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Presentation Baril Sept 12 2018 Sg Edit Georg-August-University Göttingen 10th European Feminist Research Conference September 12-15, 2018 How to cite this document Baril, Alexandre (2018). “Keynote Address: Cripping Trans Studies and Transing Crip Studies: Transness and Disability,” 10th European Feminist Research Conference: Difference, Diversity, Diffraction: Confronting Hegemonies and Dispossessions, The European Association for Gender Research, Education and Documentation (ATGENDER), Georg-August-University Göttingen (Germany), September 12th. Presentation based on selected arguments developed in detail in these papers: Baril, A. (2018). “Hommes trans et handicapés: une analyse croisée du cisgenrisme et du capacitisme” (“Trans and Disabled Men: An intersectional analysis of cisgenderism and ableism”), Special Issue: Sexuality and disability: An approach through social sciences, Genre, Sexualité & Société, (19): 1-26. Baril, A. (2016). “‘Doctor, Am I an Anglophone Trapped in a Francophone Body?’ An intersectional analysis of trans-crip-t time in ableist, cisnormative, Anglonormative societies”, Special Issue: French and Francophone World Disability Studies, Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies, 10 (2): 155-172. Baril, A. (2015). “Transness as Debility: Rethinking intersections between trans and disabled embodiments”, Special Issue: Frailty and Debility, Feminist Review, 111, p. 59-74. Baril, A. (2015). “Needing to Acquire a Physical Impairment/Disability: (Re)Thinking the connections between trans and disability studies through transability”, Special Issue: New Conversations in Feminist Disability Studies, Hypatia: Journal of Feminist Philosophy, 30, 1, p. 30-48. Author affiliation and contact information Alexandre Baril, Ph.D., Assistant Professor School of Social Work, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ottawa 120 University, Room FSS12023 Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5 Phone: 613-562-5800 #6386 | Email: [email protected] Web: https://uniweb.uottawa.ca/members/804 Academia.edu: https://uottawa.academia.edu/AlexandreBaril Short biography Alexandre Baril, Ph.D. in Women’s Studies, is an Assistant Professor at the School of Social Work at the University of Ottawa, specializing in diversity, including sexual, gender, (dis)ability, and linguistic diversity. Alexandre Baril’s interdisciplinary training combines ten years in philosophy/ethics, a Ph.D. in Women’s Studies and two postdoctoral fellowships in Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Wesleyan University (Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council/SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellowship), and in Political Science at Dalhousie University (Izaak Walton Killam Postdoctoral Fellowship). He has published articles in journals such as Hypatia: Journal of Feminist Philosophy; Feminist Review; TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly; Atlantis: Critical Studies in Gender, Culture & Social Justice; Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies; Annual Review of Critical Psychology; Medicine Anthropology Theory; Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies; Canadian Journal of Disability Studies; Disability & Society; Recherches féministes; Enfances, familles, générations; and Recherches sociologiques & anthropologiques. His intersectional research places gender, feminist, queer, trans, and disability/crip studies in dialogue with the sociology of the body, health, and social movements. A. Baril | Georg-August-University Göttingen | 12-09-2018 | Please do not distribute | 2 Cripping Trans Studies and Transing Crip Studies: Transness and Disability Hello, everyone. When I accepted the invitation a year ago to give a keynote at this conference, it seemed so far away and I certainly didn’t expect to be giving the opening keynote in front of such a large audience! I must admit, it is quite intimidating! POWERPOINT 1 PRELIMINARY REMARKS Firstly, I would like to thank the organizers for inviting me to present today and also to acknowledge all the volunteer, free, and invisible work done by many people, some of whom belong to marginalized communities, to make this event possible. Thank you very much to all of you for being here this afternoon. [CLICK] The second thing I would like to mention is that I have a few paper access copies (in large and regular font) of this talk available if anyone would like one. Please raise your hand and someone will bring you a copy. [CLICK] The third thing I would like to say is that this paper is a thought-provoking work-in-progress, an essay that raises delicate questions and doesn’t offer definitive answers, but rather aims to stimulate critical reflections on how to deal with difference and diversity among social movements, as the title of this conference suggests, and more specifically