Full Description
Trans Kids is a trenchant ethnographic and interview-based study of the first generation of families affirming and facilitating gender nonconformity in children. Earlier generations of parents sent such children for psychiatric treatment aimed at a cure, but today, many parents agree to call their children new names, allow them to wear whatever clothing they choose, and approach the state to alter the gender designation on their passports and birth certificates.
Drawing from sociology, philosophy, psychology, and sexuality studies, sociologist Tey Meadow depicts the intricate social processes that shape gender acquisition. Where once atypical gender expression was considered a failure of gender, now it is a form of gender. Engaging and rigorously argued, Trans Kids underscores the centrality of ever more particular configurations of gender in both our physical and psychological lives, and the increasing embeddedness of personal identities in social institutions.
Contents
List of Tables and Figures
Acknowledgments
1. Studying Each Other
2. Gender Troubles
3. The Gender Clinic
4. Building a Parent Movement
5. Anxiety and Gender Regulation
6. Telling Gender Stories
7. From Failure to Form
Appendix A: A Note on the Language of Gender
Appendix B: Methodology
Appendix C: List of Interviewees
Notes
Glossary
References
Index
