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"I Am Not a Hijra": Transgender Women Claiming Citizenship in South India

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Syracuse University SURFACE Dissertations - ALL SURFACE August 2017 "I am Not a Hijra": Transgender Women Claiming Citizenship in South India Liz Mount Syracuse University Follow this and additional works at: https://surface.syr.edu/etd Part of the Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons Recommended Citation Mount, Liz, ""I am Not a Hijra": Transgender Women Claiming Citizenship in South India" (2017). Dissertations - ALL. 771. https://surface.syr.edu/etd/771 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the SURFACE at SURFACE. It has been accepted for inclusion in Dissertations - ALL by an authorized administrator of SURFACE. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Abstract Through an 18-month ethnographic study conducted with hijras (gender non-conforming people assigned male at birth), newly emerging transwomen, and Dosti, a large NGO in Bangalore, India, this dissertation argues that transgender women claim citizenship by drawing distinct borders between themselves and hijras and positioning hijras as undeserving of the rights of citizenship, thus bolstering their own citizenship claims. This exploration of gender non-conforming people’s citizenship claims in the global South responds to a call for queer studies scholars to consider how citizenship operates among sexual and gender variant people in global South contexts (Richardson 2017). While the identity rubric of transgender is increasingly adopted by individuals in the global South, there is limited research about the empowering and disempowering effects of these identity shifts (Dutta & Roy 2014: 498). By analyzing transwomen’s citizenship claims, my research illustrates the ways that “publics are seduced into viewing some as less than human and come to consent to their banishment from this category and its benefits” (Haritaworn 2015: 129). Though this dissertation focuses primarily on transwomen’s efforts to distinguish themselves from hijras as a way to claim citizenship, there are many other sexual minority groups who seek to distance themselves from hijras, including even hijras. Drawing on current debates about the concept and value of citizenship from scholars in queer studies and feminist studies, I argue that transgender women participate in forms of “murderous inclusions” in order to demand their citizenship rights (Haritaworn et al. 2013). My research emphasizes the changing structures of hijra groups and other social transformations that have made it possible for transwomen to claim citizenship. For sexual minorities striving to claim the rights of citizenship, the possibility of obtaining citizenship compels the more privileged in the group to draw dividing lines between sexual minorities and gender non-conforming people who deserve citizenship and those who are undeserving of citizenship (Dutta 2012). As a newly emerging identity that is often confused with the hijra identity, transwomen are especially keen emphasize the distinctions between their legitimate claims to citizenship and hijras, whom they position as unfeminine, disreputable and necessarily outside of the boundaries of legitimate citizenship. Transwomen’s newfound chance to engage in office employment via NGOs offers them a salient way to position themselves in contradistinction to hijras, who engage in soliciting money and sex work. NGO characterizations of guru/chela relationships as “against human rights” further bolster transwomen’s citizenship claims that operate via the exclusion of hijras. While I present evidence of a series of activist projects that do not necessarily seek inclusion into normative citizenship (West 2014) via the exclusion of others, this dissertation ultimately argues that by aspiring to become citizens, transwomen have reinforced the exclusion of hijras, thus, this form of inclusion is “murderous” (Haritaworn et al. 2013). My analysis is aligned with Brandzel (2016), Spade (2015) and Haritaworn (2013 & 2015), among others, who assert that citizenship operates as an exclusionary category and should therefore be understood as antithetical to social justice struggles. “‘I am Not a Hijra’: Transwomen Claiming Citizenship in South India” by Liz Mount BA, Furman University, 2004 MA, Syracuse University, 2011 Dissertation submitted in partial requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology Syracuse University August 2017 Copyright © Liz Mount 2017 All Rights Reserved iv Table of Contents Introduction 1-36 Methods 37-56 Chapter 1: Beginnings: Citizenship Claims for the Gender Non-conforming 57-90 Chapter2: Citizenship Aspirations and Sexual Minority Disidentifications 91-105 With Hijras Chapter 3: Hijra Group Transformations, “Choice,” and Consumer 