The Joys of Grad Student Final Papers

Bionicgeek

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I'm a sociology masters student in the Northern Virginia area. Just finished my paper for my Globalization class trying to link globalization to poly. Proved to be an interesting and, at times, frustrating endeavor. Next up is a 20 page paper examining poly through feminist theory. Any suggestions people, getting to talk about this a bit would do wonders for my sanity.

I'm finding that plowing through what little academic work has been done on our community has been both enlightening and stressful given that it seems we don't do as well in bucking dominant discourses as we, or at least I, would hope sometimes.
 
Currently my working research question for my thesis is, "How do Polyamorous individuals conceptualize of family?"

However, I'm not touching that til I finish this paper for feminist theory, which was more of what I was talking about when I threw that advice remark out. In general I'm looking for people to talk to and keep me sane as I write this thing that's due on Thursday.

~Roy
 
Ah, mea culpa. No real thesis statement, it's a literature review with the general guideline of asking what feminist theory would have to say concerning polyamory.
 
I'm not finding much as yet since I just started the introduction. I finished my other 20 page paper yesterday morning at 7am and then dived into bed. Tomorrow will be diving through the journal articles I've rounded up and getting a better idea of how I'm outlining this thing. As for types of femenism I think anything after Simone de Beauvoir is game.
 
I am particularly interested in this as I have done some study on the feminist perspective of slut culture. There is quite a diverse response to it and it ties into poly nicely as there is a realm of poly that includes aspects of slut culture. By that I mean that there are poly people that engage in casual sex and relationships and have the theory that they are not responsible for the emotional well being of those they encounter. Often there is a high rate of promiscuity in the form of one night stands, sex parties and many partners that come and go from the persons life.
 
I'm not sure about the promiscuity, as that entails to some degree not letting one's other partners know. Though the patterns you remark upon could be due to the overall sex positive mindset among the community and its overlap with the 'slut' culture, and other sub-cultural groups such as kink, geek and various historic counter-culture influences.
 
I'm not sure about the promiscuity, as that entails to some degree not letting one's other partners know.
well that would be assusming ones poly is about having a primary partner and coming from coupledom first. That isn't the case for a lot of poly peoiple. Some people are poly singles dating opely and being honest about who they are involved with to everyone they date. Some are not dating persay but hanging out with like minded people and seeing who they end up with at the end of the night and calling it poly. Ya, sex positive, but all under the realm of poly rather than swinging or casual/sport sex. Feminists have several things to say about that from what I've read. It all crosses over. This is why I am wondering what the specifics are of your paper.
 
I am hoping to have the room in the paper to discuss the heterogeneity of poly identity, which i think is what you're touching on. If you get a chance to look at Hadar Aviram's article "Make Love, Not Law" she makes an excellent case for the heterogeneity, lack of coherent group identity and lack of real interest in political activism on our own behalf (identity politics in particular) to our tendency to be relatively racially and economically privileged (allowing for us to stay in the closet more easily in general,) as well as due to our cultural toolkit inherited from various counter-culture groups, scifi/fantasy fandom, geek culture generally and alternative spirituality. GSU professor Elisabeth Sheff's dissertation is another good analysis.

Right now at this point, I'm wondering what the specifics of my paper are. eek! Which is not a good thing given that it is due on Wednesday.
 
Same here though just change Clinical Psych to Soci

The syllabus details are as follows: "consider a particular issue (e.g., war, poverty, privacy rights) and show how a gendered theoretical perspective reveals what is otherwise invisible. Your paper should include discussion of several theorists on a single issue.

In either case, your work should address the following questions:

  • What does this work contribute to our ability to analyze the phenomenon in question?
  • How does a gendered perspective change our "common sense"or conventional understandings of the problem?
  • What are the limitations and applying the theoretical work to this social issue?"

Looking at this I'm beginning to realize I could definitely use some outside inspiration.
 
As a fellow graduate student (but in the physical sciences) I'm happy to assist you (i.e procrastinate on my own work).

Have you chosen the theorists you will use? I'm thinking the authors of 'Ethical Slut' might be good for the feminist view. There is also the author of 'sex at dawn' or the writers of ' A billion wicked thoughts'.

'What does this work contribute to our ability to analyze the phenomenon in question?'
For me, the obvious answer to this question is a non-judgmental view of non-monogamy. A breaking of the binary relationship standard. There scant little written about the positives of polyamory compared to the volumes of accolades for monogamy.

"What are the limitations and applying the theoretical work to this social issue?"

One way to look at this question is to examine the multitudes of ways that poly is practiced. There is no 'right' way to be polyamorous, but there is a generally accepted 'right' way to be monogamous. Maybe the only holding tenet of poly is honest communication between partners?

Hopefully that can be a start! Back to my chemistry graphs...
 
Peabean

I'm reviewing what little literature there is without focusing one one particular theorist. Though I tend to shy away from Sex at Dawn because as a sociologist I tend to see evolutionary psychology to be exceptionally flawed.

You make a good point with the objective (I wouldn't say non-judgmental, since our community does have its flaws in how we attempt to answer dominant societal discourses. Thank you for reminding me of the binary standard, I'll have to bring in a bit using Pallotta-Chiarolli's work on Australian poly families and her use of borderlands theory, which attempts to problematize our social use of Aristotelian dualities and Kantian categories.

"What are the limitations and applying the theoretical work to this social issue?"

One way to look at this question is to examine the multitudes of ways that poly is practiced. There is no 'right' way to be polyamorous, but there is a generally accepted 'right' way to be monogamous. Maybe the only holding tenet of poly is honest communication between partners?


This will probably be the most interesting part of my paper, since I'll probably be doing a bit of theorizing of my own here.

Thanks! Good luck with the chemistry!
 
Sounds interesting! You'll share it with us when it's done, yes?
 
There's a Professor at Georgia State U whose research specialization is poly. She's completing a longitudinal study on children of poly families, but it hasn't been published yet. She might have some ideas for you on what is out there comparing Poly to Feminist Theory.

I'm working on Religion papers at the moment and actively avoiding the fact that I have to delve into Feminist theory to work on Feminism in the anabaptist expression of religion. Today, I have the flu. I'm already working on an extension on this project, so I'm going to give myself today to be sick. I raided my Dad's Religion stuff (that's his area of expertise). He would die if I asked him about poly stuff though :p Hazard of his being both a Sociologist AND an Ordained Mennonite Minister.
 
Man. we got out of classes last week, but I feel your pain! I turned in a total of 46 pages last week between all my classes. :(
I've never written about poly, though.
 
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