“Unpacking Heteronormativity,” an event part of CU’s spring 2017 Diversity and Inclusion Summit, aimed to explain the system of heteronormativity and how it hurts LGBT students in the classroom and in their day-to-day lives. Dr. Scarlet Bowen, director of CU’s Gender and Sexuality Center, gave the talk Thursday.
Heteronormativity is a term that was developed in the 1990s, and is defined as the institutions and structures of the privilege of heterosexuality and how it can appear to be the only natural sexual orientation.
“Once folks have the framework for recognizing heteronormativity, there are probably lots of things in their specific positions around campus that they can think of changing,” Bowen said. She went on to say that she hoped the talk would empower participants to combat heteronormativity they saw on campus.
Bowen led the group in discussing what they associated with heteronormativity. People shared examples, such as “assuming that everyone is straight,” “assuming that everyone has a partner” and “assuming people should conform to gender roles.”
Bowen then asked the group of CU students, professors and staff, to brainstorm some of the effects heteronormativity is having on campus. The group shared things such as same-sex couples being afraid to be affectionate in public, people being afraid to dress in gender non-conforming ways for fear of harassment, women dropping out of STEM majors and trans and gender non-conforming people being afraid of using public restrooms.
Following these comments, the discussion turned to the importance of people being able to feel safe on campus regardless of their sexual orientation and gender presentation. She said that gender-neutral bathrooms were one way of making the campus more inclusive for people of different sexual orientations and physical abilities. There are single-stall gender-neutral bathrooms on the fourth floor of the Center for Community and the second floor of the UMC.
The group also discussed campus sexual assault and the ways heteronormativity affects the way people think about sexual violence. According to the sexual misconduct survey in 2015, bisexual women and gay men had the highest rates of sexual assault. However, there has been little focus from the school on the prevalence of sexual assault of LGBT students, Bowen said.
Bowen ended the talk by urging people to speak up when confronted with heteronormative attitudes around campus. She also advertised One Colorado’s LGBTQ Lobby Day on Monday, Feb. 27.
“We have wonderful protections in Colorado, and we’d like to keep them,” Bowen said.
“It was interesting to realize that the statistics are shifting and the way that I perceive the world is not necessarily the best way,” said Cate Antil, an employee in the CU bookstore, after the talk.
Contact CU Independent copy editor Carina Julig at carina.julig@colorado.edu.
