The Joys and Ambivalences of Becoming: Young Trans and Non-binary People in COVID-19


Ash Catonio, University of Toronto

Transitions to high school and university mark pivotal moments in the lives of young people – as new experiences and decisions contribute to their growing sense of identity and selfhood. This time is especially ponderous for young people who identify as trans and/or non-binary as they face unique realities in connection to their emerging non-conforming sense of self. Research on the lives of young trans and non-binary people has noted the many obstacles they face and violences they are subject to in connection to these identities. From discrimination in school (Day et al. 2018), to stigmatization in healthcare settings (Meadow 2018), low familial support (DeChants et al. 2022; Robinson 2018), and heighted harassment and violence (Lorenzetti et al. 2017; Atteberry-Ash et al. 2020), many experience disproportionate levels of negative mental health outcomes, suicidal attempts, suicide and homelessness (Johns et al. 2019). While acknowledging the necessity of this work, such deficit-based framings often construct the lives of these young people as “unliveable” (Westbrook 2021). Instead, by employing a desire-based framework, this paper counters framings of young trans and non-binary people as always already vulnerable and ‘at-risk,’ by instead focusing on their “complex personhood” (Gordon 2008). This focus opens the door for explorations of identity that center joy, desire, and resistance, alongside realities of inequality and violence (Shuster and Westbrook 2022; Gilbert et al. 2018; Fine and McClelland 2006). In this, I ask: What emotions do young trans and non-binary people experience in connection to how they negotiate their emerging sense of identity? To answer this question, I analyze 12 interviews with young (16-21 year-old) gender diverse participants in Toronto. Through the exploration of participants’ emerging sense of self, this paper contributes to the literature centering queer and trans joy and desire-based approaches to gender and sexual diversity. It forwards an epistemology in sociology that not only reorients us towards asking different questions about marginalized communities, but also towards interpreting our data using a framework of complex personhood.

This paper will be presented at the following session: