ABSTRACT
This chapter disentangles the web of terms that knots together the medical naming of transsexualism, the mediatised practices of trans sex and what might today be recognised as the multiplicities of trans sexualities. Carla A. Pfeffer has named trans sexualities ‘a lacuna’ in theorisations of sexuality and desire (2014: 598). For a growing number of (trans) scholars, trans sexualities, sex and their mediatised representations are vital academic and political concerns. Trans sex and sexuality reveals the myriad ways in which gender and sexuality are interdependent and mutually constitutive, moving forward studies of gender and sexuality in practice, in policy and even philosophically. Close analysis of erotic (self-)representations brings to light the possibility of experiencing both sexual fluidity and stability, resolving a long-standing impasse in feminist and queer approaches to sexuality (Steinbock, 2011). In this chapter I will focus on two domains that provide insight into the cultural shifts around how trans sexualities are mediatised: transfeminine activism in queer pornography and, by way of conclusion, some notes on news coverage of how to talk about trans sex.
