
The term travesti () is used in
Latin America—to designate people who were
assigned male at birth
Sex assignment (sometimes known as gender assignment) is the discernment of an infant's sex at or before birth. A relative, midwife, nurse or physician inspects the external genitalia when the baby is delivered and, in more than 99.95% of birt ...
, but develop a
gender identity according to different
expressions of
femininity. Other terms have been invented and are used in South America in an attempt to further distinguish it from cross-dressing, drag, or pathologizing connotations. In Spain, the term was used in a similar way during the
Franco era
Francoist Spain ( es, España franquista), or the Francoist dictatorship (), was the period of Spanish history between 1939 and 1975, when Francisco Franco ruled Spain after the Spanish Civil War with the title . After his death in 1975, Spa ...
, but it was replaced with the advent of the medical model of transsexuality in the late 1980s and early 1990s, in order to rule out negative stereotypes. The arrival of these concepts occurred later in Latin America than in Europe, so the concept of travesti lasted over time with various connotations.
Travesti identities are heterogeneous and multiple, so it is difficult to reduce them to universal explanations. They have been studied by various disciplines, especially
anthropology, which has extensively documented the phenomenon in both classical and more recent
ethnographies. Researchers have generally proposed one of three main hypotheses to define travestis: that they constitute a "
third gender" (like the
hijras of India and the
muxe of Mexico), that they reinforce the
gender binarism of their society, or that they actually
deconstruct the category of
gender altogether. Although it is a concept widely used in Latin America, the definition of travesti is controversial, and it is still regarded as a
transphobic slur depending on the context. Very similar groups exist across the region, with names such as , , , , , , and , among others.
Travestis not only dress contrary to their assigned sex, but also adopt female names and pronouns and often undergo cosmetic practices, hormone replacement therapy, filler injections and cosmetic surgeries to obtain female body features, although generally without modifying their genitality nor considering themselves as women. The travesti population has historically been
socially vulnerable and
criminalized, subjected to
social exclusion and
structural violence, with discrimination, harassment,
arbitrary detentions, torture and murder being commonplace throughout Latin America. As a result, most travestis
resort to prostitution as their only source of income, which in turn, plays an important role in their identity. The word "travesti", originally
pejorative in nature, was
reappropriated by Peruvian, Brazilian and Argentine activists, as it has a regional specificity that combines a generalized condition of social vulnerability, an association with
sex work, the exclusion of basic rights and its recognition as a
non-binary and
political identity. Notable travesti rights activists include Argentinians
Lohana Berkins,
Claudia Pía Baudracco,
Diana Sacayán,
Marlene Wayar and
Susy Shock
Susy Shock (born 6 December 1968) is an Argentine actress, writer, and singer who defines herself as a "trans ''sudaca'' artist".
Biography
Susy Shock was born in the neighborhood of Balvanera, in the center of Buenos Aires, to a father from La ...
, and
Yren Rotela
Yren Ailyn Rotela Ramirez (born 9 January 1981) is a Paraguayan activist for the rights of LGBT people and sex workers.
Biography
Yren Rotela was born on 9 January 1981 in the Obrero neighborhood of Asunción, Paraguay. She is the second of seve ...
from Paraguay.
Terminology
Although the use of the term is still common in Spanish,
some contemporary authors reject it to avoid confusion with the practice of
cross-dressing
Cross-dressing is the act of wearing clothes usually worn by a different gender. From as early as pre-modern history, cross-dressing has been practiced in order to disguise, comfort, entertain, and self-express oneself.
Cross-dressing has play ...
,
as well as the use of the suffix ''
-ism
''-ism'' is a suffix in many English words, originally derived from the Ancient Greek suffix ('), and reaching English through the Latin , and the French . It means "taking side with" or "imitation of", and is often used to describe philosoph ...
'', which comes from the
medical sciences and is considered
pathologizing.
In response to this, the use of the terms ( (Portuguese) or ) (Spanish) has become widespread in Brazilian academic literature since the 2000s,
and has been adopted by some Spanish-speaking authors,
while others have opted for the words (roughly "travestity"),
or (roughly "transvestivity").
