User:Zmao24/Media portrayals of transgender people

Literature

See also: List of fictional trans characters § Literature

In February 2016, John Hansen of The Guardian noted that for the past few years, "YA and middle grade books with trans main characters remain sorely lacking," and as such Hansen pointed to ten transgender authors who have trans characters in their novels. Even so, Dahlia Adler of Barnes & Noble noted that literature with transgender protagonists is quickly evolving with more "trans authors in the spotlight." Christina Orlando Book Riot wrote that one of the biggest caps in the publishing industry is "transgender fiction about the trans experience," further stating that "trans stories always seem to be a second thought," pushed aside so that other "palatable narratives" can take its place. Additionally, Hannah Weiss of Insider wrote, in 2020, that readers can find a "find a vast variety of fantasy and sci-fi stories" which star non-binary and trans characters, most of which are written by trans people.

Reviewers for The Guardian, Barnes & Noble, Insider, and Book Riot highlight some of the same books which transgender characters. These include Everett Maroon's The Unintentional Time Traveler (2014), Pat Schmatz's Lizard Radio (2015), Meredith Russo's If I Was Your Girl (2016), April Daniels' Dreadnought (2017), Anna-Marie McLemore's When the Moon Was Ours (2016), C. B. Lee's Not Your Villain (2017). Barnes & Noble further points to Matthew J. Metzger's Spy Stuff (2016) while Insider highlights Akwaeke Emezi's Pet (2019), Rich Larson's Annex (2018), Amy Rose Capetta's The Brilliant Death (2018), and a collection of stories titled All Out: The No-Longer-Secret Stories of Queer Teens throughout the Ages (2018) which are edited by Saundra Mitchell. Book Riot and The Guardian listed 12 other books with transgender characters and themes.

Painting

The portrayal of transgender people in painting is difficult to identify because painting is a visual art in which the viewer is only able know what the eye can see, especially in earlier times due to the lack of openness and terminology in society. It is hard to determine a transgender individual in a painting because the genitals, the fundamental feature that doctors use to assign biological sex, are oftentimes not depicted. Before the 20th century, visual representations of cross-dressing were extremely rare and scarce information is known about individuals who broke gender norms in earlier eras; the LGBT movement had not happened and LGBTQ+ individuals were not as widely accepted in Western culture. Portrayals of non-conforming in visual art forms have been around forever, and these art forms are increasingly becoming more accepted and visible in society.

According to David Getsy, an art history professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, "The historical record has so little in it around evidence of transgender lives - or what we would now call transgender lives - and the evidence we do have is couched in oppression and negativity." He also considers the one story narrative of history that erases evidence of oppressed identities and how the limited evidence that we do have of such works is just a piece of a greater archival records that have been lost.

The oil on canvas "Alonso Díaz de Guzmán" c. 1626, attributed to Juan van der Hamen could be considered one of the first "trans" portraits in the history of Baroque art. The painting was a depiction of Alonso Díaz de Guzmán, born as a girl with the name Catalina de Erauso. Erauso wrote an autobiography, telling the story of her lived experience lived experience as a young girl, dressed as a man, who ran away from her convent, ultimately how Erauso was given the nickname "Lieutenant Nun." Art collective Cabello/Carceller has attempted to accumulate different visual media with the goal of challenging the heteronormative representations in visual culture since 1992 and created a "new" portrait of Erauso. The exhibition, an analogue-digital portrait gallery, featuring the painting by Cabello/Carceller as well as the historical portraits dating back to 1625, was on view in Akuna Zentro in 2022.

Giuseppe Bonito "II Femminiello" 1740-1760, oil on canvas

Displayed in the Portland Art Museum and seen as one of the earliest paintings of gender fluidity painted sometime between 1740-1760, Giuseppe Bonito's "II Femminiello" is a medium oil on canvas measuring 77.1 by 63.2 centimeters. "Femminielli" was directly translated to "little female-men" to refer to cross-dressers in 18th century Italian society. The term was associated with the "third sex" and was accepted by society, even used with endearment toward these cross-dressers, mostly coming from poverty stricken neighborhoods that were seen to bring good luck, combining the strength of both males and females. The term "femminiello" is not to be directly compared to the term transgender but as a separate somewhat parallel term used in Italian culture. Known to work in the genre "pittora ridicula" (ridiculous paintings), Bonito's intentions of his depiction of the "femminiello" is unclear. According to Sotheby, "in these pictures, artists chose subjects from the lower classes and depicted them in mildly amusing ways or situation, and often with moralizing overtones."

