Femininity: Julia Serano And Janet Mock

The way in which society targets femininity is written about by both Julia Sereno and Janet Mock, and the fact that this theme is present in both of the writings produced by trans women shows its importance when discussing trans-female identity (Mock 147, Serano 42). To specify, similar concepts about femininity are posed by both Serano and Mock in their writings. Serano, in an instance when she is talking about media productions of trans women, Serano explicates, “The media neutralizes the potential threat of trans femininities rose to the category of ‘woman’ by playing to the audience’s subconscious belief that femininity itself it artificial… In fact, it’s the assumption that femininity is inherently ‘contrived,’ ‘frivolous,’ and ‘manipulative

In the case of Janet Mock, her identity as a Hawaiian and African American only made it more difficult to represent herself in American society where not only are all standards of beauty assumed to be cisgender but also rarely factor people of color into the equation (194). This reality is best represented in a statement which reads, “I was a mixed black girl existing in a Westernized Hawaiian culture where petite Asian women were the ideal, in a white culture where black women were the furthest from the standard of beauty, in an American culture where trans women women of color were invisible.” (Mock 194) In stating this, Mock is showing how the culture in which she was raised gave her no standards for what it meant for her to be beautiful, thus making it more difficult to not only find self confidence, but also meet physical standards for what it means to be a woman (Mock 194, Vries 56). Mock explains how significant it was for her when the media began to focus on Beyonce in Destiny’s Child because it gave her an image of a woman that she could truly relate to, as the media rarely focuses on black women as a standard of beauty

Race is often overlooked by white authors who aren’t oppressed by it, and this is true for Eli Clare and Julia Serano (Clare 34, Serano xxii). Eli Clare’s memoir, which establishes an intersectional look at his own identities, largely glosses over race, which he admits in a footnote stating, “Reading this story now in 2009, I’m struck by the ways I’ve downplayed racism and my own white privilege (34).” In this confession, Clare is referring to a story that he tells of the way his family treated his Aunt’s African American partner, in which admits he overlooked the way his family directed racism to her as a result of his own privilege blocking him from seeing it (34). A similar statement is made by Serano in her preface, “…it seems clear in retrospect that it would have been a far stronger book had I extended my analysis to examine how these forces also intersect with other marginalization (eg., racism, classism, ableism, act.) (xxii).” Serano goes on to explain how working class trans people and trans people of color are at the highest risk for transphobic violence, and how her narrative should only be seen as part of a much larger story (xxiii). This statement truly illuminates the reader to the absence of race as an intersection in the book, which limits the view of transgender identity, shows this dire issue is able to be ignored because the writer, Serano or Clare,