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The Transsexual Empire: The Making of the She-male (Athene) [Paperback]

Janice G. Raymond (Author)
2.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 264 pages
  • Publisher: Teachers' College Press; New edition edition (31 May 1994)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0807762725
  • ISBN-13: 978-0807762721
  • Product Dimensions: 15.6 x 1.7 x 20 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 2.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 2,258,446 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Product Description

Synopsis

Fifteen years ago, when it was first published, "The Transsexual Empire" challenged the medical psychiatric definition of transsexualism as a disease and sex conversion hormones and surgery as the cure. It exposed the antifeminist stereotyping that requires candidates for transsexual surgery to prove themselves by conforming to subjective, outdated and questionable feminine roles and "passing" as women. Then as now, defining and treating transsexualism as a medical problem prevents the person experiencing so-called gender dissatisfaction from seeing it in a gender-challenging or feminist framework. Transsexualism goes to the question of what gender is, how to challenge it, and what reinforces gender stereotyping in a role-defined society. In the new introduction to this feminist work, Raymond discusses how these same issues are now debated in the context of transgender. Transgenderism reduces gender resistance to wardrobes, hormones, surgery and posturing - anything but real sexual equality. It assimilates the roles and definitions of masculinity and femininity, often mixing and matching, but never really moving beyond both.

In a similar way, transsexualism is thought to be a radical challenge to gender roles, breaking the boundaries of gender and transgressing its rigid lines. But if the transsexual merely exchanges one gender role for another, and if the outcome of such a sex reassignment is to endorse a femininity which, in many transsexuals, becomes a caricature of much that feminists have rejected about many-made femininity, then where is the challenge, the transgression, and the breaking of any real boundaries? This book will be used as a text in women's studies, psychology, sociology, technology and public policy, as well as by medical students, law students, and all who have an interest in feminist issues.

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Customer Reviews

2.2 out of 5 stars
8 reviews
2.2 out of 5 stars
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Still One Of The Most Important Works In The Feminist Canon. 14 Aug 2012
By Jackie Mearns
Format:Paperback
I suspect most of those "reviewing" this book haven't even bothered to read it and are relying on second hand rumour and slur from thore gender conformist, anti-feminist misogynists within the "transgender community". For those readers wise enough to seek knowledge in their own right, I would advise that you ignore the negative "reviews" above and grab a copy for yourselves of this outstanding work, which remains a classic in feminist studies of "gender" under the rule of capitalist patriachy. You won't regret it, and you certainly won't see the oft used trope of "a woman trapped in a man's body" in quite the same way ever again.
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23 of 32 people found the following review helpful
1.0 out of 5 stars A cheap, mean-spirited pseudofeminist attack on transsexuals 11 April 1998
By A Customer
Format:Paperback
Janice Raymond apparently hasn't met many transsexuals. She would have us believe that transsexuals are frustrated men who can't possess women directly as they would wish, and who therefore conspire to appropriate the female body by becoming women themselves. She paints all T*s as reactionary perverts who want to force "real" women deeper into their traditional gender roles. Nowhere in her book does she admit of the possibility that transsexuals may be seeking some sort of inner peace for themselves in their private lives. Raymond is an embarrasment to the feminist movement.
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17 of 25 people found the following review helpful
1.0 out of 5 stars A disturbing hateful book 19 Nov 1999
By A Customer
Format:Paperback
It's amazing that a publisher would consider reissueing this - although I'm sure it's usefull that someone still makes copies of mein kamp available for study.

As to the statements of the first reviewer that transsexualism is a only a moderm phenomenom I suggest she read Transgender Warriors or The Prehistory of Sex or a review ancient history on the Scythians or Hijira's to gain a more accurate perspective. The idea that we "understand the mental life of the transsexual subject" instead of asking transsexual actors to speak for themselves continues to perpetuate the perception of transsexuals as others and academics as "natural" (Heaven forbid there should be transsexuals who are academics!) The thought that we "need to interrogate the institutions that make the creation of these synthetic females and males" again implies transsexuals are incapable of making any decisions of their own and completely ignores the real life situation most transexuals find themselves in - which is the need to fight for the treatments they desire; since it is so often unavailable. In a world where transsexuals have few if any protections regarding employment, access to medical care, marriage or child custody rights - a world in which a transsexual is usually fired, refused housing, inelligible for medical for treatment of breast cancer under most medical insurance ans is 20 times more likely to be murdered than a non-transsexual - one must question those who make these assertions most closely and study what makes them the way they are and what institutions interests are being served by the promotion of their thoughts.

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