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A review by traingirl24
Before We Were Trans: A New History of Gender by Kit Heyam
5.0
Okay this was so good! It’s definitely the most comprehensive history of trans and gender nonconforming people I’ve read, intentionally going well beyond the most common western white straight binary trans experiences that are usually the most palatable to cis western audiences. I didn’t know much about the intersex experience and next to nothing about the two spirit one before this, and really appreciated the author’s obvious concern and love for representing every community they wrote about on their own terms. It’s not ownvoices for either of those, but for a book trying to give a really wide overview of a variety of gender experiences I thought it did a good job.
One of the themes that ran through the book that was super interesting was the idea that you can’t necessarily separate out the different parts of a person’s identity. They were specifically talking about how in histories where trans and gay/lesbian/crossdresser/intersex/two-spirit/etc stories overlap, you shouldn’t try to claim that person or story for just one group. That no one can ‘own’ a specific history and you can’t neatly apply a modern western understanding of gender onto the past and cultures with different ideas around what gender is (ie presentation, social roles, or sexuality being an inherent part of a person’s gender identity). But I feel like that’s still very true today. Like there is a lot of value in pulling apart the various parts of your identity, and specifically in understanding that nothing has to go together, everyone is unique and that’s amazing. But it’s also impossible to separate a specific person’s identity from their expression, sexuality, or roles. We’re all just big balls of labels and contradictions trying to do our best. And it’s the interaction of all our identities and experiences that make each of us who we are.
Idk if that made sense, but it seemed important in my head so I wrote it down. Idk don’t @ me, I’d recommend the book cause it’s good
One of the themes that ran through the book that was super interesting was the idea that you can’t necessarily separate out the different parts of a person’s identity. They were specifically talking about how in histories where trans and gay/lesbian/crossdresser/intersex/two-spirit/etc stories overlap, you shouldn’t try to claim that person or story for just one group. That no one can ‘own’ a specific history and you can’t neatly apply a modern western understanding of gender onto the past and cultures with different ideas around what gender is (ie presentation, social roles, or sexuality being an inherent part of a person’s gender identity). But I feel like that’s still very true today. Like there is a lot of value in pulling apart the various parts of your identity, and specifically in understanding that nothing has to go together, everyone is unique and that’s amazing. But it’s also impossible to separate a specific person’s identity from their expression, sexuality, or roles. We’re all just big balls of labels and contradictions trying to do our best. And it’s the interaction of all our identities and experiences that make each of us who we are.
Idk if that made sense, but it seemed important in my head so I wrote it down. Idk don’t @ me, I’d recommend the book cause it’s good