Trans children and the necessity to complicate gender in primary schools

Abstract

Trans children have become more visible in primary schools in recent years. Arising from a qualitative study with twelve parents of trans children (aged 5–13) and six primary school educators in Ireland, this paper explores how trans children experience two very different forms of celebratory rituals that are entangled with life in primary schools: birthday celebrations and religious rituals. These rituals are experienced as moments of affectively intense rupture for trans children, moments that shunt the violence of the disciplinary framework of gender into view. Informed by theorizing on gender norms and affect, this paper makes visible the cruel conundrum of navigating a gender frame that acts violently but at the same provides the very terms through which trans identities can be asserted and apprehended. Ultimately, this paper provides an empirical illustration of the messiness of gender and argues for the necessity to complicate the framework of gender in primary schools.