Coming Out: The Power of Online Stories in the Validation of Experiences for Youth From LGBTQ Families

• In Event: 28.048 - LGBTQ and Allied Parents Speak Out About Their Experiences at School

Abstract

Objectives or purposes

Coming out is a political act, one that resists the status quo and marks LGBTQ people in their difference. It is a necessity due to a culture that assumes heterosexuality, but it is also a coming of age, and a celebration of new identity. Anyone who has ‘come out’ knows it is by no means a singular act, rather it is something that is negotiated on a daily basis with each new encounter or environment. For LGBTQ families the matter of coming out and/or outing our children in the context of school is an ongoing concern (Goldstein, in press). This paper explores the role of participatory media and online videos in working through experiences of coming out, and being outed with young people from LGBTQ families.

Perspective(s) or theoretical framework

How we understand the world is how we see it represented through images and stories (Coulter, Michael & Poynor, 2007; Hall, 1997). Participatory media has made it possible for the average internet user to create “critical interventionist pedagogy” through publishing a blog, a video, and even a Facebook post (Reid, 2010). Users have a role in shaping cultural discourse (Reid, 2010), by telling stories that make sense of the world through an emergent self that constructs and reconstructs identity (Coulter, Michael & Poynor, 2007; Robson, 2013). Stories of, by and for marginalized communities are largely missing from popular culture and are an important part of validation, community building, and connection (Author, 2014). By aggregating diverse queer stories through participatory media we can engage public pedagogy as a site of community, connection, and validation.

Methods and data sources

As part of a three-day applied theatre research-creation workshop with young people from LGBTQ families participants watched online video interviews conducted with LGBTQ parents about their experiences with schooling (Goldstein, 2018). Participants responses were filmed and transcribed.

Results

After viewing each video there was an outpouring of stories from youth participants relating to and connected to the experience of the person in the video. The youth became emboldened and excited to share about their encounters with outness. The online videos were more than just a methodological prompt; they were able to name and validate the youth’s experiences. They created opportunities for encounter where participants felt witnessed by a community that understood their own stories.

Scholarly significance of the study or work

Young people are spending more and more time on devices, their sense of self, and their identities are defined and redefined by their encounters with public pedagogy in online spaces. When middle-school aged children are beginning to exercise their independence and discovering identities separate from their parents, engaging with online texts that validate and affirm their experiences can be very powerful and important to their ability to navigate outness in schools which are primary heteronormative institutions.

Author

• Pamela Baer, Brock University