. The goal of the weaker force was shown as a desire for equality within all culture and fair treatment of these individuals. This goal of the weaker force highlighted a weakness in the stronger force which was seen as fear.

Throughout the book, Bailey argues that in cities around the country in the 1960’s, the “ordinary” person battled the constant struggle of both private and public sexual behaviors, which came to follow post WWII in America. Throughout the text, Bailey

Benway, a representation of the state’s control, relates Carl’s homosexuality to a disease, saying “We regard it as a misfortune… a sickness… certainly nothing to be censured or uh sanctioned any more than, say, tuberculosis.” By comparing the two, Benway is able to imply that homosexuality is life threatening and contagious. Benway tells Carl that the threat of illness requires the intervention of “authorities concerned with public health.” For this intervention of the state to occur, Carl must concede that he is abnormal, and that it is the state’s responsibility to rehabilitate him. In effect, Carl and other patients create a social stigma of their

Within popular culture today, objectified female bodies can be represented everywhere from advertising images to magazine covers, television, music and many more. Through these media institutions, we allow them to construct social identities in ways that allow us to understand what it means to be black, white, Asian, male or female etc. Within many popular culture mediums such as music, stereotypical representations of racially marked female bodies are often formed. Thus, these representations also have the ability to create stories about a certain culture. In music videos, it does not go unnoticed that women are portrayed as objects whose objectives are to pleasure men. In this paper, I will argue how racially marked female bodies are represented. This paper will mainly focus on how these racially marked women are depicted in the hip hop culture. To demonstrate this, I will draw examples by using award winning music videos by Nicki Minaj, R.Kelly, 50 cent to exemplify representations of the female body and how they are objectified as sex objects. In conclusion, we will be able to see how the female bodies are used in mainstream hip hop videos to convey seductively.

In James Baldwin’s novel Giovanni’s Room, a character named David struggles to accept homosexuality as his true identity. One of the ways this is portrayed is through the impacts of his father and his deceased mother. David’s father has an ideal picture of how he wants David to turn out and that is a tough and masculine man. The pressure David feels from this vision of his father’s forces him to deny his homosexuality. David’s father is the symbol of the fuel to his fire, whereas his mother symbolizes the inescapable hold his true identity has on him.

Adolescents experience a multitude of physical, cognitive, emotional, and social, and mental changes during a short span of years in their developmental journey to adulthood, and this transition period is full of many developmental changes and milestones. Some typical changes and milestones in an adolescent’s life include puberty, learning to drive, dating, developing new social relationships and social roles, cognitive changes, becoming sexually active, obtaining employment, and graduating high school. In addition to all of these changes in this tumultuous time of life, adolescents are identifying, developing, and coming to terms with their own sense of self, and learning about their identity becomes a priority. Teens and young adults must also address certain challenges that may arise in their lives such as bullying, drug and alcohol use, violence, sexual abuse, eating disorders, depression or other mood/mental health issues, and issues concerning sexuality, and gender identity. Sherman Alexie’s The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is an engaging story that deals with many of the challenges that all adolescents face, and this novel also addresses challenges that are unique to those teens who may be grappling with issues that face minority cultures and communities as well.

He argues that psychologists as early as Freud have determined the importance of a person’s sexual identity in defining a person’s psychological make-up and then points out that it is impossible for a reader to divorce their sexuality from a reading of any text, that a reader brings to a text the entirety of his experiences and identity and therefore, he brings his sexual identity to the reading of a text also. I use the male pronoun at this point in this paper because the author of the article examined the homosexual male reader, which is separate from either the heterosexual identity and also separate from a lesbian identity because "the homosexual male, in spite of his ‘difference’ is still a biological man, and very importantly, he is a socially constructed man, with all that this implies for phallocentrism and patriarchy" (73). Therefore, it can be seen, a reader can neither divorce their sexual identity nor their gender identity from a reading of a text; in fact, because these factors play a major role in a reader’s psychological make-up, they also play a major role in a

This opening scene incorporates a variety of dynamics.  First, the squad of running soldiers entices Prior's sexual appetite, as do the bodies of his own men later on at the baths.  This outlines the sexual and military objectification of the male physique.  Second, the domineering doctor anally penetrates the passive Prior with his fingers, which Prior interprets as an intermingling of medical and sexual authority.  For Prior, the line between clinical and sexual authority blurs.  Later, in the baths, Prior's command authority over his naked men mixes with his desire to exercise sexual authority.  Third and finally, the doctor infantilizes his patient, spurring ghostly memories of childhood sexual abuse.  As steeped as this scene is in sexual innuendo, this is just the beginning; Barker's booker is overripe with sexual subtexts and Foucaultian

In the one-hour documentary, Miley: The Movement, pop sensation Miley Cyrus grants viewers extraordinary access into her exuberant and spirited life as she ascends to the top of the iTunes chart with her album Bangerz. As a teenage Disney princess, Miley accumulated millions of devoted fans; now, just a few years later, Miley’s suggestive music videos and public displays have permanently replaced the blond wig of her childhood image with an original and controversial persona while at the same time embracing her passion: music. Whether in the studio alongside Britney Spears, preparing for an unforgettable Video Music Award performance, or on set of her latest music video “Wrecking Ball,” Miley radiates confidence throughout her progressive

The raison d’etre of the Western is arguably to celebrate masculinity, but Brokeback Mountain is a revisionary Western that challenges definitions of masculinity. Discuss this statement with reference to Jane Marie Gaines’s and Charlotte Cornelia Herzog’s comments on the homoeroticism of the Western.