Trans Teacher Experiences and the Failure of Visibility

Abstract

This chapter draws on one case study of a trans* male-identifying teacher in an urban high school in Melbourne, Australia. As a counter-discourse to contemporary popular notions of more inclusive and anti-homophobic schools, this chapter proposes that trans* teacher experiences are still an under-researched and sometimes controversial 'final frontier' for even 'safe' schools that strive to engage with LGBTQ-inclusive discourses and practices. Drawing out Halberstam's focus on 'the bathroom problem' in trans* experience and scholarship (1998), and extending his notion of productive failure (2011), we argue more broadly that some current mainstreaming of diverse sexualities education and antibullying attention to LGBTQ students do not extend inclusivity to care of teachers - most especially trans teachers - nor do they acknowledge the particularity of trans subjectivities.