Religion, Gender and Sexuality

Dear Colleagues,

Human history has documented that religion, gender and sexuality are embedded in patriarchal norms and prejudices that have shaped the repression of the female gender and the criminalization of sexuality. The discourse on religion, gender and sexuality, which is both local and international, continues to remain relevant in the 21^st century. As social identities, sexuality, gender and religion are sites of power assertion and expressions of how the human instinct to control is manifest in norms surrounding gender and sexuality. Religion has often sanctioned identity through the socialization process, thus influencing attitudes and general behavior.

As significant intersecting identities, religion, gender and sexuality highlight how social norms and structures of power intersect to reveal the complex social dynamics surrounding challenges to embrace norms while negotiating rights. Some scholars have noted the interaction between multiple identities as an area for academic exploration to further highlight the varying levels of privilege and oppression and the implications for socioeconomic, health and social justice in general. When considering interrelated social categories, the interrogation of complex social dynamics that inform privilege, oppression and social structures help to reveal how power is maintained. The contradictions that are presented by the intersecting relationship have implications that include the health and general welfare of individuals.

Although there is a growing body of academic work that examines the intersection of religion, gender and sexuality, there is a strong need for additional research on the implications of such intersection for human rights, public health, and social justice. As is demonstrated in various studies, selective empirical findings concerning the effects of general religiousness and spirituality on adolescent and premarital sexuality; contraceptive use; abortion; exposure or attitudes toward risky sexual behavior, including HIV/AIDS; marital sexuality; infidelity; lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) populations; and sexual abuse implicate the sanctification of gender and sexuality (Hernandez et al., 2011). Cultural and religious sanctioning of practices related to reproductive health such as female genital cutting, child marriage and levirate marriages—or as they are popularly known, widow inheritance—is implicated in general health disparities and general welfare. Theories and perspectives that argue for the personal as being political call for the need to interrogate deeply held beliefs about gender and sexuality towards an understanding of the interconnectedness of these identities with politics and policies that may determine rights, socioeconomic status, and general welfare. 

This Special Issue of Religions is devoted to an exploration of the intersection of religion, gender and sexuality, while taking into account the multiple social variables and the changing expression of religion in diverse social and cultural contexts. Scholars are invited to analyze and reflect critically on matters related to religion, gender and sexuality as social categories, especially revealing how identities intersect in their social ordering and in their manifestation of power and dominance. Scholars are invited to draw on feminist theories of intersectionality, gender, human rights, queer, masculinity, social construction and diversity studies as well as to demonstrate how interdisciplinary the subjects of religion, gender and sexuality are and how both academics and individuals outside of academia connect on these topical issues.

Prof. Dr. Mary Nyangweso
Guest Editor

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• religions
• spirituality
• gender
• identity
• feminism
• intersectionality
• sexuality
• heterosexuality
• transgender
• lesbian
• LGBTQ