HISTORY OF TRANSSEXUALISM

HISTORY OF TRANSSEXUALISM

“ It is a topic excluded from medical discussions of sex until the 19th century. It was also not regarded as a mental illness, which was one way our predecessors labeled phenomena we now call psychological. In fact, many so-called primitive cultures simply regarded it as one variation in human behaviour.”

“ Cross dressing was not regarded as a sign of lesbianism or homosexuality until the 18th century and then, for men, it became associated with effeminate homosexuality.”

(Introduction. Page x) ‘Cross Dressing, Sex, and Gender’. Vern L. Bullough/ Bonnie Bullough.  University of Pennsylvania Press. 1993.

“It was not until after World War II that interest in the subject reappeared in the professional literature, and as research progressed, it became clear that cross-gender behaviour included not only a desire to dress and impersonate the opposite sex but also, for some individuals, a desire to change one's sex. The latter group came to be called transsexuals and were thus distinguished from other transvestites.”

“The appearance of the new diagnostic category was not the result of a theoretical breakthrough. Rather it appeared on the scene as the result of the development of a surgical treatment for the extreme form of transvestism. In a sense, transsuxualism was a socially constructed phenomenon. Ordinarily, a diagnosis is made independent of the planned treatment, but in the case of transsexuals, the treatment became the diagnosis.”

(Transsexualism. Page 253)

(Christine Horgensen,1950-53, early sex change) “They pointed out they had not actually changed the sex or their patient, because his chromosomal sex remained the smae, but they had relieved his distress by creating the external appearance of a sex change.”

Early cases : 1943 in Germany, 1933 Lili Elbe, Sophia Hedwig 1882.

“Lili had started life as the well-known Danish painter Einar Wegener, who became convinced that a sort of twin being, a female, shared his body. He visited several doctors, some of whom thought he was homosexual. Another treated him with x-ray therapy, while still another told him he probably had a set of rudimentary female organs inside his body. He went to Berlin, where he had his penis and testicles removed and ovarian tissue from a healthy 26 year old woman transplanted into his abdomen.”

(Transsexualism: Early cases. Page 254)

“It is clear that, within these gender cultures, the spaces of possibility for transvestites vary widely from one society to another. Transvestism illustrates rather well the current inferences of the cultural discourse, in terms of whether space has been allowed for it or not. In some cultures, such as India and the Native American Indians, space has been allowed. With the hijras there is a clear message: no confusion because space has been allocated. In the Uk there is confusion because there is no place and therefore, to a British sensibility, transvestism makes no sense. The question arises as to why these spaces are or are not possible.”

(Dressing Up/Dressing Down: Reconsidering sex and gender culture. The correlates of gender culture - transvestism as material objectification. Page 155)  ‘Unzipping Gender. Sex, Cross-dressing and culture'

Charlotte Suthrell. Berg. Oxford. 2004

“Transvestites, those who tempt social jeopardy by dressing in forbidden clothing, seem to appear as a relative constant throughout most human societies - like suicides - although the form varies and their numbers are considerably more difficult to measure. Each transvestite may be acting as an individual agent but s/he is also performing a social role for the whole of society, whether this is viewed as a social imperative, a transgression or a striking out for balance and wholeness. ... The secular cross-dressers of Western industrialised societies are consigned by their culture to a position which primarily bears disadvantages, marginalisation and disapproval.”

(Thinking of themselves: transvestism and concepts of the person. Transvestism as a social phenomenon. Pages 164-165)

“One thing which becomes abundantly clear is that in both societies (UK and India), any putative crossing, reversals, or 'neutering' in the sex and gender arean is one which provokes a strong reaction; the cultural insistance on conformity is deep-rooted, and the possibilty of change in this area - especially in the westernised cultures of the US and UK - continues to be something which induces anxiety and resistance; nor would this seem to be declining.”

(A broader conceptualisation of transvestism. Page 179)

Tasha