In this session, you work together in your groups to prepare for Seminar 2 and Seminar Paper 2. Åsa goes around the groups to help out and answer questions.

Kim is 12 years old and identifies as non-binary gender and they have recently told their family, friends, and teacher about this. Kim's closest family and friends are supportive, but Kim is also met with oppressive sex and gender normativity at school and other places. Kim gets support from their school counselor who encourages Kim to put down their thinking in writing. Excerpts from Kim's letter to the school counselor can be found here.

Incidently, the school counselor also studied global gender studies back in the day (!)

Kim is very interested to learn that there is such a thing as Global gender studies and that some of the problems they are facing are things that philosophers and other scholars have much to say about. Kim is also very interested to learn about the Hirjas in India. They therefore ask the school counselor to explain some of this knowledge.

Drawing on the obligatory texts from the last three lectures, what are helpful arguments, discussions, and concepts that could illuminate ways in which sex and gender norms can be oppressive and challenged to help Kim on their journey through childhood and adulthood? Alternatively, what about the Hirja case that could be useful for Kim to learn? Your group should argue from the point of view of a chosen text and refer to the other texts as you find them relevant and useful to your discussion.

For the group's Seminar Paper 2, pretend that you are the school counselor who writes a letter to Kim. In the letter, write down what your group arrived at in your discussion and readings for Seminar 2. Include references.

The text below is recommended, but not obligatory:

Dy Martinez, Angela. (2020). ‘Gender theory non-conforming. Critical realist feminism, trans politics, and affordance theory’, van Ingen, Michiel; Grohmann, Steph; Gunnarsson, Lena. (2020). Critical realism, feminism, and gender: A reader. Routledge studies in critical realism. (23 pages).