Sex Is As Sex Does book review

Posted July 19, 2022 by geograph in nonbinary, nonfiction, queer, review / 0 Comments

I received this book for free from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Sex Is As Sex Does book reviewSex Is as Sex Does by Paisley Currah
Published by NYU Press on May 31, 2022
Genres: Law / Gender & the Law, Political Science / Civil Rights, Social Science / LGBTQ+ Studies / Transgender Studies
Pages: 288
Format: ARC, eBook
Source: Netgalley

What the evolving fight for transgender rights reveals about government power, regulations, and the law

Every government agency in the United States, from Homeland Security to Departments of Motor Vehicles, has the authority to make its own rules for sex classification. Many transgender people find themselves in the bizarre situation of having different sex classifications on different documents. Whether you can change your legal sex to “F” or “M” (or more recently “X”) depends on what state you live in, what jurisdiction you were born in, and what government agency you’re dealing with. In Sex Is as Sex Does, noted transgender advocate and scholar Paisley Currah explores this deeply flawed system, showing why it fails transgender and non-binary people.

Providing examples from different states, government agencies, and court cases, Currah explains how transgender people struggle to navigate this confusing and contradictory web of legal rules, definitions, and classifications. Unlike most gender scholars, who are concerned with what the concepts of sex and gender really mean, Currah is more interested in what the category of “sex” does for governments. What does “sex” do on our driver’s licenses, in how we play sports, in how we access health care, or in the bathroom we use? Why do prisons have very different rules than social service agencies? Why is there such resistance to people changing their sex designation? Or to dropping it from identity documents altogether?

In this thought-provoking and original volume, Sex Is as Sex Does reveals the hidden logics that have governed sex classification policies in the United States and shows what the regulation of transgender identity can tell us about society’s approach to sex and gender writ large.Ultimately, Currah demonstrates that, because the difficulties transgender people face are not just the result of transphobia but also stem from larger injustices, an identity-based transgender rights movement will not, by itself, be up to the task of resolving them.

This book sure is terrifying in our Current Political Environment! (I am writing this review on June 25th, 2022, and queueing it ahead of time. How does the future look now?) I really recommend picking it up, and then also making plans to leave the country! Honestly, this book is a really important read right now, but it’s also scary, and it’s been sitting in my ‘to review’ box for ages. I will say that this is neither super academic but it’s also not super conversational. Four stars and also I need to go lie down. Booksweet link here.

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