A Sisterhood of Hope: How China's Transgender Sex Workers Cope with Intimate Partner Violence

Power and control, resistance and survival: A systematic review and meta-synthesis of the qualitative literature on intimate partner violence against transgender individuals

Transgender (trans) individuals experience intimate partner violence (IPV) at elevated levels compared to cisgender individuals. Traditional theoretical understandings of IPV as men's patriarchal domination of women, and later, broader theories in which IPV is conceptualized as the relatively privileged partner enacting domination over the relatively oppressed partner, do not fully capture the totality of IPV experiences, including how IPV is perpetrated against trans individuals. We conducted a systematic review and qualitative meta-synthesis of the qualitative and theoretical literatures on IPV against trans individuals (N = 37 articles and books) to generate novel IPV theory inclusive of trans individuals' experiences. We identified five major themes: (1) societal context of IPV, (2) IPV tactics and types, (3) help-seeking, (4) consequences of IPV, and (5) proposed interventions for victims. Synthesizing across themes, we offer a novel theoretical model that demonstrates how abusers can leverage structural discrimination and vulnerabilities against trans victims, regardless of the abuser's own identities. We identify individual power and control tactics abusers use, including identifying a category of IPV that we term leveraging vulnerability, which involves abusers weaponizing their own vulnerabilities to avoid accountability. Reducing IPV in trans communities requires expanding current IPV theory to include trans victims, recognition of a wider range of abuse tactics, and structural interventions that promote the respectful treatment of trans individuals. Our theoretical model of IPV "centers the margins" to make trans victims' experiences, and indeed all victims whose experiences fall outside normative scripts, more legible.

"Be the Dream Queen": Gender Performativity, Femininity, and Transgender Sex Workers in China

An under-researched aspect of transgender sex workers in China pertains to their desires and expressions of femininity. Male-to-Female (MTF) transgender sex workers are a high-risk population prone to depression and stress regarding body image, intimate relationships marked by violence, and social stigma, rendering them vulnerable to hate crimes and discrimination. Ethnographic data from in-depth interviews with 49 MTF transgender sex workers indicate that sex, gender and feminine desire are mutable in the construction of self and subjectivity. This study uses the conceptual framework of gender performativity, that is, gender is performative and distinct from physical bodies and binary classifications. It is not only an individual's normative gender expressions which are based on the sex assigned at birth, but it also reinforces the normative gender performances of the gender binary. This article argues that the 49 MTF transgender sex workers are embodiments of gendered performances, displaying femininity to ameliorate hate crimes and discrimination as well as reinforce the masculinity and sexuality of their clients and intimate sex partners. Embracing their femininity constitutes a self-help program, enabling them to build self-confidence and develop a positive self-image in the face of overwhelming social disapproval.