Date of Award

2018

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Sociology

Abstract

Contemporary views of contraception have intrinsically linked birth control to heterosexual sex and pregnancy prevention. As such, contraception is culturally understood to be exclusively for heterosexual women. Despite this, the little work that has been done on queer people1 and contraception use demonstrates they are also accessing birth control (Chrisler, Gorman, Manion, Murgo, Adams-Clark, Newton and McGrath 2015). This schism between the cultural understanding of contraception as a manifestation of heterosexual womanhood and the everyday use of contraception by both queer and heterosexual people takes root in the medical system. Based in heteronormative ideologies, the medical system fails to take into account the needs of queer people (Lim, Brown and Kim 2014). Given both the incongruity in the cultural perception of contraception, as well as heterosexism in the healthcare system, I have chosen to study the intricate relationship between queer women and contraception obtainment. Using face-to-face interviews with sixteen self-identified queer people, this study investigates how queer people obtain contraception, as well as why they obtain contraception. This Study finds that queer people have a myriad of different reasons for obtaining contraception, including pregnancy prevention and relief of dysphoria.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

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