Before We Were Trans
A New History of Gender
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Narrated by:
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Dr. Kit Heyam Ph.D
About this listen
A groundbreaking global history of gender nonconformity
Today’s narratives about trans people tend to feature individuals with stable gender identities that fit neatly into the categories of male or female. Those stories, while important, fail to account for the complex realities of many trans people’s lives.
Before We Were Trans illuminates the stories of people across the globe, from antiquity to the present, whose experiences of gender have defied binary categories. Blending historical analysis with sharp cultural criticism, trans historian and activist Kit Heyam offers a new, radically inclusive trans history, chronicling expressions of trans experience that are often overlooked, like gender-nonconforming fashion and wartime stage performance. Before We Were Trans transports us from Renaissance Venice to seventeenth-century Angola, from Edo Japan to early America, and looks to the past to uncover new horizons for possible trans futures.
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Critic reviews
"Before We Were Trans is a thoughtful, fun, and refreshingly readable romp through the history of gender variance before the invention of contemporary ‘transgender’ categories and concepts.—Susan Stryker, author of Transgender History
"Before We Were Trans provides much needed context, nuance, and breadth to our understanding of human gender diversity throughout history and in different cultures. While people who we might now call transgender or LGBTQIA+ have always existed, Kit Heyam shows how both individuals' and societies' understanding of sex, gender, and sexuality are situational, multifaceted, and constantly evolving.—Julia Serano, author of Whipping Girl and Sexed Up
"Before We Were Trans enlarges our understanding of trans histories and highlights the beauty, complexity, and contradictions of doing historical work - all in a voice that invites the reader in, and not only teaches us what to think about trans lives in the past, but how to think about them.—Hugh Ryan, author of The Women’s House of Detention
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For the last 20 years, John Corvino - widely known as the author of the weekly column "The Gay Moralist" - has traversed the country responding to moral and religious arguments against same-sex relationships. In this timely audiobook, he shares that experience - addressing the standard objections to homosexuality and offering insight into the culture wars more generally. Is homosexuality unnatural? Does the Bible condemn it? Are people born gay (and should it matter either way)? Corvino approaches such questions with precision, sensitivity, and good humor.
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Great book and great author
- By Anonymous User on 06-21-18
By: John Corvino
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The Honor Code
- How Moral Revolutions Happen
- By: Kwame Anthony Appiah
- Narrated by: Kwame Anthony Appiah
- Length: 6 hrs
- Unabridged
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In this groundbreaking work, Kwame Anthony Appiah, hailed as "one of the most relevant philosophers today" (New York Times Book Review), changes the way we understand human behavior and the way social reform is brought about. In brilliantly arguing that new democratic movements over the last century have not been driven by legislation from above, Appiah explores the end of the duel in aristocratic England, the tumultuous struggles over foot binding in 19th-century China, the uprising of ordinary people against Atlantic slavery, and much more.
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Horribly Boring
- By Merle N. Savedow on 02-10-21
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Down Girl
- The Logic of Misogyny
- By: Kate Manne
- Narrated by: Lauren Fortgang
- Length: 10 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Misogyny is a hot topic, yet it's often misunderstood. What is misogyny, exactly? Who deserves to be called a misogynist? How does misogyny contrast with sexism, and why is it prone to persist - or increase - even when sexist gender roles are waning? This book is an exploration of misogyny in public life and politics by the moral philosopher Kate Manne. It argues that misogyny should not be understood primarily in terms of the hatred or hostility some men feel toward all or most women. Rather, it's primarily about controlling, policing, punishing, and exiling the "bad" women.
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Five Star Book w/bad Narration
- By Cherrybomb on 02-08-19
By: Kate Manne
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Incarnations
- India in Fifty Lives
- By: Sunil Khilnani
- Narrated by: Vikas Adam
- Length: 16 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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For all of India's myths, its sea of stories and moral epics, Indian history remains a curiously unpeopled place. In Incarnations, Sunil Khilnani fills that space, recapturing the human dimension of how the world's largest democracy came to be. His trenchant portraits of emperors, warriors, philosophers, film stars, and corporate titans - some famous, some unjustly forgotten - bring feeling, wry humor, and uncommon insight to dilemmas that extend from ancient times to our own.