Early portrayals of non-conforming in paintings not only appeared in Western paintings but also from all other places. Hosoda Eisui's "Wakashu with a Shoulder-Drum" (1769-1770) is a notable piece that has only recently deserved the recognition it deserves. "Wakashu" were recognized as their own gender, determined by sex, age, physical appearance, and the role they played in the sexual hierarchy that was present in the Edo Period. In art, they were portrayed as indeterminable gendered people, but in real life, they were seen as desirable to both men and women. The term described males who had not completed the "genpuku," the Japanese coming-of-age traditional ritual who were oftentimes identified by their hairstyle, "a slightly shaven crown flanked by side locks," which differed from a man who would have no crown, only featuring side locks. During the Edo period (1603-1868), gender was not binary in Japan, and gender dynamics were also influenced by age and appearance, not just sex. However, since the making of this painting and the 1700s, gender relationships have changed in Japan due to Western colonization during the late 19th century. At the Royal Ontario Museum, "Wakashu with a Shoulder-Drum" was displayed from May 27 to November 27, 2016 in "A Third Gender: Beautiful Youths in Japanese Edo-Period Prints and Paintings," the first exhibition in North America to highlight gender dynamics, featuring the Wakashu, in the Edo Period of Japan.

"Chevalier de'Eon" by Thomas Stewart, after Jean Laurent Mosnier, oil on canvas 1792

"Chevalier d'Eon" originally painted by French artist Jean-Laurent Mosnier (1743-1808) and presented at the Royal Academy in 1791, was recreated by Thomas Stuart. The painting portrayed Chevalier d'Eon, born as Charles Geneviève Louis Auguste André Timothée d'Éon de Beaumont. Despite conservative gender norms in the 18th century, she was accepted as a woman into society, serving the King and playing a key role in negotiating peace that ended the Seven Years War. Not only was she accepted into society, a rare celebration for the LGBTQ+ community at the time, she was also praised and celebrated, featured in other paintings such as "The Fencing Match between Chevalier de Saint-George and the Chevalier d'Eon" by Alexandre-Auguste Robineaue c. 1787-1789.

Ria Brodell's 2016 piece "Captain Wright" c. 1834, gouache on paper at 11 by 17 inches is featured in the collection at the Davis Museum at Wellesley College. Mr. Wright and his wife lived at Kennington Lane with a respectable reputation, known for his jovial personality, love for rabbits, and frequent presence at the nearby pubs. On Sunday, December 14, 1834, an extraordinary discovery was published in the London newspaper, The Bell's New Weekly Messenger; Mr. Wright's body, examined after his death, had possessed woman genitalia, marking his biological sex as female. Mr. Wright was referred to as a "creature" in the article, and people speculated the motivation behind his identity. Ria Brodell created a series of paintings called "Butch Heroes," attempting to reveal names in our history "who were assigned female at birth but whose gender presentation was more masculine than feminine." She highlights, "thoguh some could be identified today with the terms 'lesbian,' 'transgender,' 'nonbinary,' 'genderqueer,' etc., these myriad LGBTQIA terms were not available to them during their lifetimes. Since it is impossible ot knwo exactly how each person would self-identify using today's terminology, I view this project as an ongoing effort to document a shared history within the LGBTQIA community."

Comics/Manga

See also: List of fictional trans characters § Comics

According to a study by Erik Melander in 2005, at least 25% of webcomic creators were female. This percentage was significantly larger than the number of successful women creating print comics at the time, and the number may have been even higher, as a certain percentage of contributors were unknown. In 2015, 63% of the top 30 comic creators on webcomic conglomerate Tapastic were female. In 2016, 42% of the webcomic creators on Webtoon were female, as was 50% of its 6 million active daily readers. Girls with Slingshots creator Danielle Corsetto stated that webcomics are probably a female-dominated field because there is no need to go through an established publisher. ND Stevenson, creator of Nimona and Lumberjanes, noticed that webcomics predominantly feature female protagonists, possibly to "balance out" the content of mainstream media. Corsetto noted that she has never encountered sexism during her career, though Stevenson described some negative experiences with Reddit and 4Chan, websites outside of their usual channels. However, there exist a large amount of openly gay and lesbian comic creators that self-publish their work on the internet. These include amateur works, as well as more "mainstream" works, such as Kyle's Bed & Breakfast. According to Andrew Wheeler from Comics Alliance, webcomics "provide a platform to so many queer voices that might otherwise go undiscovered," and Tash Wolfe of The Mary Sue has a similar outlook on transgender artists and themes.

DC Comics introduced Alysia Yeoh as the first major transgender character written in a contemporary context in a mainstream comic book. She is a fictional character created by writer Gail Simone for the Batgirl ongoing series, and is Barbara Gordon’s best friend, and a transgender woman. They went on to premiere the first ever transgender wedding in Batgirl #45. Marvel Comics has followed suit, with writer Al Ewing adapting popular character Loki to have a fluid gender identity.

Transgender themes are also found in manga. One notable example is Wandering Son, which deals with issues such as being transgender, gender identity, and the beginning of puberty. Gary Groth of Fantagraphics Books said in an interview he licensed Wandering Son because "it's not a typical choice for a manga title published in the U.S. and it's not typical subject matter for comics in general," saying that the subject is "perfectly legitimate ... for literature—or comics." Web comics have also included trans characters, with award-winning series Questionable Content adding trans woman Claire Augustus in comic 2203.