Reviews tagging 'Racism'

Before We Were Trans: A New History of Gender by Kit Heyam

11 reviews

hazel_oat's review

challenging informative reflective medium-paced

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia, Sexual assault, Violence, and Xenophobia

Moderate: Violence, Slavery, Racism, and Dysphoria

angelfireeast24's review

dark informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Biphobia, Domestic abuse, Injury/Injury detail, Racism, Sexual violence, Violence, Bullying, Colonisation, Misogyny, Religious bigotry, Cultural appropriation, Deadnaming, Adult/minor relationship, Body shaming, Classism, Excrement, Homophobia, Murder, Outing, Rape, Ableism, Hate crime, Police brutality, Torture, and Transphobia

joensign's review against another edition

emotional informative reflective medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Transphobia, and Sexual violence

Moderate: Colonisation, Racism, and Xenophobia

sophieprime's review

challenging informative reflective medium-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia, Sexual violence, Racism, Medical trauma, and Xenophobia

uriah's review against another edition

5.0

I felt so grounded and at home in my transness when reading this.

Comfort, desperation, love: this is the emotional register in which I, too, experience trans and queer history. Like Shapland, I came to identification with the queer past before I came to full articulation of my queer present: I knew that I felt deep hurt and anger about past injustices against queer men, and deep emotional identification with them, long before I realised that was one aspect of my trans experience.... But it's through such indecorous emotion that history has provided me with some of the most intensely important experiences of my life.

Heyam reifies the watered down arguments I have in my head when I am met with the transphobic rhetoric of transness being a 'new fad'. My copy is tagged, dogearred, and annotated to the brim. I treasure this reading experience and I thank you, Dr. Heyam, for giving us hope in the form of history.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia, Sexual violence, Colonisation, and Racism

rachbake's review against another edition

dark emotional informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racism, Transphobia, Homophobia, Sexual assault, and Colonisation

warlocksarecool21's review against another edition

hopeful informative reflective

4.5

Before We Were Trans is a brilliant book exploring trans history in an intersectional way. The author shows how the history of trans identities overlaps with history of intersex people, women, lesbians, non-western cultures & spirituality and how they were warped by colonization. Dr. Heyam does a wonderful job of explaining the nuances of how trans history is interconnected with all those things above and directly questions how interpretation of history can harm certain communities even if unintentionally. This book was really thought-provoking and even if you have a good understanding of intersectional theory regarding activism and feminism, I still recommend this book because of how detailed Dr. Heyam is and how well-researched his book is. The audiobook was narrated by the author and I really enjoyed it. Although it might be worth getting your hands on a physical copy or ebook to at least see the names of the historical figures and communities mentioned. 

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Police brutality, Medical content, Cultural appropriation, Colonisation, Classism, Racism, Religious bigotry, and Transphobia

the_reading_wren's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

Fascinating, challenging and most of all comforting. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Transphobia, Colonisation, Homophobia, Lesbophobia, Sexual content, Biphobia, Sexism, Outing, and Misogyny

Moderate: Cultural appropriation, Medical content, Genocide, Ableism, Adult/minor relationship, Classism, Deadnaming, Dysphoria, Forced institutionalization, Slavery, War, Medical trauma, Racism, Rape, Suicidal thoughts, Religious bigotry, Torture, and Toxic relationship

Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic, Kidnapping, Medical trauma, Pregnancy, Emotional abuse, and Mental illness

zombiezami's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Medical trauma, Blood, Misogyny, Genocide, Sexism, Forced institutionalization, Violence, Death, Religious bigotry, Child death, Murder, Colonisation, Sexual content, Transphobia, Torture, Child abuse, Hate crime, Racism, Medical content, Deadnaming, and Police brutality

Moderate: Infidelity, Infertility, Slavery, Confinement, Dysphoria, and Kidnapping

Minor: Pandemic/Epidemic, Animal death, Cursing, Lesbophobia, War, Biphobia, Adult/minor relationship, and Pedophilia

Eugenics, Intersexism, Incarceration

lbelow's review against another edition

informative medium-paced

5.0

This is the kind of book that for years I have been looking for. It looks at the past with an openness that reflects the breadth of the trans experience. Rather than pointing to a list of people who meet certain criteria, the author expounds on the trends and situations of the past and the multi-layered reasons for acting in gender-nonconforming ways—from the economic and social/political in Western/European history to reasons intrinsically tied with sexuality, (non-white) culture, and spirituality. I may not have finished this book with a laundry list of definitely trans figures, but I'm left with a buoying feeling that people like me have always existed. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Transphobia

Minor: Medical trauma, Genocide, Lesbophobia, Dysphoria, Ableism, Racism, and Homophobia