Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Ohio University, 2018, History (Arts and Sciences)

This dissertation challenges the widespread myth that black Americans make up the most homophobic communities in the United States. After outlining the myth and illustrating that many Americans of all backgrounds had subscribed to this belief by the early 1990s, the project challenges the narrative of black homophobia by highlighting black urban neighborhoods in the first half of the twentieth century that permitted and even occasionally celebrated open displays of queerness. By the 1960s, however, the black communities that had hosted overt queerness were no longer recognizable, as the public balls, private parties, and other spaces where same-sex contacts took place were driven underground. This shift resulted from the rise of the black Civil Rights Movement, whose middle-class leadership – often comprised of ministers from the black church – rigorously promoted the respectability of the race. This politics of respectability included the demand by religious and activist leaders that all members of the black community meet the outward expectations of an upstanding, heteronormative citizen. This shift is grounded in the deep history of mainline black Christian denominations as sites of resistance against slavery and white supremacy, institutions that presumed individual respectability was prerequisite for the struggle for full citizenship. Over time, this led to publicly preaching homophobic sermons even while tolerating private queerness in the pews and choirs. This dynamic of Sexual Plausible Deniability, where queerness was tolerated as long as it went unnamed, gave rise to the so-called Down Low phenomenon—referring to black men who have sex with other men without adopting a gay identity—that gained public notoriety during the worst years of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The final chapter explores the oral histories of black queer men who describe their experiences after the Civil Rights Movement, illuminating that queer expressions in black spaces continued to exist b (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Katherine Jellison (Committee Chair); Steve Estes (Committee Member); Brian Schoen (Committee Member); Kevin Mattson (Committee Member); Barry Tadlock (Committee Member) Subjects: Gender Studies; History

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2013, Political Science

Why do states use secrecy? Specifically, why do great powers often seem to create a kind of “backstage” area around local conflicts? That is, why create a kind of covert realm where external powers can meddle in local conflicts to pursue their security interests? This project generally analyzes how secrecy is used in international politics and why states are individually and collectively motivated to use it. Existing scholarship suggests states use secrecy to surprise their adversaries or insulate their leaders from dovish domestic political groups. I develop an alternative logic rooted in the desire to control conflict escalation risks. In the context of interventions in local conflicts by outside powers, I find intervening states use covert methods to maintain control over the perceptions and interpretations of outside audiences whose reactions determine the magnitude of external pressure on leaders to escalate further. Intervening in a secret, plausibly deniable manner makes restraint and withdrawal on the part of the intervening state easier. It also creates ambiguity about their role which can give the political space to responding states to ignore covert meddling and respond with restraint. Escalation control dynamics therefore make sense of why states intervene secretly and, more puzzling, why other states – even adversaries – may join in ignoring and covering up such covert activity (what I call “tacit collusion”). Drawing on Erving Goffman and others, I develop an “impression management” theory for why states individually and jointly use secrecy and political denial to achieve their goals. To illustrate several new concepts and evaluate the theory’s value-added, I use a sophisticated comparative case study research design that leverages within- and between-case variation in the Korean War, Spanish Civil War, and the civil war in Soviet-occupied Afghanistan. Each conflict hosts se (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Randall Schweller Ph.D. (Committee Chair); Richard Herrmann Ph.D. (Committee Member); Jennifer Mitzen Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: International Relations; Political Science