<p>Bytt namn till Sam Holmqvist</p>

Spanning the period from the early years of the Cold War to the early twenty-first century, Crossing Out argues that medical theories of gender variance which emerge in the middle of the twentieth century are bound by the Cold-War–era discursive limits within which they were articulated, and that the ideological content of those theories persists into late-century research and treatment protocols. I parallel these analyses with interrogations of literary representations of transgendered subjects. What emerges most powerfully from this analysis of literary works is their tendency to signify in excess of the medical foreclosures, even when they seem consistent with medical discourse. By reading these two discursive systems against each other, the dissertation demonstrates the ability of literary discourse to accommodate multifaceted subject positions which medical discourse is unable to articulate. Literature thus complicates the stories that medical culture tells, revealing complex and multivariate possibilities for transgendered identification absent from traditional medical accounts. In tracing these discursive intersections the dissertation draws on and extends Michel Foucault’s theory of subjugated knowledges and Judith Butler’s writings on the formation of gendered subjects. Chapter One establishes the Cold War context, and argues that there are significant continuities between 1950s theories of intersexuality and Cold War ideology. Chapter Two extends this analysis to take in theories of transsexualism that emerged in the same years, and analyzes the discursive excesses of a 1950s pulp novel representation of a transsexual. Chapter Three establishes that the ideological content of the medical theories remained virtually unchanged by the 1990s, and argues that multivalent literary representations of transgenderism from the same decade promise the emergence of unanticipated forms of gender identity that exceed medical norms. Chapter Four is concerned with transgendered children, as they are represented in medical writing and in young adult and children’s literature. Interrogating fiction which negotiates between established medical discourse and an emergent transgender discourse, the chapter argues that these works at once invite and subvert a pathologizing understanding of gender-variant children while simultaneously providing data that demands to be read through the lens of an emergent affirmative notion of trans-childhood.

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The thesis aims to produce a reconsideration of the queer spaces articulated in 1980s and 1990s literary criticism through the corporealising theory of gender and sexuality in the recent development of Australian material feminism and Rita Felski‟s idea of transient time. It particularly focuses on interpretations of transgender characters in critical readings of Renaissance drama and contemporary fiction. The academic fields investigated are thus late twentieth-century Renaissance criticism of gender and sexuality, late twentieth-century queer interpretations of transgenderism and transgender characters in contemporary literature, contemporary transgender studies and material feminist theory. Chapter 1 introduces a queer space articulated by discourses of gender and sexuality in 1980s and 1990s criticism of Renaissance drama. It concludes that the historical methodology of the critics is flawed and that the idea of Renaissance queerness is built as a contrast to late twentieth-century queerness. Chapter 2 is a reconsideration of the Renaissance anatomical sources used by the canonical critics introduced in the previous chapter. It establishes that the queer idea of sex and gender developed through these should rather be read in light of the more corporeal Renaissance discourse of monstrosity. Chapter 3 reconsiders the transgender characters in Shakespeare‟s Twelfth Night and As You Like It and introduces a reading of Middleton and Dekker‟s The Roaring Girl from a point of view that introduces Renaissance sexual monstrosity as a formation of corporealised though flexible gender subjectivity. Chapter 4 introduces a late twentieth-century queer space partly articulated in relation to the Renaissance queer space. It critiques the theoretical foundations of late twentieth-century queer theory, introducing transgender responses to „queering‟ readings of transgender bodies, as well as queer theorists‟ own attempts to narrativise themselves as points of incoherence in Butler‟s model and introduces a corporealising material feminist perspective of gender subjectivity as a more accommodating alternative. Chapter 5 reconsiders queer readings of transgender characters in Angela Carter‟s The Passion of New Eve. It concludes that the novel has been evaluated from a queer perspective and that it offers a more interesting comment on sex and gender if read from a material feminist point of view. Chapter 6 discusses John Cameron Mitchell‟s Hedwig and the Angry Inch as one transgender narrative that has been critiqued by transgender academia and Gore Vidal‟s Myra Breckinridge as a transgender narrative that has been approved. It analyses and critiques the reasons for the texts‟ reception and formulates a new poetics of corporeal gender based on the idea of nomadic gender subjectivity developed in the works of the Australian school of material feminists. The thesis finally exchanges a queer reading of transgender characters for a nomadic corporeal reading that better accommodates the historical discourses surrounding the Renaissance material, the literary content of the contemporary fiction, and the idea of transgender identity as it is considered in transgender studies.

This thesis explores young people’s transgenderings through negotiations of language, bodies and experiences of different peer and community-based support spaces in Aotearoa New Zealand. It critically examines what ‘support’ means for young people in relation to developing subjectivities and embodiments shaped by being both young and transgender/ gender non-conforming. While these perspectives are varied, I argue that the production of community and peer-based support for those who are both young and transgender or gender non-conforming has been undergoing a period of significant change, reflecting queer and postmodern shifts which have worked to re-conceptualise the ways queer and transgender communities and peers are imagined, incorporating a greater inclusive focus on diversity. Utilising Sara Ahmed’s concept of queer phenomenology and post-structuralist theory, the thesis thinks beyond binary approaches to gender and support, to consider support and gender non-conformity through the process of ‘disorientation’. Throughout this project both ‘gender’ and ‘support’ are positioned as being subjective, embodied and discursive knowledges and actions, represented in multiple and contradictory ideas, identities and expressions of the different participants. The study utilises in-depth qualitative interviews with participants who are young people (aged 16-30 years) and support providers and developers of transgender/queer based support in Aotearoa New Zealand. Working with young people and support providers, this research provides an analysis of support development for transgender and gender non-conforming young people in Aotearoa New Zealand, arguing that all participants in support (both providers and recipients) are shaping its provision.

