Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
This cutting-edge collection of articles examines the sociocultural context of the lives of lesbians and lesbian families and reveals how new insights about lesbian identities, experiences, and relationships can be integrated into clinical theory and practice. A family therapist, Joan Laird presents several clinical approaches to working with lesbians as individuals and in couple and parenting relationships and to viewing sexual orientation in its full complexity of race, class, gender, and cultural identity.
Rich with clinical case studies and research on the everyday lives of lesbian families, this book includes chapters on the strategic language of self-disclosure, the family lives of lesbian mothers, and lesbian mothers who come out to their adolescent children.
Table of Contents
pt. 1. Lesbians and the social context. Unconsciousness-raising: hidden dimensions of heterosexism in theory and proctice i.e. practice with lesbians / Elaine Spaulding. Ascribing master status to lesbians: clinical echoes of identity dilemmas / Susan Donner. Gender and sexuality in lesbian relationships: feminist and constructionist perspectives / Joan Laird. The long road to equality: lesbians and social policy / Ann Hartman -- pt. 2. Lesbian couples. A struggle for language: patterns of self-disclosure in lesbian couples / Tara Healy. Therapy with a lesbian couple: the art of balancing lenses / Kathryn Karusaitis Basham. Object relations couples therapy with lesbians / Carol Sussal -- pt. 3. Lesbians, parenting, and children. Lesbian co-parenting: on being/being with the invisible (m) other / Cheryl Muzio. Lesbian parents: understanding developmental pathways / Betty Morningstar. The family lives of lesbian mothers / Laura Lott-Whitehead and Carol T. Tully. Voices from the heart: the developmental impact of a mother's lesbianism on her adolescent children / Ann O'Connell -- pt. 4. Special themes in theory and practice. A relational perspective on mutuality and boundaries in clinical practice with lesbians / Carolyn Dillon. Resilience in lesbians: an exploratory study / Sandra Anderson and Barbara Sussex. The application of control mastery theory in clinical practice with lesbians / Jo Nol.