Trans Masculine Geographies: On Navigating Urban Spaces and Negotiating Liveable Lives in Cape Town and Johannesburg, South Africa
Monakali, Esethu LU
(2024)
- Abstract
- This dissertation is a qualitative, life history/narrative study that explores how 19 adult trans masculine people living in different urban areas around Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa, navigate and negotiate liveable lives in the spaces and places they live and move in. This study draws from the theoretical and analytical traditions of feminist geographies, queer phenomenology, black trans feminism and the analytic of racial capitalism. To this end, this study brings forth a critical analysis of urban subjectivities and urban spatialities and traces the rhythm, textures and contours of trans masculine lives and how gender, space, class, race/ism, and sexuality shape the conditions of their possibility and emergence within the... (More)
- This dissertation is a qualitative, life history/narrative study that explores how 19 adult trans masculine people living in different urban areas around Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa, navigate and negotiate liveable lives in the spaces and places they live and move in. This study draws from the theoretical and analytical traditions of feminist geographies, queer phenomenology, black trans feminism and the analytic of racial capitalism. To this end, this study brings forth a critical analysis of urban subjectivities and urban spatialities and traces the rhythm, textures and contours of trans masculine lives and how gender, space, class, race/ism, and sexuality shape the conditions of their possibility and emergence within the two cities. The cities of Johannesburg and Cape Town are hailed for their extensive historical and contemporary formations of queer and gender non-normative socialities. Through narrative analysis, this study shows how the classed and racialised gender-sexuality-spatiality formation marking the topography of the two cities animates the discursive and material constitutions of trans masculinities. Further, the discursive and material conditions variably permit trans masculine lives and complicate the emergence and visibility of trans masculinities, particularly those that do not lend themselves to normative registers of gender and sexuality. Further, this study shows how trans masculine people strategically commit to expressions and practices of masculinities depending on the spatial context of their movements. These strategies make possible the safe negotiation and passage in different social spaces of the cities. Finally, this dissertation emphasises how spaces, places, and gender subjectivities become and are continually re/produced through practicing and embodying otherwise forms of being. Specifically, through the insistence on nurturing forms of sociality that displace the racialised gender and sexuality binary as the authoritative grammar and syntax for knowable and legible life. (Less)
- Abstract (Swedish)
- Denna avhandling är en kvalitativ, livshistorisk och narrativ studie som undersöker hur 19 vuxna transmaskulina personer i Johannesburg och Kapstaden, Sydafrika, navigerar och förhandlar fram hållbara liv i de miljöerna de lever och rör sig i. Studiens teoretiska ramverk bygger på teoretiska inslag från feministisk geografi, queerfenomenologi, svart transfeminism och analyser av rasifierad kapitalism. Med hjälp av detta utforskas urbana subjektiviteter och rumsligheter med fokus på de rytmer, texturer och konturer som formar transmaskulina liv. Studien undersöker hur genus, rum, klass, rasism och sexualitet påverkar de villkor som formar deras existens i de aktuella städerna. Johannesburg och Kapstaden är kända för sina rika historiska och... (More)
- Denna avhandling är en kvalitativ, livshistorisk och narrativ studie som undersöker hur 19 vuxna transmaskulina personer i Johannesburg och Kapstaden, Sydafrika, navigerar och förhandlar fram hållbara liv i de miljöerna de lever och rör sig i. Studiens teoretiska ramverk bygger på teoretiska inslag från feministisk geografi, queerfenomenologi, svart transfeminism och analyser av rasifierad kapitalism. Med hjälp av detta utforskas urbana subjektiviteter och rumsligheter med fokus på de rytmer, texturer och konturer som formar transmaskulina liv. Studien undersöker hur genus, rum, klass, rasism och sexualitet påverkar de villkor som formar deras existens i de aktuella städerna. Johannesburg och Kapstaden är kända för sina rika historiska och samtida sammansättningar av queera och könsöverskridande