Navigating intimate trans citizenship while incarcerated in Australia and the United States

Abstract

Trans women incarcerated throughout the world have been described as “vulnerable populations” due to significant victimization, mistreatment, lack of gender-affirming care, and human rights violations, which confers greater risk of trauma, self-harm, and suicide compared with the general incarcerated population. Most incarceration settings around the world are segregated by the person's sex characteristics (i.e., male or female) and governed by strong cis and gender normative paradigms. This analysis seeks to better understand and appreciate how the “instructions” and the “authorities” that regulate trans women's corporeal representation, housing options and sense of self-determination implicate and affect their agency and actions in handling intimacies related to their personal life. Drawing upon lived incarcerated experiences of 24 trans women in Australia and the United States, and employing Ken Plummer's notion of intimate citizenship, this analysis explores how trans women navigate choices and ways “to do” gender, identities, bodies, emotions, desires and relationships while incarcerated in men's prisons and governed by cis and gender normative paradigms. This critical analysis contributes to understanding how incarcerated trans women through grit, resilience, and ingenuity still navigate ways to embody, express and enact their intimate citizenship in innovative and unique ways.

A Critical Discourse Analysis of an Australian Incarcerated Trans Woman's Letters of Complaint and Self‐Advocacy

“…2019; Brömdal et al. 2022; Brown 2014; Lynch and Bartels 2017; U.S. Department of Justice 2012) who experience significant and disproportionate violence, harassment, and sexual mistreatment by other incarcerated persons and correctional staff due to having a gender identity or expression that does not align with socially constructed norms, rooted in cisnormativity and heteronormativity (Brömdal et al. 2019; Jenness and Fenstermaker 2016; Lynch and Bartels 2017; National Center for Transgender Equality 2018; Phillips et al.…”

“…Research from the US and Australia suggest that trans incarcerated persons, especially trans women, are a “vulnerable group” ( Brömdal et al 2019 ; Brömdal et al 2022 ; Brown 2014 ; Lynch and Bartels 2017 ; U.S. Department of Justice 2012 ) who experience significant and disproportionate violence, harassment, and sexual mistreatment by other incarcerated persons and correctional staff due to having a gender identity or expression that does not align with socially constructed norms, rooted in cisnormativity and heteronormativity ( Brömdal et al 2019 ; Jenness and Fenstermaker 2016 ; Lynch and Bartels 2017 ; National Center for Transgender Equality 2018 ; Phillips et al 2020 ; Rosenberg and Oswin 2015 ; Brömdal et al 2022 ; Clark et al 2022 ; Hughto et al 2022 ; Stanley and Smith 2015 ; Van Hout, Kewley, and Hillis 2020 ). Moreover, within correctional settings, trans women often have limited access to gender-affirming medical care and a lack of gender-affirming accommodations ( Brömdal et al 2019 ; Brown 2014 ; Van Hout, Kewley, and Hillis 2020 ; White Hughto et al 2018 ; Clark, White Hughto, and Pachankis 2017 ; Brömdal et al 2022 ; Hughto et al 2022 ).…”

Victimization Within and Beyond the Prison Walls: A Latent Profile Analysis of Transgender and Gender Diverse Adults

“…Once incarcerated, TGD people are typically housed in sex-segregated facilities according to their genitalia. Thus, TGD individuals who have not had gender-affirming “lower” surgery are typically placed in facilities that do not match their gender identity or expression; for example, transgender women are typically incarcerated in men’s prisons (Brömdal, Mullens et al, 2019; Brömdal et al, in press; Phillips et al, 2020). Once incarcerated, TGD people are at high risk for experiencing verbal, physical, and sexual assault at the hands of other incarcerated people and/or jail and prison staff (Grant et al, 2011; James et al, 2016; Lydon et al, 2015; Reisner, White Hughto, et al, 2015a).…”

A trans agent of social change in incarceration: A psychobiographical study of Natasha Keating

“…Research has shown that incarcerated trans women experience victimization, misgendering/misnaming, as well as physical and sexual assault while incarcerated, at the hands of other incarcerated persons and correctional staff (Grant et al, 2011 ; Hughto et al, 2022 ; Lydon et al, 2015 ; Reisner, White Hughto, et al, 2015 ). Incarcerated trans women are, therefore, a vulnerable priority group (Brömdal et al, 2022 ; Brömdal, Clark, et al, 2019 ; Brown, 2014 ) who experience significant mistreatment, victimization, and indifference due to structural stressors and who thus require additional measures of support and resources, including protection to uphold their rights and health while incarcerated.…”

“…In most countries, including Australia, incarceration settings are segregated by the person's sex assigned at birth (i.e., male or female setting). As a result, trans women who are not legally recognized as women are typically incarcerated in carceral settings intended for men (Brömdal, Clark, et al, 2019 ; Brömdal, Mullens, et al, 2019 ; Brömdal et al, 2022 ; Redcay et al, 2020 ; Van Hout et al, 2020 ; White Hughto et al, 2018 ;). This classification accords with medicalized views of being trans, which historically viewed trans individuals as medically deviant, labeling them initially as transexual (American Psychiatric Association [APA], 1980 ) and subsequently as suffering from Gender Identity Disorder (APA, 1994 ).…”