ABSTRACT
This chapter explores representations of gender-variant identities in global media, analyzing the ambivalent tension between the “Westernization” of endogenous identity categories and the development of cross-national/-cultural modes of identification. While the remaking of endogenous gender identities in a Euroamerican model involves familiar dynamics of cultural imperialism, it simultaneously makes nonnormative gender identities legible in a global context and enables a transnational movement for recognition and acceptance. Further complicating this dynamic, both transnational media companies (often based in Europe or North America) and local national media participate in this remaking of “transgender” identities, raising important questions about the role of global media elites in this process of Westernization. Our argument centers this ambivalence, presenting three different cases representing three different sets of relations between global media and local identities: hijra in India, two-spirit communities in North America, and transgender rights activists in Namibia.
