{"id":52,"date":"2021-05-05T19:25:47","date_gmt":"2021-05-05T23:25:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/arx340-cswaimfox\/?page_id=52"},"modified":"2021-05-12T19:49:24","modified_gmt":"2021-05-12T23:49:24","slug":"early-and-family-life","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/early-and-family-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Early and Family Life"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Although the 1982 SCLA survey focuses on students\u2019 experiences at Smith, it also asks a variety of questions about the respondents\u2019 relationships with their family and friends from home. Of the students who identified as lesbian or gay, the median age that they first identified as such was 19, and only 12% identified as LGBT before the age of 16. <sup class='footnote'><a href='#fn-52-1' id='fnref-52-1' onclick='return fdfootnote_show(52)'>1<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n<p>The survey asks about the first times that the respondents understood lesbianism. The vast\u00a0 majority (70.9%) first learned what the term \u201clesbian\u201d meant between the ages of 11 to 15, with a median age of 13. <sup class='footnote'><a href='#fn-52-2' id='fnref-52-2' onclick='return fdfootnote_show(52)'>2<\/a><\/sup> Some wrote about being \u201cfascinated\u201d or \u201ccurious\u201d about lesbians from a young age, but others reported being \u201crepulsed,\u201d \u201cscared,\u201d \u201cintimidated,\u201d or thinking the idea was \u201cgross\u201d or \u201cdeviant\u201d when they first heard about it. <sup class='footnote'><a href='#fn-52-3' id='fnref-52-3' onclick='return fdfootnote_show(52)'>3<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n<div class=\"h5p-iframe-wrapper\"><iframe id=\"h5p-iframe-11\" class=\"h5p-iframe\" data-content-id=\"11\" style=\"height:1px\" src=\"about:blank\" frameBorder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" title=\"disgust upon arriving\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>By the time the respondents arrived at Smith, 46.7% reported feeling somewhat positive or very positive about lesbianism, 28.7% reported feeling neutral or indifferent, and 24.6% reported feeling somewhat negative or very negative by the time they arrived at Smith. <sup class='footnote'><a href='#fn-52-4' id='fnref-52-4' onclick='return fdfootnote_show(52)'>4<\/a><\/sup> One wrote she was afraid she might \u201cbecome one\u201d if she went to Smith, but others noted that they didn\u2019t really understand lesbianism until they came to Smith. <sup class='footnote'><a href='#fn-52-5' id='fnref-52-5' onclick='return fdfootnote_show(52)'>5<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n<p>When asked about early examples of gay people in their lives, respondents reported a wide variety of people they suspected or knew to be gay. The word cloud below shows the terms people used to describe the people they knew or thought to be gay when they were growing up. Clearly teachers and gym teachers were a strong source of LGBT representation for many of the students, although many had mixed feelings about the LGBT individuals in their lives.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_54\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-54\" style=\"width: 640px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-54 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/arx340-cswaimfox\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/Screen-Shot-2021-05-05-at-7.24.59-PM-1024x467.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"292\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/Screen-Shot-2021-05-05-at-7.24.59-PM-1024x467.png 1024w, https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/Screen-Shot-2021-05-05-at-7.24.59-PM-300x137.png 300w, https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/Screen-Shot-2021-05-05-at-7.24.59-PM-768x350.png 768w, https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/Screen-Shot-2021-05-05-at-7.24.59-PM-640x292.png 640w, https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/Screen-Shot-2021-05-05-at-7.24.59-PM-1100x502.png 1100w, https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/Screen-Shot-2021-05-05-at-7.24.59-PM-1440x657.png 1440w, https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/Screen-Shot-2021-05-05-at-7.24.59-PM-2000x912.png 2000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-54\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Visualization by Callie Swaim-Fox. Sourced from 1982 SCLA Survey, pages 58-62.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Though no question explicitly asked the respondents if they were \u2018out\u2019 to their family, the survey\u00a0 asked if the students had talked to their families about lesbianism. 64% of the respondents said that they had discussed lesbianism\/homosexuality with their father at some point, and 83.6% said they had discussed it with their mother. For 67.6% of the conversations with their mothers and 59.2% of conversations with their fathers, lesbianism\/homosexuality had come up in conversations \u201cas an aspect of Smith.\u201d <sup class='footnote'><a href='#fn-52-6' id='fnref-52-6' onclick='return fdfootnote_show(52)'>6<\/a><\/sup> One stated that the \u201cdiscussion resulted from the media releases about lesbianism at Smith\u201d and another mentioned lesbianism coming up \u201cas it related to Northampton \u2018townies.\u2019\u201d [Ibid., 83, 77.] Clearly, Smith\u2019s reputation surrounding lesbianism caused many of the respondents to choose to, or have to, discuss lesbianism with their families.<\/p>\n<p>Lesbian and bisexual Smith students had unique relationships to their family and sexuality. You can learn more about these topics on pages 75-98 of the report.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_209\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-209\" style=\"width: 50px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/smith-friends-and-student-body\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-209\" src=\"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/app-1646214_640-150x150.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"50\" height=\"50\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/app-1646214_640-150x150.png 150w, https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/app-1646214_640-300x300.png 300w, https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/app-1646214_640-100x100.png 100w, https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/661\/2021\/05\/app-1646214_640.png 640w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 50px) 100vw, 50px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-209\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Next Survey Page<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<div class='footnotes' id='footnotes-52'>\n<div class='footnotedivider'><\/div>\n<ol>\n<li id='fn-52-1'> Lesbian Alliance Student Survey Results, May\u00a0 1983, CA-MS-00112, Box 3016.1, Folder 8, Lesbian Bisexual Transgender Alliance Records, Smith College Archives, https:\/\/findingaids.smith.edu\/repositories\/4\/resources\/16\/collection_organization, 74. <span class='footnotereverse'><a href='#fnref-52-1'>&#8617;<\/a><\/span><\/li>\n<li id='fn-52-2'> Ibid., 63. <span class='footnotereverse'><a href='#fnref-52-2'>&#8617;<\/a><\/span><\/li>\n<li id='fn-52-3'> Ibid., 64-67. <span class='footnotereverse'><a href='#fnref-52-3'>&#8617;<\/a><\/span><\/li>\n<li id='fn-52-4'> Ibid., 63. <span class='footnotereverse'><a href='#fnref-52-4'>&#8617;<\/a><\/span><\/li>\n<li id='fn-52-5'> Ibid., 64-69. <span class='footnotereverse'><a href='#fnref-52-5'>&#8617;<\/a><\/span><\/li>\n<li id='fn-52-6'> Ibid., 75, 78. <span class='footnotereverse'><a href='#fnref-52-6'>&#8617;<\/a><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Although the 1982 SCLA survey focuses on students\u2019 experiences at Smith, it also asks a variety of questions about the respondents\u2019 relationships with their family and friends from home. Of the students who identified as lesbian or gay, the median age that they first identified as such was 19, and only 12% identified as LGBT &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/early-and-family-life\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Early and Family Life&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1891,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-52","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/52","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1891"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/52\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":322,"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/52\/revisions\/322"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.smith.edu\/queer-social-worlds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}