In the same way, the words and (roughly "transvestiteness" or "transvestment") are used as an alternative to "transvestism", but to designate (i.e.
drag performers
Drag or The Drag may refer to:
Places
* Drag, Norway, a village in Tysfjord municipality, Nordland, Norway
* ''Drág'', the Hungarian name for Dragu Commune in Sălaj County, Romania
* Drag (Austin, Texas), the portion of Guadalupe Street a ...
). The
Hispanicism
Hispanism (sometimes referred to as Hispanic studies or Spanish studies) is the study of the literature and culture of the Spanish-speaking world, principally that of Spain and Hispanic America. It can also entail studying Spanish language and ...
''travestism'' ( en, transvestism) is sometimes seen in articles in English about the topic, especially by South American authors.
The use of the term precedes that of "
transgender" in the region and its differentiation from the notions of "
transsexual" and "
trans woman" is complex and can vary depending on the context, ranging from considering it a regional equivalent to a unique identity.
The original use of the word refers to the act of cross-dressing, and became extended in the 1960s to refer to individuals who dressed as women as a performance or in their day-to-day lives.
However, travestis not only choose to dress contrary to their assigned sex, but also adopt female names and pronouns and often undergo cosmetic practices,
hormone replacement therapy,
filler injections and
cosmetic surgeries to obtain female body features, although generally without
modifying their genitals nor considering themselves as women.
[Kulick, 1998, p. 5] As such, they may be described as a
transfeminine gender identity,
and have been considered a regional equivalent to the notion of "
pre-op transsexual
Transsexual people experience a gender identity that is inconsistent with their assigned sex, and desire to permanently transition to the sex or gender with which they identify, usually seeking medical assistance (including sex reassig ...
".
After a long period of criminalization, "
sexual deviations" became an object of study in the medical and sexual sciences, which established the different forms of
deviation.
[Fernández, 2004. p. 22] In a first period, between 1870 and 1920, a large amount of research was produced about people who
cross-dressed
Cross-dressing is the act of wearing clothes usually worn by a different gender. From as early as pre-modern history, cross-dressing has been practiced in order to disguise, comfort, entertain, and self-express oneself.
Cross-dressing has play ...
or wished to adopt the role assigned to the opposite sex.
In 1910, the renowned German sexologist
Magnus Hirschfeld coined the term transvestite ( in Spanish and Portuguese), introduced in his text ''Transvestites: The Erotic Drive To Cross Dress'' (german: Die Transvestiten: ein Untersuchung über den erotischen Verkleidungstrieb).
[Fernández, 2004. p. 29] Hirschfeld used the term to describe "people who feel a compulsion to wear clothes of the opposite sex" and rejected the idea that they were a variant of
homosexuality, which at that time was a very widespread conception within sexology.
Between 1920 and 1950, the terms transvestism and
eonism were incorporated into the scientific literature, although generally these reports only supplemented those of previous years.
[Fernández, 2004. p. 23] During the 1950s the term
transsexual—first used by American sexologist
David Oliver Cauldwell—gained relevance at the same time that sexual identity clinics and
sex change surgery
Gender-affirming surgery (GAS) is a surgical procedure, or series of procedures, that alters a transgender or transsexual person's physical appearance and sexual characteristics to resemble those associated with their identified gender, and ...
emerged.
[Fernández, 2004. p. 31] In this way, since the late 1960s and during the 1970s, transvestism was put aside as a topic of medical interest.
The term
transgender was popularized by American activist
Virginia Prince in the late 1960s to designate those who transgressed gender norms but did not identify with the or transsexual categories, and by the 1980s its widespread use in
core countries was established.
However, the "trans" and "transgender" categories cannot be easily translated outside core countries, due to the complexity of practices they encompass.
The use of the term precedes theirs in
Latin America, and their differentiation is complex and can vary depending on the context.
Scholar Cole Rizki pointed out that "trans and identifications are constantly shifting and should not be understood as mutually exclusive. The tensions between trans and as identificatory categories are often untranslatable, leading us to ask what sorts of limitations and possibilities are embedded within the terms' distinctions and critical affinities."
Despite being an
emic concept widely used throughout the region,
the definition of is a source of controversy,
as it refers to heterogeneous and multiple identities, hence being paradoxical to reduce them to universal explanations.
Groups very similar to travestis exist across Latin America, with names such as , , , , ,
, among others.