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Great listen, the author is biased
- By Anonymous User on 02-15-19
By: Sunil Khilnani
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The Hemingses of Monticello
- An American Family
- By: Annette Gordon-Reed
- Narrated by: Karen White
- Length: 30 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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This epic work tells the story of the Hemingses, whose close blood ties to our third president had been systematically expunged from American history until very recently. Now, historian and legal scholar Annette Gordon-Reed traces the Hemings family from its origins in Virginia in the 1700s to the family's dispersal after Jefferson's death in 1826. It brings to life not only Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson but also their children and Hemings's siblings, who shared a father with Jefferson's wife, Martha.
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Worried at first
- By Phillip Goodson on 12-13-08
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Confronting the Classics
- Traditions, Adventures and Innovations
- By: Mary Beard
- Narrated by: Lynne Jenson
- Length: 12 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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One of the world's leading historians provides a revolutionary tour of the Ancient World, dusting off the classics for the twenty-first century. Mary Beard, drawing on thirty years of teaching and writing about Greek and Roman history, provides a panoramic portrait of the classical world, a book in which we encounter not only Cleopatra and Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar and Hannibal, but also the common people - the millions of inhabitants of the Roman Empire, the slaves, soldiers, and women.
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Annoying narrator
- By Chris E on 02-27-15
By: Mary Beard
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The Creation of Anne Boleyn
- A New Look at England’s Most Notorious Queen
- By: Susan Bordo
- Narrated by: Barbara Rosenblat
- Length: 12 hrs
- Unabridged
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Part biography, part cultural history, The Creation of Anne Boleyn is a fascinating reconstruction of Anne’s life and an illuminating look at her afterlife in the popular imagination. Why is Anne so compelling? Why has she inspired such extreme reactions? What did she really look like? Was she the flaxen-haired martyr of Romantic paintings or the raven-haired seductress of twenty-first-century portrayals? (Answer: Neither.) And perhaps the most provocative questions concern Anne’s death more than her life.
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Most Enjoyable Biography--Win!
- By Roswatheist on 03-29-14
By: Susan Bordo
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Holy Sh*t
- A Brief History of Swearing
- By: Melissa Mohr
- Narrated by: Napoleon Ryan
- Length: 10 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Almost everyone swears, or worries about not swearing, from the two year-old who has just discovered the power of potty mouth to the grandma who wonders why every other word she hears is obscene. Whether they express anger or exhilaration, are meant to insult or to commend, swear words perform a crucial role in language. But swearing is also a uniquely well-suited lens through which to look at history, offering a fascinating record of what people care about on the deepest levels of a culture - what's divine, what's terrifying, and what's taboo.
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WHERE IS THE REFERENCE MATERIAL PDF????
- By justin on 07-08-14
By: Melissa Mohr
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The Man Who Invented Fiction
- How Cervantes Ushered in the Modern World
- By: William Egginton
- Narrated by: Michael Butler Murray
- Length: 8 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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In the early 17th century, a crippled, graying, almost toothless veteran of Spain's wars against the Ottoman Empire published a novel. It was the story of a poor nobleman, his brain addled from studying too many novels of chivalry, who deludes himself that he is a knight errant and sets off on hilarious adventures. That story, Don Quixote, went on to sell more copies than any other book beside the Bible, making its author, Miguel de Cervantes, the single most-read author in human history.
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Very Interesting and Informative, but Poorly Read
- By LCorSMT on 06-21-23
By: William Egginton
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God Believes in Love
- Straight Talk About Gay Marriage
- By: Gene Robinson
- Narrated by: Gene Robinson
- Length: 5 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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Story
From Gene Robinson, the Bishop of the Diocese of New Hampshire in the Episcopal Church, the first openly gay person elected (in 2003) to the historic episcopate and the world's leading religious spokesperson for gay rights and gay marriage, comes a groundbreaking book that lovingly and persuasively makes the case for same-sex marriage. It establishes a commonsense, reasoned, religious argument, made by someone who holds the religious text of the Bible to be holy and sacred.
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He nailed it!
- By Jamie on 12-27-12
By: Gene Robinson
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African Europeans
- An Untold History
- By: Olivette Otele
- Narrated by: Olivette Otele
- Length: 8 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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Conventional wisdom holds that Africans are only a recent presence in Europe. But in African Europeans, renowned historian Olivette Otele debunks this and uncovers a long history of Europeans of African descent. From the third century, when the Egyptian Saint Maurice became the leader of a Roman legion, all the way up to the present, Otele explores encounters between those defined as "Africans" and those called "Europeans."
