Unzipping gender : sex, cross-dressing and culture / Charlotte Suthrell.

Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:

How does culture shape notions of sexuality and gender? Why are transvestites in the West so often seen as deviant or perverse, while they are accepted in other societies? What are the implications for the categories of male and female when considering transvestism?

Transvestism, and its cultural practice, is a useful lens through which we can view and thus debate models of sex, gender and sexuality. Drawing on primary fieldwork, Unzipping Gender offers a cross-cultural study of transvestism through an examination of transvestites in Britain and the Hijras of India. The author tackles the critical question of whether or not transvestism is motivated primarily by sex or gender, and she challenges the straightforward binary divide that dominates Western theories of gender. Taking into account the importance of material culture, she also pays close attention to the detail of dress and considers the artefactual nature of the construction of the self through clothing.

Highlighting the differences between the two groups and drawing on further cross-cultural perspectives, Suthrell illustrates the social construction of sex and gender. She considers the roles that emotion, mythology, imagery and belief systems play in influencing ideas about sex and gender in different cultures. Since sex and gender must inevitably be intertwined, Suthrell argues for a more sophisticated response to the complex practice of transvestism.

In order to gain a deeper understanding of sex and gender issues, it is imperative to examine the underlying social and symbolic structures. This unique study across cultures leads the way.

Table of contents provided by Syndetics

• List of Illustrations (p. ix)
• Preface and Acknowledgements (p. xi)
• 1 Introduction (p. 1)
• Fieldwork (p. 3)
• The Doctrines of Gender (p. 5)
• The Prevalence of Transvestism (p. 6)
• Clothing as Gender Landscape (p. 8)
• 2 Clothing Sex, Sexing Clothes: Transvestism, Material Culture and the Sex and Gender Debate (p. 13)
• The Importance of Sex and Gender (p. 13)
• Dress and Identity: Transvestism and Material Culture (p. 14)
• 'Is Gender to Culture as Sex is to Nature?': Transvestism and the Discourses of Sex and Gender (p. 19)
• Corporeality and the Politics of Sex (p. 21)
• Clothing the Brain (p. 23)
• 3 Transvestites in the UK: the Dream of Fair Women (p. 31)
• Are those Women's Clothes? (p. 31)
• Fieldwork in the UK (p. 34)
• Becoming Extraordinary: The Experience of the Transvestite in Western Societies (p. 37)
• Becoming 'The Other' (p. 41)
• UK Transvestites: Interviews with Anthony/Suzanne, John/Joy, Dan/Shelly, Gavin/Gina and Simon/Sandra (p. 42)
• The Range of Possibilities (p. 55)
• Clothing Choices (p. 64)
• Some Conclusions about UK Transvestites (p. 68)
• 4 Disorder Within the Pattern: the Hijras of India (p. 75)
• Fieldwork in India (p. 75)
• Hijras in Context: Who are Hijras? (p. 78)
• Why the Hijras? (p. 80)
• The Need to Categorise: Studies of the Hijras (p. 82)
• Becoming a Hijra (p. 83)
• Hijras and the Principle of Male and Female Union (p. 84)
• Hijras and Religion (p. 86)
• Part II--Fieldwork with Hijras--Shabana, Tara, Jaitun, Chand, Leila's Information, Ramdhan (p. 90)
• The Position of Hijras within the Indian Cultural Framework (p. 106)
• The Changing Position of Hijras in Indian Public Life and Media (p. 107)
• 5 Crossing Gender Boundaries in Cultural Context: Fieldwork Comparisons and Cultural Influences (p. 115)
• Cross-dressing and Clothing Choices (p. 117)
• Differences in Lifestyle (p. 119)
• Transvestism Within Contrasting Cosmological Contexts (p. 124)
• 6 Dressing Up/Dressing Down: Reconsidering Sex and Gender Culture (p. 131)
• Woman = Soft, Man = Hard: Concepts of Language Made Material (p. 134)
• Gendered Emotions and the Ceremony of Naven (p. 137)
• Masculine Representation of the Feminine (p. 139)
• Jung and the Inner World of Opposites (p. 140)
• Sex, Gender or Sexuality? (p. 143)
• Crossing Gender as an 'Institutionalised' Role (p. 145)
• The Brazilian Travestis (p. 147)
• Binary Categorisation as 'Common Sense' (p. 150)
• Masculinity, Femininity; Genetics and Mosaics (p. 151)
• The Correlates of Gender Culture--Transvestism as Material Objectification (p. 154)
• Cross-cultural Evidence and the Conceptualisation of Gender Crossing (p. 156)
• Marking Gender (p. 160)
• 7 Thinking of Themselves: Transvestism and Concepts of the Person (p. 163)
• Transvestism as a Social Phenomenon (p. 163)
• Concepts of the Person, Individual and Society in India and England: Cultural Contexts of Transvestites and Hijras (p. 165)
• Contrasting Concepts of Self within the Hindu and Western Traditions (p. 169)
• Individuality and Identity (p. 172)
• Personhood and Transvestism in Cross-Cultural Perspective (p. 173)
• Blurring the Boundaries: Deconstructing Theories of the Self (p. 175)
• Transvestites, Constructed Selves, and Issues of Sex and Gender (p. 177)
• A Broader Conceptualisation of Transvestism (p. 179)
• 'This is an Absurd Ordination for People to Live in, in 2002' (p. 181)
• Appendix A Questionnaire (p. 185)
• Appendix B Occupations (p. 191)
• Appendix C Questions 4, 5 & 6 (p. 195)
• Appendix D Adjectives (p. 197)
• Bibliography (p. 199)
• Index (p. 209)

Author notes provided by Syndetics