Search results

1 – 10 of 30
Book part
Publication date: 5 December 2022

Travers

While transgender people have had some success in gaining recognition and human rights in the collection of nations known colloquially as ‘the West’, a well-financed reactionary…

Abstract

While transgender people have had some success in gaining recognition and human rights in the collection of nations known colloquially as ‘the West’, a well-financed reactionary movement is attempting to roll back these gains. A constellation of white supremacist, conservative, and heteropatriarchal organizations and movements are in collusion with so-called ‘gender critical feminists’ to resist feminist and gender-inclusive challenges to traditional gender and sexual hierarchies by targeting trans girls and women – more so than trans boys, trans men and non-binary people – for surveillance and exclusion (Sharrow, 2021a, 2021b). In the past several years, bills designed to delegitimize and exclude trans people in various ways have been introduced in many US state legislatures. Within this larger anti-trans campaign, bills designed specifically to block trans girls and women from participating in ‘female’ sport have been signed into law in 11 US states to date and proposed in many others. It is no accident that organized sport is a site for contesting the inclusion of transgender people and that transgender girls and women are the primary targets of these campaigns. Debates about criteria for female eligibility and a succession of pseudo-scientific forms of ‘sex testing’ in elite levels of sport highlight both the ideological nature of the two-sex system and the intense material and cultural investment in maintaining its façade. In this chapter, I mobilize moral panic theory to focus specifically on anti-trans campaigns in the United States aimed at preventing trans girls and women from participating in ‘female’ sport as evidence of a testosterone panic.

Book part
Publication date: 5 December 2022

Anna Baeth and Anna Goorevich

In the months leading up to, and during, the 2021 legislative session – the most dangerous for trans athletes in the history of the United States – 1,224 news articles, public…

Abstract

In the months leading up to, and during, the 2021 legislative session – the most dangerous for trans athletes in the history of the United States – 1,224 news articles, public statements and opinion pieces were published through online sources about trans people having access to sport. Conducting a textual analysis of those mediated articles, we conclude that trans athletes are being used by conservative political forces to instigate a social, moral panic. We identified three primary framings being used to instil a moral panic in articles published between 1 December 2020, and 1 June 2021, inflaming the debate over trans athletes. First, trans athletes have been positioned as spectres haunting the future of sport. Second, narratives of fear frame trans women as psychologically malevolent. Finally, conservative politicians are creating a moral panic to paint themselves as protectors of cisgender girls in sport. We conclude by describing the ways fears about trans athletes are being politicized by larger conservative forces that may have especially harmful ramifications for both trans athletes and cisgender women athletes.

Details

Justice for Trans Athletes
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80262-985-9

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 5 December 2022

Jaime Schultz, Anna Baeth, Anne Lieberman, Lindsay Parks Pieper and Elizabeth A. Sharrow

As advocates and scholars dedicated to advancing equality for women and girls, we believe that sport can empower all people – and to change the world. Exclusion and restrictions…

Abstract

As advocates and scholars dedicated to advancing equality for women and girls, we believe that sport can empower all people – and to change the world. Exclusion and restrictions for transgender athletes undermine this cause. Transgender athletes are not and have never been a threat to women's sport. There are, however, serious and well-documented threats to women's sport that warrant attention, including unequal opportunities in participation and leadership, inequitable funding and pay, uneven media coverage, a lack of sponsorship opportunities, sexual harassment and abuse and incomplete implementation of gender equality policies (Bisgaard & Støckel, 2019; Cooky et al., 2021; Hindman & Walker, 2020; Lough & Greenhalgh, 2019; Novkov, 2019; Pape, 2020; Raso, 2019; Schultz, 2018; Staurowsky et al., 2020; Yanus & O'Connor, 2016; Zerunyan, 2017).

A close reading of peer-reviewed, researched-based and credible sources allow us to better understand the experiences of trans athletes, to dispel the dangerous misinformation peddled in recent media accounts and political debates, to outline critical legal and policy discussions about trans athletes, and to highlight why access to sport matters for everyone. There is a clear consensus across multiple disciplines: the future of sport includes transgender women and girls.

