Eliminación del gas intestinal

(Meyer et al., 2001, p. 42).8 Transgender, a term still under construction (Stryker, 2008)

is “an umbrella term to include everyone who challenges the boundaries of sex and gender. It is also used to draw distinctions between those who reassign the sex they were labeled at birth, and… those whose gender expression is considered inappropriate” (Feinberg, 1996, p. x). Both terms (transgender and transsexual) challenge the rigidity of gender roles and gender expression.

Colloquially, some people use transsexual and transgender interchangeably, and others draw clear distinctions between them. For example, transsexual has been used to define those who seek surgical and hormonal transition options, and transgender has been used to broadly characterize gender expression that subverts the gender binary (Bornstein, 1994). Such distinctions have created hierarchy within trans* communities with more “authenticity” ascribed to those who closely match the transsexual model (Schilt & Waszkiewicz, 2006). Those who go through biomedical transition processes are seen as “more real” because of their interest in, ability to, and adherence to the medical model for transitioning.

In an effort to avoid hierarchical distinctions within the community:

The simpler and more impartial trans, by itself and in conjunction with other terms [seems to be of growing preference]. There is still little standardization of language around trans experiences, which also tend to be complicated by various political, medical, and personal agendas in academic literature. Also, transpeople have their own understandings of terms and phrases that differ from those used by academics and other professionals [such as those in psychological and other medical communities]. (Martin & Yonkin, 2006, p. 106)

8

The Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association, Inc. is now called the World Professional Association for Transgender Health, Inc. (WPATH). The citation notes the first author who was the Chairperson of the Committee.

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Definitional distinctions are important, but it is equally important that all individuals “describe and label their own gender identities in whatever ways feel most appropriate to them” (Catalano et al., 2007, p. 219).

Trans*, as a term, is the newest iteration of trans or transgender functioning as a more inclusive umbrella designation, one that references the growing omnipresence of internet language where the asterisk serves as a wildcard for multiple words, and diminishes conflicts over “authenticity” between transsexual versus transgender

terminology. For political, inclusive, and temporal purposes, I use trans, transgender, or trans-identified terminology when I refer to participants in my research, and trans* in reference to broader communities, movements, and theories.9

The following working definitions take into consideration political implications and social experiences, knowing the terminology an individual uses for self-identification may be at odds with these working definitions. Transgender, trans, or trans*, as an identity category or concept, refers to the transgression of the gender binary and other norms pertaining to sex or gender and is a self-determined category. Trans* identity and

trans* communities will be used as an umbrella term for those who intentionally or

unintentionally challenge the boundaries of sex and gender and to signal the myriad identities for which it can refer to including, but not limited to: genderqueer, FtM, MtF,

trannyboy, transgrrrl, drag queen, drag king, transvestite, transsexual, transgender, androgynous, gender-nonconforming, bi-gendered, and gender variant.

9

I make the distinction regarding my participants because trans* became more common in usage after member-checks were conducted with my participants.

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Transsexual10 will be used to refer to those who use that identity label for

her/him/hirself and for reference to the pathology of Gender Identity Disorder (GID). I interpret a person’s use of transsexual as being linked to biomedical transitioning in direct ways that transgender does not necessarily require, but it is noteworthy to mention that there are those in trans* communities who follow and comply with the medical model, and there are also those who identify as transsexual who resist the medical model. In discussing my research, I honor participants’ use of language as accurately as I

understood them to identify themselves, acknowledging that for many there was more than one term that they used (or that I understood them to use) and for some language was context dependent.

There are other terms related to the topic of trans* that are only touched upon in this research but are worth addressing to avoid confusion. Those who write about trans* identity, and certainly those who live it, may use a variety of the aforementioned identity labels, as well as many others that are constantly evolving and shifting. A definition of

genderqueer is necessary because it is a semi-regular identity term used by participants. Genderqueer is a gender identity that resists categorization, not conforming within

traditional categories of the sex/gender binary, and possibly failing at recognition.11

Genderqueer in relationship with my research relies on the verb form of queer, to queer

gender, which keeps the focus on the gender identity and gender expression of the individual.

10

I am utilizing the spelling of transsexual, instead of transexual, which is a political identity spelling cited from Wilchins (1997) as coming from British activism to usurp the medical communities language of a compound word, trans-sexual.

