Publication Date

1-1-2025

Document Type

Contribution to a Book

Publication Title

Sexually and Gender Diverse Adolescents Critical Perspectives on Risk and Resilience

DOI

10.4324/9781003479055-20

First Page

185

Last Page

194

Abstract

The collective liberation of queer and trans people—which is inherently tied to the liberation of those oppressed by white supremacy and racism, ableism, classism, ageism, and other asymmetrical power distributions—is possible when we develop critical consciousness through critical pedagogy. As young people develop an awareness of the contradictions and falsehoods they are taught (e.g., the myth of meritocracy), they begin to work to change their environments and offer resistance to the structures that inequitably shape their world. The vast majority of research on queer and trans adolescents, though, has been shaped by dominant, deficit-based views of queerness that presuppose that queer and trans youth are always already only victims who are damaged by their society. This leads most research to rely on unspoken assumptions that queer and trans youth are passive victims whose most salient features are the presence, absence, or severity of mental health concerns. Critical pedagogy provides a framework for researchers, educators, and adolescents themselves to better understand the power that queer and trans youth cultivate through their adolescence, without ignoring the harms that heterosexist and cissexist environments enact on them. Indeed, critical pedagogy provides a fruitful avenue for researchers to examine the ways that queer and trans adolescents experience discovery, joy, and freedom as they work to change the broken world they have inherited.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

Department

Child and Adolescent Development

Download

Share

COinS