Although schools are meant to be places where fundamental human values are taught and embraced, challenges encountered by student teachers with same-sex sexualities are inherently connected to contextual experiences of rejection and of being “othered.” These student teachers navigate the internalised homophobia, low self-esteem and anxiety of the teaching profession and begin to take on the role of the activists who “unsilence” and “visibilise” sexual diversity in normative school environments. However, there is scant research on how self-identified effeminate gay and masculine lesbian student teachers negotiate and navigate their identities in a heteronormative school environment during Work Integrated Learning (WIL). This article interrogates the conflation between gender expressions and the assigned sex that seems to raise the question of fitness of same-sex sexuality student teachers for the profession. In the research project undertaken, a qualitative design, which comprised a focus-group interview to elicit responses from 12 self-identified same-sex sexuality student teachers, was utilised. Themes that emerged from the data analysis are: policed bodies and gender-regulated professional teacher identities; self-regulation and performativity; and disrupting heteronormativity in the classroom. These themes are embedded within Activity Theory (AT). The results of this study show how the policing of dress code, mannerism and perceived sexual practice regulated and “genderised” teacher professional identity in schools. This indicates that as part of diversity education, urgency exists for teacher training programmes to incorporate knowledge on inclusive collegial atmospheres that are accommodative of same-sex sexualities.

This article reports on intergroup dialogue as an innovative pedagogical tool to disrupt compulsory heteronormative values among life orientation (LO) students. LO is a school subject that is the study of the self in relation to others and to society. An intergroup dialogue between student teachers and their peers with diverse sexual orientations and gender expressions aimed to explore and understand sexuality differences, foster deeper understanding about issues of oppression and privilege, and build alliances for social change. Using a three-phase approach, the article examines the initial perceptions held about sexual diversity among the student teachers and how dialogue with same-sex sexual desire students enabled an understanding of the everyday realities of bullying and harassment. Six students with diverse sexual orientations and gender expressions, as guest speakers, shared their school experiences with a fourth-year cohort of LO students during sessions for comprehensive sexuality education. Dialogues between these two groups led to an increase in compassion for the repressive experiences of diverse sexual orientations and gender identities and a quest for knowledge on how to facilitate redress. Intergroup dialogue was shown to be a promising pedagogical tool to facilitate critical self-awareness, a shift in dissonance, and a quest for more knowledge to provide an inclusive learning environment for all learners.

This article investigates how lesbian students experience microaggressions in bathrooms at a South African university. We conveniently and purposively used in-depth interviews with 17 lesbian students largely from one of the faculties. Our findings show that notions of microaggression in university bathrooms were not always subtle but pervaded with strong intentions of cissexism and heteronormative messages that had serious implications for the wellbeing of same-sex sexual identity students. Although the university’s intent to introduce gender-neutral bathrooms was to address concerns of safety and forceful sexing of the body through the architecture of the traditional gender-binaried bathrooms, lack of engagement with the diverse student populations created confusion and anxiety. In light of the severity of hate crimes towards lesbians in South Africa, participants were of the view that the newly queered bathrooms made them more vulnerable to violence and ostracism. Implications are that the protection and inclusion of people with same-sex sexual identities in university bathroom spaces remain compromised. Tokenistic attempts at gender transformation in institutions of higher learning are indicative of the need for more focused and thought-through approaches with various stakeholders to consider the voices and needs of those directly affected.

Despite an increase in the research that promotes affirmative gender and sexual diversity in the South African Life Orientation (LO) education, there remains an uncomfortable silence on intersex bodies. In the absence of distinctive binary classifications of external genitalia, learners with variant intersex characteristics are incapable of integration into socio-educational environments. This article explores how individuals with variant intersex characteristics learn about the self in relation to society within LO lessons. It extrapolates factors that influence the educational and psycho-social agency in and around the classroom. This phenomenological study has drawn on in-depth interviews with six individuals with variant intersex characteristics post schooling. The evidence shows that the LO curriculum privileges distinct genital developments as a marker of normal human development and means of gender identification. Previous studies found that the mutually exclusive biological sex characteristics drawn from XY (male) and XX (female) chromosomal development were major determinants of social sexual and gender embodiment in puberty lessons. Lensed through the theory of unintelligibility, bodies that deviated from this normative development were seen as ambiguous and derogatively referred to as hermaphrodites. Their personal identities were marred with constructions of freaks and abnormality. Vilifying personhood rhetoric impacted the social skills of intersex learners and their peers. Learners with intersex bodies were uncomfortable to engage with the gender binary curriculum content, facilities and school culture. Silences on intersex bodies in the LO curriculum made these learners feel invisible which led to early school dropout. This article argues for the integration of intersex knowledge that affirms, humanises and protects all gender, sexual expressions and sex characteristics in the school context. The LO curriculum is well-positioned to disrupt problematic constructions of intersex bodies as deficit and embarrassing by including variant sex characteristic developments as a norm.

The South African Schools Act of 1996 inaugurated a new education system that confronts all forms of unfair discrimination and intolerance. South African schools remain heteronormative and heterosexist. We report on learners' attitudes and experiences towards the learning of LGBT issues. Using a case study methodology, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 high school learners. Findings reveal that sexual and gender diversity is not taught in schools due to a lack of knowledge, ignorance and stereotyping of gender and sexuality. We learned that gender and sexual diversity is a silent topic in schools and that silence perpetuate the compulsory heteronormative culture in schools. However, young people are exposed to and confront same-sex sexualities from different sources since many of the peers are disclosing their same-sex sexualities at younger ages. This study concludes that learners are positive and willing to learn about sexual diversity. If the learners are ready to be taught then we will have to revisit those who are charged with teaching, the educators. We conclude that the educators seem to be the barriers to the teachers and learning of sexual diversity and more research will have to look at in and pre-service teacher education.