New Publication: Trans Textuality: Dysphoria in Medieval Skin

"A trans soul lives in the skin 
and goes deeper with each touch of the knife. "

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Transliterature was recently featured in a special collection on Queer Manuscripts edited by Roberta Magnani and Diane Watt, published by postmedieval: a journal of medieval cultural studies with the article, "Trans Textuality: Dysphoria in the Depths of Medieval Skin." Thank you to everyone who encouraged this piece along and who attended its reading at the New Chaucer Society session in London.

Abstract:

"This article proposes a theoretical method of approaching manuscripts, such as the Ellesmere manuscript of Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, through transgender theory, called trans textuality. Beyond looking for transgender identities in medieval texts, such a method asks, ‘what is a trans way of reading?’ and ‘how might non-human objects function in trans ways?’ The study is informed by foundational texts in trans psychoanalysis concerning the processes that trans skin undergoes during transition, texts which are put in conversation with medieval manuscript studies and new materialisms. The resulting response focuses on the threefold work of trans textual skins: depth, duration, and dysphoria. Whether the object is the organ of a transgender body or a medieval manuscript, such trans texts are skin constructs which relate through materiality and metaphor the ongoing narrative of bodies in transition. The article concludes with a twofold study of Fragment VI of the Ellesmere manuscript where the images and writing of the Physician and Pardoner demonstrate the principles of trans textuality: the depth of meanings from other times and genders, the duration of a body through transitions in form, and a dysphoric soul striving in the deeps of medieval skin."

Read the full article online at postmedieval online.

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New Publication: TSQ Trans*Historicities Roundtable

"We need transgender history now more than ever."

Jack Halberstam

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Honored to be co-authors with gifted scholars of the caliber of Howard Chiang, Jack Halberstam, Jacob Lau, Kathleen P. Long, Marcia Ochoa, C. Riley Snorton, Leah DeVun, and Zeb Tortorici. A truly fantastic issue and an especially enjoyable roundtable discussion on the critical theories of "Trans*historicities"

The TSQ abstract:

“Trans*historicities: A Roundtable Discussion” offers reflections on how thinking about time and chronology has impacted scholarship in trans studies in recent years. Contributing scholars come from numerous disciplines that touch on history, and have expertise in far-ranging geographic and temporal fields. As a broad conversation about some of the potential possibilities and difficulties in seeking out—and finding—trans in historical contexts, this discussion focuses on the complex interrelations between trans, time, and history."

Read more via Transgender Studies Quarterly online!

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New Publication: Were There Trans People in the Middle Ages?

"Yes...
Sorry, did you need more than that?"

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Transliterature recently partnered with the Public Medievalist in order to produce a summary of some of my research in order to introduce a lay audience into the history of transgender in the Middle Ages. Already the article has had wide readership just in time for the midterm elections! As addressed in the article, responses to medieval trans studies reflects many of the interests as well as anti-trans prejudices which cluster around contemporary transgender studies. Yet overall, it has been a gift to speak again to a wider audience to let them know that the future of our past is much vaster and more complicated than society leads us to expect.

Introduction from the Public Medievalist:

"A fantastic article on the long history of medieval transgender people, by the amazing Gabrielle MW Bychowski. If you've been led to believe that being transgender is a relatively "new" phenomenon, or some kind of "postmodern lifestyle choice", you should read this article. There is a long transgender history that shows clearly that being transgender is simply part of the human condition, and can't be imagined away."

Read more on the Public Medievalist Website!

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