Ex‐centric textualities and rehearsed narratives at a gender identity clinic in Brazil: Challenging discursive colonization. (June 2017)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Borba, Rodrigo
• Other Names: Milani Tommaso M. guestEditor.; Lazar Michelle M. guestEditor.
• Is Part Of: Journal of sociolinguistics. Volume 21:Number 3(2017)
• Page Start: 320
• Page End: 347
• Publication Date: 2017-06
• Subjects: Discursive colonization -- rehearsed narratives -- trans‐specific healthcare -- Brazilian Portuguese; Sociolinguistics -- Periodicals; 306.4405
• DOI: 10.1111/josl.12236
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1360-6441

Abstract

Abstract : Transsexuality is classified as a disorder by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, which shapes trans‐specific healthcare policies worldwide. This paper addresses the discursive effects the imposition of a psychiatric diagnosis impinges on the daily life of Brazilian gender identity clinics. It aims to assess the epistemological and political dynamics which make the global circulation of this manual possible and to understand the socialization trajectory that leads to the materialization of diagnostically driven, rehearsed narratives in a gender clinic in the global South. I argue that the globalization of medical epistemologies and their textualities homogenizes transsexuality and impels transsexual individuals and their doctors to engage in textually constrained interactional performances which make the construction of a trusting healthcare relationship virtually impossible. The paper, thus, discusses how a sociolinguistics from the South may contribute to foster (trans)autonomy in healthcare settings where epistemological imbalances produced by ex‐centric, globalized textualities constrain possibilities for agency.