[Kulick, 1998, p. 231] Writing for the ''
Latin American Research Review'' in 2020, Joseph M. Pierce claimed that in Hispanic American countries, "as a general category, (transgender) or the more popular ''trans''
..refers to people who make identitarian, corporeal, and social efforts to live as members of the gender that differs from the normative sex that they were assigned at birth."
Comparing it to the term , he noted that:
in Argentina, Uruguay, and Chile, [] refers most frequently to people assigned male sex at birth and who feminize their bodies, dress, and behavior; prefer feminine pronouns and forms of address; and often make significant bodily transformations by injecting silicone or taking hormonal treatments but do not necessarily seek sex-reassignment surgery. ..... the specific Latin American conceptual and identity marker involves gender variance but not always gendered difference. While ''transgender'', ''trans'', and ''transsexual'' are terms that refer to changing gender and sex through legal, corporeal, or social mechanisms, a may have been assigned "male" at birth but does not necessarily consider herself a woman (though some do). ..For many travestis the term ''transgender'' depoliticizes a violent history of social and economic marginalization. The term , in contrast, retains this class difference and popular resonance, and is thus a political, rather than a psychological, or even corporeal identification.
According to Brazilian activist Amara Moira, the terms ''trans woman'' and are synonymous, with many people using the former to avoid the negative connotations associated with the latter.
The imposition of the transgender and transvestite categories by Anglo-American academics over identities has been considered by some to be
colonizing
Colonization, or colonisation, constitutes large-scale population movements wherein migrants maintain strong links with their, or their ancestors', former country – by such links, gain advantage over other inhabitants of the territory. When ...
and
westernizing in nature, and has been met with resistance by the community.
Originally used colloquially as a
pejorative term, the category has been
reappropriated by Brazilian,
Peruvian and especially Argentine activists since the 1990s,
[Raíces Montero, ed., 2010. p. 61] as it has a regional specificity that combines a generalized condition of social vulnerability, an association with
sex work, the exclusion of basic rights and its recognition as a
non-binary and
political identity.
As they are excluded from the educational and labor system, stigmatized and reified as objects of theoretical criticism or media consumption, one of the main struggles of activism since its emergence in the 1990s was the creation of their own political subjectivities.
Argentine activist
Lohana Berkins pointed out in 2006:
We hold the identity not only by resorting to linguistic regionalism, but also by circumstances and characteristics that make travestism a different phenomenon from North American and European transgenderism. In the first place, we travestis live different circumstances compared to those experienced by many transgenders from other countries, who (...) have the objective of rearranging themselves in the binary logic as women or men. A large part of Latin American travestis claim the option of occupying a position outside of binarism and it is our objective to destabilize the male and female categories. Second, the word transgenderism originated from theoretical works developed within the framework of the North American academy. In contrast, (...) the term in Latin America comes from medicine and has been appropriated, reworked and embodied by travestis to call themselves. This is the term in which we recognize ourselves and that we choose to construct ourselves as subjects of rights. (...) The term "travesti" has been and continues to be used as a synonym for AIDS
Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual m ...
, thief, scandalous, infected, marginal. We decided to give new meanings to the word and link it with struggle, resistance, dignity and happiness.
Despite its reappropriation by some as a political identity, in some places (especially Spain)
is still regarded as a
transphobic slur, often used to invalidate people who prefer the terms transsexual or transgender.
For example, in 2020 a Spanish journalist caused controversy and had to make a
public apology A public apology is a component of reparation as stipulated in the United Nations Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights resolution proclaiming the Basic Principles and Guidelines on the Right to a Remedy and Reparation for ...
after using the term to refer to late media personality
La Veneno
Cristina Ortiz Rodríguez (19 March 1964 – 9 November 2016), better known as ('Poisongirl'), was a Spanish singer, actress, sex worker, and media personality. Considered one of the most important and beloved LGBT icons in Spain, she rose t ...
.
History and culture
Argentina

An important historical source in the history of the travesti community during the 20th century are the firsthand accounts of Malva Solís,
who emigrated from Chile as a teenager and lived in Argentina until her death in 2015 at the age of 93, being regarded as the longest-lived travesti from the country.
