Exploring Transsexualism
Book Details
- Publisher : Routledge
- Published : 2005
- Cover : Paperback
- Pages : 100
- Category :
Psychoanalysis - Catalogue No : 19727
- ISBN 13 : 9781855753327
- ISBN 10 : 1855753324
Also by Colette Chiland
Sex Makes the World Go Round
Price £32.99
Free UK Delivery over £25
In the case of sexuality and gender, can whatever is in the mind be changed, perhaps with help of psychotherapy or otherwise, rather than opt for external surgery? Is psychotherapy treatment powerless in the case of transsexuals?
This intriguing volume is a work by a French psychoanalyst who has worked with many transsexuals. It is a useful addition to the debate on transsexuals and the definitions of sex and gender.
The word 'transsexualism' was coined in 1953 and although transsexuals and intersexed people had existed for much longer, surgery to reassign one's sex is a relatively recent phenomenon. Transsexuals feel that the opposite sex to their biological one is their true identity - their true body and self. The idea of 'hormonal and surgical sex reassignment' appeals to them; it would biologically put right what they already know to be right and true in their minds. The author discusses the problems of 'reassigning' one's sex and argues that surgery cannot fix the situation.
Transsexualism as a result of interaction with environment in infancy is seen as more shameful option compared to something biological happening to the body while in utero. If this condition is seen as something merely biological, it doesn't mark the person in question as psychologically ill or unbalanced.
This introductory text helps in looking at this difficult, even taboo, issue from various angles. It acknowledges the difficulty of the subject and warns the readers against judgements being made without being informed of all the sides of the story.
'Transsexuals put us to the test. We cannot remain indifferent to their suffering, nor can we stay aloof as they challenge us with the question that means so much to them. We respond with our own subjectivity: to say that any one human being is a man or woman is initially a statement about surface criteria; conformity to social criteria that vary according to cultural patterns; deep-down psychological criteria that vary according to the expectations each of us has.
The various kinds of discourse that surround transsexuals are part of the diversity of the universe of discourse, in which, whatever our willingness to do so, we can never find common ground. We have no choice but to make a personal choice.'
- From the Introduction
About the Author(s)
Colette Chiland is Professor Emeritus at René Descartes University of Paris; Psychiatrist-in-chief at the Alfred Binet Center and a Training Analyst of the Paris Psychoanalytical Society. She is also an Honorary President of the International Association for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Allied Professions (IACAPAP). She has written numerous books and contributed papers to various journals. Colette read philosophy and psychology, then medicine and psychiatry at the University of Paris. She taught clinical psychology at La Sorbonne, then at Université Paris Descartes, and is training analyst at the Paris Psychoanalytical Society.
Customer Reviews
Our customers have given this title an average rating of 5 out of 5 from 1 review(s), add your own review for this title.
Willow Arune on 08/02/2005
(5 out of 5)
A truly fantastic book!!!
From the viewpoint of transsexual activists, perhaps the most politically incorrect book on the subject, but from any other view the most insightful and "tell-it-like-it-is" view of transexuality available today, perhaps ever. It does not pander to the subject, but treats it in the cold light of reality.
As a transexual woman who can deal with reality, I am overjoyed that a book finally exists that dispells the mythology concerning the subject.
Chiland easily deals with the most prevalent of TS statements ("I am a woman")and treats them with respect, but also with the logic that most ignore. She points to the finacial aspect of SRS as a motivation for some doctors and the need to face the question of SRS directly.
Her book is unique, for it does not avoid the basic questions posed by transsexuality but rather addresses each in turn, with a logic that will force all but the zealots to think.
Caregivers need to read this; transsexual patients need to read this. This book says what it real, not what is myth. Transsexuals who believe in the mythology will be irrate for it does not offer blind support(although it certainly offers compassion) and questions some of their most basic and firmly held beliefs, It questions what has become a standard medical answer in North America and elsewhere.
The transsexual "lobby" has become active in the past years, attacking without mercy those who differ with their mythology. J. Michael Bailey of Northwestern University has been a favoured target. As this book becomes known, it shall be attacked by those who wish us all to follow the demanded cant of "I am woman","I am man". Some may regard it as an attack akin to Janice Raymonds "Transexual Empire" of long ago. It is far from that. While Chiland questions the very foundation of transsexulity and Moneys seperation of "sex" and "gender", there is none of the questionable scholarship and feminist rhetoric to be found in these pages. This book is firmly based in experience and logic.
I suspect that many American readers will react much as they did when France opposed the War in Iraq, with emotional zeal and blind adherance to their view. That is a shame, for Chiland deserves and very careful consideration by all who are or deal with transexual patients. She raises questions that demand answers not blind following of a possibly misguided solution.
The truth hurts. For some, this book will hurt greatly. For those who pause and reflect rationally, it will raise issues long put to the back of the mind, uncomfortable issues that many elect to ignore. Issues that have been ignored for far too long...
A major step in our understanding of this difficult subject.
A Transsexual Woman
Willow Arune
pangarune@shaw.ca
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