Trans Vitalities: Mapping Ethnographies of Trans Social and Political Coalitions (Theorizing Ethnography)

This book applies a framework of ‘trans vitalities'through an ethnographically-anchored exploration of trans coalitional labor and activism in Washington, DC. Specifically, it considers how trans social justice work at the local level exemplifies why and how the notions of ‘trans community'or ‘trans rights'must be reconfigured. Trans vitalities, as a framework developed in this volume, functions in three particular ways: 1) to disrupt and rethink what valuable, viable, or quantifiable quality of life looks like; 2) to shift our understandings of community towards ‘coalition'; and 3) as a methodological, theoretical, and application-based set of tools that integrates a radical trans politics and community-based approach towards addressing trans lives. Trans Vitalities incorporates one-on-one interviews, community map-making projects, and an analysis of the DC Trans Needs Assessment, produced through trans coalitional labor. An accessible case study for both how to research trans-specific topics and how to apply a framework of trans vitalities, this book is valuable reading for those who research or instruct on LGBTQ topics as well as activists, policy makers, and law makers. This book applies a framework of â••trans vitalitiesâ•• through an ethnographically-anchored exploration of trans coalitional labor and activism in Washington, DC. Specifically, it considers how trans social justice work at the local level exemplifies why and how the notions of â••trans communityâ•• or â••trans rightsâ•• must be reconfigured. Trans vitalities, as a framework developed in this volume, functions in three particular ways: 1) to disrupt and rethink what valuable, viable, or quantifiable quality of life looks like; 2) to shift our understandings of community towards â••coalitionâ••; and 3) as a methodological, theoretical, and application-based set of tools that integrates a radical trans politics and community-based approach towards addressing trans lives. Trans Vitalities incorporates one-on-one interviews, community map-making projects, and an analysis of the DC Trans Needs Assessment, produced through trans coalitional labor.An accessible case study for both how to research trans-specific topics and how to apply a framework of trans vitalities, this book is valuable reading for those who research or instruct on LGBTQ topics as well as activists, policy makers, and law makers. Cover 1 Half Title 2 Series Information 3 Title Page 4 Copyright Page 5 Dedication 6 Table of contents 8 Figures 9 Preface 10 Acknowledgments 12 Abbreviations 14 Introduction: Tracing entangled trans desire lines—vitalities and geometries of motion 16 Bodies and space: trans coalitions, bodies, and experience in the nation’s capital 18 Geographic specificity: the paradox of Washington, DC 19 Methodology: community map-making, needs assessment, and the DC Trans Coalition 20 Expressions and articulations of trans rights: the DC Trans Coalition 22 Space(s) of coalitional meaning-making: a call to reject ‘community’ 25 Notes 31 Works cited 31 1 Trans studies and anthropologists studying ‘trans people’ 33 Trans studies and embodiment 35 Works cited 40 2 Washington, DC: Depicting trans spatialities 45 Celebrating the US nation-state and the annual high-heel drag race: considering mainstream and LGBT maps of Washington, DC 45 Washington, DC as a ‘trans city’: mapping lived experience 48 Data collection and demographics 53 Theme discussion 55 Sex work(er) strolls 55 Community organizations, clinics, and support groups 58 Bars, clubs, and restaurants 61 Parks and malls 63 Home and where friends live 65 Depictions of violence, criminalization, and work 67 Conclusions: inclusions and exclusions 70 Notes 70 Works cited 71 3 Mapping as method: Articulations of bodies in place 72 Visualization: the utility and analysis of maps and map-making 72 Power: mapping and space/place 73 Mapping, resistance, and power 75 Mapping, the body, and embodiment 76 Maps, queer space/place, and Washington, DC 76 Evaluation of maps 78 Texts and evaluation: critical discourse analysis and indexicality 79 Critical discourse analysis 80 Safety and Washington, DC: ideology, inequality, and locating trans space(s) in DC 83 Safety and safe space 86 LGBT ‘safe space’ 87 Danger and risk 91 Conclusions: what is ‘trans’ space? 93 Note 98 Works cited 98 4 Mapping ideology and embodied practices: Approaches to documenting and discussing lived experience 101 Mapping the unmappable: mapping, bodies, and accounting for gendered practice 101 What maps can say about bodies: mapping biopolitics, necropolitics, and phenomenology 104 The body as object: biopower, biopolitics, and necropolitics 105 Biopolitics and phenomenology combined: gender as example 107 Mapping the urban sphere 108 Gentrification: bodies in spaces of exception 110 Note 112 Works cited 113 5 Measuring vitalities 116 DC Trans Needs Assessment Survey 116 Methodology 116 Data analysis and presentation of findings 119 Defining trans lives, trans needs, and trans rights 122 Gender identity and transgender rights: defining the ‘T’ in LGBT 123 A brief history of the US LGBT paradigm 125 Homonormativity and homonationalisms: projects in erasure and violence 126 Needs assessment: experiences at LGBT organizations 127 Criminalizing the need for support: sex work(er) strolls 129 Acceptable support: community organizations 132 Employment protection and hate crimes law: Washington, DC as a case study 135 DC’s Human Rights Act and employment non-discrimination 135 ¿Son Legales?: the other kind of employment discrimination: documentation 136 Uneven distribution: the application of hate crimes legislation in DC 138 How to win trans rights: trans needs as identified by national LGBT rights groups 140 Employment non-discrimination legislation as trans rights: requirements for effectiveness 141 Hate crimes legislation as trans rights: disjunctures in lived experience 142 Towards trans rights in the US nation’s capital: conclusions and next steps 143 Notes 144 Works cited 145 6 Towards a generative politics of life: Trans vitalities through spatialities of social justice 148 Interlude: phone call from a friend 148 Mapping trans ethnographies: materiality and erasure 150 Trans spatialities: specificity and the dangers of LGBT generalizations 152 Towards trans vitalities: generative life in the US nation’s capital: resilience and activisms 154 Note 155 Works cited 155 Index 157 "This book applies a framework of 'trans vitalities' through an ethnographically-anchored exploration of trans coalitional labor and activism in Washington, D.C. Specifically, it considers how trans social justice work at the local level and exemplifies why and how the notions of 'trans community' or 'trans rights' must be reconfigured. Trans vitalities, as a framework developed in this volume, functions in three particular ways: 1) to disrupt and rethink what valuable, viable, or quantifiable quality of life looks like; 2) shift our understandings of community towards 'coalition'; and 3) a methodological, theoretical, and application-based set of tools that integrates a radical trans politics and community-based approach towards addressing trans lives. Trans Vitalities incorporates one-on-one interviews, community map-making projects, and an analysis of the DC Trans Needs Assessment, produced through trans coalitional labor. An accessible case study for both how to research trans specific topics and how to apply a framework of trans vitalities, this book is valuable reading for those who research or instruct on LGBTQ topics as well as activists, policy and law makers"