Cover not available

In:Identity Perspectives from Peripheries
Edited by Yoshiko Matsumoto and Jan-Ola Östman
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 352] 2025
► pp. 260–289

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload Book PDF
EPUB logo with download linkDownload Book EPUB
authorization required

Chapter 12
#transandproud

Narrative positioning and construction of female‑to‑male transgender identity on Instagram

 | University of Colorado Boulder
Published online: 13 June 2025
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.352.12arn
Abstract
Drawing on Ochs and Capps’ (1996) concept of partial selves constructed through narrative and Tannen’s (2008) concept of Master Narratives, I employ Bamberg’s (1997) tri-level framework of narrative positioning to analyze two English-language Instagram posts by a popular American transgender Instagrammer, whom I call Gregory Bauer. I consider each post to be a multimodal narrative which employs multiple semiotic resources afforded by the online platform — including verbal strategies, hashtags, and images of the body. I demonstrate how Bauer constructs his identity as a proud transgender man who has overcome hardship and fosters online community for transgender people, who are at the periphery of mainstream society, of LGBTQ+ communities, and of academic studies. I also consider the ways in which Bauer’s narratives construct a normative view of what it means to be transgender, demonstrating that those at the periphery can construct norms for their own community which position themselves as more central and those that deviate as more marginal. The analysis contributes to a deeper understanding of transgender narrators and narratives, as well as to the rapidly emergent literature on multimodal storytelling in digital communication.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Background
    • 2.1Gender-related terms and definitions
    • 2.2Theoretical background
      • 2.2.1Narrative, identity, and positioning
      • 2.2.2Narrative, gender, and sexuality
      • 2.2.3Multimodal narratives in online contexts
  • 3.Data and methods
  • 4.Analysis
    • 4.1“I lived in a stranger’s body for years”: Characters positioned within the story world
    • 4.2“Surround yourself with people that love you”: Narrator positioned with audience
    • 4.3#transandproud: Positioning the self vis-à-vis the self
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
References (51)
References
Astor, Maggie. 2023. [G.O.P.] “State Lawmakers Push a Growing Wave of Transgender Bills.” The New York Times, June 20, 2023. [URL]
Bamberg, Michael. 1997. “Positioning Between Structure and Performance.” Journal of Narrative and Life History 7 (1–4): 335–342. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2003. “Positioning with Davie Hogan: Stories, Tellings, and Identities.” In Narrative Analysis: Studying the Development of Individuals in Society, ed. by Colette Caiute, and Cynthia Lightfoot, 135–157. London: Sage.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bamberg, Michael, and Alexandra Georgakopoulou. 2008. “Small Stories as a New Perspective in Narrative and Identity Analysis.” Text & Talk 28 (3): 377–396. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Boyd, danah. 2010. “Social Network Sites as Networked Publics: Affordances, Dynamics, and Implications.” In A Networked Self: Identity, Community and Culture on Social Network Sites, ed. by Zizi Papacharissi, 39–58. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bucholtz, Mary, and Kira Hall. 2005. “Identity and Interaction: A Sociocultural Linguistic Approach.” Discourse Studies 7 (4–5): 585–614. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Carlisle, Madeleine. 2021. “Anti-Trans Violence and Rhetoric Reached Record Highs Across America in 2021.” TIME, December 30, 2021. [URL]
Cashman, Holly R. 2018. “Narrating the Intersection: Body, Time, Space and Transition in One Queer Life.” Gender and Language 12 (4): 416–436. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
@d_mxmln. “Left Pre-T vs. Right 3 Years.” Instagram photo, August 16, 2020. [URL]
Davies, Bronwyn, and Rom Harré. 1990. “Positioning: The Discursive Production of Selves.” Journal for the Theory of Social Behavior 20 (1): 43–63. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
DiMaggio, Anthony. 2022. Rising Fascism in America: It Can Happen Here. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Döring, Nicola, Anne Reif, and Sandra Poschl. 2016. “How Gender-Stereotypical Are Selfies? A Content Analysis and Comparison with Magazine Adverts.” Computers in Human Behavior 55: 955–962. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Duguay, Stefanie. 2016. “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, and Queer Visibility Through Selfies: Comparing Platform Mediators Across Ruby Rose’s Instagram and Vine Presence.” Social Media + Society, 1–12. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Edelman, Elijah Adiv, and Lal Zimman. 2014. “Boycunts and Bonus Holes: Trans Men’s Bodies, Neoliberalism, and the Sexual Productivity of Genitals.” Journal of Homosexuality 61 (5): 673–690. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
franzke, aline shakti, Bechmann, Anja, Zimmer, Michael, Ess, Charles, and the Association of Internet Researchers. 2020. Internet Research: Ethical Guidelines 3.0.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Georgakopoulou, Alexandra. 2007. Small Stories, Interaction and Identities. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2016. “From Narrating the Self to Posting Self(Ies): A Small Stories Approach to Selfies.” Open Linguistics 2: 300–317. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Giroux, Henry. 2022. The Scourge of Fascist Policies and the Rise of White Nationalism from Orbán to DeSantis.” CounterPunch:1–1.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
