Coloniality of White Feminism and Its Transphobia: A Comment on Burt

• Author: Nishant Upadhyay
• DOI: 10.1177/1557085121991337
• Published date: 01 October 2021
• Date: 01 October 2021
• Subject Matter: Comments

2021, Vol. 16(4) 539 –544

https://doi.org/10.1177/1557085121991337

Feminist Criminology

© The Author(s) 2021

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DOI: 10.1177/1557085121991337

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Comment

Coloniality of White

Feminism and Its

Transphobia:

A Comment on Burt

Nishant Upadhyay1

Abstract

In this comment, I challenge Burt’s colonial epistemological framework in her

theorizations of sex, gender, and transness. Drawing upon anti-racist, decolonial,

and trans of color feminisms, I argue that transphobia is inherent to white feminisms

due to its roots in colonialism. Heteropatriarchy and cisnormativity are products of

colonialism, and feminists who espouse transphobic discourses invariably reproduce

colonial and white supremacist frameworks of patriarchy and gender violence.

Keywords

transphobia, white feminism, coloniality, colonialism, white supremacy

In February 2019, Zapatista women in a letter to the “women who fight all over the

world” wrote:

Maybe we do not know what the best feminism is, maybe we do not know how the words

change, or what is gender equality. And it is not even fair that they say “gender equality,”

because they only speak of the equity of women and men, and even we, who they call

ignorant and backward, we know well that there are people who are neither men nor

women, who we call “otroas,” but who can call themselves as they please, and it has not

been easy for them to gain that right to be who they are without hiding, because they are

mocked, persecuted, violated, murdered. Are we still going to force them to be either men

or women? . . . How can we complain that they do not respect us as women if we do not

respect those people? (Zapatista Army of National Liberation, 2019)

1University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA

Corresponding Author:

Nishant Upadhyay, Department of Ethnic Studies, 339 UCB, University of Colorado Boulder,

CO 80309 USA.

Email: Nishant.Upadhyay@colorado.edu

991337

FCXXXX10.1177/1557085121991337Feminist CriminologyUpadhyay

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