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The Presentation of Trans in Everyday Life: an Autoethnographic Exploration of Gendered Performance City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects 10-2014 The Presentation of Trans in Everyday Life: An Autoethnographic Exploration of Gendered Performance Elijah C. Nealy Graduate Center, City University of New York How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/506 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] The Presentation of Trans in Everyday Life: An Autoethnographic Exploration of Gendered Performance by Elijah C. Nealy A dissertation submitted to the Graduate Faculty in Social Welfare in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, The City University of New York 2014 Copyright @2014 Elijah C. Nealy All Rights Reserved ii This manuscript has been read and accepted for the Graduate Faculty in Social Welfare in satisfaction of the Dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Irwin Epstein _________________ ______________________________ Date Chair of Examining Committee Harriet Goodman _________________ ______________________________ Date Executive Officer SJ Dodd Deborah Tolman Salvador Vidal Ortiz Supervisory Committee The City University of New York iii Abstract The Presentation of Trans in Everyday Life: An Autoethnographic Exploration of Gendered Performance by Elijah C. Nealy Adviser: Professor Irwin Epstein The life experiences of transgender men are an understudied area in social work research. Given the negative experiences many transgender men have utilizing the medical and social service systems, greater understanding is needed about how these men negotiate their identities in an array of relational contexts. This dissertation uses autoethnography to explore how one transgender man navigates his identity as a man, father, and social work professional. Viewed through the theoretical frame of Erving Goffman’s work, and in dialogue with masculinities studies and queer theory, this study finds that trans men are continually negotiating their identities in varying relational contexts, even post transition. They face ongoing choices about self disclosure. Transgender men face constant challenges to their masculinity, even to their humanity. Transgender fathers challenge traditional notions of parenting. Out social work professionals face these complexities even among colleagues. Despite this, transgender men are remarkably resilient and find numerous ways to surmount the impact of stigma. iv Practice implications include acknowledging the challenges to a trans man’s masculinity while helping him place it is the broader context of manhood in America, providing support for the many ways he is continually navigating his identity, creating opportunities for transgender fathers to connect and share resources, and nurturing the varied ways trans men thrive in the midst of pervasive stigma. v Acknowledgements To my friends and colleagues who offered support and encouragement at so many points along the way: Jacqueline Hudak, Ben Davis, Sandra Jones and Lynn Domina, Jodie Kliman, Barbara Simon, Marianne Yoshioka, Anne Stockwell, Katherine Rachlin, Monica McGoldrick, Kenneth Hardy, Wendy Stark, Bill Hirt; To Robyn Brown Manning who met me for breakfast and dissertation talk on many mornings; To Dan Spencer and MB Walsh who offered support at a critical moment; To Beverly and Mo, and Dot and Linda who offered space to write; To my colleagues at the Culture Conference and at American Family Therapy Academy who cheered me on each year; To my clients whose stories inspired me; To Michael Fabricant whose book on contemporary settlement houses drew me to Silberman’s program and whose qualitative research courses first awakened my interest in autoethnography; To my Committee members, Salvador Vidal-Ortiz, Deborah Tolman, and SJ Dodd, who pushed me to write the best dissertation possible; To my Chair, Irwin Epstein, who offered the title, introduced me to Erving Goffman, and steadily encouraged me to stay the course; To my Mom and Jan who have loved me and believed in me the entire time; vi To my children, Karen, Alex, and Kaj whose stories have become a part of this study and who tolerated my absence on many weekends while I wrote – we have much to catch up on! To my wife and companion, Alexandra Soiseth, who tirelessly listened to me discuss queer theory, Goffman, and masculinities studies, patiently endured my worries about whether I would ever finish this project, covered for me on the home front more than any partner has a right to ask, and loved me unconditionally through all of it. vii A correctly staged and performed scene leads the audience to impute a self