After collecting testimonies from travestis over the age of seventy, Josefina Fernández found in 2004 that most of them regarded the first period of
Juan Perón
Juan Domingo Perón (, , ; 8 October 1895 – 1 July 1974) was an Argentine Army general and politician. After serving in several government positions, including Minister of Labour and Vice President of a military dictatorship, he was elected P ...
's government—who ruled
Argentina between 1946 and 1955—as "the one that most clearly began the persecution of
gay men
Gay men are male homosexuals. Some bisexual and homoromantic men may also dually identify as gay, and a number of young gay men also identify as queer. Historically, gay men have been referred to by a number of different terms, including ' ...
and travestis, whether or not they practiced street prostitution."
In those years, travestis (identified at that time as ''mariconas'') began to be regularly imprisoned at the
Devoto prison
The Devoto prison ('' es, Cárcel de Devoto''), officially named ''"Complejo Penitenciario Federal de la Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires"'' was built in 1927 as a medium-security prison and managed by the '' Policia Federal Argentina''. In 1978 ...
, as "
sex offenders."
The prison was a recurring meeting point for travestis and continued to be so until the 21st-century.
Despite its repressive aspects, the prison space gave them the possibility of generating solidarity strategies and forging links that would later spread outside.
They even developed their own
argot known as ''carrilche'', which was nourished by prison
jargon.
As anthropologist María Soledad Cutuli explains: "Today this code is known as the ''teje''. It consists of taking up elements of prison jargon or "
olice lunfardo", deforming some syllables of certain words, and also using invented terms such as ''cirilqui'' to refer to the police, or even the
polysemic
Polysemy ( or ; ) is the capacity for a sign (e.g. a symbol, a morpheme, a word, or a phrase) to have multiple related meanings. For example, a word can have several word senses. Polysemy is distinct from ''monosemy'', where a word has a single ...
''teje'' (Spanish for "
weaving"), which can mean, depending on the context, 'lie, story, argument, affair.' To say that someone is a ''tejedora'' implies a subtle way of qualifying her as a liar; to ask 'what are they ''tejiendo''?' refers to assuming that a meeting or conversation may have ulterior motives".
The
Carnival
Carnival is a Catholic Christian festive season that occurs before the liturgical season of Lent. The main events typically occur during February or early March, during the period historically known as Shrovetide (or Pre-Lent). Carnival typi ...
was historically regarded as the popular festivity of travestis, as it was the only time of the year in which they could express themselves freely in the public space without suffering police persecution.
As a travesti from Buenos Aires recalled in 2019: "They were 6 days of freedom and 350 in prison. I'm not exaggerating. So it was for us. This is how it was before and after
the dictatorship, even worse after the dictatorship. Those days it was something magical: because from being discriminated against we would turn into diva-like. If there were no travestis in a carnival parade, it seemed like something was missing."
The
Buenos Aires Carnival's ''
murgas'' first incorporated "messy"
cross-dressing
Cross-dressing is the act of wearing clothes usually worn by a different gender. From as early as pre-modern history, cross-dressing has been practiced in order to disguise, comfort, entertain, and self-express oneself.
Cross-dressing has play ...
acts in the 1940s and 1950s to entertain audiences, a modality that later gave way to the ''transformista'' figure (i.e.
drag queens)—defined as "the luxuriously dressed ''maricón''"—becoming an attraction for the public.
According to Malva Solís, two travestis from
La Boca's carnival parade named Cualo and Pepa "La Carbonera" pioneered of the figure of the "''murga''s
vedette", an innovation that began around 1961.
This little-documented phenomenon known as the "travesti carnival movement" marked a milestone in the parades of the 1960s and 1970s, and had the participation of make-up artists, costume designers and choreographers from Buenos Aires'
revue theatrical scene, all of them ''maricones''.
A 1968 ''
Primera Plana'' article on the Carnival of Buenos Aires reported: "Those who resist disappearing are travestis, who began by exaggerating their feminine charms and have ended up in a dangerous refinement. Wigs and modern cosmetics turned them into suggestive stars, whose sexual identity was no longer so simple to grasp."
In 2011, Solís reflected on the importance of Carnival celebrations for travestis: "I think to myself, that the leitmotif of the travestis who integrated the ''murgas'' was to bring out from the bottom of their soul their repressed self of the rest of the year. Everyone saw them and applauded them, but could not understand that behind that bright facade there was a desire, the desire to be recognized and accepted in order to live in freedom."