sätt att vara sociala. Genom narrativanalys belyser avhandlingen hur dessa städers klass- och rasbaserade genus-sexualitets-rumsliga sammansättningar formar transmaskuliniteter både diskursivt och materiellt. Dessa villkor möjliggör en mångfald av transmaskulina uttryck, och samtidigt försvårar de uppkomsten och synligheten av vissa transmaskuliniteter, särskilt de som inte passar in i normativa köns- och sexualitetsramar. Vidare visar studien hur transmaskulina personer strategiskt anpassar sina maskulinitetsuttryck beroende på den rumsliga kontexten för att säkerställa trygg passage i olika sociala miljöer. Dessa strategier möjliggör tryggare förhandling och passage av olika sociala rum i städerna. Avhandlingen lyfter slutligen fram hur rum, platser och genussubjektiviteter blir till och ständigt omformas genom praktiker som förkroppsligar alternativa sätt att vara. Detta sker särskilt genom en betoning på omsorgsfulla sociala relationer som utmanar den rasifierade binära köns- och sexualitetsstrukturen, och därmed skapar nya grammatiker och syntaxer för att förstå och synliggöra liv. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/2e31970d-845b-43df-9944-b4c4fa891ec2
- author
- Monakali, Esethu
LU
- supervisor
- opponent
-
- Professor Phoenix, Ann, UCL, Institute of Education
- organization
- publishing date
- 2024-08
- type
- Thesis
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- transgender studies, social theory, urban geography, gender studies
- pages
- 235 pages
- publisher
- Lund University
- defense location
- Gamla Kökets hörsal, Allhelgona kyrkogata 8, Lund
- defense date
- 2024-09-19 13:15:00
- ISBN
- 978-91-8104-102-6
- 978-91-8104-103-3
- project
- Trans Masculine Geographies: On Navigating Urban Spaces and Negotiating Liveable Lives in Cape Town and Johannesburg, South Africa
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- 2e31970d-845b-43df-9944-b4c4fa891ec2
- date added to LUP
- 2024-08-15 09:25:02
- date last changed
- 2024-08-21 11:58:18
@phdthesis{2e31970d-845b-43df-9944-b4c4fa891ec2,
abstract = {{This dissertation is a qualitative, life history/narrative study that explores how 19 adult trans masculine people living in different urban areas around Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa, navigate and negotiate liveable lives in the spaces and places they live and move in. This study draws from the theoretical and analytical traditions of feminist geographies, queer phenomenology, black trans feminism and the analytic of racial capitalism. To this end, this study brings forth a critical analysis of urban subjectivities and urban spatialities and traces the rhythm, textures and contours of trans masculine lives and how gender, space, class, race/ism, and sexuality shape the conditions of their possibility and emergence within the two cities. The cities of Johannesburg and Cape Town are hailed for their extensive historical and contemporary formations of queer and gender non-normative socialities. Through narrative analysis, this study shows how the classed and racialised gender-sexuality-spatiality formation marking the topography of the two cities animates the discursive and material constitutions of trans masculinities. Further, the discursive and material conditions variably permit trans masculine lives and complicate the emergence and visibility of trans masculinities, particularly those that do not lend themselves to normative registers of gender and sexuality. Further, this study shows how trans masculine people strategically commit to expressions and practices of masculinities depending on the spatial context of their movements. These strategies make possible the safe negotiation and passage in different social spaces of the cities. Finally, this dissertation emphasises how spaces, places, and gender subjectivities become and are continually re/produced through practicing and embodying otherwise forms of being. Specifically, through the insistence on nurturing forms of sociality that displace the racialised gender and sexuality binary as the authoritative grammar and syntax for knowable and legible life.}},
author = {{Monakali, Esethu}},
isbn = {{978-91-8104-102-6}},
keywords = {{transgender studies; social theory; urban geography; gender studies}},
language = {{eng}},
publisher = {{Lund University}},
school = {{Lund University}},
title = {{Trans Masculine Geographies: On Navigating Urban Spaces and Negotiating Liveable Lives in Cape Town and Johannesburg, South Africa}},
url = {{https://lup.lub.lu.se/search/files/193337515/e-nailing_ex_esethu.pdf}},
year = {{2024}},
}