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A fascinating overview of overlooked history
- By Scott GG Haller on 09-25-21
By: Olivette Otele
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wouldn't recommend unless you're informed
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simply life changing
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The T in LGBT
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Hey, I'm Jamie, a 29-year-old trans guy from the UK. I've been transitioning for 12 years now after realising I was trans (by accident!) at sixteen years old. I knew I was a boy since the age of four, but realised whilst growing up that I was different. It was only in my teens that I found the words to express who I was and what I needed to do. Since then, I've been on testosterone for more than a decade - I know, I can't believe it either - I've also had top and bottom surgery and legally changed my sex, so I know a few things about the transitioning process and being trans!
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Amazing
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He/She/They
- How We Talk About Gender and Why It Matters
- By: Schuyler Bailar
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- Length: 11 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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Anti-transgender legislation is being introduced in state governments around the United States in record-breaking numbers. Trans people are under attack in sports, healthcare, school curriculum, bathrooms, bars, and nearly every walk of life. He/She/They compassionately addresses fundamental topics, from why being transgender is not a choice and why pronouns are important, to more complex issues including how gender-affirming healthcare can be lifesaving.
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Perspective, educational, raw
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What listeners say about Before We Were Trans
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Lars Nioclás
- 02-12-24
My introduction to Queer History
I use queer as in abnormal to the status quo in the title. I don't remember where or who online recommended this book but I'm glad I saved it. I was hoping for a history book on possible trans history that was inclusive to marginalized groups of people besides just trans people, this is exactly that (coming from a white person and this book was written by a white person). The stories told by Kit were riveting and I can see myself in many of these vastly different humans. More than anything, the detail put on how we do not know if many of these people were trans but they could have been; they also could have been a plethora of different identities, including or excluding being gender queer. I have only an American public school education, learning true history, the history colonizers tried to erase, is so deeply comforting
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- Anonymous User
- 09-14-24
forgot to review this 09-13-25
yeah no this is pretty good
kinda surface level, but it was a good look at history
what i liked about it more than the actual historical analysis was the methods she described and the reasoning for why we should look at things from a certain lense
and it complemented my knowledge well as i read other books about queer feminist history
a bit disapointed tbh but i think that speaks more to the quality of the other books ive read so far and not to the lack of quality of this one. worth the buy imo
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- Michael D. Kilman
- 03-07-24
A fascinating and important work
The core idea, that gender has never been static and that there were always individuals who played with different concepts is a cornerstone of history. This book, which successfully challenges the inevitability of gender, is an important work of history and I can't recommend it enough. Very little of our modern worldview is inevitable and it's books like this that demonstrate humans have always been both curious and complex in the ways they move through the world.
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- Serena
- 10-29-24
FANTASTIC
This is an amazing book, my favorite to date. I see myself reflected in these pages
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- Modulus16
- 03-29-23
Lovely Broad Overview of Trans History
I really loved the broad overview of trans history, and the careful view of ensuring readers understand applying the same labels we use today to the past isn't always accurate, even if people in the past experienced very similar things people experience today. At the same time, helping us see the feelings we feel are valid and are not unique to just this brief period of time and people have been experiencing these feelings for generations.
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- Markus
- 01-10-24
I have learned SO much!
Thank you for sharing your wisdom. I am happy to continue a path of learning, growing, and loving.
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- Shannon Glenn
- 03-08-24
Understanding
I wasn't sure what to think at first, there was so much detail, good, but lots of information in the intro. The history, the quality of respect given to all peoples, the stories, were all fantastic. I appreciate the references and the facts, deeply. So good! It would be great if everyone read this book.
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- Sheen
- 07-06-24
Love the history & information
Well thought out book and great references. Love the history but lost me a little at the white part… nonetheless it’s a good read with great stories!
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- Daniel Hebert
- 04-11-23
The history we need right now
Loved it. Extremely informative, with fascinating insights into the intersections of trans history with gay history, racial history, colonial history, intersex history, culture, and spirituality.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Mr.
- 12-11-24
a meaningful yet flawed view on chronological relativism
the author does an excellent job of trying to Cobble together a history of transgenderism before it became a term in explaining gender nonconformity from various cultures strange to a colonialist white British author. I found the first chapter touching and felt very deeply the author's plight and struggles for growth but notice the author did not contact as far as I'm aware anyone from the cultures from which he is writing for official permission for example he did not contact any First Nations Representatives and I guess he feels entitled to do so because he's British. historically his analysis is roughly correct but his Judgment of individual historical characters is deeply flawed through his white privileged British colonialist background. and then in the last chapter explains that he does not run rough shot over history which to me didn't feel 100% correct having said that this is a deeply notable work that is worth reading but reading through the lens of someone who's read Empire of guns
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