Matching Items (4)
Filtering by
- All Subjects: LGBTQ studies
- Genre: Academic theses
- Creators: Goksel, Nisa
Description
Though LGBT people have been able to seek asylum in the United States since the ‘90s, they still face a multitude of challenges upon arrival in the US as well as in their application process, leaving an air of uncertainty for many whether they will be successful in their cases. This thesis seeks to understand these challenges and how they relate to the perception of identities of LGBT asylum seekers, especially as it relates to Western stereotypes of gender and sexuality. To examine these issues, this thesis includes in-depth interviews with four officials who work closely with asylum seekers to incorporate their input on the asylum system as a whole and how the system impacts LGBT asylum seekers. Based on the analysis of court cases and supplementary qualitative data, this thesis aims to reveal the implications of relying on “consistency” as evidence of credibility based on the stereotypes and how this can harm LGBT asylum seekers as well as others outside of the LGBT community. Finally, this thesis proposes an intervention to alleviate these challenges not only for those in the LGBT community but for everyone seeking asylum in the US and suggests a new framework for how to understand and communicate identities of asylum seekers without limited definitions of their sexual identities or stripping them of autonomy.
ContributorsCordwell, Cailan Rose (Author) / Lee, Sangmi (Thesis advisor) / Wheatley, Abby (Committee member) / Goksel, Nisa (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2023
Description
On June 12, 2016, Omar Mateen entered Pulse Nightclub in Orlando, FL and shot and murdered 49 people and wounded over 50 more. At the time, it was the deadliest mass shooting ever to occur on U.S. soil. That particular evening, Pulse, a queer nightclub, was hosting a “Latin Night,” which resulted in over 90 percent of the victims being Latinx in descent and many that identified as Afro-Latinx or Black. Essentially, Pulse is the most lethal act of violence against queer and trans bodies of color in this country. Pulse reminds queer and trans people of color of the conditions of the world that position Brown and Black queer and trans death as mundane. That is to say, the lives of trans and queer bodies of color are lived in close proximity to death. And yet, Pulse was anything but mundane. In every practical sense, it was a fantastical event of radical violence. The tension between these and the implications found within is what this project seeks to engage. Utilizing critical/performance-based qualitative methods and data derived from the queer and trans of color communities in Phoenix, AZ, this project investigates the performative afterlife of Pulse. I apply and name the term performative afterlife to suggest that the events at Pulse are connected to material conditions and consequences that get performed by and through queer and trans bodies of color. Interlocutors share the afterlife is performed within the context of ubiquitous whiteness found in Phoenix, often manifesting as a survival mechanism. Additionally, many interlocutors express the mundane threat of violence everyday has prevented a thorough engagement of what it means to live in a world after the events at Pulse nightclub have occurred. Ultimately, the performative afterlife of Pulse gets performed by queer and trans bodies of color in Phoenix through a co-performance between one another. Much like the dancing that occurred at Pulse, the performative afterlife is a performance that moves the world towards queer or color futures not yet here.
ContributorsTristano, Michael (Author) / Brouwer, Daniel (Thesis advisor) / Bailey, Marlon (Committee member) / Danielson, Marivel (Committee member) / LeMaster, Benny (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020
Description
Through the lived experiences of Georgian queer migrants, this thesis argues that the international and national refugee laws and practices are an essential starting point but remain weak and, in some cases, even exclusionary when it comes to protecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQI) individuals. Specifically, this thesis documents the experiences of Georgian LGBTQ migrants to reveal the social, political, cultural, and economic factors in Georgia and recipient countries essential to shaping their experiences with belonging and protection. It critically explores how one’s LGBTQ identify shapes their sense of belonging in Georgia, how their identity played a direct role in deciding to migrate, and how queer migrants’ identities shape processes in migration and resettlement. Engaging the academic scholarship on citizenship and migration, this thesis contributes new insights for understanding how international and national institutions and laws overlap to create a restrictive regime that forces Georgian migrants to navigate asylum by detaching their claims from their persecution as LGBTQI individuals. Through centering the experiences LGBTQI, this thesis reveals injustices and harms as well as possible top-down legal remedies to improve identity-based protections in national anti-discrimination law and international asylum law.
ContributorsBerianidze, Levan (Author) / Colbern, Allan (Thesis advisor) / Firoz, Malay (Committee member) / Goksel, Nisa (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020
Description
The transgender community is often targeted by hate crimes at greater levels thananyone else under the LGBTQAI+ umbrella but the true scope of the epidemic is far from
understood due to dramatically low rates of reported hate crimes. The current study seeks
to understand the relationship between transgender people and authorities through an indepth
analysis of historical and current trends in reporting GIB hate crimes. In
conjunction, I apply the notion of regional identity to hypothesize which US region(s)
will have the highest rates of GIB inclusive policies based on their historical identities
and socio-political underpinnings. I posit the Pacific, Mountain, New England, and Mid
Atlantic (West and Northeastern) regions will have the highest rates of protection for
transgender people from 2013-2019. Additionally, I assert there will be a moderate (0.2-
0.4 correlation coefficient) to high (0.4+ correlation coefficient) correlation between GIB
inclusive policies and reported rates of violence. A simple linear regression found a high
correlation (.934) between regional political identities and their rate of enacted GIB
policies. Furthermore, based on the annual report data provided by the FBI, the regions
with the highest tallies of GIB inclusive policies were the same regions with the highest
rates of reported GIB hate crimes with an average of 0.537 over a seven-year time span.
This study provides evidence that regional socio-political underpinnings directly affect
policy enacted regarding GIB protections and that those policies are aligned with higher
rates of reported violence.
ContributorsMiller, Kassandra Elizabeth (Author) / Comstock, Audrey (Thesis advisor) / Goksel, Nisa (Committee member) / Kramer, Zachary (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2021