106-135 Citizenship for Transwomen Chapter 4: “Modern Girls”: Identity, Livelihood and Transwomen’s 136-183 Citizenship Aspirations Chapter 5: Human Rights and Hijra Relationships 184-208 Conclusion 209-214 Bibliography 215-223 Vita 224-229 v List of Illustrative Materials Figure 1: Page 161 Figure 2: Page 162 Figure 3: Page 163 Figure 4: Page 164 Figure 5: Page 165 Figure 6: Page 166 Figure 7: Page 167 Figure 8: Page 168 Figure 9: Page 169 Figure 10: Page 170 Figure 11: Page 171 Figure 12: Page 172 Figure 13: Page 173 Figure 14: Page 174 Figure 15: Page 175 Figure 16: Page 176 Figure 17: Page 177 1 INTRODUCTION In South India, historically recognized groups of hijras (gender non-conforming people assigned male at birth with ritual status in South Asia devotional traditions) are undergoing important changes as younger hijras curtail their participation in these groups and younger gender non- conforming people increasingly elect not to join the hijras, instead identifying themselves as “independent” transgender women. Despite the fact that the identity rubric of transgender is increasingly being adopted by individuals in the global South, there is limited research about the empowering and disempowering aspects of these identity shifts (Dutta & Roy 2014: 498). This dissertation examines the social processes that enabled the emergence of transgender women in South India and the ways that transgender women claim citizenship. This exploration of gender non-conforming people’s citizenship claims in the global South responds to a call for queer studies scholars to consider how citizenship operates among sexual and gender variant people in global South contexts (Richardson 2017). Key questions this work engages with are: What is the process that has enabled transwomen to emerge as a new identity? What kinds of identity work do transwomen engage in to make their citizenship claims? How is this process impacted by changes in hijra communities and how are these processes narrated by observers? What is the impact of NGO-led sexual rights activism on the emergence of the transwoman and on the transformation of hijra groups? While my argument focuses on the citizenship rights transwomen claim, as the foil to which transwomen favorably compare themselves, hijras feature prominently in this story. Drawing on current debates about the efficacy of employing citizenship as a concept in social justice struggles by feminist and queer studies scholars, this dissertation offers an ethnographically-grounded study demonstrating the process through which 2 emerging transwomen claim citizenship. I argue that transwomen claim citizenship by drawing clear boundaries between themselves and hijras and positioning hijras as undeserving of the rights of citizenship, thus bolstering their own claims to legitimate citizenship. Thus, transwomen stake their citizenship claims over and against the figure of the hijra, whose limited access to citizenship is unchallenged and thus implicitly supported. This dissertation speaks directly to current debates among feminist and queer studies scholars such as Brandzel (2016), Haritaworn (2015), Spade (2015) and West (2014), among others, who question the use of citizenship as a concept within social justice struggles, debating whether citizenship functions as a mechanism of exclusion that is antithetical to social justice or if it is a troubled concept that might usefully be rehabilitated. Through an ethnographically grounded account situated in the global South, this research highlights the exclusionary processes involved in claiming citizenship for gender and sexual non-conforming people, thus offering supporting evidence that citizenship claims for some operate alongside exclusion for others. Transwomen Waiting for a Chance See, ever since I was five or six years old, I knew that I was something else, something different. I used to dress up as if I’m a female, in my sister’s clothes. I used to put makeup on and all that; and I knew that I was different. So I was waiting for a chance. Actually, I didn’t know that there is [the ability to get] castration or that you can grow up to be a woman one day. I used to pray to God every day, saying, “please, I’ll go to sleep tonight and tomorrow morning, I want to wake up as a girl.” And I got lots of beatings from my parents, asking, “Why do you dress up like this? Why do you behave like a girl? Why do you do this?!”…I was just waiting for a chance. [emphasis in original] --Mariyamma, transwoman in her 50s In this excerpt from a conversation I had with Mariyamma outside of the NGO office where she works part-time, she emphasizes her awareness of her gender non-conforming identity from a young age, which she understood as “different” from her peers. Perceiving no way to navigate 3 the incompatibility between her desire to dress
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