Performative Linguistic Practices by Transgender Speakers

Abstract

This study explores the relationship between Japanese transgender people’s (especially transgender women) gender identities and their linguistic practices. This study rejects the essentialist view of gender and suggests the validity of a poststructuralist view of gender as a social construct through transgender people’s own words. It explores how transgender people’s fluid self-embodiment and a self-construction of identity can be observed through their performative linguistic experiences.