11

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The clarification of terminology explains how I use these terms in my study, although when quoting, I honor the terminology used by my participants. Intentional language usage with clear definitions allows for clarity prior to describing how those identities interact with institutions and culture. In the next sub-section, I turn my attention to oppression and the ways trans* identities interact with systems of power and privilege.

Trans* Oppression

Trans* oppression, referred to in some literature as genderism (Bilidoeau, 2009;

Hill, 2002; Hill & Willoughby, 2005; Wilchins, 2002), manifests through

marginalization, powerlessness, exploitation, cultural imperialism, and violence (Young, 1990).

Genderism is an ideology that reinforces the negative evaluation of gender non- conformity or an incongruence between sex and gender. It is a cultural belief that perpetuates negative judgments of people who do not present as a stereotypical man or woman. (Hill & Willoughby, 2005, p. 534)

Bilodeau’s discussion of genderism based the concept on four characteristics: social labeling, gender accountability, privileging binary gender systems, and invisibility and isolation of transgender persons. In my research, I prefer to utilize the term trans*

oppression (Catalano et al., 2007; Catalano & Shlasko, 2010, 2013) because the language

fits more soundly with the structural and systemic social justice education language and focuses on trans* lives and experiences, whereas genderism in its attempts to address the broader oppression of the gender binary and ultimately re-centers the gender binary by making trans* people and experiences either tangential or invisible.

There are many ways to occupy the category of trans*, and there are

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adjectives, yet there are constructions of transgendering as a gerund that draws attention to behavior and social process (Ekins & King, 2006). The conceptualization of

transgendering allows for the fluidity of meaning and enactment, whether permanently or

temporarily, and

[It allows for] the idea of living in between genders; and to the idea of living “beyond gender” altogether. It also refers to the social process within which competing transgendering stories and attendant identities and ideologies emerge, develop, and wax and wane in influence, in time and place. (p. xiv)

While there is a theoretical utility in the notion of transgendering, there has not been much progress (in community or in academic/scholarship) in consideration of transgendering. Although it is interesting, it is not useful in my current work.

Most recently, Valentine (2007) offered his own insight on the identity category of transgender, specifically on the concept of transgender community as a product of the imaginary, because it is not imagined, but the result of categorization within institutional systems and not how people categorize themselves. Through his fieldwork and interviews with trans* women he described

how the collective mode of transgender both succeeds and fails to account for the identities and communities so described. I focus on these people partly because they demonstrate the instability of “transgender” even as they are central to an imaginary of what a transgender community is. (p. 69)

His research, an anthropological ethnography to understand a particular social identity group, exposes that as of the time of his writing (and I would argue as of yet) there is no clarification or shared meaning of trans* communities. Instead:

[Trans* communities exist only within] the context of those very entities which are concerned to find a transgender community: social service organizations, social science accounts, and activist discourses… This does not mean that transgender identity and community are figments of the imagination, but rather that they are products of an imaginary. (p. 68)

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The impact of trans* oppression is experienced, in part, through the pathologizing of trans* identities and results in disjointed experiences (inconsistent across those who share trans* identities) and ambiguous communities (trans* identities are lacking intragroup connections) because of a failure of a shared language of identification.

Valentine’s (2007) research demonstrated that transgender as a category is not coherent, as there are not shared meanings among those who may identify within the category, and he points out that communities of people are not necessarily organizing around a singular or even slight variation of “transgender.” Meanwhile, social services and other institutions have already started employing transgender as if it were a fixed category. The institutionalization of transgender as a category can be characterized as an attempt to wrangle trans* identities to fit within the gender binary, while still locating trans* identities as “other” or apart from the normative categories of man and woman.

There are assumptions about the group alignment/affiliation of transgender identities within the broader community moniker of LGBTQ communities, although these assumptions are contested by various subsets of that community12. The historical

interconnectedness and assumptions within the LGBT or LGBTQ nomenclature is beyond the scope of this literature review, but it may prove useful, briefly, to state that the framing of a social group as “transgender” or “trans*” can be viewed as connected and disconnected from identity politics about gender and sexuality, yet distinctly separate from both. Despite historical links between transgender, gay and lesbian, and queer

12

The ambiguous formation of transgender communities and dis-alignment with the notion of LGBT/LGBTQ as an overarching categorization and moniker demonstrates the precariousness of social groups. See Halberstam (2003), Stryker (2008) and Meyerowitz (2002) for critiques and histories of transgender identities. See Marine (2011) for BGLT as alphabetical configuration rather than putting emphasis on any identity based on order.

