Transgender History, Homonormativity, and Disciplinarity

The Hirschfeld Archives : Violence, Death, and Modern Queer Culture

“…of AfroAmericans," protested its racial representation, which in Douglass's words aimed to "exhibit the Negro as a repulsive savage." 47 Douglass here referred to displays such as the Dahomean village, a reconstruction of a West African village complete with human inhabitants, which literally put colonized bodies on display, exploiting and perpetuating stereotypes about primitive culture. Elsewhere, World's Fair-related cartoons peddled racist ideas, typically adapting the language and imagery of evolutionary theory to support their claims about distinctive primitive and civilized societies.…”

“…But the younger generation! 47 Employing a derogatory older sexual vocabulary to discredit the emerging emancipatory efforts of men who love and desire other men, Engels here turns to a foreign language-French-to articulate what is otherwise unspeakable to him. The outburst was prompted by Engels's encounter with the work of the lawyer and homosexual rights activist Karl Heinrich Ulrichs, who in the lead up to the unification of the German states was campaigning for the adoption of an antidiscriminatory penal code in the new nation.…”

“…It was published in the Illustrated London News in 1929-with the disclaimer that "the opinions expressed are [Hirschfeld's] and not necessarily editorial"-to coincide with the meeting of the World League of Sexual Reform in London. 47 At this meeting Hirschfeld presented talks on the history and current state of sexology, as well as a paper on indecency. The paper ostensibly dealt with incest and rape but also critiqued the uses of the word indecency in the antisemitic rhetoric that was gaining prominence in Germany.…”

“…46 While Die Transvestiten was in many ways radical-Stryker calls Hirschfeld "a pioneering advocate for transgender people" because of it and his related work-the study also indicates some of the gendered limits that, somewhat paradoxically, circumscribed Hirschfeld's ideas. 47 As Geertje Mak has pointed out, the introduction of the "transvestite" focused mostly, albeit not exclusively, on male-to-female transitioning, relegating female-to-male transitioning to the realm of passing for economic privileges or sexual fulfillment. 48 While Mak's attention to assigned gender in some ways runs counter to the recovery work of transgender history, it nevertheless usefully documents that assigned gender shaped the conditions of, and possibilities for, transitioning.…”

Queer Asian Subjects: Transgressive Sexualities and Heteronormative Meanings

“…Certainly, gay liberation discourse contains an expectation of movement away from "traditional" family obligations and toward homosexual "nuclear" couples who can live openly together, an expectation now decried as "homonormative" by its critics (see, for example, Duggan, 2003;Stryker, 2008). Proper gay and lesbian subjects, in this liberationist story, should declare their independence from family expectations and refuse to marry or have children in the conventional manner.…”