Coming Out of Shame: Transforming Gay and Lesbian Lives - Softcover

Kaufman Ph.D., Gershon; Raphael Ph.D., Lev

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0385477961 ISBN 13: 9780385477963

Publisher: Main Street Books, 1996

Synopsis

Most gay men and lesbians grow up learning that to be gay is to be sick, to be unnatural, to be a sinner. By adolescence, such negative attitudes have produced and reinforced a single, powerful emotion: shame, the feeling that you’re inferior and judged as “bad,” for what you are—gay.

In Coming out of Shame Gershen Kaufman and Lev Raphael expose the role shame has come to play in gay and lesbian lives. Rarely discussed but vastly important, shame powerfully shapes each individual’s development of self-esteem, identity, and intimacy—three areas in which gay men and lesbians have been extremely vulnerable to the crippling effects of shame. Tracing the historical and cultural sources of gay shame, Kaufman and Raphael reveal how gay men and lesbians have internalized shame, resulting in self-loathing and destructive behaviors.

The hallmark of shame is silence, and by breaking the silence around the dynamics of gay shame, Kaufman and Raphael offer a way to “come out” of shame and begin the journey toward wholeness and self-acceptance. Filled with the experiences of those struggling to overcome shame, Coming Out of Shame includes strategies for:

· Storing self-esteem
· Creating a positive gay identity
· Healing scenes of shame
· Developing partnerships in intimacy
 
Self-affirming and inspirational, Coming Out of Shame guides the transformation of gay shame into gay pride and empowers gay men and lesbians as no other book has done.

About this title

About the Author

Gershon Kaufman, PhD, is the author of several works on the subject of shame including, Coming Out of Shame: Transforming Gay and Lesbian Lives. He is a professor at Michigan State University and lectures on shame and self-esteem.

Lev Raphael, PhD, is the author of several works including a collection of short stories, Dancing on Tisha B’Av. He teaches creative writing, popular literature, and Jewish American literature at Michigan State University.

From Library Journal

Psychologist and psychotherapist Kaufman (Shame: The Power of Caring, Shenckman, 1981) has been publishing on shame for two decades; Raphael, his life partner of ten years, is best known for his fiction (Winter Eyes, St. Martin's, 1992). Together they present the main features of shame theory based on the work of Silvan Tomkins; they then move on to examine how internalized shame and fear impact on self-esteem, identity, and intimacy, specifically in the life experiences of lesbians and gay men. Maintaining that the self is continuously evolving, the authors offer "reparenting" imagery to transform scenes in an attempt to help make patterns of emotion more visible and thus diminish shame in individuals and relationships, as well as facilitate resolution of such issues as sexual monogamy. The use of humor and examples from case studies help mitigate the text's redundancy. The technical terminology somewhat obscures the many insights in this book clearly intended for the sophisticated layperson. For public collections strong on gay issues.?James E. Van Buskirk, San Francisco P.L.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Main Street Books
• Publication date: 1996
• ISBN 10: 0385477961
• ISBN 13: 9780385477963
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 304