Contrary to the 1950s, the 1970s are considered an era of "artistic travesti 'uncover'" (Spanish: "''destape''"), which began with the arrival of a Brazilian travesti who performed in a well-known theater in Buenos Aires.
[Fernández, 2004, p. 35] Her show paved the way door to later performances by local travestis.
According to Solís, the use of the term ''travesti'' began to be used in the 1960s, initially as a way to refer to the cross-dressing and transsexual performers who came from abroad to do shows.
In 1963, French entertainer
Coccinelle visited Buenos Aires to perform at the
Teatro Maipo and made a big impact among local ''mariconas''.
Solís told researcher María Soledad Cutuli in 2013: "Beginning with Coccinelle (...) there is a whole opening, something new that is coming. A lot of 'siliconized'
erformerscame, plastic surgeries; social openness, (...) new opportunities for ''mariconas'', 'the travesti artist' is inaugurated. (...) From then on a new way of life opened. (...) The culture of the ''puto'' artist, all of them were already walking around with cotton stuffing to make their breasts, and they were already going out to sing, to dance..."
The stage became the only place where travestis could publicly dress as women, as it was forbidden to do so on the streets.
Around 1964, travesti artists—at that time named ''lenci'', in reference to a type of cloth, because they "were like little rag dolls"—met at an apartment on
Avenida Callao
Callao Avenue ( es, Avenida Callao) is one of the principal thoroughfares in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Overview
Mayor Torcuato de Alvear, inspired by the urban redevelopment works in Paris at the direction of Baron Haussmann, drew up master pla ...
, where they rehearsed musical acts and prepared to go out to nightclubs or theaters shows.
Since the use of silicone had not yet become widespread, they resorted to the use of female hormones to "be able to show their breasts on stage as aesthetically as possible".
According to writer Daniela Vizgarra: "If you didn't have an
Anovlar 21 in your makeup bag, apparently you were nonexistent."
Travestis emulated a contoured figure—which emphasized breasts and buttocks—through
paddings called ''truquis'',
''piu-piú'' or ''colchón'' (), first using cotton fabrics and later
foam rubber.
While padding had been in use since at least the 1950s, the arrival of
lycra
Spandex, Lycra, or elastane is a synthetic fiber known for its exceptional elasticity. It is a polyether-polyurea copolymer that was invented in 1958 by chemist Joseph Shivers at DuPont's Benger Laboratory in Waynesboro, Virginia, US.
The g ...
in the 1960s allowed them to "build more realistic physical contours."
The
feminine beauty ideal put forward by American television also included small and pointed noses but, as surgeries were too expensive, most travestis settled for temporary arrangements, resorting to the use of glue and objects that could emulate a prosthesis.
María Belén Correa argues that the emergence of travesti stage performers such
Vanessa Show
Vanessa Show (27 September 1945 – 15 September 2023) was an Argentinian travesti (gender identity), travesti performer. As the first travesti in Argentine show business, she is considered a pioneering figure.
Early life
Vanessa Show was born ...
, Evelyn, Brigitte Gambini and Ana Lupe Chaparro in the 1960s and 1970s constituted "another way of activism".
According to Evelyn—one of the first people to popularize ''transformismo'' in the theater scene—the "first travestis to appear in Buenos Aires" were a group called Les Girls in 1972, followed by
Vanessa Show
Vanessa Show (27 September 1945 – 15 September 2023) was an Argentinian travesti (gender identity), travesti performer. As the first travesti in Argentine show business, she is considered a pioneering figure.
Early life
Vanessa Show was born ...
and Ana Lupez.
She also mentioned the travestis of the "following era", which included Graciela Scott, Claudia Prado and herself, who debuted in 1977.

The arrival of industrial silicone in Buenos Aires radically transformed travesti bodies and subjectivities.
It was brought from France to Brazil, and from there to neighboring countries.
[Kulick, 1998, p. 73] In the 1980s, famous actress and vedette
Moria Casán became a role model for local travestis, not only for her voluptuous body, but also for her public image of sexual ease.
This contoured body type ideal began to shift in the 1990s, when "more stylized and androgynous female forms" were popularized.
With the appearance of silicone, a new "hierarchy between the bodies" of travestis arose, differentiating between those that had or did not have silicone, but also regarding the amount used and the quality of the final results.
