Heteronormativity in the University Classroom: Novelty Attachment and Content Substitution among Gay Friendly Students.

This article explores the complex relationship between an openly gay instructor, homophobia, and heteronormativity in a university classroom. We first tabulated the frequency in which the instructor used the lives of heterosexuals and homosexuals as examples of content or content itself, and then interviewed 32 students about their perceptions of these frequencies. We found students significantly overestimated LGBT frequencies and underestimated heterosexual ones. We develop two analytical concepts to highlight this form of heteronormativity: novelty attachment and content substitution. We explain these phenomena by suggesting that the novelty of using LGBT examples and discussing homosexuality as content results in the activation of stereotypes among otherwise gay friendly students. We examine the cognitive underpinnings of this using social identity theory and call for further research to examine the applicability of our theory to other minority groups.