Nonfiction Books

J.E. Sumerau & Eric Anthony Grollman

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Black Lives and Bathrooms: Racial and Gendered Reactions to Minority Rights Movements examines how people respond to minority movements in ways that maintain existing patterns of racial and gender inequality. By studying the Black Lives Matter and Transgender Bathroom Access movement efforts, J.E. Sumerau and Eric Anthony Grollman analyze how cisgender white people define minority movements in relation to their existing notions of United States social norms; react to minority movements utilizing racial, classed, gendered, and sexual stereotypes that reinforce racism, sexism, and cissexism in society; and propose ways that racial and gender minorities could gain conditional acceptance by behaving in ways cisgender white people find more comfortable and normal. Throughout this work, Sumerau and Grollman note how assumptions about whiteness and cisnormativity are spread as cisgender white people respond to racial and gender movements seeking social change.

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Violent Manhood
J.E. Sumerau

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This book will touch on all of the hot topic issues of masculinity and violence, including gun violence, sexual assault and the #MeToo movement, violence against women, LGBT people, and people of color. Its unique approach will add to many conversations that should, as Sumerau explains, be focused on masculinity, and are far too often focused on something else. Taking the approach of talking with young college men who are privileged provides a unique look at how manhood and masculinity may not be progressing like many people hope and provides insights from all angles to critically examine the ways men construct and explain relationships between violence, manhood, and inequality in society.

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Expanding the Rainbow: Exploring the Relationships of Bi+, Polyamorous, Kinky, Ace, Intersex, and Trans People
Brandy L. Simula, J.E. Sumerau, & Andrea Miller

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Expanding the Rainbow is the first comprehensive collection of research on the relationships of people who identify as bi+, poly, kinky, asexual, intersex, and/or trans that is written to be accessible to an undergraduate audience. The volume highlights a diverse range of identities, relationship structures, and understandings of bodies, sexualities, and interpersonal relationships. Contributions to the volume include original empirical research, personal narratives and reflections, and theoretical pieces that center the experiences of members of these communities, as well as teaching resources. Collectively, the chapters present a diverse, nuanced, and empirically rich picture of the variety of relationships and identities that individuals are creating in the twenty-first century.

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America Through Transgender Eyes

J.E. Sumerau & Lain A.B. Mathers

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America through Transgender Eyes provides an opportunity for readers to look at American society through the eyes of transgender people at a time when movements for and against transgender people permeate socio-political discussions throughout the nation. This book provides readers with important insights into the beauty and struggle of transgender people, identities, experiences, and relationships. As political, religious, and scientific traditions update their arguments in relation to growing recognition of transgender lives and histories, America through Transgender Eyes offers an opportunity to visualize the way such traditions appear to some of the people often left out of them. As political battles about the rights of transgender Americans grow throughout the nation, this book provides an important introduction to this population for voters, leaders, activists, and scholars seeking to make sense of the shifting gender dynamics of contemporary America.

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Christianity and the Limits of Minority Acceptance in America: God Loves (Almost) Everyone

J.E. Sumerau & Ryan T. Cragun 

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This book explores the ways Christian women in college make sense of bisexual, transgender, polyamorous, and atheist others. Specifically, it explores the ways they express tolerance for some sexual groups, such as lesbian and gay people, while maintaining condemnation of other sexual, gendered, or religious groups. In so doing, this book highlights the limits of Christian tolerance for the advancement of minority rights.

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Negotiating the Emotional Challenges of Conducting Deeply Personal Research in Health 

Edited by Alexandra C.H. Nowakowski & J.E. Sumerau 

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This book presents a diverse array of case examples from scholars of health-related topics, focusing on biographical narrative as a window into understanding key needs in trauma informed scholarship and medicine. Exploring stories from people of varied backgrounds, experiences, and contexts can help professionals within and beyond the academic research and clinical care spheres create rewarding experiences for patients.

Negotiating the Emotional Challenges of Conducting Deeply Personal Research in Health will be of interest to public health practitioners, educators and researchers as well as students.

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