Open AccessDen uintenderede kønskrontol
Author(s) -
Beate Sløk-Andersen
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
kvinder, køn and forskning
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2245-6937
pISSN - 0907-6182
DOI - 10.7146/kkf.v0i3-4.28035
Subject(s) - danish , unintended consequences , gender studies , power (physics) , sociology , everyday life , psychology , political science , law , philosophy , linguistics , physics , quantum mechanics
The unintended gender controlThrough a reconstellation of Judith Butlers ‘heterosexual matrix', this article explores how subtle everyday events in the Danish society work as (unintended) gender policing which participates in constituting transgendered citizens as non-human. This is done by regular comparisons of the citizen's registered ‘biological sex' with the citizen's apparent, ‘visible gender' e.g. in airports or at the doctor's office where one is required to show ID. If these two aspects of gender do not correlate in a way that is socially understandable (i.e. females being feminine, males being masculine), the citizen cannot be recognized. The consequence of a lacking recognition is not being recognized as human. Based on this thesis, transgendered citizens' unpleasant experiences in everyday life is explained as a consequence of a missing recognition; ";a site of power by which the human is differentially produced"; (Butler 2004: 2).