Abstract
This chapter discusses the purpose, process, and implications of body normalization in the United States. It traces the intricate link between tenets of conservative Christianity and homophobia/transphobia. Foucault’s theories present a means to analyze modes of internalized bodily normalization. There is a critique of forced conformity prior to being validated as moral citizens. Research partners’ recollections of gender performativity, segregation, normalization, and gender role conformity congeal to instantiate the deep-seeded pain and strife that they experienced as young children in school.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Bendroth, M. (1992). Fundamentalism and femininity: Points of encounter between religious conservatives and women, 1919–1935. Church History, 61(2), 221–233.
Bornstein, K. (1994). Gender outlaw: On men, women, and the rest of us. New York, NY: Routledge.
Butler, J. (1993). Bodies that matter: On the discursive limits of ‘sex’. New York, NY: Routledge.
Butler, J. (2004). Undoing gender. New York, NY: Routledge.
Butler, J. (2006). Gender trouble. New York, NY: Routledge.
Cook, D. (1993). The subject finds a voice: Foucault’s turn toward subjectivity. New York, NY: Peter Lang.
Cromwell, J. (1999). Transmen and FTMs: Identities, bodies, genders, and sexualities. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
Deacon, R. (2003). Fabricating Foucault: Rationalizing the management of individuals. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press.
Foucault, M. (1990 [1976]). The Care of the Self: The History of Sexuality: Volume III (R. Hurley, Trans.). New York, NY: Pantheon.
Foucault, M. (1990 [1985]). The use of pleasure: the history of sexuality: Volume II (R. Hurley, Trans.). New York, NY: Vintage Books.
Foucault, M. (1995 [1975]). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison (A. Sheridan, Trans.). New York, NY: Vintage Books.
Foucault, M. (2005 [1981–1982]). The hermeneutics of the subject (G. Burchell, Trans.). New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.
Halberstam, J. (2005). In a queer time and place: Transgender bodies, subcultural lives. New York: New York University Press.
Kimmel, M. (2000). The gendered society. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Lalonde, M. (2007). From critical theology to a critical theory of religious insight. New York, NY: Peter Lang.
Lather, P. (2004). Critical pedagogy and its complicities: A praxis of stuck places. Educational Theory, 48(4), 487–498.
MacNaughton, G. (2005). Doing Foucault in early childhood studies. New York, NY: Routledge.
Meyers, R. (2006). Why the Christian right is wrong. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Niditch, S. (1979). The wronged woman righted: An analysis of genesis 38. The Harvard Theological Review, 72(1/2), 143–149.
Nietzsche, F. (2006 [1887]). On the genealogy of morals. New York, NY: Barnes & Noble.
Nietzsche, F. (2006 [1895]). The antichrist, a criticism of Christianity (A. M. Ludovici, Trans.). New York, NY: Barnes & Noble.
Paley, V. (1986). Boys and girls: Superheroes in the doll corner. Chicago IL: The University of Chicago Press.
Pinto, H. (2003). Foucault, Christianity, and interfaith dialogue. London: Routledge.
Rose, D. (2005). Wrapped in blue. Scottsdale, AZ: Living Legacy Press.
Rowland, D. (2004). The boundaries of her body. Naperville, IL: Sphinx Publishing.
Rupp, L., & Taylor, V. (2003). Drag queens at the 801 cabaret. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.
Sullivan, A. L. (2009). Hiding in the open: Navigating education at the gender poles: A study of transgender children in early childhood (Order No. 3361853). Available from ProQuest Dissertations and Theses A&I (304843384). Retrieved from http://ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.ezaccess.libraries.psu.edu/docview/304843384?accountid=13158.
Thurer, S. (2005). The end of gender: A psychological autopsy. New York, NY: Routledge.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Sullivan, A.L., Urraro, L.L. (2019). Focusing the Lens: Theoretical Perspectives of Body Normalization. In: Voices of Transgender Children in Early Childhood Education. Critical Cultural Studies of Childhood. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-13483-9_7
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-13483-9_7
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-13482-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-13483-9
eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)