?Trans America places the recent conversation about trans issues in its historical context, in impressive depth. Sweeping across the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, Barry Reay provides an accessible yet comprehensive guide to the important people, places and trends, in the USA and beyond ? ideal for anyone who wants to understand what came before the ?Transgender Tipping Point?.?Juliet Jacques, author of Trans: A Memoir?The richly varied nature of the current trans movement is so beautifully explored and uncovered in Barry Reay's new book. A pleasure to read.?Fayette Hauser of The Cockettes?This is an admirable contribution to trans history by a highly respected scholar. It is a story of shifting categorizations, often highly medicalized and limiting, but above all a narrative of agency as trans people pushed definitions to the limit, bent them, and broke them and increasingly spoke for themselves in a powerful, if not always singular, voice. It?s a major achievement and deserves to become a classic.?Jeffrey Weeks, London South Bank University?This book is of very high quality. Reay is a major scholar in the field and writes with great authority and assurance.?Thomas Laqueur, University of California at Berkeley?Trans America is a thoughtfully written and impressively researched treasure trove of resources for those interested in understanding the history of transgender people and ideas in the USA.?Eric Plemons, Social History of Medicine
List of IllustrationsIntroduction1 Before Trans2 The Transsexual Moment3 Blurring the Boundaries4 Backlash5 The Transgender TurnConclusionNotesIndex
Barry Reay is Professor Emeritus of History and former Keith Sinclair Chair at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. A leading historian of the social and cultural history of sex and gender, his books include the Polity publications Sex Before Sexuality and Sex Addiction: A Critical History.