These eight case studies can be used for to analyze race, class, gender, and sexuality dynamics in the United States today. Each case is accompanied by questions that address the five themes in the conceptual framework presented in the companion textbook, Understanding Race, Class, Gender, and Sexuality: A Conceptual Framework, by Lynn Weber. Cases were carefully selected to represent a wide range of group experiences cross-cutting race, class, gender, and sexuality; institutional arenas; regional locations; and thematic foci. In each case, students are asked to analyze both the foregrounded dimensions of oppression and privilege as well as those that are less apparent. Questions ask students to consider the implications for social action and social justice embedded in the story and their analysis.

CASE STUDY #1: ?The Valenzuela Family,? excerpt from Leo R. Chavez, 1992, Shadowed Lives: Undocumented Immigrants in American Society. Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt Brace College Publishers. CASE STUDY #2: ?A Love Story? by Kathy Scully Davis, In Susan Wadia-Ells and Nancy Mairs (Eds.), 1995, The Adoption Reader: Birth Mothers, Adoptive Mothers, and Adoptive Daughters Tell Their Stories. Seattle, WA: Seal Press; Emeryville, CA: Publishers Group West. CASE STUDY #3: ?Getting Off on Feminism? by Jason Schultz, In Rebecca Walker (Ed.), 1995, To Be Real: Telling the Truth and Changing the Face of Feminism. New York: Anchor Books. CASE STUDY #4: ?The Tale of City Pride? by William Kowinski, 1993, Smithsonian24(7) Pp. 118(10). CASE STUDY #5: ?Punishing Institutions: The Story of Catherine (Cedar Woman),? narrated by Luana Ross, In Susan Lobo and Steve Talbot (Eds.), 1998, Native American Voices: A Reader. New York: Longman. (and more...)