Transgender 101: A Simple Guide to a Complex Issue

by Nicholas M Teich

Transgender 101 does what it says on the tin--it's a simple explanation geared mostly toward family, friends, and significant others of transgender people explaining what being transgender is. It gives the best clear-cut, non-judgmental explanation of 'feeling like' some gender that doesn't match up with your assigned sex is, with a detailed explanation of the differences between assigned sex, gender identity, and gender expression, and their interactions. It gives descriptions of the hormones and surgery trans people can choose to take/undergo and their physical effects while emphasizing that everyone is different and not everyone will want hormones, surgery, or both. It's also useful for newly out (to themselves) transpeople who want a clear-cut explanation of their choices, the limitations surrounding those choices, and what is likely to be going through the heads of family, friends, and coworkers as they start to come out. Finally, it provides a brief history of the understanding of transgenderism and touches on the intersections with class, race, nationality, and sexism.

Its only flaw was some debate about terms--I'm not sure it's accurate in its definitions of 'transgender' and 'transsexual', and it didn't mention that these terms are used differently by different people. Also, it gave outdated definitions for 'pansexual' and 'asexual' and didn't touch on the romantic spectrum at all, but I thought it could be forgiven for that since sexual/romantic orientation wasn't its focus--in fact, it repeated several times that they were not the same thing and should not be treated as such. It used permutations of'gender assigned' and 'natal sex' but focused on the concept that the letter on a birth certificate is assigned by a medical professional or a parent, not something inherent and immutable. It's current, which is really nice--it provides descriptions of both the just-outdated DSM-IV and its Gender Identity Disorder and the just-in DSM-V and its Gender Dysphoria. Definitely recommended for anyone with basic questions about what it means to be trans, both in the 'definition' sense and the 'now what' sense. It focused on MTF and FTM transpeople, but did acknowledge other gender identities, specifically genderqueer, and other types of queering the gender binary which may or may not be tied to transgenderism for any given person, specifically, gender variant/gender nonconforming, crossdressing, drag, and disorders of sex development/intersexism.

Overall rating: 4.5/5

Project upshot: Not eligible for use in the paragraph I need for the conference, this book will still be helpful in terms of what Leandra's going to find as s/he starts to do research, and for informing the reactions of various people in the story. I think I won't give it back to the library just yet.