Book part
Publication date: 9 November 2023

Estel Boix Noguer and Leslie K. Larsen

A number of anti-transgender bills were proposed in the United States during the first half of 2021, with several becoming laws. The passing of these bills has made it…

Abstract

A number of anti-transgender bills were proposed in the United States during the first half of 2021, with several becoming laws. The passing of these bills has made it increasingly difficult for trans people to gain access to lifesaving, gender-affirming healthcare and to participate in sport based on their gender identity rather than their sex assignment at birth. In light of these new laws, sport organizations such as the NCAA have made statements promising to support trans athletes. While these statements may promote awareness, in order for trans athletes to compete safely and openly throughout their collegiate careers, the NCAA must create policies and implement effective practices centred around trans inclusion. In this chapter, I (Estel, they/he) share my journey as a transgender student-athlete at an NCAA Division I university during the Spring 2021 season. During my collegiate athletic career, I felt both grateful for the chance to row and fear and frustration due to discrimination. Through memory work and participant case analysis, my co-author and I outline the ways that transphobic myths may have influenced my interactions with administrators, coaches and athletes throughout my collegiate athletic career and negatively impacted my wellbeing and performance. We also identify specific ways in which NCAA policies on trans inclusion are outdated and do not align with their expressed commitment to the well-being of trans student-athletes; we provide recommendations for changes to these policies. Further, we recommend trans-inclusive practices NCAA member institutions can implement to create an inclusive and empowering sports environment.

Details

Trans Athletes’ Resistance
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80382-364-5

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 9 November 2023

C.B. Lucas and Matthew R. Hodler

Sport co-produces our notions of sex, gender and sexuality. Sport policies based on inclusion demand trans athletes become visible. This creates a problem within sport's…

Abstract

Sport co-produces our notions of sex, gender and sexuality. Sport policies based on inclusion demand trans athletes become visible. This creates a problem within sport's hierarchical gender order, and trans athletes' bodies become comprehensible only through mobility from one sex/gender to the other – literally the embodiment of movement through a static gendered space.

In this chapter, we examine the contradictory expectations placed on trans athletes to be visible within heterosexist, white supremacist ‘regimes of looking’ (Fleetwood, 2011). Our purpose is twofold: (1) to critically examine the construction of transness through white racial frames and (2) to grapple with the inherent harmfulness of sport. We ask why trans people would want to participate in an institution that actively limits opportunities for expansive subjectivity, ultimately concluding that the potential for queer futures lies in the very construction of limits themselves. We forward a belief in what sport could be when intentionally created through queer world building. We highlight teams, leagues and spaces that have developed processes that work against dominant forms of medicolegal recognition and visibility politics.

Book part
Publication date: 5 December 2022

Helen Jefferson Lenskyj and Ali Durham Greey

The last decade has seen significant positive changes in global attitudes, policies and practices that impact the lives of trans people. Meanwhile, the world of sport has been…

Abstract

The last decade has seen significant positive changes in global attitudes, policies and practices that impact the lives of trans people. Meanwhile, the world of sport has been notoriously slow to follow these social justice initiatives. In fact, sport has the dubious distinction of lagging behind almost every other western social organization on issues of discrimination, whether based on sex, gender, ‘race’, ethnicity, social class, religion or ability. Underlying these trends is the binary thinking that has formed the basis for gender categories of sport and physical activity for over a century.

The introduction begins as Helen Lenskyj extends the issue of justice for trans athletes beyond the scope of sport. Next, the contemporary socio-political contexts in the US, UK, and beyond are outlined. A brief description of the common ground between justice for trans and intersex athletes is provided, while noting that the focus of this book is on trans athletes. An overview of terminology is presented.

Ali Greey then describes their personal experience competing for Canada as a non-binary athlete. Engaging Gleaves and Lehrbach's (2016) work, their argument challenges the viability of making trans-exclusive physiological equivalency synonymous with a rhetoric of fairness. Finally, the authors explain the volume's analytic frameworks and present an overview of the contents, summarizing the key themes and findings.

Details

Justice for Trans Athletes
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80262-985-9

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 8 January 2018

Rachel S. Wexelbaum

Multiple research studies show a positive correlation between library usage and student retention. At the same time, no formal research studies focusing on the effect of library…

3390

Abstract

Purpose

Multiple research studies show a positive correlation between library usage and student retention. At the same time, no formal research studies focusing on the effect of library usage on LGBT student persistence and retention exist. The purpose of this paper is to provide information about today’s LGBT undergraduates, their personal and academic needs, and how academic libraries may meet those needs.