Genom att intervjua fyra personer som identifierar sig som trans har denna studie undersökt hur upplevelsen av att identifiera sig med en könsidentitet som inte överensstämmer med samhällsnormen påverkat vid valet av vad individen vill jobba med. Med utgångspunkt i queerteori och kvalitativ metod har resultatet visat att deltagarnas möjlighetshorisont influeras av diskriminering, psykisk ohälsa och den påfrestning som uppstår hos individerna av att verka i ett normativt samhälle. För dessa individer blir arbetsplatsens kultur och förståelse för behovet av acceptans och trygghet viktigare än vilken bransch individen söker sig till. Hur synlig individen vill eller orkar vara påverkar också intresset för olika yrken. Studien bekräftar att samhällets utformning begränsar vissa möjligheter till anställning för personer som identifierar sig som trans. / By interviewing four individuals who define themselves as transgender, this study has researched how identifying with a gender that does not conform to the views of normative society effects their choice of vocation. Taking queer theory as a point of departure and using a qualitative interview method the results show that the respondents’ horizon for action is limited by the influence of discrimination, mental health and the strains experiences by simply living in a normative society. Acceptance and feeling safe in the workplace therefore becomes of particular importance, more so than what profession one chooses or the tasks that such a position entails. To what extent the individual wants or has the energy to be visible in their employment affects how appealing a line of work is but society itself also limits the possibilities for certain employment positions due to identifying oneself as transgender.

Debates between feminists and trans people are often narrowly framed in terms of inclusion and authenticity, or by questions about the extent to which trans identities challenge or reinforce normative conceptions of sex and gender. The terms of these engagements promote essentialist understandings of identity, difference, and community, and neglect to register the heterogeneity and differential locations of both women and trans people. This thesis examines several contemporary sites of contestation between and among feminist and trans scholars with specific attention to the unspoken assumptions and practices of erasure that shape and constrain these critical ‘border wars’, making certain kinds of subjects and conversations central, while rendering others peripheral, out of the question, or even impossible. Applying an intersectional trans/feminist analysis to the conceptual structure and discursive contours they assume, I investigate how such struggles, and our positions within them, might be deconstructed and reconceptualized in ways that disrupt dominant Self/Other relations and, in turn, make new political understandings and alliances possible.

Transsexualism innebär en upplevelse av att det juridiska könet inte stämmer överens med könsidentiteten och följs ofta av en önskan om att korrigera sitt kön så att det överensstämmer med det upplevda. Rösten är en identitetsmarkör och utgör en betydande aspekt av könskorrigeringen. Denna studie utgjordes av en enkät riktad till 24 verksamma röstlogopeder samt 49 personer i könskorrigeringsprocess i Uppsala-Örebro sjukvårdsregion. Enkätstudien ämnade undersöka transsexuella personers upplevda behov av logopediska insatser och i vad mån de tillgodoses, vilka kunskaper logopederna upplever som nödvändiga, faktorer som kan försvåra arbetet samt behandlingsinnehåll. Ett ytterligare syfte var att jämföra resultaten från föreliggande studie med de resultat som framkom i studien av Andersson och Aronsson (2008)  som kartlade logopediskt omhändertagande av transsexuella i norra regionen. Resultaten visade att de transsexuella respondenterna i stor utsträckning upplevde röstproblem, få hade haft logopedkontakt och en stor andel av dem som inte hade träffat logoped ville göra det. Information från vården till personer i könskorrigeringsprocess, angående logopedens roll, var otillfredsställande. Större delen av de personer som hade haft logopedkontakt hade åtminstone i någon mån fått tillräcklig logopedisk hjälp. Resultaten visade även att kunskap om könskorrigeringsprocessen och transrösten är nödvändiga vid behandling av patientgruppen och brist på kunskap och erfarenhet kan utgöra hinder i behandlingen. Behandlingsinnehåll och antal behandlingstillfällen varierade mellan logopeder. Kunskap om hur röstbehandling av transsexuella går till var skiftande bland logopederna i studien. Få logopeder hade tagit del av vårdprogrammet för transsexuella och intresset för vidareutbildning var stort. Resultaten i föreliggande studie visade liknande tendenser som studien utförd av Andersson och Aronsson (2008). / Transsexualism is an experience of the legal sex not matching the gender identity and is often followed by a desire to correct one’s gender so that it is consistent with the perceived. The voice is an identity marker and represents a significant aspect of gender reassignment. This study consisted of a survey of 24 active speech-language pathologists as well as 49 individuals in gender reassignment process in the Uppsala-Örebro Health Care Region. The questionnaire aimed to examine transgender individuals experienced need of speech therapy, and to what extent they are met, what knowledge speech therapists perceive as necessary, factors that can complicate the work and treatment content. A further aim was to compare the results from the present study with the results obtained in the study by Andersson and Aronsson (2008) who mapped the logopedic treatment of transsexuals in the northern region. The results showed that the transgender respondents largely experienced voice problems, few had had speech-language pathologist contact and a large proportion of those who had not met a speech-language pathologist wanted to meet one. Information from health care to individuals in gender reassignment process, regarding the speech-language pathologist’s role, was unsatisfactory. Most of the people who had had a speech-language pathologist contact had, at least to some extent, got sufficient logopedic help. The results also showed that knowledge of the gender reassignment process and trans voice is necessary in the treatment of the patient population and the lack of knowledge and experience can be an obstacle in the treatment. Treatment content and number of treatment sessions varied between speech-language pathologists. Knowledge of voice treatment of transsexuals varied among the speech-language pathologists in the study. Few speech-language pathologists were familiar with the health care program for transsexuals and interest in further training was great. The results of the present study showed similar trends as did the study conducted by Andersson and Aronsson (2008).

Thesis PlanB (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Stout, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, Department of English, General Literature and Rhetoric, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references.