Teaching trans students: How dominant truth discourses facilitate misrecognition and preclude equitable schooling

Abstract

There is extensive evidence that trans youth face significant barriers to equitable school access. Effective intervention strategies, however, are less clear – an issue which is compounded by contemporary trans-hostility. Currently, in the absence of UK-wide policy, provision for trans students is inconsistent and often dependent on individual educators. Yet, whilst many teachers have inclusive intentions, even with relevant training their approaches are frequently limited by persistently cisnormative beliefs and practices; genuine trans equity in schools is rare. Accordingly, this thesis investigates how teachers come to adopt particular approaches, identifying barriers and supports for trans-emancipatory practices.
Methodologically, I combine Foucault with critical realism to present an ontologically realist and epistemologically relativist framework, facilitating causal analysis of contributory factors. Following a two-stage research design, I firstly conducted thematic analysis of 15 interviews with teachers, producing three factors which each represent a dominant truth discourse: neoliberalism; sex/gender essentialism; and childhood innocence and developmentalism. Secondly, I assessed these factors with a larger sample (n=93) completing an online questionnaire; this data was used to analyse causal salience through systematic case comparison in Qualitative Comparative Analysis. Of the two resultant causal models, for the presence and absence of a trans-emancipatory teacher approach, the latter is particularly well-evidenced regarding sufficiency and necessity – suggesting that the absence of this trans-emancipatory outcome could be reached through investment either in sex/gender essentialism, and/or in both neoliberalism and childhood innocence and developmentalism.
Finally, I develop a theoretical account of potential generative mechanisms, particularly considering divergence between expressed teacher support and marginalising trans student experiences. Here, I integrate insights from Honneth’s recognition theory with my primarily Foucauldian theoretical approach; I posit that normative forms of teacher care, informed by the identified truth discourses, misrecognise trans students – instead often interpreting them primarily in terms of threat.