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Introduction -- Coming out (or not) as trans -- Transgender experience in LGBTQIA communities -- Transgender experience in cisgender realities -- Transgender experiences with religion -- Transgender experience with medical science -- Conclusion -- Methodological appendix -- Bibliography -- Index.

This article examines processes wherein Gay Christian men transition from closeted religious people to openly Gay Christians. Based on 36 months of fieldwork in a southeastern lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) Christian church and a synthesis of research into LGBT Christian experience over the past 25 years, we conceptualize these transformations as a moral career consisting of (1) essentializing religious belief and practice (2) emotionalizing early religious experience, (3) spiritualizing coming out of the closet and religion, and (4) sexualizing coming back to religious participation. In so doing, Gay Christian men interpreted the stages of their lives as an ongoing sexual–religious process wherein they became the spiritual and sexual beings they believed God always wanted them to be. In conclusion, we draw out implications for understanding (1) the moral career of a Gay Christian, (2) the usefulness of conceptualizing religious and sexual transitions as elements of a moral career, and (3) the reproduction of religious privilege.

This article outlines a generic process in the reproduction of inequality we name cisgendering reality. Based on 114 responses from transgender Mormons and systematic reviews of religious, transgender, and inequalities scholarship, we demonstrate how contemporary American religions cisgender reality by (1) erasing, (2) marking, and (3) punishing transgender experience in ways that reproduce conceptions of reality predicated on cisnormativity. In conclusion, we argue that examining processes of cisgendering reality may provide insight into (1) transgender religious experience, (2) transgender secular experience, and (3) cisnormativity embedded within many contemporary religions.

This article explores two cases at the intersection of emerging studies of transgender experience: heterosexualities and asexualities. Drawing on data from a mixed-methodological survey, we analyze the ways 57 asexual transgender people and 42 heterosexual transgender people occupying varied gender, race, class, age, and religious identities (1) make sense of gender and (2) experience coming out as transgender. Our analyses reveal some ways cisnormativity impacts transgender people across sexual identities, and the theoretical potential of incorporating transgender people into studies focused on asexualities and heterosexualities. In conclusion, we outline implications for understanding (1) transgender experiences with cisnormativity across sexual and other social locations and (2) possibilities for expanding studies of heterosexualities and asexualities beyond cisgender experiences.

Celebrates diverse queer experiences on society's marginsOutskirts addresses the diverse and intricate aspects of the queer experience on the periphery of the social world. From the Korean spa to the Carnival krewe to new sexual identities, this volume asks important questions about the atypical places, spaces, and identities that are an important part of LGBTQ life in the United States. By bringing together scholars specializing in the less visible facets of queer culture, the book offers valuable insights that contribute to a deeper understanding of queer perspectives and their impact on the discipline of sociology. The volume challenges researchers to focus on diversity and complexity of the queer experience in the fringe to inform larger sociological questions and contribute to the field of sociology. Most simply put: what is it that we learn from studying at the margins?The essays in Outskirts focus on the influence of place, both physical and virtual, within institutional settings and in situations of placelessness. This attention to non-normative spaces and identities enriches the collective knowledge of LGBTQ experiences and offers a compelling narrative that pushes the boundaries of sociological inquiry and highlights the importance of queer voices on the fringes of society