Fear of the Trannies

On Filmic Phobia of Transvestism in the New Latin American Cinema

Dados Bibliográficos

ID3034337
AutoresGustavo Subero (0000-0001-6075-5948, autor correspondente), Gustavo Subero Gustavo Subero
Ano2008
Volume43
Fascículo2
Páginas159-179
Data de publicação2008-01-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoLatin American Research Review (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 0023-8791 • E-ISSN: 1542-4278
EditoraProject MUSE (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1353/lar.0.0017
OpenAlexW2161596756
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas6
Referências citadas23

The transvestite, as a figure that contests both heteronormativity and machismo, has remained in the cinema of Latin America, unlike its literature, a rather unexplored theme. Although some films have attempted to deal with such a figure, they have devoted very little diegetic time either to the process of physical and psychological transformation from man to woman or to showing transvestism as the externalization of the character's self-perceived gender identity. This article aims to show that the lack of on-screen transvestism in Arturo Rip-stein's El lugar sin límites (1978), Miguel Barreda's Simón, el gran varón (2002), and Karim Aïnouz's Madame Satã (2002) is caused by a kind of heteronormative filmic fear to depict the fluidity of sexuality beyond the biologically oriented binary man-woman. I suggest that Latin American audiences do not respond positively to transvestitic images (i.e., the cinematic acknowledgment of transvestism) because they transgress the fixity of gender roles within heteronormativity

Art · Art history · Heteronormativity · Human sexuality · Latin Americans · Linguistics · Movie theater · Psychoanalysis · Sociology · Transvestism · Cuban History and Society · Gender and Feminist Studies · Gender Studies · Philosophy · Psychology · Sexuality, Behavior, and Technology