TY  - JOUR
TI  - New York Encounters: Religion, Sexuality, and the City
AU  - Andersson, Johan
AU  - Vanderbeck, Robert M
AU  - Valentine, Gill
AU  - Ward, Kevin
AU  - Sadgrove, Joanna
PY  - 2011
PB  - SAGE Publications
LA  - eng
AB  - This paper explores questions of sexual difference and religious belief in relation to recent debates in urban studies and geography on urban encounters. Although it has been widely suggested that increased contact between members of different groups is an important driver for tolerant and respectful intergroup relations, there is need for more careful consideration of the kinds of sites that actually facilitate 'meaningful encounters'. Specifically, we draw on empirical research in Episcopalian churches in New York City and examine how straight-identified parishioners and clergy narrate and perceive their encounters with the city's LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) population. Moving beyond the traditional focus on public space in the literature on cosmopolitan urbanism, we examine how churches serve as 'micropublics' which organize, facilitate, and/or limit encounters with sexual difference. To capture the tension between orthodox theological understandings of human sexuality and lived experiences in a metropolitan context where homosexuality is expressed relatively openly, the discussion focuses in particular on an evangelical case-study parish, where the church leadership is opposed to full LGBT inclusion in the church.
UR  - https://doi.org/10.1068/a43202
DO  - 10.1068/a43202
T2  - Environment and planning. A
VL  - 43
IS  - 3
SN  - 1472-3409
SN  - 0308-518X
SP  - 618-633
UR  - https://www.pollux-fid.de/r/cr-10.1068/a43202
H1  - Pollux (Fachinformationsdienst Politikwissenschaft)
ER  -