As researcher Ana Grabiela Álvarez explains: "The arrival of industrial silicone brings them closer to a generic female construction and fixes both bodily transformations and a particular prostitution niche".
In the 1980s, the
Pan-American Highway—which connects the City of Buenos Aires with the
Buenos Aires Province
Buenos Aires (), officially the Buenos Aires Province (''Provincia de Buenos Aires'' ), is the largest and most populous Argentine province. It takes its name from the city of Buenos Aires, the capital of the country, which used to be part of th ...
's different districts—established itself as the most important area in which travestis worked as prostitutes,
and thus became one of the definitive aspects of the travesti identity for Argentine society and media culture.
In 1986,
Canal 9 journalist José de Zer reported and at the same time denounced, with testimonial resources, the murder of travestis working on the Pan-American Highway.
Due to the television report, both the journalist and the channel were sued and faced trial, so travestis had to organize themselves during the following years so as to make their ignored identity appear in the mass media.
Travestis broke into Argentine public opinion in the 1990s,
[Fernández, 2004. p. 38] and their first appearances on television coincided with the organized appearance of the travestis on the public scene and in the streets of Buenos Aires.
In 1991, Keny de Michelli became the first travesti to appear on
free-to-air television, appearing in various programs in order to visibilize the community.
These appearances were quickly trivialized and presented as a peculiar hyper-feminine expression of masculinity.
After gaining popularity as a vedette in 1995,
Cris Miró
Cris Miró (16 September 1965 – 1 June 1999) was an Argentine entertainer and media personality who had a brief but influential career as a top-billing vedette in Buenos Aires' revue theatre scene during the mid-to-late 1990s. Miró began her ...
caused a
media sensation
Media circus is a colloquial metaphor, or idiom, describing a news event for which the level of media coverage—measured by such factors as the number of reporters at the scene and the amount of material broadcast or published—is perceived t ...
for her gender identity and expression.
As the first travesti to become a national celebrity,
she is regarded as a symbol of the social milieu of the 1990s and paved the way for other Argentine travestis and trans women to gain popularity as vedettes, most notably
Flor de la V
Florencia Trinidad (born 2 March 1975), better known by her stage name Flor de la V, is an Argentine actress, television personality, comedian and vedette. As producer Gerardo Sofovich's protégée, who discovered her in a 1998 revue in Bueno ...
.
Parallel to Miró's rise to notoriety, the political organization of Argentine travestis was emerging, with activists making their first appearances in local media.
The vedette's celebrity was initially criticized by a portion of these activists, who resented the unequal treatment they received and her attempt to embody an idealized vision of the perfect woman.

During the early-to-mid 2000s, the musical and literary career of
Susy Shock
Susy Shock (born 6 December 1968) is an Argentine actress, writer, and singer who defines herself as a "trans ''sudaca'' artist".
Biography
Susy Shock was born in the neighborhood of Balvanera, in the center of Buenos Aires, to a father from La ...
, a renowned travesti activist, was built and gained visibility through LGBT cultural spaces such as Casa Mutual Giribone in Buenos Aires and the Asentamiento 8 de Mayo in José León Suárez, Buenos Aires Province.
In November 2007, the first issue of ''El Teje'', the first periodical written by travestis in Latin America, was published in a joint initiative between activists and the Ricardo Rojas Cultural Center.
In travesti jargon, ''teje'' is a polysemic word that comes from prostitution life, as explained by ''El Teje''s director Marlene Wayar: "It is the complicit word between us, which we don't want the other to find out about: bring me the ''teje'', because of the cocaine; or look at the ''teje'', it is when
he client
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' in ...
has a wallet with money. And that is the name of the magazine.
In the late 2010s, the travesti community of Buenos Aires and its surroundings has gained recognition for its creative and artistic contributions, inserting itself in the "queer
countercultural scene", a circuit of theaters, bars and cultural centers such as Casa Brandon, Tierra Violeta, MU Trinchera Boutique and, more recently, Feliza and Maricafé.
