Familiar claims : representations of same-gendered families in South African mainstream news media

Morison, Tracy; Reddy, Vasu

Title: Familiar claims : representations of same-gendered families in South African mainstream news media
Creator: Morison, Tracy
Creator: Reddy, Vasu
Date Issued: 2013
Date: 2013
Type: Book chapter
Identifier: vital:6211
Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1003062
Description: From the Introduction: There has been significant reform of South African legislation pertaining to same-gendered families. The Constitution supports the rights of gay men and lesbians to establish life partnerships or, more recently, to enter into civil unions, to adopt children, keep custody of their own children in divorce proceedings, and to undertake co-parenting of their created families. Despite—or maybe because of—these developments, public debate on these issues is as lively and vociferous as it has ever been. At the time of writing this chapter, for instance, a veteran journalist published a column in a national newspaper in which he denounced same-gendered family “arrangements” as “neither the norm nor ultimately desirable” (Mulholland, 2013). Children in same-gendered families must be informed of this, he claimed. His argument was unsupported, save for unsubstantiated claims regarding the unnaturalness of same-gendered families, which defy “the natural order of things”, and the vehement refusal that “same-sex matrimony is the same as that of heterosexuals” (Mulholland, 2013). Mulholland’s column, which met with outrage by various activists and academics, demonstrates some of the ideas that circulate in public discussion of same-gendered families: concerns regarding the differences between homosexual and heterosexual families and the effects that these ‘differences’ might have on children living in ‘alternative’ families. In this chapter, we examine the public discussion, focusing on South African print media as a key site where debate has occurred. Recognising that the discussion of LGBTI issues in South Africa has increased in visibility over time, focusing on stories about coming out, rights, transgressions, stigma, discrimination and violence, this chapter concentrates on the public discussion in local print media that centre on ‘alternative’ family arrangements that are in contrast to a traditional heterosexual nuclear family. Drawing on a selection of print media reportage, we examine the social and public discourses that underpin and resist normative meanings associated with ‘the family’ as a social unit and, specifically, how same-gendered families (often rendered invisible and pathologised) are constructed within this material.
Description: C. Lubbe & J. Marnell (Eds.) 2013. Home affairs: rethinking lesbian, gay, bisexual & transgender families in contemporary South Africa. A copy of the book can be obtained from: http://www.jacana.co.za
Format: 19 pages
Format: pdf
Publisher: Jacana Media
Language: English
Relation: Morison, T., & Reddy, V. (2013). Familiar claims: representations of same-gendered families in South African mainstream news media. In: C. Lubbe & J. Marnell (Eds.). Home affairs: rethinking lesbian, gay, bisexual & transgender families in contemporary South Africa. Johannesburg: Fanele Press (Jacana Media), pp. 21 – 49.
Rights: Pre-print version uploaded with permission from Jacana Media

Hits: 538
Visitors: 685
Downloads: 163

Collections

Morison, Tracy (Dr)

RU Department of Psychology

		Thumbnail	File	Description	Size	Format
View Details Download			SOURCEPDF	PDF	709 KB	Adobe Acrobat PDF	View Details Download