O gênero encarnado: modificações corporais e riscos à saúde de mulheres trans

Abstract

This dissertation discusses the body modification performed by trans women based on their narratives, collected through semi-structured interviews, and supplemented by participant observation conducted in their different spaces of sociability. Documentary analysis was conducted in order to contextualize and localize historically and socially the research object. Travestis, transsexual women, bombadeiras, plastic surgeons and the health team of a Rio de Janeiro university hospital are the main subjects of this investigation, unfolded into three different levels: (i) analysis of the discourses embodied in legal provisions, health policies, and technical/educational materials; (ii) analysis of travestis and transsexuals women´s narratives about their body modification trajectories ; (iii) and analysis of the knowledge and the practices of bombadeiras, plastic surgeons and healthcare professionals, focusing on their conceptions of body and gender and their perception of risk and health care. The data collected were organized and interpreted in the light of thematic content analysis, centering attention on subjects' narratives about their experiences, knowledge and practices. The results show that trans women begin to wonder their bodies, tastes and desires even in childhood, and that two facts seem indispensable to the decision of modifying their bodies: the emergence and acceptance of a transgender identity and the access to information on techniques, materials and people who can help them to "make a woman's body". The results also point to the fact that the trans women interviewed know the risks of clandestine use of industrial silicone and hormones, and also to the fact that the financial situation will define the risks to be taken in the process of body modification. Laws, ministry resolutions and ordinances which establish the health policy to trans women understand trans identities in a reductionist way, locating travestis and transsexuals in different health care alternatives. They often situate travestis in STD-AIDS prevention strategies, and transsexual women in strategies of access to sex reassignment surgery. These health policies, systems and services will foster the search by trans women for clandestine bombadeiras services, increasing their health risks.