Abstract
Background
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, and other sexually and gender diverse (LGBTQ) people
often experience health disparities and disparities in accessing safe health care.
Yet dietetics curriculum and training opportunities for LGBTQ care are limited.
Objective
The objective of this research was to explore the perspectives and professional training
experiences within LGBTQ-focused topics of Canadian dietitians in order to inform
future curriculum and pedagogy.
Design
This research is framed within poststructuralist philosophies. Semi-structured qualitative
interviews were conducted.
Participants/setting
To be eligible, participants needed to be dietitians within Canada who had an interest
in discussing gender and sexual diversity within the profession. Although the research
call was open to all Canadian dietitians who wanted to discuss gender and sexual diversity
within the profession, only dietitians who self-identified as allies to LGBTQ groups
ended up participating in this project. Of the 16 dietitians who participated, 11
participants self-identified as members of LGBTQ groups and 5 self-identified as straight.
All participants took part in online interviews done in private locations of their
choosing from September 2020 to January 2021.
Analysis
A systematic thematic analysis was conducted.
Results
Three themes, including understanding the ethics of dietetics education, recognizing
the cis- and hetero-normativity of dietetics education, and moving forward with queer
pedagogy, were noted from the data.
Conclusions
Participants explored the lack of LGBTQ focus and content during their professional
training and believed such gaps were problematic to the caring philosophies of dietetics.
Participants offered insights into how dietetics educators can disrupt ingrained cis-
hetero-normativity and rigid binary gender norms within dietetics education and curriculum.
Keywords
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Biography
P. Joy is an assistant professor, Applied Human Nutrition, Mount Saint Vincent University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Biography
J. Marie McSweeney-Flaherty is an educational developer, Centre for Learning and Teaching, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Article info
Publication history
Published online: February 21, 2022
Accepted:
February 17,
2022
Received:
September 15,
2021
Footnotes
STATEMENT OF POTENTIAL CONFLICT OF INTEREST No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
FUNDING/SUPPORT This work was funded by Mount Saint Vincent University: New Scholars Grant to the principal investigator, Dr. Phillip Joy.
AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONS P. Joy contributed to the funding, research design, data collection, data analysis, interpretation, and writing of manuscript. J. M. McSweeney-Flaherty contributed to the data analysis, interpretation, and writing of manuscript. Both authors are in agreement with the manuscript and declare that the content has not been published elsewhere.
Identification
Copyright
© 2022 by the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.
