Oral and Written Scholarship

Abstract

We have often observed that the gap between oral or clinical knowledge and written scholarship in the field of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) mental health can be great. Clinicians doing excellent work with LGBT patients may find the time to speak at professional conferences but not write down their wisdom. Researchers doing smaller, more cutting-edge studies may not find an audience for their work in larger, general-interest mental health journals. Professionals whose own lives may have important insights to bear may feel uncomfortable in speaking or writing about themselves, absent the distance that talking about a patient or patient population provides. The Journal of Gay & Lesbian Mental Health is committed to establishing a written record of these insights, currently limited to an oral tradition, so that they may be shared, discussed, and expanded upon among a wider professional audience. This issue contains all three examples cited above. We begin with an original study by Tyrel J. Starks, MA, and colleagues, “Examining Discrepancies among Sexual Orientation Components in a Representative Sample of Men at Risk for HIV/AIDS.” It has long been observed that sexual orientation cannot be measured in a simple, binary way (gay/straight) and that people may identify in different ways with regards to sexual behavior, attraction, and identity or self-labeling. This study begins to shed light on the complexity of this experience for individuals and