About the project
The project is finished: This website will no longer be updated.
Teaching research project Rainbow Generations
What is the project "Rainbow Generations - How do lesbians, gays, bisexuals, queer and trans*gender people shape healthy ageing?" about?
In healthcare, social work and elderly care, there is often a lack of sensitivity towards LGBTQ* people and a lack of services that address the needs and requirements of this population group. As social work students at Fachhochschule Dortmund, we spent two semesters working on a teaching project on how the situation can be improved. To this end, we also conducted group interviews with transsexual and transgender people, lesbian women and gay men in the region and carried out a photo analysis together with co-researchers (Photovoice).
Approximately ten percent of the population live and love non-heterosexually and / or not in their "birth gender". The emancipation movements of lesbians, gays, bisexuals, queer and trans*gender people (LGBTQ*) have significantly changed their social situation since the 1970s: a number of legal disadvantages have been abolished and the social climate has liberalized in many areas.
But in the field of social work, there is often a lack of services that are sensitive to the particular history of LGBTQ* people. Older LGBTQ* people in particular have often experienced discrimination and violence in their biography and have not received the same recognition as heterosexual and cisgender people.
Together with institutions and organizations from the LGBTQ* community, we are working on a participatory research project on ageing and intergenerational dialogue among LGBTQ* people.
On January 18, 2018, the students presented the results of the project at a public event at the KCR Dortmund and invited people to discuss them.
The teaching research project is now complete.
We would like to thank everyone involved, especially the co-researchers and the participants in the group interviews, for their commitment!