36

communities, their histories are not interchangeable (Marine, 2011; Stryker, 2008). Marine notes that experiences of gender and sexuality also are not interchangeable. Because transgender people express their gender in myriad ways, they also experience their sexuality in myriad ways… Transgender people’s concerns are connected with those who are bisexual, gay, or lesbian because these identities share a common facet of oppression: by facility to conform to prescribed gender stereotypes for men’s and women’s behaviors in society, each is “transgressing gender” in different ways. (p. 61)

The language of gender is embedded within the language of sexuality, making the

languages reliant and dependent on each other for clarification, even though they are part of two different social identities and somewhat distinct from each other.

Yet social groups, even those potentially understood as experiencing any one or more of the five faces of oppression (Young, 1990), must not be understood in isolation from other identities. The processes of affinity and differentiation, Young cautioned, “do not give groups a substantive essence. There is no common nature that members of a group share. As aspects of a process, moreover, groups are fluid; they come into being and may fade away” (p. 47). Given Young’s assertion, it stands to reason that transgender communities should be examined in relationship to social group formations and

processes. My research provides space for participants to describe how they are connected to communities on their campus and to examine how, and if, they are connected to trans* communities. Given the limited literature on trans* communities, I next move to a review of literature about trans* identities.

Literature Focusing on Trans* Men

Since the mid-1990s, books that address female-to-male (FtM)

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memoirs13, anthologies14, a variety of academic disciplines15, and psychological guidance

books (books written by mental health practitioners who seek to aid either transsexual people or their families)16. The memoir genre continues to grow from the 10 FtM

memoirs published17 since the beginning of my research. My research adds voices and

empirical research to develop a more thorough understanding of the lives of trans* men. Cromwell (1999) identified 1995 as the first time there was an increase in

literature on FtMs since the 1960s and corroborates my observation that as of 1991 there had been only one FtM memoir published.18 In 1997, Aaron H. Devor, at the time known

as Holly Devor, published FTM: Female-to-male transsexuals in society, the first social science research published since Lothstein’s psychologically rooted research in 1983. Green (1997), a memoir author and trans* advocate/educator, speculates about the absence of research on FtMs prior to Devor’s publication:

What I found then [1984] and for the most part since has consisted mainly of critiques of highly dysfunctional families; accounts of “gender dysphoric” children presented to clinicians by their homophobic parents; dismissive, tut-tut attitudes towards girls who “refused” to give up their “tomboy” ways; a great deal of misogyny and sexism; studies that generalize about FTM experience based on one or two interviews; the assumption that the FTM process is the mirror image of

13

A memoir as an identifying category is a way of clustering books characterized as narrative or autobiography, and may not be consistent with publisher classifications. I acknowledge my limitation in understanding how or why the publishing industry has chosen such genre assignment. (See Cummings, 2006; Green, 2004; Kailey, 2005; Khosla, 2006; Martino, 1977; Scholinski, 1997; Valerio, 2006)

14

(See Amato & Davies, 2004; Bornstein & Bergman, 2010; Cameron, 1996; Diamond, 2004; Dzmura, 2010; Kane- DeMaios & Bullough, 2006; Kotula, 2002; Nestle, Howell, & Wilchins, 2002; Sennett, 2006)

15

(See G. Beemyn & Rankin, 2011; Califia, 2003; Cromwell, 1999; Devor, 1997; Forshee, 2008; Hale, 1998; Hill, 2002; Mackenzie, 1994; Nadal, Rivera & Corpus, 2010; Namaste, 2000; Prosser, 1998; Rubin, 2003; Spade, 2011)

16 _{(See Lev, 2004; Kane-DeMaios & Bullough, 2006; Morrow & Messinger, 2006). There are of course many other}

mental health and support books available, but I have mentioned the few that were helpful in my research as a starting point.

