Description: Through an examination of the experience of transsexuals, this book enhances understanding of how gender can and does function in complex and subtle ways. This book investigates the pressures and motivations to conform to expected gender roles, and the ways in which these are affected by social, educational, and professional status.
Brief description: Joanne B. Eicher was Regents Professor Emerita at the University of Minnesota. Joanne was Editor-in-Chief, Encyclopedia of Dress and Fashion (Bloomsbury and OUP); Series Editor, Dress, Body, Culture (Bloomsbury) and Dress and Fashion Research (Bloomsbury); Editor, Global Trade and Cultural Authentication: The Kalabari of the Niger Delta; and Co-Author, The Visible Self (Fairchild); Dress and Gender (Berg); Dress and Ethnicity (Berg); Beads and Beadmakers (Berg); Mother, Daughter, Sister, Bride (National Geographic); and a wide variety of published articles in professional journals and chapters in books.
Review Quotes: "(Griggs') writing is complex, subtle and serious, but the language is never technical or over-academic, with the result that almost anyone could enjoy, and learn something from, this book, from the full-on academic to the just plain interested. And its clear and wide-ranging references to academic sources will guarantee its inclusion on undergraduate reading lists. [...] The book is a reminder that we all, expert and amateur alike, have more to learn. Griggs' perspicacious and nuanced insights on gender are relevant to everyone, male and female, not just to transsexuals and academics . . . Due to her personal experiences, she is uniquely placed to explore the tragedy of gender, as well as its comedy, as she has privileged insight into the different way the sexes are treated." --Costume