Date of Award

1-1-2019

Document Type

Masters Thesis

Degree Name

M.A.

Organizational Unit

College of Arts Humanities and Social Sciences, Anthropology

First Advisor

Alejandro Ceron, Ph.D.

Keywords

Digital anthropology, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, LGBTQ, Memes, Minority stress, Resilience

Abstract

This work identifies transgender oriented image memes as a dataset that reflects transgender lived experience, minority stress, and resilience. In this analysis of transgender memes, four themes were identified: Community, Bodies, Transgender Experience, and The Broken System of Gender. Memes about bodies dealt not only with medical transition, but discussed the distinction between euphoria and dysphoria, as well as cisgender expectations of transgender bodies and bodily narratives. Memes about community included depictions and acts of validation, discussions of reclamations of power, and the queering of media to form senses of community representation. Transgender experience memes discussed the ways being transgender tints otherwise common experiences, such as interfacing with family, or coming into one's identity. Finally, the ways gender, as a social system, limit people and reinforce harmful hegemonic tendencies are discussed. Importantly, these memes demonstrated each element of minority stress, as well as resilience against such stressors.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.

Rights Holder

Ashley Lorraine Blewitt-Golsch

Provenance

Received from ProQuest

File Format

application/pdf

Language

en

File Size

186 p.

Discipline

LGBTQ studies, Cultural anthropology

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