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Pre-teenage Transgender Children: Their Families and Education

Faulkner, Jamie
http://orcid.org/0000-0001-5072-6983
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1435244358

Abstract Details

2015, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, EDU Teaching and Learning.
This qualitative study focuses upon the experiences of pre-teenage transgender (PTT) children as they negotiate their identities with their families and educational institutions. PTT children are an at risk population in U.S. public schools and frequently experience a lack of support and understanding from their families. Transgender identities are often subsumed into the broader discourse of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) identities. The lack of awareness of and support for PTT children is a substantial problem within education and leads to problems such as verbal and physical harassment. This qualitative study has two principle foci. The first is to determine how an analysis of historical discourses of transgender informs our current understanding of this concept. Using a Foucauldian discourse analytical style it examines and questions the basis for transgender being categorized as a psychiatric condition. The second is to understand how PTT children negotiate their identities with their families and schools, and to see how their unique identities highlight gender inequities. These questions were addressed by analyzing the data in the interviews conducted with the study participants using Ahmed’s cultural politics of fear, Goffman’s stigma, and Connell’s doing transgender. The first foci area of this study found that transgender as a concept has been shaped more by normalizing heteronormative and cisnormative discourses than scientific facts, and that researchers should reflect the negative impact of discourses on transgender identities when conducting research. It found the contention that transgender was a disordered form of gender identity development, when no ordered or normal form exists to be highly problematic, along with the fact that transgender still remains a psychiatric condition. It found the argument that the treatment of PTT children is unethical to be largely unsubstantiated and that in fact treatment constitutes a firmer ethical standpoint than non-treatment. The second foci area of this study found that PTT children had an early awareness of how their identities are stigmatized, but were nonetheless reported as being happier since their gender transition. PTT children became aware of their gender identity from as young as 2 and often felt pressured by society to conform to stereotypical gender norms. Finally, PTT children experienced harassment in schools, faced gender segregated schools that were hard to fit into, and families faced schools that in general were uninformed and unprepared to handle a PTT child. It recommends that educators minimize gender segregation in schools, implement school policies that offer specific protections for gender identity and gender expression, actively incorporate anti-bullying training into school culture, and finally develop guidelines for introducing transgender students to schools. Finally it suggests families incorporate a child-led form of parenting, develop community networks of support, and become aware of the current medical implications and realities for PTT children.
Mollie Blackburn, PhD (Advisor)
Cynthia Tyson, PhD (Committee Member)
Antoinette Errante, PhD (Committee Member)
440 p.
Early Childhood Education; Education; Education Policy; Elementary Education; Endocrinology; Gender; Gender Studies; Glbt Studies; Health; Higher Education; Individual and Family Studies; Middle School Education; Multicultural Education; Pedagogy; Teacher Education
Pre-teenage transgender children; transgender; MtoF; FtoM; Hormone blockers; medical intervention; Gender identity; Education; Pedagogy; School policies; harassment; bullying; gender segregation;

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Faulkner, J. (2015). Pre-teenage Transgender Children: Their Families and Education [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1435244358

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Faulkner, Jamie. Pre-teenage Transgender Children: Their Families and Education. 2015. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1435244358.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Faulkner, Jamie. "Pre-teenage Transgender Children: Their Families and Education." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2015. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1435244358

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1435244358
1,262
© 2015, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.