ABSTRACT
In this chapter, Dean uses in-depth interview data with black and white straight women to explore shifts in the roles of homophobia and antihomophobia in the social construction of straight femininities. A continuum is introduced to map a range of interactional practices through which these women enact straight femininities. Straight women, on one end of the continuum, construct their sexual-gender identity status through homophobic practices that are generally based on their Christian religious beliefs that condemn homosexuality. The other end documents straight women’s antihomophobias, moving from women who establish weak boundaries of social distance to those who blur them. On this end of the continuum, Dean suggests that we approach understanding antihomophobic practices as plural and constitutive in the establishment of straight femininities. By antihomophobia, he means practices that aim to counter prejudice and discrimination against lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and queers as well as practices that may expose, and sometimes renounce, straight status and privilege. In these sections, Dean highlights straight women’s antihomophobic practices that help to give rise to a post-closeted culture of openly lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) individuals and representations of them.
