Gender Studies Seminars

The questioning of simple, binary relations and boundaries between sex and gender categories has for some time been foundational to contemporary feminist and queer theorizing. Indeed, such questioning has come into even starker relief as issues and prejudices surrounding trans/nonbinary persons increasingly enter the mainstream. Yet, the dangerously vocal backlash of transphobia to these issues, particularly from ostensible feminists, shows that the status of and relations between sex/gender categories remains a significant political issue for feminist practice. Drawing on the work of trans- and queer feminists, I am interested in the apparent re-entrenchment of biology-as-destiny and collapse of the sex/gender distinction that has informed an increasingly prominent moves to curtail trans-rights. In recent social and political moves, we have seen attempts to stigmatise and ‘eliminate’ trans-identity, while feminist movements that might have, historically, argued against a reduction of ‘woman’ to her body, have increasingly turned to ‘biological sex’ and allied with far-right groups against ‘the trans threat’. In examining the underlying relationship of transphobia to conceptions of the heterosexualized body, we can see how trans-exclusion relies on a conception of ‘bodily integrity’ that not only undercuts feminist aims but also perpetuates a conservatism – and ultimately racism – around what constitutes ‘normal’ bodies.