Emily Cousens
Dr
Birkbeck, University of London
The Archive of 1970s Trans Community Print Culture as Second Wave Feminist Theory
Dominant scholarly stories of second wave feminism equate the period either explicitly, or by reference to its presumed biological essentialism, with trans-exclusionary feminism. Opening the archive of second wave feminism to include trans community print culture this paper explores the overlooked contributions of trans feminists writing during the 1970s. It argues that trans community produced print publications comprise a rich set of embodied and affective theorising on sex and gender and offer valuable challenges to cisnormativity. Not only were trans people active in second wave feminism, they were also contributing some of its most enduring philosophical and intellectual arguments. Entering the archive of second wave trans feminist print culture reveals nuanced non-binary perspectives on sex and gender developed by trans people in the 1970s. These deserve to be consulted as epistemically valuable for feminism and trans studies in the present.