ABSTRACT
This chapter explains some of the fundamental ways in which schools and families are located within wider societal forms and assumptions. It starts by explaining and developing the understanding of the heterosexual matrix and its relationship to civil society, including schools. The chapter discusses the ways that changes in civil society, in tandem with the heterosexual matrix, are leading to the development of forms of homonormativity that parallel long-established heteronormative arrangements. Pallotta-Chiarolli suggests that heteronormativity, homonormativity and opposite-sex and same-sex couple families are three unequal systems of power that frame and marginalize bisexual and queerly-mixed families. It briefly discusses ideologies of motherhood and fatherhood and their relationship to different forms of LGBTQI+ parenting, and to female and male bodies. Finally, the chapter examines visibility and invisibility and the question of who is acknowledged in schools' relationships with parents, and who is erased.
