Trans Television Culture: Queer Politics, Gender Fluidity, and Quality TV

Abstract

For decades, trans people have hardly been represented in American popular culture. And when they were depicted on screen, they were grossly misrepresented. But recent years have brought about changes and trans people have, to a certain degree, assumed center stage in popular culture. The luxury retailer Barneys New York and the award-winning jewelry designer Alexis Bittar have, for instance, showed transgender models; in February 2014, a memoir by Janet Mock, who was a former editor at People magazine and who focuses on her transition from male to female in her book, made the New York Times best-seller list; and Dancing with the Stars featured contestant Chaz Bono. Just as gay and lesbian characters have moved into the spotlight since the 1990s, transgender characters are increasingly gaining more visibility on TV, from Alex Newell as Wade “Unique” Adams on Fox’s Glee to Laverne Cox as Sophia Burset on Netflix’s Orange Is the New Black, for which she made history as the first openly transgender Emmy acting awards nominee. In the past two years then, TV shows have shown an increasing presence of trans people after Cox became a breakout star and after Amazon Studios has placed a transgender character center stage with the 2014 premiere of Transparent. In this paper, I will analyze how queer politics and identity are negotiated in recent TV series, looking into the possibilities for resistant queer performances via the politics of trans feminism, that is transgender perspectives on feminism, or feminist perspectives on transgender issues. I will argue that recent TV series like Orange Is the New Black and Transparent, which feature queer and transgender characters, can be seen not only as instruments for global consumer capitalism but also forums for feminism, queer, and trans activism. The characters depicted in these shows not only help push the boundaries of acceptance in film and television, but also contribute to the cultural politics of television, the way in which the content of these shows themselves engage with the politics of their time. Relying on Queer Theory as well as Trans Theory, I will read these recent TV shows for their queer and trans politics, showing that popular culture, especially recent Quality TV shows, constitute important political interventions into sexual politics.