XVI Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association Symposium
17 - 21 August 1999, London

Reflections on "Transsexualism and Sex Reassignment" 1969 -1999

Through Transgendered Eyes: Experiential Learning and Profound Transformation

Fambrough, Mary J., Case Western Reserve University

Based on data acquired through life story interviews of male-to-female transgendered individuals and immersion in the transgendered subculture in several cities in the Midwest region of the US, this paper investigates the process of "male femaling" (Ekins, 1993; 1997) from the perspective of adult learning theory. Kolb’s (1984) model of experiential learning provides a frame for exploring the actual process of learning along with related techniques used by male-to-female transgendered people in crossing gender boundaries.

I suggest that critical to transmuting from one socially designated gender category to another requires empathic knowing which is defined as a relational construct rooted in a conceptualization of empathy as a multiphased experiential process in which the cognitive and affective states of the other are experienced (Duan & Hill, 1996). Empathic knowing is seen as an intersubjective process in which individual subjectivities meet and new knowledge and awareness are co-created, context-dependent, and conditional. The process of empathic knowing unfolds in the space between apprehension and comprehension enabling a connected knowing described by Belenky, Clinchy, Goldberger, & Tarule (1986) in Women’s Ways of Knowing. The telling of stories is identified and developed as a primary means of intersubjective communication.

A model of empathic knowing as an element of experiential learning is presented. The notion of empathic knowing is illustrated by the stories of transgendered individuals who participated in this research. The fluidity of the processes of learning male femaling are acknowledged and are not assumed to be linear or sequential (King, 1993).