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Experiences of Silence, Stigma and Cultural Violence Among LGB People in El Paso, TX

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Experiences of Silence, Stigma and Cultural Violence Among LGB People in El Paso, TX University of Texas at El Paso DigitalCommons@UTEP Open Access Theses & Dissertations 2011-01-01 Is Silence Golden? Experiences of Silence, Stigma and Cultural Violence Among LGB People in El Paso, TX. Elias Gonzalez University of Texas at El Paso, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.utep.edu/open_etd Part of the Sociology Commons Recommended Citation Gonzalez, Elias, "Is Silence Golden? Experiences of Silence, Stigma and Cultural Violence Among LGB People in El Paso, TX." (2011). Open Access Theses & Dissertations. 2298. https://digitalcommons.utep.edu/open_etd/2298 This is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@UTEP. It has been accepted for inclusion in Open Access Theses & Dissertations by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@UTEP. For more information, please contact [email protected]. IS SILENCE GOLDEN? EXPERIENCES OF SILENCE, STIGMA AND CULTURAL VIOLENCE AMONG LGB PEOPLE IN EL PASO, TX. ELIAS GONZALEZ Department of Sociology and Anthropology APPROVED: Aurolyn Luykx, Ph.D., Chair Howard Campbell, Ph.D. Brenda Risch, Ph.D. ____________________________ Benjamin C. Flores, Ph.D. Acting Dean of the Graduate School Copyright © by Elias Gonzalez 2011 Is Silence Golden? Experiences Of Silence, Stigma And Cultural Violence Among LGB People In El Paso, TX. by ELIAS GONZALEZ, B.A. in Anthropology, Linguistics THESIS Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of The University of Texas at El Paso in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF ARTS Department of Sociology and Anthropology THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT EL PASO August 2011 Acknowledgements I would like to thank my committee, Dr. Aurolyn Luykx, Dr. Howard Campbell and Dr. Brenda Risch who guided and led me through the process of forming and writing a thesis. I would also like to thank Dr. Katharine Schmidt whose guidance during the Spring of 2010 led to the inception of this thesis project. I am indebted to the help of Mr. Tony Ramos, Mr. David Peralta-Torres, Mr. Jesus Smith, Ms. Christina Rivera, Ms. Kirsten Perez, and Mr. Jonathan Kennedy whose help during the recruitment phase of this thesis was invaluable; and I would like to thank Rio Grande Adelante, M-Factor, and UTEP’s Queer Student Alliance as well as the friends and colleagues who agreed to be interviewed for this thesis. Thanks also go to my fellow graduate students, Alma Hernandez, Maggie Nelan, Angelica Forrero, Yolanda McDonald, and Anthony Jimenez whose friendship, guidance and mentorship helped me through the process of navigating the stressful thesis process. Final thanks go to my beloved family; my parents, brother, and Ricky, whose love and support through these past two years kept me going and without whom I would be lost. iv Abstract Stigma not only affects how one is treated within a society; it is also one of the factors influencing social identity and sexual behavior. LGB individuals, as part of a stigmatized group, form their sexual identities in a culture and society that is hostile to or ignorant of them. This project synthesizes 14 ethnographic interviews with LGB individuals in El Paso, TX. The interviews focus on the formative years of the individual‟s life on the U.S.-Mexico Border, namely their school years and early formation through family socialization. They also focus on LGBT individuals‟ perceptions of their community and the city at large in terms of violence, safety and stigma. Few studies on the U.S. Mexico border have looked at how silence, stigma and sexuality intersect and affect social identity among LGBT individuals. This exploration of sexual identity and society on the U.S.-Mexico border increases the understanding of the role of stigma and violence in the generation of social identities. v Table of Contents Acknowledgements..........................................................................................................................iv Abstract ............................................................................................................................................ v Table of Contents ............................................................................................................................vi List of Tables ................................................................................................................................v iii Introduction...................................................................................................................................... 1 Literature review .............................................................................................................................. 3 1.1 Stigma ............................................................................................................................ 3 1.2 Violence ....................................................................................................................... 11 1.3 Silence.......................................................................................................................... 22 1.4 El Paso-Juárez .............................................................................................................. 25 Methodology .................................................................................................................................. 32 2.1 Location of the Study................................................................................................... 32 2.2 Data Collection ............................................................................................................ 37 2.3 Participants .................................................................................................................. 38 2.4 Analysis ....................................................................................................................... 41 2.5 Contributions to the Literature..................................................................................... 43 2.6 Limitations ................................................................................................................... 44 2.7 Positionality ................................................................................................................. 44 Description and findings ................................................................................................................ 47 3.1 Experiences of Stigma ................................................................................................. 47 3.2 Experiences of Silence ................................................................................................. 63 3.4 El Paso-Juárez and LGB People .................................................................................. 76 3.5 Violence ....................................................................................................................... 90 3.6 Space and Safety ........................................................................................................ 103 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 109 4.1 Summary of Findings ................................................................................................ 109 4.2 Significance ............................................................................................................... 112 4.3 Limitations ................................................................................................................. 113 4.4 Avenues for Further Study......................................................................................... 113 vi References .................................................................................................................................... 117 Appendix...................................................................................................................................... 126 Vita…………….. ........................................................................................................................ 129 vii List of Tables Table 2.1: Participants and demographic information. .................................................................. 40 viii Introduction Stigma and violence against marginalized groups have occurred for centuries of human history, targeting victims on the basis of race, religion, disability, sex and nationality; yet recently violence on the basis of sexuality, sexual orientation and gender identity has come to prominence. Often these acts take the form of violent attacks against gay and lesbian men and women. While the literature on hate crime against Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) people is expansive there are some aspects of violence that have remained relatively unstudied or unacknowledged. These include non- physical forms of violence such as silence, shunning, restriction of access to resources and more. The origins of and motivations for these symbolic acts of violence can be viewed through the theoretical lens of stigma, developed by Erving Goffman and others in the early part of the 20th century. LGBT people suffer intense forms of social stigma for a variety of reasons that will be further elaborated in the following paragraphs. The Hate Crimes Statistics Act of 1990 requires the U.S. Attorney General to obtain and keep records of instances of hate crime based on race, religion, sexual orientation and ethnicity (Willis,
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