Design/methodology/approach

The author will challenge the grand narrative perpetuated by LGBT librarians that “libraries save [LGBT] lives” through a review of existing research literature on LGBT undergraduates and their personal and academic needs, where libraries play a role in LGBT undergraduate life, and whether or not academic libraries actually meet those needs.

Findings

No formal research studies on how libraries play a role in the retention of LGBT undergraduates exist. While LGBT undergraduates share many similarities with their peers, they seek out resources and spaces that the library may be able to provide independently or through collaborations with other units on campus. The existence of campus LGBT resource centers may impact LGBT undergraduate use of libraries.

Practical implications

The author will provide suggestions for academic libraries to create appropriate resources, services, and spaces for LGBT undergraduates so that they persist at their institutions and graduate.

Originality/value

This is the first research paper to address the role that academic libraries play in LGBT student retention.

Details

Library Management, vol. 39 no. 1/2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0143-5124

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 9 November 2023

Sabeehah Ravat

In the binary sex-segregated space of professional sports, sex-gender diversity is met with suspicion, derision and exclusion. In the United States, along with widespread…

Abstract

In the binary sex-segregated space of professional sports, sex-gender diversity is met with suspicion, derision and exclusion. In the United States, along with widespread anti-trans policies at various societal levels, legislations and regulations are being pushed to limit or eliminate transgender athletes from competing in all levels of sports. However, little scholarship has considered the implications of the presence of nonbinary athletes, those who identify outside the spectrum of man and woman, beyond the conversation of a ‘third gender’ category in sport. In this chapter, I seek to examine how nonbinary athletes embody disobedience by challenging the binary categorization of sex-gender within professional sports. I explore the racialized embodiment of sex and gender in professional women's sports, specifically WNBA player Layshia Clarendon. I explore how disobedience is employed to incite resistance against the narrow sex-gender categories that are forced upon athletes. Finally, I argue that embodied disobedience provides a key pathway for nonbinary athletes to undermine the regulatory nature of sex-gender categorization in sport. Particularly, nonbinary athletes may seek medical and social forms of gender affirmation, while simultaneously embodying disobedience by continuing to actively participate in professional sports categories in which they may not neatly fit.

Details

Trans Athletes’ Resistance
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80382-364-5

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 5 December 2022

Colleen English and Lindsay Parks Pieper

The aim of this chapter is to examine and challenge the fairness rhetoric used by many US lawmakers to prevent trans girls and women from participating in school sports…

Abstract

The aim of this chapter is to examine and challenge the fairness rhetoric used by many US lawmakers to prevent trans girls and women from participating in school sports. Legislators embrace faulty scientific claims to assert unfairness based on physiology and many sport philosophers work from the premise that the first priority of sport is to be competitively fair. We argue that this is a misguided notion and that sport must be just before it can be fair. Using Iris Marion Young's framework of justice, we contend that excluding trans athletes from school sport is an injustice. We propose that focusing on the eradication of injustice is the ethical path forward for the inclusion and full participation of trans people in sport.

Details

Justice for Trans Athletes
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-80262-985-9

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 11 August 2022

Thomas Köllen and Nick Rumens

This paper aims to challenge the cisnormative and binary assumptions that underpin the management and gender scholarship. Introducing and contextualising the contributions that…

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to challenge the cisnormative and binary assumptions that underpin the management and gender scholarship. Introducing and contextualising the contributions that comprise this special issue, this paper critically reflects on some of the principal developments in management research on trans* and intersex people in the workplace and anticipates what future scholarship in this area might entail.

Design/methodology/approach

A critical approach is adopted to interrogate the prevailing cisnormative and binary approach adopted by management and gender scholars.

Findings

The key finding is the persistence of cisnormativity and normative gender and sex binarism in academic knowledge production and in society more widely, which appear to have hindered how management and gender scholars have routinely failed to conceptualise and foreground the array of diverse genders and sexes.

Originality/value

This paper foregrounds the workplace experiences of trans* and intersex people, which have been neglected by management researchers. By positioning intersexuality as an important topic of management research, this paper breaks the silence that has enwrapped intersex issues in gender and management scholarship. There are still unanswered questions and issues that demand future research from academics who are interested in addressing cisnormativity in the workplace and problematising the sex and gender binaries that sustain it.

Details

Gender in Management: An International Journal , vol. 37 no. 6
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1754-2413

Keywords

1 – 10 of 30