Feminist and Queer Theories: The Response to the Social Construction of Gender

Abstract

One of the obvious trends seen in our interview study was that the responses regarding gender roles, gender identity, and sexuality became more nuanced and elaborated, as one moved from the straight to the gay/lesbian to the transgender interview participants. Gay/lesbian and transgender participants were more likely to have thought about the socially constructed and embodied aspects of gender and sexual identity, about the dynamic interactions between gender and sexuality, and about their own strategies for self-constructing their gender and sexual identities in the context of living in a social environment that defines and enforces norms of gender and sexual behaviors and appearances.