to a performed character, but this imputation – this self – is a product of a scene that comes off, and is not a cause of it. The self, then, as a performed character, is not an organic thing that has a specific location, whose fundamental fate is to be born, to mature, and to die; it is a dramatic effect arising diffusely from a scene that is presented, and the characteristic issue, the crucial concern, is whether it will be credited or discredited. - Erving Goffman, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (1959, p. 253) viii Table of Contents Chapter 1: Introduction 1 Discrimination and Its Impact 2 The Need with Social Work 6 My Study 9 Chapter 2: Literature Review 13 Identity Models 13 Critique of Identity Models 16 Relevant Transgender Studies 17 Theoretical Literature 24 Early Ideas about Gender 24 Early Men’s Studies 27 Analysis of Power 29 Social Construction of Masculinities 34 Queer Theory 37 Goffman and Stigma 39 Theoretical Framework 41 Chapter 3: Methodology 46 Foundations of Method 46 Autoethnography as Method 47 ix Researcher as Subject 48 Strengths of Autoethnography 50 Conducting the Study 53 Data Collection 54 Data Analysis 55 Evaluative Criteria 56 Critiques of Autoethnography 59 Relational Ethics and Protection of Human Subjects 60 Coming Out as Transgender: A Brief Autobiographical Sketch 63 Chapter 4: Coming Out as a Man 65 Identity Negotiated 65 Identity Contested 71 Identity Affirmed 80 Identity Reconstructed 90 Chapter 5: Coming Out at Home 98 Managing Information and Social Anxiety 98 To Pass or Not to Pass 108 Identity Management at Home: Stories of a Transgender Father 112 x Chapter 6: Coming Out Professionally 127 Microaggressions 129 Transforming Stigma 142 Chapter 7: Discussion 154 Contradictions in my narrative 154 Reflections on my narrative 165 Findings of this study 169 Clinical Themes 169 Administrative Themes 172 Implications for Policy Work 175 Research Recommendations 176 Limitations of this study 178 Chapter 8: Conclusion 180 Bibliography 184 xi Chapter 1: Introduction The term “transgender” is used to describe people who cross or transcend culturally defined categories of gender (Bockting et al, 2004; Davis, 2008; Green, 2004). Many such individuals were assigned one biological sex at birth, but live their lives to varying degrees as the opposite sex. They may or may not choose to socially or medically transition (Bornstein, 1994; Hird, 2002). Transgender is also an umbrella term used to describe the many different gender communities such as transsexual, bi-gendered, butch queen, cross dresser, drag king, drag queen, femme queen, FTM, male-to–female, pre-op(erative), post-op, trans woman, trans man, or in Native American culture, two-spirit (Burdge, 2007; Lev, 2004; McPhail, 2008). Individuals of transgender experience challenge our notions of gender normalcy and as a result, people who are gender different are stigmatized by the dominant culture. As early as childhood, many trans persons already experience significant rejection from family and peers, accompanied by feelings of alienation and hopelessness (Nemoto, Operario, & Keatley, 2005). This marginalization silences the voices of many transgender persons and renders their stories and lives invisible. The binary gender assumption marks trans persons as “other” and “queer.” It classifies them as gender transgressors and subjects them to shame, ostracism, hatred, verbal, physical and sexual assaults, and even murder. Experiences of transprejudice and transphobia include general misunderstanding and ignorance, objectification, and pathologizing a transgender person’s mental health or physical appearance (Singh, Boyd, & Whitman, 2010). In the face of this stigmatization, it’s no surprise that many transgender people struggle with self esteem problems and even suppress their true selves. 1 Transgender persons are typically judged for how well they “pass” within the binary lens of gender expression. Likewise they are routinely subjected to detailed and invasive questions about their physical bodies, particularly the size and shape of their genitals, and whether they have had sex reassignment surgeries or are involved in hormone treatments. These judgments “contribute to the perception that transgender persons are ‘others,’ rather than legitimate and valued members of our society” (Singh, Hays, & Watson, 2011). Negative reactions are endemic while a person is in the early stages of gender transition. However as Prosser (1998) notes, revealing one’s transgender history is always fraught with uncertainty and can be followed by disbelief, judgment, ridicule, or harm. Consequently discrimination, at the very least in
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