In Judith Butler’s 1990 book Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, the gender theorist criticises and analyses the popular perception of gender as a binary (i.e., masculine or feminine). During this work, Butler introduces the concept of “gender performance”; in society, especially during the 80’s, it was important to conform to the normative gender roles, typically the one you were assigned at birth. Men play sports and have beards, while women wear dresses and like the colour pink. These were not things you did because of your gender, but instead were actions you partook in to reassure the world that you were, in fact, a big strong man, or a prim and proper lady.
Ever since the 90’s, the societal idea of gender has been breaking down year by year, from the popular 90’s fashion movement “lesbian chic” to that one Vogue cover with Harry Styles in a dress. The idea of “gender performance”, and the frequent subversion of the idea in modern queer media has become more mainstream.
As the subversion of traditional gender gains more traction within popular culture, the more people who typically stay within the traditional gender roles start breaking their personal conceptions of gender, which then brings in more mainstream observers, and it goes on and on, gaining more traction, like a genderqueer ouroboros beyblading down a hill.
But enough queer history. I’m no history lecturer, I’m a transgender music student with a large and fragile ego, so let’s talk about me. I’m Izzy, I’m 19, I go by she/they pronouns, and my gender identity is, as of writing this, a mess. A specific gender is often hard to articulate, which is why some choose to use metaphor instead, and mine being “that scribble you do to get a pen working”, “a dachshund with an anxiety disorder” and “Pig-Pen from the comic strip Peanuts™”.
Although I go by she/they pronouns, most people often don’t see that when they look at me. I present mostly masculine: I don’t shave my arm or facial hair as much as I would like, I’m often always running late so nail polish isn’t really a thing, my hair defaults to the gender-neutral-leaning-masculine afro, and I’m a lumbering 6ft (182cm) human with a figure similar to a used pillow. This bothered me for a while, and for a long time, I worried that I’ll never look like an actual woman, often referred to as “passing” in transgender communities.
However, as the filthy music student that I am, my perspective was changed by a song, namely Nvr Pass by trans folk-punk artist She/Her/hers, which features the lyrics “So I’ll probably never pass // Seems more like hiding than being who I am // And I’ll probably never pass // I’d rather live my life visibly trans”. The song continues on with the themes of not passing and gender performance, and the strange idea that trans people, who break away from the preconceptions of gender so radically, try to fit back into it in order for some sort of acceptance from a society that doesn’t entirely accept trans people in the first place. This idea of “passing”, as presented through Nvr Pass, along with Judith Butler’s book (or at least quotes on Wikipedia, my attention span isn’t long enough to read through academic jargon), has formed my opinion on gender performance, namely, dress up like a mess and prance around society like the horrid gender jester I am, being constantly booed off the metaphorical stage of society, but prancing around nonetheless, for nothing society can say will deter my diabolical gender gremlin demeanor.
(originally written for the Dircksey volume 7 edition 1)
