Trans Women Who Care: Reproductive Labor Outside the Charmed Circle

• In Event: 30407 - Trans Life Chances under Institutionalized Violence and Discrimination

Abstract

Two primary sociological traditions theorize the relationship between patriarchy and labor. The gendered organizations framework foregrounds dynamics of exclusion and subordination as workplaces reproduce the structural dominance of men over women. The social reproduction tradition, by contrast, highlights intersectional domination and focuses on the interweaving of intimacy and exploitation. Research on transgender people has drawn largely from a gendered organizations tradition, but we argue that a social reproduction framework more comprehensively addresses intersectional trans inequality. Centering trans people also extends our understanding of reproductive labor. Drawing on 23 work history interviews with trans women of color, we illustrate how the racial organization of care work is, itself, internally stratified according to sexual normativity. Existing at the site of sexualized femininity shapes the kinds of reproductive labor trans women of color are excluded from, exploited for, and drawn to as forms of personal meaning.

Authors

• Joss Taylor Greene, University of California-Davis

• Woods Ervin, Critical Resistance