ABSTRACT
The definition of gender dysphoria provided by the American Psychiatric Association is from the latest edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. At present, the DSM is one of the most influential psychiatric texts, as it contains the most comprehensive account of diagnostic categories used by the profession, which is further legitimized by the influence of the pharmaceutical industry in promoting the diagnostic model and biomedical treatments of emotional distress. Unfortunately, due to the definition of 'abnormality' centring heavily on thegroups, they are more likely to be the focus of psychological and psychiatric theories, research and treatment. The production and authentication of dominant 'norms' feeds into a culture where nonconformity is punished through ridicule, harassment, exclusion and violence. Psychology and psychiatry's oppression of individuals has been conceptualized as 'sanism'or sometimes 'mentalism'. Within transgender activist spaces, and people's descriptions of their own identity, there are just as many terms- such as 'transexual', 'transgender' and 'genderqueer'.
