Love and Sex Final Project by owen Trail

Transgender Visibility

trailowen — 2025-05-01 01:17:29 UTC

For the focus of my Padlet, I'm researching how transgender people worldwide have organized, supported each other, and made themselves visible. We've heard of a couple of trans men and women, but I haven't heard much about the everyday transgender people living outside of North America. What were their lives like? How did they keep themselves safe while also being themselves? I believe that proof does exist, and I intend to find it and analyze the presence of trans people, out as their chosen gender identity, in a variety of nations. Trans people are everywhere people are, I want to find the proof.

For this project, I used the following databases:

JSTOR
Project Muse
Digital Transgender Archives

South African and Namibian Transgender Communities

trailowen — 2025-05-01 01:44:51 UTC

This is the first source I found for this project. It shows the point I was trying to make in my search: trans people around the world feel invisible, and it's so hard to find evidence of them. That's actually why the name of this project is Trans Visibility. I was excited to find it, as it's one of the clearest documents I could find, and it uses the United States trans organizing as a comparison between that and the South African/Namibian organizing. Many of the documents outside of the United States have been focused on the LGBTQ community as a whole, and that's not what I was looking for. This goes into the reality of transgender individuals in South Africa and Namibia, how they are overlooked, how they fight back, and what they are doing differently in their communities. Not only does this highlight the existence of transgender people, but it also explores how their lives are lived, and what it looks like in comparison to the trans community in the United States. This is super perfect considering I was specifically looking for non-US representation, this also goes into the differences and similarities between the United States and Namibian/South African transgender communities. Which none of the other sources do (not that they need to, it would just be convenient for me and this project ). I found this source on Project Muse after looking up "trans around the world".

Citation: Currier, Ashley. "Transgender Invisibility in Namibian and South African LGBT Organizing." Feminist Formations, vol. 27 no. 1, 2015, p. 91-117. Project MUSE, https://dx.doi.org/10.1353/ff.2015.0000.

Trans Women In Paris, London, Amsterdam and?

trailowen — 2025-05-01 01:46:31 UTC

Loved looking through this document, it was very interesting, it seems like a sexy magazine created for chasers? It was perfect for my project, though, it series multiple women across Europe and them being confident and 'sexy' (I don't like women like that, not trying to objectify, just trying to describe it). From London to France, to Amsterdam, this book has it all, undeniable proof of the existence, beauty, and success of European Trans Women. I had no clue something like this existed, and it seems like there are quite a few things like this out there; this is only one of the ones I went through. I found this by searching "trans around the world".

Citation: S-K Press. "Transvestism Around the World." Book. 1964. Digital Transgender Archive, https://www.digitaltransgenderarchive.net/files/s7526c44f

Kashmiri Wedding Songs, sung by Shabu

trailowen — 2025-05-01 01:55:02 UTC

This is so lovely and just what I was looking for. However, it is extremely recent in 2023, but it's still important that we see international representation, considering how conservative so many people are nowadays and how cruel the world can be. This story follows a transgender woman named Shabu, who performs wedding songs that not only reflect the experience of many women or feminine-presenting people, but also her experience as a trans woman. I see this as a form of resistance, love, confidence, and bravery. Shabu lives in Kashmir, which was (and still is) a territory of conflict, not safe, dangerous, and full of restrictions for Shabu, yet she continues and is seen as a resistor for both cis and trans women. I want to see more of this as I continue my search. I found this by looking up "transgender worldwide" on Project Muse.

Citation: Fox, Diana J. and Shazia Malik. "“I Am Very Sexy, Sexy, Sexy”: Expressions of Freedom in Kashmiri Transgender Wedding Songs." English Language Notes, vol. 61 no. 2, 2023, p. 86-103. Project MUSE, https://muse.jhu.edu/article/915534.

Senagalese

trailowen — 2025-05-01 01:58:36 UTC

This book goes over homophobia and transphobia in Senegal, but details about transgender people are not super prevalent. It might not show up immediately, but after looking, I found evidence of transgender people documented in Senegal. While this is a newly published book, it goes into depth about historical events and people, how it evolved, and what we missed looking in from the outside. It would be nice to have some more documents that aren't assessing the history of oppression or homophobia, it's important, but I would rather see everyday trans communities and achievements for this project. I found this on Project Muse by searching up "transgenderism around the world".

Citation: M'Baye, Babacar. "The Origins of Senegalese Homophobia: Discourses on Homosexuals and Transgender People in Colonial and Postcolonial Senegal." African Studies Review, vol. 56 no. 2, 2013, p. 109-128. Project MUSE, https://muse.jhu.edu/article/519186.

India! Bombay Movies

trailowen — 2025-05-01 02:02:37 UTC

This newspaper clipping is from the Trikone Magazine in Mumbai, India, 1996. It is clear proof of the existence of trans people. A lot of this magazine article is discussing gay relationships and crossdressing however, this media representation is 100% essential in showing the queer community in India that others like them exist and that's okay. It proves the existence of gender bent identities, even if just in the media, it normalizes the idea of drag and queerness, as something lighthearted rather than something to be feared. This article may not reflect everyday transgender identities in the way a lot of these other sources do, which frankly tend to be very disregarding of someone's privacy. It is an important piece of information reflecting a certain culture around the idea of gender queerness, reaching back to the 1960s. To find this, I searched "trans in India" on the Digital Transgender Archive. I had the idea to search specifically for India because of the Gulabi Gang and their ideas on gender.

Citation: Chadwa, Anruddh. "Cracks in the Tinsel Closet: Genderbending in Bombay Films." Article. 1996. Digital Transgender Archive, https://www.digitaltransgenderarchive.net/files/hx11xf62z

Hijra

trailowen — 2025-05-01 02:43:06 UTC

The Hijra are described as the third gender in many east asian countries, primarily India and Pakistan. These groups of gender queer, intersex people, could gather together to support each other in literally surviving, just everyday things. They follow a 'kinship' system and are important members of the overall community in Southeast Asia. Unfortunately, their existence within feminist movements (even by other queer people) is still 'controversial' despite all they do in support of their community. I found this by searching "Transgender in India" as well. I am going to do a deeper dive on the Hijra in my own time, I'm curious about their role in society and how it varies from place to place.

Citation: Moorti, Sujata. “A Queer Romance with the Hijra.” QED: A Journal in GLBTQ Worldmaking, vol. 3, no. 2, 2016, pp. 18–34. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.14321/qed.3.2.0018.

Middle Eastern Trans Pop Star

trailowen — 2025-05-01 02:44:30 UTC

This article details a teacher's experience after discovering a new pop artist from one of his students. The pop artist is commonly listened to, so he decides to look into it. Turns out it's an Israeli pop artist known as Danna International, and she is a transgender woman. He goes into detail about the implications of this and how it affects political, cultural, and social circumstances moving forward in the Middle East, specifically Egypt. Danna performed at Eurovision back in 1998! This is an amazing example of a transgender person making themselves visible, literally across the world. Thanks Danna! I found this article by searching "transgenders in the middle east".

Citation: Swedenburg, Ted. “Saida Sultan/Danna International: Transgender Pop and the Polysemiotics of Sex, Nation, and Ethnicity on the Israeli-Egyptian Border.” The Musical Quarterly, vol. 81, no. 1, 1997, pp. 81–108. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/742451.