Performing transgender experience the case of Esmeray Özadikti

Abstract

This thesis mainly deals with several foundational approaches to transgender identity and considers transgender experience as a concept to discuss transgender identity and politics in Turkey. This study considers the role of transgender voice in constructing a transgender subjectivity. Moreover, this study inquiries the production of transgender self through performance of experience and examines how it broadens the political and social territories of transgender identity and politics in Turkey. Esmeray’s three performances, titled as Cadının Bohçası, Yırtık Bohça and Kestirmeden Hikayeler, are analyzed in order to contextualize the performance of transgender experience. It is concluded that Esmeray’s performance of transgender experience moves beyond a mere theatrical representation of a trans woman. Rather, it is a productive method of struggle against heteronormative views on trans women in Turkey.