Trans history in the present with Susan Stryker
As part of the LGBTQIA+ Health & History Series, Utah State University invited Susan Stryker to present her research to students and staff. Stryker is a senior research fellow who focuses on gender and human sexuality at Stanford University’s Humanities Center. She is also a professor of gender studies at the University of Arizona and works with other universities to educate students.
Stryker’s talk on April 6 at USU was titled, “What Transpires Now: Trans History in the Present.” The audience consisted of a variety of age ranges, colleges and sexual orientation.
As a transgender woman, Stryker found it of personal importance to educate the public on similarities that have occurred between present-day anti-trans bills to those of the past.
Stryker said the current crisis around gender is being figured in the representation of transgender phenomena and transgender bias in a longer historical context. She said gender is one of the most critical concepts of our time.
“It provides a vocabulary for articulating and understanding the relationship between our sense of self, biological substance or social existence or physical environments, and our beliefs about the future,” Stryker said.
The word “transpire” was the focus of Stryker’s talk, and she explained it can mean “to passively happen.” But if you focus on the parts of the word, what prefix and roots are present, change can be found.
“Trans is a Latin prefix. It is a shape-shift, changing principle of movement across borders, animating addition. Trans attaches itself to the name, and pulls that thing over boundaries between it and whatever it is not,” Stryker said.
Stryker presented examples in history of cross-dressing being acceptable, including Brigham Morris Young, one of Brigham Young’s sons. He was considered a professional woman impersonator, and would wear women’s clothing to sing and perform under the name Madam Pattirini. It was contrasted to today’s controversy over drag shows to explain how cross-dressing might have become fuel to the fire of an overly-politicized debate.
Other examples were shown of past moral panics pointed towards those who didn’t fit a two-sex binary norm. Thomas(ine) Hall was born in 1603 and was intersex. This means they didn’t have genitalia that directly matched male or female biology. They were scrutinized and forced to prove their intersex characteristics by showing their body to courtrooms, as well as being forced to dress in clothes that showed they were both male and female.
If they chose to present themselves in just one gender’s fashion, it was considered deceiving. According to Stryker, many Americans today believe dressing in the opposite gender’s clothing is impure or meant to deceive others, with fear surrounding narratives of children and women’s bathrooms.
“Trans histories in the past are transpiring again in the present, the same issues are at stake,” Stryker said.
She said national issues create local targets on the backs of transgender people in their homes, classrooms, bathrooms and stores.
As of 2023, more than 24 bills have been introduced that are seeking to restrict transgender health care access, and across the nation, debates over bathrooms and “wokeness” have gained serious traction.
At the end of the talk, Stryker’s Q&A session posed a very serious question for LGBTQ+ youth, asking how they should move forward in a world that wants to stop them from being themselves.
Stryker answered there is no way to know what will happen next and it will be very hard, but offered advice focused on self-care, and finding people who accept you for you.
“I have always felt this really strong sense of self. I know that I am okay,” Stryker said.
She said she feels very fortunate to have a family that has always accepted her, and to have a partner, kids and a successful professional life.
Despite the possibility of states taking back rights she has enjoyed for decades, she told trans youth what they can’t do is take away who you are inside, at your core.
After the talk, many people in the audience stayed to discuss r the many challenges trans people are now facing with Stryker.
Ike Thomas, a sociology major at USU, was at the event for an extra -credit opportunity for a class.
“I found it very interesting, and wanted to learn more about trans history because I was never taught about it in high school,” Thomas said. “I wanted to broaden my perspective of the trans experience.”
Thomas’ professor, Guadalupe Marquez-Velarde, assistant professor of sociology, said she was excited to share the opportunity with her students.
“I think it’s important to learn new perspectives. We don’t have a lot of voices like Susan Stryker here at USU or Utah in general, so I thought it was a great opportunity to learn something new,” said Marquez-Velarde.
You can learn more from Susan Stryker by watching her film, “Screaming Queens: The Riot at Compton’s Cafeteria,” or reading her books which can be found online.