“Except That the Haunted, Hidden Thing Was Me”: Ghostly Matters and Transsexual Haunting

This paper examines motifs of ghostliness and haunting in representations of transsexuality, both in the violent and oppressive representations of transsexuality within a transphobic culture, and in the self-representation and narration of transsexuals themselves. Using scholar Avery Gordon’s definition of haunting—which characterizes haunting as the “knot” of oppression, self-representation, and knowledge production—this paper argues for the necessity of recognizing transsexual oppression as a form of cultural haunting.