A review by ferris_mx
Before We Were Trans: A New History of Gender by Kit Heyam

5.0

Thoughtful comparison of transgender people in today's culture with the available records from the past (including other cultures), that is careful to limit or discuss appropriation. Shows how the idea of transgender, or gender nonconforming, or non-heterosexual attraction can take different shapes and be valued/suppressed differently, indeed understood differently, and that it is difficult to discuss the meaning of transgender people etc. in those cultures, we just don't have the references or the vocabulary, but we can still see that the western "binary" is not universal.