17

I conducted numerous different types of internet and library searches for books which cover the topic of FTM, utilizing a wide-range of phrasing and word combinations for searches, as well as combed through previously published author’s references for possible leads on books. The number (10) reflects memoirs that were published outside of the United States.

18

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the male-to-female (MTF) process; and the constant refrain that “not enough study has been done.” (p. xi)

The publication of Devor’s book served to increase the visibility of FTM identity and experience as a researchable topic.

Sloop (2004) pointed to the impact of the Brandon Teena murder and the subsequent film Boys Don’t Cry (based on the facts of the murder case) that brought transgender issues to mainstream media attention, and there were a number of

possibilities as to why there was an increase in FtM voices as well as transsexual and transgender voices in general. Whittle (1998) argues that an upswing in trans* voices was the result of the Internet.

[Through the Internet trans* people] are able to develop a sense of home within the cyber community and no longer need to deny their transgenderism. Thus the community within and without cyberspace has formed a new identification based upon failing, rather than succeeding, at “passing.” The actual rather than the real becomes authentic. (p. 402)

Wilchins (2004) echoed Whittle’s assertion by claiming that the advent of the Internet and its unfettered and somewhat anonymous access to information increased the ability for trans* people to live less isolated lives.

The ways in which cyberspace enabled an emergence of trans* identities and information sharing also allowed for a more complicated emergence of communities and identities. A contested emergence of trans* visibility developed, spurred on by the use of the Internet.

The trans community as a movement has achieved a significantly large profile in public discourse… Movement activists explain this phenomenon, suggesting that the Internet has allowed people to educate themselves and others, to make contact, and to organize without ever having to appear in public as a trans person—

reducing the risk to which individuals must expose themselves in order to organize. (Shapiro, 2004, p. 166)

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Further, the consequences of the medicalization of gender transgression created a culture in which “prior to the Internet, it was possible for transpeople to have no knowledge of anyone else like themselves, and the dominant mode of existence, which was encouraged by the medical community, was stealth” (p. 170). Encouragement to be stealthy19 and

hide one’s trans* identity post-transition was echoed in many trans* narratives and historical documents (e.g., Bornstein, 1994; Califia, 2003; Green, 2004; Stone, 1997). The potential for trans* activism and the ways to organize in a realm that can be both visible and invisible for the individual continue to be advantageous for trans* identities in some mainstream public venues.

Certainly the development of the medical and hormonal advancements increased the ability for transgender and transsexual people to find treatments that would assist in their biomedical transition (Hausman, 1995). However, healthcare access is a significant consideration, regardless of whether there are any developments in the fields of science, due to finances, fear, body discomfort, and ability to find trans*-savvy medical providers (Rachlin, Green, & Lombardi, 2008). Yet, popular culture and the general mainstream may be perceived to be less of a daunting sphere to navigate with celebrities, such as Chaz Bono (2011), child of Cher and Sonny Bono, coming out as transgender and his subsequent memoir. Whatever the impetus for the increased visibility and discourse, the appearance of trans* narratives by those who were assigned to the category of female at birth, for which all engaged in some form of biomedical transition to become men,

19_{“Stealth” is a specific in-community term used to refer to how a trans* person lives as a cisgender person} without a trans* past. I used being stealthy about one’s trans* identity here because I think it makes the meaning clearer.

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allowed for an understanding of their experiences as self-identified transsexuals through their voices and placed a subtle emphasis that biomedical transition was a necessity for becoming a man.

An examination of the messages within trans* men’s memoirs about masculinity has not occurred, but eventually there was research (albeit limited) on the experiences of trans* men. Cromwell (1999) pointed out the number of other research and theoretical- based writings that promised to return to the topic of FtMs after a discussion of MtFs, but never did so. My research study on trans* men in college is in response to the prior lack of follow-through Cromwell described. Trans* men are an understudied group, overall and in comparison to MtFs, which is not to say that MtFs, or any trans* people have been significantly studied. My choice was based on personal connection to the topic, a notable absence in the research, and interest in studying formerly female-bodied people who now embody, acquire, and perform masculinity.

Prior researcher focus on MtFs over FtMs may be connected to the ways in which trans* women were thought to threaten patriarchy through their rejection of male identity and privilege. “Sexism assures that heterosexual men who wear women’s clothing will