Book Review : Trans : transgender life stories from South Africa, edited by Ruth Morgan, Charl Marais, and Joy R. Wellbeloved
- Authors: Morison, Tracy
- Date: 2009
- Language: English
- Type: Book review , text
- Identifier: vital:6214 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1003069 , ISBN 9781920196226
- Description: ‘If you are silent about your pain, they’ll kill you and say you enjoyed it’ proclaimed author Zora Neale Hurston, writing during the US civil rights movement. Silence and pain are certainly central to the lives of many trans people. The term ‘trans’, also the book title, can be read as being inclusive of different ‘types’ of trans-identified people. The idea of transsexualism/transgenderism alone has long been unmentionable in most contexts owing to longstanding stigma and prejudice.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2009
- Authors: Morison, Tracy
- Date: 2009
- Language: English
- Type: Book review , text
- Identifier: vital:6214 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1003069 , ISBN 9781920196226
- Description: ‘If you are silent about your pain, they’ll kill you and say you enjoyed it’ proclaimed author Zora Neale Hurston, writing during the US civil rights movement. Silence and pain are certainly central to the lives of many trans people. The term ‘trans’, also the book title, can be read as being inclusive of different ‘types’ of trans-identified people. The idea of transsexualism/transgenderism alone has long been unmentionable in most contexts owing to longstanding stigma and prejudice.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2009
Gay men and fatherhood in South Africa: a discursive study
- Morison, Tracy, Lynch, Ingrid, Reddy, Vasu
- Authors: Morison, Tracy , Lynch, Ingrid , Reddy, Vasu
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143782 , vital:38282 , https://ischp.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/ischp_2015_abstract_booklet.pdf
- Description: There is little South African research on gender and sexual minorities’ reproductive decision-making and, to date, no published work explicitly focused on gay men. Motivated by the virtual absence of gay men in research, as well as their marginalisation more generally, we undertook a qualitative investigation of gay men’s thoughts, feelings and perspectives of fatherhood, fatherhood decisions, and experiences of pathways to parenthood. Framed by a reproductive justice perspective, the aim of the study was not only to generate new knowledge, but also to inform policy, services, and advocacy. In this paper we present some of the findings from our discursive analysis of participants’ accounts of their own experiences of the pathway to parenthood or remaining ‘childfree’. We locate our analysis within the broader South African context and show how the entanglement of various social identity markers - particularly gender, race, and class - come to bear on participants’ experiences.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
- Authors: Morison, Tracy , Lynch, Ingrid , Reddy, Vasu
- Date: 2015
- Language: English
- Type: text , article
- Identifier: http://hdl.handle.net/10962/143782 , vital:38282 , https://ischp.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/ischp_2015_abstract_booklet.pdf
- Description: There is little South African research on gender and sexual minorities’ reproductive decision-making and, to date, no published work explicitly focused on gay men. Motivated by the virtual absence of gay men in research, as well as their marginalisation more generally, we undertook a qualitative investigation of gay men’s thoughts, feelings and perspectives of fatherhood, fatherhood decisions, and experiences of pathways to parenthood. Framed by a reproductive justice perspective, the aim of the study was not only to generate new knowledge, but also to inform policy, services, and advocacy. In this paper we present some of the findings from our discursive analysis of participants’ accounts of their own experiences of the pathway to parenthood or remaining ‘childfree’. We locate our analysis within the broader South African context and show how the entanglement of various social identity markers - particularly gender, race, and class - come to bear on participants’ experiences.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2015
What to expect when you’re not expecting : child-freedom, social stigma, and online subjectivities
- Authors: Morison, Tracy
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: Conference paper , text
- Identifier: vital:6210 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1003915
- Description: From Introduction: Today I’m presenting some of the preliminary findings of a study about voluntary childlessness conducted with Indian, Polish, and fellow South African collaborators. Voluntary childlessness is also frequently referred to as being childless by choice or childfree. The term childfree (as opposed to ‘childless’) is intended to show that not having children “can be an active and fulfilling choice”, and to indicate agency and freedom from social obligation. The distinguishing feature of voluntary childlessness is the deliberate avoidance of parenthood, and this is precisely what opens up childfree people, especially married heterosexuals, to greater stigma than the temporarily or involuntarily childless, since it is seen as willing and deliberate deviation from the norm. Having children is seen as a natural consequence of being a “normal” heterosexual woman or man, as well as an expected outcome of marriage. Parenthood is therefore normalised by regulative discourses around sexuality and gender. This process of normalisation is reinforced by pronatalist discourse. According to Meyers, pronatalism rests upon twin strategies: The first is the valorisation or glorification of parenthood, which supports the belief that having children is the only true path to fulfilment. The second strategy is the denigration of non-reproduction in which childlessness is cast as horrific. The result of these dual strategies is to eliminate deliberate childlessness as a possibility. Parenthood, as the only truly viable option for a fulfilling life, is therefore a non-choice. This is compounded by nationalistic and religious rhetoric that constructs childbearing as an obligation or duty. Consequently, as my previous research showed, people often do not reflect on whether to have children or not, but see it more as a matter of timing.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
- Authors: Morison, Tracy
- Date: 2013
- Language: English
- Type: Conference paper , text
- Identifier: vital:6210 , http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1003915
- Description: From Introduction: Today I’m presenting some of the preliminary findings of a study about voluntary childlessness conducted with Indian, Polish, and fellow South African collaborators. Voluntary childlessness is also frequently referred to as being childless by choice or childfree. The term childfree (as opposed to ‘childless’) is intended to show that not having children “can be an active and fulfilling choice”, and to indicate agency and freedom from social obligation. The distinguishing feature of voluntary childlessness is the deliberate avoidance of parenthood, and this is precisely what opens up childfree people, especially married heterosexuals, to greater stigma than the temporarily or involuntarily childless, since it is seen as willing and deliberate deviation from the norm. Having children is seen as a natural consequence of being a “normal” heterosexual woman or man, as well as an expected outcome of marriage. Parenthood is therefore normalised by regulative discourses around sexuality and gender. This process of normalisation is reinforced by pronatalist discourse. According to Meyers, pronatalism rests upon twin strategies: The first is the valorisation or glorification of parenthood, which supports the belief that having children is the only true path to fulfilment. The second strategy is the denigration of non-reproduction in which childlessness is cast as horrific. The result of these dual strategies is to eliminate deliberate childlessness as a possibility. Parenthood, as the only truly viable option for a fulfilling life, is therefore a non-choice. This is compounded by nationalistic and religious rhetoric that constructs childbearing as an obligation or duty. Consequently, as my previous research showed, people often do not reflect on whether to have children or not, but see it more as a matter of timing.
- Full Text:
- Date Issued: 2013
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