Abstract
In “Transgender Studies: Queer Theory's Evil Twin,” the author argues that the field of transgender studies is often marginalized within the broader framework of queer theory, despite the fact that transgender issues have been an important part of queer activism and scholarship for decades. Like Frankenstein's monster, the evil twin is a common narrative trope, found everywhere from daytime soaps to Pasolini. As queer theory's evil twin, transgender studies brings trouble into the family. The author names three of the writers with whom she was in dialog as Judith Butler, Sandy Stone, and Leslie Feinberg, for all of whom trans-ness is already a kind of gender trouble, needling at some corner of what is not yet ready to be named cis normativity. As to how close its relation to queerness ought to be is still up for debate.