GLAAD. 2015. “5 of the Most Unsettling Realities for America’s Trans Community.” Last modified February 19, 2015. [URL]
Gordon, Cynthia. 2011. “Impression Management on Reality TV: Emotion in Parental Accounts.” Journal of Pragmatics 43: 3551–3564. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haimson, Oliver L. 2020. “Challenging ‘Getting Better’ Social Media Narratives with Intersectional Transgender Lived Experiences.” Social Media + Society. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hall, Kira, Rodrigo Borba, and Mie Hiramoto. 2021. “Relocating Power: The Feminist Potency of Language, Gender and Sexuality Research.” Gender & Language 15 (1): 1–10. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hamilton, Heidi E. 1998. “Reported Speech and Survivor Identity in On-Line Bone Marrow Transplantation Narratives.” Journal of Sociolinguistics 2 (1): 53–67. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hendricks, Bailey. 2018. “Laverne Cox Shares Journey of Transition and Triumph with TU.” The Towerlight, March 20, 2018. [URL]
Jones, Rodney H. 2015. “Generic Intertextuality in Online Social Activism: The Case of the It Gets Better Project.” Language in Society 44: 317–339. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jones, Tiffany. 2024. “Trans Bans Expand: Anti-LGBTIQ+ Lawfare and Neo-Fascism.” Sexuality Research and Social Policy. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Karlsson, Marie, and Christina Olin-Scheller. 2015. “‘Let’s Party!’ Harry Potter Fan Fiction Sites as Social Settings for Narrative Gender Constructions.” Gender and Language 9 (2): 167–188. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Korobov, Neill, and Michael Bamberg. 2007. “‘Strip Poker! They Don’t Show Nothing!’: Positioning Identities in Adolescent Male Talk About a Television Game Show.” In Selves and Identities in Narrative and Discourse, ed. by Michael Bamberg, Anna De Fina, and Deborah Schiffrin, 253–271. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Liang, A. C. 1997. “The Creation of Coherence in Coming-Out Stories.” In Queerly Phrased: Language, Gender, and Sexuality, ed. by Anna Livia, and Kira Hall, 287–309. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
@mrcoachcody. 2020. “It’s Been a Long Journey.” Instagram photo, August 18, 2020. [URL]
National Center for Transgender Equality. 2016. “Understanding Transgender People: The Basics.” Last modified July 9, 2016. [URL]
Ochs, Elinor, and Lisa Capps. 1996. “Narrating the Self.” Annual Review of Anthropology 25: 19–43. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Page, Ruth. 2010. “Re-examining Narrativity: Small Stories in Status Updates.” Text & Talk 30 (4): 423–444. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Page, Ruth, and Bronwen Thomas. 2011. “Introduction.” New Narratives: Stories and Storytelling in the Digital Age, ed. by Ruth Page, and Bronwen Thomas, Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Post 1. 2017. “I Lived in a Stranger’s Body for Years.” Instagram photo, August 25, 2017. [URL]
Post 2. 2018. “Three Years on Testosterone.” Instagram photo, June 10, 2018. [URL]
Schiffrin, Deborah. 1996. “Narrative as Self-Portrait: Sociolinguistic Constructions of Identity.” Language in Society 25 (2): 167–203. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sheeler, Jason. 2020. “Caitlin Jenner on the Five-Year Anniversary of Her Transition: ‘I Have No Regrets.’” People, June 10, 2020. [URL]
Singh, Jaspal Naveel. 2021. “Language, Gender and Sexuality in 2020: Forward Global South.” Gender & Language 15 (2): 207–230. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Vásquez, Camilla. 2014. The Discourse of Online Consumer Reviews. London: Bloomsbury.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Vitanova, Gergana. 2016. “Exploring Second-Language Teachers’ Identities Through Multimodal Narratives: Gender and Race Discourses.” Critical Inquiry in Language Studies 13 (4): 261–288. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wargo, Jon M. 2015. “‘Every Selfie Tells a Story…’: LGBTQ Youth Lifestreams and New Media Narratives as Connective Identity Texts.” New Media & Society. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wood, Kathleen M. 1997. “Narrative Iconicity in Electronic-Mail, Lesbian Coming-Out Stories.” In Queerly Phrased: Language, Gender, and Sexuality, ed. by Anna Livia, and Kira Hall, 257–273. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wortham, Stanton, and Angela Reyes. 2021. Discourse Analysis Beyond the Speech Event. 2nd Edition. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zappavigna, Michele. 2018. Searchable Talk: Hashtags and Social Media Metadiscourse. London: Bloomsbury.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zimman, Lal. 2009. “‘The Other Kind of Coming Out’: Transgender People and the Coming Out Narrative Genre.” Gender and Language 3 (1): 53–80. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2014. “The Discursive Construction of Sex: Remaking and Reclaiming the Gendered Body in Talk About Genitals Among Trans Men.” In Queer Excursions: Retheorizing Binaries in Language, Gender, and Sexuality, ed. by Lal Zimman, Jenny Davis, and Joshua Raclaw. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2019. “Trans Identification, Agency, and Embodiment in Discourse: The Linguistic Construction of Gender and Sex.” International Journal of Sociology of Language 256 (1): 147–175. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue