I Want to Look Transgender”

Anti-Assimilation, Gender Self-Determination, and Confronting White Supremacy in the Creation of a Just Judaism

Bibliographic Data

ID8203580
AuthorsS J Crasnow (0000-0003-3135-2749, Rockhurst University, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume88
Issue4
Pages1026-1048
Publication date2020-12-31
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of the American Academy of Religion (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0002-7189 • E-ISSN: 1477-4585
PublisherOxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1093/jaarel/lfaa048
OpenAlexW3112706670
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited24

In this article, I consider transgender identity and white Jewish identity to argue that “passing” or normative assimilation is a trap, in that it extends the offer of privilege to individuals who can “successfully” conform within the confines of normativity, while leaving intact, or even reifying, the oppressive systems that are at work. As a corrective to normative assimilation, I consider alternative models for Jewish life offered by nonnormative Jewish communities that resist these oppressive norms. I further argue for the normativity and privileging of “passing” to be replaced with a non-hierarchical approach that lets all genders, all Jewish (and other) identities, be treated as valid or “real.”

Aesthetics · Assimilation (phonology) · Cultural assimilation · Epistemology · Ethnic group · Identity (music) · Jewish identity · Judaism · Normative · Political science · Privilege (computing) · Racism · Sociology · Theology · Transgender · White (mutation) · White supremacy · Anthropology · Gender Studies · Jewish and Middle Eastern Studies · Jewish Identity and Society · Law · LGBTQ Health, Identity, and Policy · Philosophy

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