ABSTRACT
When transgender actress and political activist Laverne Cox appeared on the cover of Time at the end of May 2014, the historical moment was described as ‘the transgender tipping point’. The article suggests that the struggle for transgender justice as a civil rights movement is beginning to gain traction in terms of both legislative changes and growing social acceptance (Steinmetz, 2014). Indeed, it appears that trans and non-binary struggles in the USA are regaining the significant organizational and sociopolitical foothold that was lost in the mainstreaming of ‘gayness’ since Stonewall. In diverse media sites, including social media and mainstream entertainment television, transgender and non-gender-conforming people are speaking out in defence of their civil rights and challenging society’s entrenched and binarized understandings of gender and sexuality.
