Reconceptualizing gender transitioning: recognition, flexibility, and safety in non-binary identity journeys

Rodriguez, S.M. ORCID: 0000-0002-3944-5600 (2025) Reconceptualizing gender transitioning: recognition, flexibility, and safety in non-binary identity journeys. Sociological Inquiry. ISSN 0038-0245 (In Press)

Text (Reconceptualizing Gender Transitioning _ Sociological Inquiry Accepted) - Accepted Version Pending embargo until 1 January 2100. Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (341kB)

Abstract

This article rethinks gender transitioning by centering non-binary experiences, which challenge the binary-driven narratives that dominate both medical and sociological frameworks of transition. Drawing on seven focus groups with 48 non-binary participants across multiple countries, this study explores three interrelated forms of transition: social, medical, and flexible aesthetic transitioning. Participants articulated transition as an ongoing, fluid process rather than a linear movement toward a fixed gendered endpoint. Their experiences challenge the assumption that transition must always align with transnormative narratives of dysphoria, permanence, or binary gender embodiment. Instead, participants engaged in practices that “undo” gender—whether through pronoun pooling, aesthetic shifts, or strategic gender visibility—in ways that reject rigid classification while still navigating safety, recognition, and legibility. This study builds on and critiques theories of doing, redoing, and undoing gender by demonstrating how non-binary transitioning disrupts dominant models of gender accountability, recognition, and self-determination. Ultimately, this work expands sociological understandings of gender transition by foregrounding non-linearity, fluidity, and the role of social, institutional, and embodied constraints in shaping non-binary identity formation.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2025 The Author
Divisions:	Gender Studies
Subjects:	H Social Sciences
Date Deposited:	09 Jun 2025 14:18
Last Modified:	09 Jun 2025 15:21
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/128332

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