ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews knowledge and practice that social workers need in order to establish competency in working with transgender and gender non-conforming people. It emphasizes the language, terminology, and vocabulary of trans-culture rather than the language or terminology used by social services and health care providers. Developmental theorists often make a strong connection between physical or biological developmental theory and psychosocial concerns. Transgender and gender non-conforming individuals typically pose a challenge to public space and how it is made available via the use and misuse of gender. Transgender youth typically confront minimum-age requirement barriers for access to services, requirements for parental consent, and medical ethics issues. In many major urban areas such as New York City, Washington, DC, Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Seattle, resources are being used to develop peer-driven intervention within the trans-communities. The cultural violence that the gender binary supports affects all of us in some way or another – trans-people and non-trans-people.
