Voice recovery – paradigm shift in transgender research

Abstract

The aim of the article is to show how scientific analyses of transsexuality have changed over recent years, and how the two types of discourses on transsexuality/ transgender, i.e. medical and social, clash with each other. The result of this clash is a departure from treating transsexuality as a purely medical phenomenon classified as a deviation from the norm. I will also consistently use a range of terms showing there has been a transformation in the approach to the phenomenon being described – from transsexualism, through transsexuality, to contemporary terms such as trans person/ people with transsexuality. The change in the terminology reflects a perceptible shift in the paradigm.

Keywords

• transsexuality
• deviation
• paradigm
• medicine