among trans* and disability rights movements and their related fields of study. Because my time is limited, and I cannot fully develop my arguments here, [CLICK x 4] I invite you to take copies of articles I have written, in which I present more detailed and nuanced arguments, and which I brought here today [from Canada, so please take copies because I don’t want to fly back with them!] POWERPOINT 2 CRIPPING TRANS* STUDIES AND TRANSING CRIP STUDIES Today I am going to spend about 40 minutes talking about the necessity for a reconceptualization of boundaries between trans* studies and movements and disability studies and disability rights movements. It is important to state that this presentation is not based on empirical data from fieldwork; it relies on secondary data from other qualitative and quantitative studies, as well as first-hand narratives from trans* and disabled people in essays, blogs, books, and so on. Nonetheless, my reflections are relevant for starting dialogues between fields of study, such as gender studies, trans* studies, and disability and crip studies, where, on the one hand, conversations about the intersections between gender identity, transness, and disability are under- theorized, while, on the other hand, conversations about intersections between cisgenderism and ableism are critical, but remain nearly absent from academic literature. More specifically, I will focus on trans* realities and embodiments through theoretical and political tools developed in critical disability studies to look at the heuristic value of thinking about transness through a disability and crip lens, a process we can call “cripping” trans* studies. By doing so, as my title suggests, I also aim to offer a form of “transing” disability and crip studies, in order to make disability and crip studies more accountable toward trans* people. My research is anchored in feminist, trans*, queer, and crip scholarship, and adopts an intersectional perspective to rethink relationships between transness and disability. It is also informed by my own lived experience as a trans and disabled man. A. Baril | Georg-August-University Göttingen | 12-09-2018 | Please do not distribute | 3 POWERPOINT 3 DEFINITIONS OF KEY TERMS Since this conference brings together a large group of diverse people, I want to take two minutes to define a few terms that I will be using during my presentation. Similar to the resignification of the word “queer” by sexual minorities, the term “crip” is derived from the insulting adjective “crippled” but has been resignified to question biomedical assumptions about health and ability. [CLICK] Within the wider field of disability studies, crip studies, based on crip theory put forward by Robert McRuer (2006), represents a more radical and anti-assimilationist school of thought contesting normality with respect to the abilities of body/mind. [CLICK] The term “cisgenderism” is a synonym for transphobia. It refers to a system built by and for cisgender people that discriminates against, excludes, and marginalizes trans* people. The prefix “cis” is the opposite of “trans”: cisgender people are therefore not trans*. [CLICK] I use trans* with an asterisk to indicate the inclusion of a wide range of gender identities, such as transsexual, transgender, non-binary, genderqueer, agender, gender fluid, and two-spirit people, to name only a few. POWERPOINT 4 A FEW STATISTICS Despite the fact that I am very critical of a positivist approach to research, let’s start with a few statistics to illuminate some aspects of the topic I am discussing today. I am currently part of a team conducting a research project about trans* youth in Canada. [CLICK x 3] Despite the fact that our research project is not connected to disability or health, we have discovered that 71% of our small sample of 24 trans* youth identify as disabled (Pullen Sansfaçon et al. 2017a; 2017b). While we might think that this significant percentage results from examining a very small and biased sample, larger quantitative studies tend to indicate a similar reality: a significant percentage of trans* people are disabled or disabled people are trans*. POWERPOINT 5 Indeed, according to Trans Pulse Survey, the largest quantitative study on trans* people in Canada, where I am from, [CLICK] 55% of the Canadian trans* population lives with disability or chronic illness (Bauer and Scheim 2015; Bauer et al. 2012). [CLICK]. In the United States, of a sample of more than 27,000 trans* people, 39% state they live with a disability or chronic illness (James et al. 2016: 57). [CLICK] One extensive North American literature review also concludes that more than one in two trans* people (52%) live with disability, including high rates of mental/psychological disability (Davidson 2015: 43). POWERPOINT 6 AN ABSENCE OF RESEARCH [CLICK] Despite the fact that a significant
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