I’M SERVING UP DRAG QUEEN REALNESS: A LOOK INTO LANGUAGE, KINSHIP, AND SIGNIFICANCE OF GENDER PERFORMATIVITY WITHIN AND BEYOND THE DRAG COMMUNITY AND ITS ROLE IN NATIONAL TRANSGENDER PROGRESSION by Hannah Paperno A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of The Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences with a Concentration in Anthropology Wilkes Honors College of Florida Atlantic University Jupiter, Florida May 2016 I’M SERVING UP DRAG QUEEN REALNESS: A LOOK INTO LANGUAGE, KINSHIP, AND SIGNIFICANCE OF GENDER PERFORMATIVITY WITHIN AND BEYOND THE DRAG COMMUNITY AND ITS ROLE IN NATIONAL TRANSGENDER PROGRESSION by Hannah Paperno This thesis was prepared under the direction of the candidate’s thesis advisor, Dr. Jacqueline Fewkes, and has been approved by members of her supervisory committee. It was submitted to the faculty of The Honors College and was accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences. SUPERVISORY COMMITTEE: ___________________________ Dr. Jacqueline Fewkes ___________________________ Dr. Christopher Strain ___________________________ Dean Jeffrey Buller, Wilkes Honors College ___________ Date i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my thesis advisor, Dr. Jacqueline Fewkes, for guiding and supporting throughout this process. She helped me keep my head on straight and motivate me despite all of the struggles that accompany a research project. I would also like to thank Dr. Corr for her motivation throughout the thesis process and Dr. Strain, my second reader, for his guidance and mentorship throughout my last four years. To the rest of the professors at the Honors College, thank you for inspiring me to focus my research on something that I truly love and teaching me to always think critically of any type of research material that comes my way. To some of my dearest friends, James D’Amore, Courtney Noya, Skylar Benedict, Evan Jackson, Sarah Sax, Brian Pennington, Robert(o) Hernandez, Michael Ford, Michael Habib, Rachel Rohan, Tania Rodriguez and Addison Breen – thank you for your love, support, and fierceness throughout this entire process. Having friends who are as excited about my research as I am have kept me focused and driven even when times were frustrating. Thank you for all of fun and laughs on Thursday nights with our many trips to de Nile. These are memories I will never forget. To my parents, though you may not have understood drag before I came around I am so grateful that you have supported me during my time at the Honors College and taken the time to learn about some of the things that I enjoy. I love you very much. To the Honors College, thank you for giving me the opportunities to learn and grow both as a student and human being. I am a much better person after having come through this university and I will be forever grateful. ii ABSTRACT Author: Hannah Paperno Title: I’m Serving up Drag Queen Realness: A Look into Language, Kinship, and Significance of Gender Performativity within and beyond the Drag Community and its Role in National Transgender Progression. Institution: Wilkes Honors College of Florida Atlantic University Advisor: Dr. Jacqueline Fewkes Degree: Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences Concentration: Anthropology Year: 2016 ______________________________________________________________________________ In this study I aim to examine the uses of kinship, language and naming practices, and gender performativity within and beyond the drag community of the United States and how each of these elements plays a role in national transgender progression. My data was collected through surveys, interviews, and a textual analysis of RuPaul’s Drag Race. Based on my findings, I argue that drag community and its media presence over the last two decades has led to a national transgender progression within the United States. Keywords: Transgender, LGBT, drag, community, progression iii To all of my queens out there. Come through. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS I. Introduction........................................................................................................................ 1 II. What is Drag?..................................................................................................................... 3 III. Drag Herstory.................................................................................................................... 10 IV. Drag in the Public Sphere................................................................................................. 14 V. Language Practices........................................................................................................... 28 VI. Kinship.............................................................................................................................. 36 VII. The Importance of Drag.................................................................................................... 39 VIII. The Transition of Jennifer Sinclair................................................................................... 43 IX. Transgender Progression................................................................................................... 56 X. Glossary of Terms............................................................................................................. 60 XI. Works Cited...................................................................................................................... 62 v Introduction “I’m trying to bring attention to one of my favorite causes which is me.” -Willam Belli For years I had an idea of what drag was but had never really explored it. I knew who RuPaul was but never knew her history or really what exactly it was that she did. It was not until I got to college that I attended my first drag show, sponsored by FAU Jupiter’s LGBT organization Spectrum. Five queens performed, and I fell in love. The costumes were over the top and colorful and sparkly and everything I loved in a performance. I was sitting in the middle of a row about five or six rows back from the front with some of my closest friends. I recall at the end of our row was a student frantically making rosary necklaces for our Catholic club. The juxtaposition was absolutely hysterical to me. The show began with a queen entering the stage in a flapper dress with a huge beehive hairdo. She was told us about herself and about the group that would be performing with and then introduced the first queen. Each one performed twice to a wide range of music. There were some old jazz and Broadway songs, some Latin music, and some top 40s hits. They did kicks and spins and one even did a cartwheel all while in heels. I cheered so loud that for the next week I sounded like I smoked fifty packs a day. They were queens but more than that they were royalty and from then on I knew I could not get enough. Since then I have attended drag shows across the state though mostly in West Palm Beach. I was witness to a RuPaul’s Drag Race contestant performing in Gainesville-- although I did not 1 realize who she was until two years later when I finally watched the show—and have met some other queens who hold very prestigious titles within their community. My interest in drag and gender performativity has grown over the last few years and I knew that the best way to explore this more was to study it for my thesis. Luckily I already had some rapport with the local queens who perform at our campus so I knew it would relieve some of the stress of getting informants. The approach I took once I rounded out my topic was to create a list of both survey and interview questions to use to gather data and submit that to the Institutional Review Board (IRB) so that I could get permission to do the research that I wanted. I knew that my main focuses would be on language, kinship, and the importance of gender performativity through drag and how this may or may not have impacts of the larger transgender community. I identified transgender progress by its mentions in the media and the legislation mad regarding the transgender community. To gain insight, my plan was to conduct interviews with drag queens right after taking photos of them transforming from male to female. For those who I could not interview due to time or geographical constraints I would use the survey to gather the information. I collected my data through one interview and two surveys in order to complete this thesis.. After receiving all of the data and combing through the responses, I compared this to both prior knowledge and background research (either from academic articles or examples drag in the media) on drag culture. I then analyzed each individual subset to determine whether or not each element of the drag community has had an impact on transgender progression within the United States. 2 What is Drag? “We're born naked, and the rest is drag.” -RuPaul, Lettin it All Hang Out: An Autobiography My definition of drag, and the understanding that results from this definition, structures the whole of my research. Drag is a means through which men and women can perform exaggerated notions of gender and expose a part of their identity that is left often in the shadows in day-to-day life. In the United States, drag is a means for men and women to cross-dress to appear more passable in the gender opposite to their sex and express a part of their identity. For the purposes of this study, I focus only on male to female