In Intimate Diversity Paul Smith explores the question, 'What grace can be found in the gift of interreligious marriage?' He investigates the experience of interfaith couples for theological themes and from a mssional standpoint.

While cross-cultural relations were once assumed to be inherently problematic, in recent years these couples have increased in both numbers and social acceptance, and there is now a growing awareness of how little we really know about them. Addressing this gap in our knowledge, this book presents 12 chapters focusing on cross-cultural couple formations (i.e., a partner from the U.S. and another from abroad). Highlighting both the struggles and successes of couples, this book challenges the principle of homogamy, helping the reader gain a deeper understanding and respect for intercultural couples. The chapters tackle a broad range of topics and issues, including systemic considerations of the phenomenon of cross-cultural couples, bilingual couples, interfaith relationships, struggles in such couple formations, different methods of approaching solutions, and the use of the internet to meet partners from diverse backgrounds.

This edited volume addresses diversity in sexual and intimate experience later in life (50+) and captures international research and analysis relating to intersectional identities. Contributors explore how being older intersects with differences of ethnicity, gender, sexuality and class.

Addressing diversity in sexual and intimate experience later in life (50+), this collection explores how being older intersects with ethnicity, gender, sexuality and class. This original text extends knowledge concerning intimacies, practices and pleasures for those thought to represent normative forms of sexual identification and expression.

This book examines the meanings and significance of the UK Gender Recognition Act within the context of broader social, cultural, legal, political, theoretical and policy shifts concerning gender and sexual diversity, and addresses current debates about equality and diversity, citizenship and recognition across a range of disciplines.

Discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation or gender identity is forbidden in contemporary international human rights law, yet in many interpretations of Islamic law, this is seen to contradict the tenets of Islam. Vanja Hamzic here offers a path-breaking historical and anthropological analysis of the discourses on sexual and gender diversity in the Muslim world. The first of its kind, the book sheds new light on the understanding of diversity and resistance to hegemonic visions of the self in Muslim societies. Combining first-hand ethnographic accounts of Muslims in contemporary Pakistan including the hijra community whose pluralist sexual and gender experience defy the disciplinary gaze of both international and state law with new archival research, this book provides a unique mapping of Islamic jurisprudence, court practice and social developments in the Muslim world. Hamzic provides a comprehensive look at the ways in which sexually diverse and gender-variant Muslims are seen, and see themselves, within the context of the Islamic legal tradition.

Anthropologist Serena Nanda has heralded the importance of understanding human similarities and differences throughout her writing and teaching career. This was especially evidenced in her groundbreaking work, Gender Diversity: Crosscultural Variations, a masterful, far-reaching examination of the relationships between sex, gender, and sexuality and how they are culturally constructed. Rich ethnographic examples representing nine cultures illuminate the need to analyze sex/gender roles and identities on the basis of broad cultural patterns and distinct cultural features, including social class, ethnicity, age, religion, urban or rural residence, and exposure to Western cultures. The latest edition incorporates new material on hijras in Bangladesh, three gender alternatives in Indonesia, and global changes related to migration, health, and communication. Concept-reinforcing questions have been added to each chapter. Gender Diversity, Second Edition encourages readers to think in new ways about what they consider natural, normal, or morally right. As a concise supplement with multidisciplinary appeal, the enhanced edition is sure to energize the undergraduate classroom.