Media education curricula are often used to educate students about the world around them, including various social issues such as gender identity and sexual orientation.
These curricula can also perpetuate systemic queerphobia that contributes to negative attitudes towards LGBTQ+ individuals. This essay will discuss how media education programs may be reformed to promote better understanding of queer identities.
One way that media education curricula contribute to systemic queerphobia is through their depiction of stereotypes.
TV shows and movies often portray gay men and lesbians as flamboyant and hypersexualized, which reinforces harmful stereotypes that have been historically used to oppress LGBTQ+ people. By presenting these stereotypes in media education curricula, teachers may unintentionally reinforce these ideas to young students who are just beginning to develop their own understanding of gender and sexuality.
Media education curricula may exclude or minimize the presence of nonbinary or transgender characters, leading to a lack of representation for those who do not identify as cisgender.
To address this issue, media education curricula should include more diverse representations of LGBTQ+ people in their materials. Teachers can use books, videos, and other resources that showcase positive representations of queer people from different backgrounds and experiences. They should also provide context for why certain stereotypes exist, highlighting the historical oppression and discrimination faced by the LGBTQ+ community.
Teachers should focus on teaching about the diversity of gender identity and sexual orientation, going beyond binary labels to acknowledge the spectrum of human experience.
Another way that media education curricula contribute to systemic queerphobia is through their failure to address intersectionality.
While many programs discuss issues such as racism and sexism, they may not consider how these interlock with homophobia and transphobia. Queer individuals face unique challenges due to overlapping forms of oppression, including higher rates of violence and discrimination in healthcare, employment, housing, and politics. By failing to recognize these issues, media education curricula perpetuate a culture where marginalized identities are siloed rather than understood as interconnected. To promote better understanding of LGBTQ+ issues, teachers should integrate conversations about how systems of oppression intersect with each other. This can be done through group projects, classroom activities, and guest speakers who share their own experiences.
Media education curricula have the potential to transform students' understanding of queer identities if reformed appropriately. By providing more diverse representations of LGBTQ+ people, acknowledging the intersections between various forms of oppression, and discussing how historically harmful stereotypes have impacted communities, educators can create a more inclusive learning environment for all students.
How do media education curricula contribute to systemic queerphobia, and what reforms could transform understanding of LGBTQ+ issues?
The media education curriculum may have an influence on shaping society's views on LGBTQ+ individuals due to its role as a source of information dissemination. According to research, some educational institutions' lack of representation of sexual minorities in their teaching materials reinforces heteronormativity and cisnormativity, which perpetuate discrimination against LGBTQ+ people (Chen et al. , 2019).