Representing trans: visibility and its discontents

Abstract

ABSTRACT In this introduction to the special issue Representing Trans, the authors reflect on the radical changes in trans representation between the early 1990s and the present. Through brief reflections on Pose (2018-) and other landmark examples of trans representation in film and television, the authors show how these changes attest to complex interrelations between visibility, recognition, and violence. Beyond the realm of film and television, the introduction also discusses broader media representations that connect the question of visibility to political debates and the regulation of public spaces. Highlighting a variety of trans theorical engagements with different forms of mediality (including literature), the authors propose a more expansive understanding of trans as a reading practice as well as a method of analysing and transing medial forms.