Doing Gender Diversity: Readings in Theory and Real-World Experience

What is gender diversity? Doesn’t diversity often mean a focus on people who vary from typically gendered people, like intersex people and drag queens? What would it mean to talk about gender diversities? What does it mean to argue that all forms of gender, from the usual to the unusual, are socially constructed? How is gender developed, experienced, and presented by the range of persons who “do” or perform gender (namely, all of us)?

This reader demonstrates the multiple ways in which the universe of gender is socially, culturally, and historically constructed. The complexity of our gendered lives can be confusing. This anthology focuses on gender itself—how gender operates socioculturally, exists, functions, and is presented in micro and macro interactions. In order to avoid balkanization, the authors examine the various ways in which culture intersects with individuals to produce the range of presentations of self that we call “gender,” from people born male who become adult men to lesbian women to transmen, and everyone else on the diverse gender spectrum. This cutting-edge book focuses on both hegemonic and transgressive gender development, roles, identities, and practices.