As researcher Patricia Fogelman pointed out in 2020: "In this set of spaces, travestis are seen more and more frequently performing theater, stand-up monologues, reciting poetry, doing performances, accompanying musical bands, etc. On the other hand, within the same extended community there is a clear interest in incorporating
ravestisand highlighting them as central characters in novels, plays and songs. Thus, we could say that around the figure of traveestis there is a recognition and a forceful attempt to put them in places of visibility, especially, by lesbian authors of novels and music for alternative young people."
''
Las malas
''Bad Girls'' ( es, Las malas) is the first novel by Argentine author Camila Sosa Villada, first published in Argentina on March 1, 2019, by Barcelona-based book publisher Tusquets Editores, which later published it in Spain on June 9, 2020. The ...
'', the debut novel by travesti writer and actress
Camila Sosa Villada
Camila Sosa Villada (born 28 January 1982) is a transgender Argentine writer and theatre, film, and television actress.Sosa Villada, Camila (2016)The National Government is giving us an example to follow (broken link, available on the Internet ...
—first published in 2019 in Argentina and the following year in Spain—has been a widespread critical and commercial success.
It focuses on the lives of a group of travestis from
Córdoba, Argentina
Córdoba () is a city in central Argentina, in the foothills of the Punilla Valley, Sierras Chicas on the Primero River, Suquía River, about northwest of Buenos Aires. It is the capital of Córdoba Province, Argentina, Córdoba Province a ...
and their work as prostitutes at
Sarmiento Park. However, Sosa Villada has denied that the book was conceived as an act of activism or visibility, claiming that focusing discussions about travestis around marginality and sex work silences their current cultural contributions to society.
The ongoing editorial success of ''Las malas'' has sparked local interest in local
transgender literature, and has been framed within a so-called "new
Latin American boom", with several non-male authors from the region capturing the attention of the international market.
With the onset of the
COVID-19 pandemic in Argentina in March 2020, travestis were one of the groups most affected by the
lockdown, since most of them resort to prostitution and live from day to day, leaving them without income and, in many cases, under threat of eviction from the hotels where they were already paying elevated prices.
The situation was so delicate that different NGOs came out to face the emergency, such as 100% Diversidad y Derechos and La Rosa Naranja.
In 2021,
Flor de la V
Florencia Trinidad (born 2 March 1975), better known by her stage name Flor de la V, is an Argentine actress, television personality, comedian and vedette. As producer Gerardo Sofovich's protégée, who discovered her in a 1998 revue in Bueno ...
—one of the most visible transgender people in the country— announced that she no longer identified as a trans woman but as a travesti, writing: "I discovered a more correct way to get in touch with how I feel: neither woman, nor heterosexual, nor homosexual, nor bisexual. I am a dissident of the gender system, my political construction in this society is that of a pure-bred travesti. That what I am and what I want and choose to be."
Brazil
Anthropologist
Don Kulick noted that: "Travestis appear to exist throughout Latin America, but in no other country are they as numerous and well known as in Brazil, where they occupy a strikingly visible place in both social space and the cultural
imaginary)."
[Kulick, 1998, p. 6] For this reason, they are frequently invoked by social commentators as symbols of Brazil itself.
[Kulick, 1998, p. 7]
One of the most prominent travestis in the Brazilian cultural imaginary of the late 20th century was
Roberta Close, who became a household name in the mid-1980s and was "widely acclaimed to be the most beautiful woman in Brazil," posing in ''
Playboy'' and regularly appearing in television and several other publications.
Photographer Madalena Schwartz made a series of portraits of the travesti scene of São Paulo in the 1970s.
In recent years, hiring trans women has become popular in the
advertising industry, although at the same time differentiating them from transvestites.
Paraguay
In the 1980s, during
Alfredo Stroessner's military dictatorship, twenty travestis were arrested as part of the Palmieri Case (Spanish: ''Caso Palmieri''), among them the well-known Carla and Liz Paola.
A 14-year-old teenager, Mario Luis Palmieri, had been found murdered and the hypothesis handled by the police was that of a homosexual
crime of passion, unleashing one of the most famous persecutions of LGBT identities in the history of Paraguay.
Paraguayan travestis use a secret language called ''jeito''—originated in the field of prostitution—which they use to protect themselves from clients, the police or any person strange to the places where they work and that threatens the security of the group.
[Falabella, Augsten, Recalde & Orué Pozzo, 2017. p. 69] Some of its words are ''rua'' (street),
[Falabella, Augsten, Recalde & Orué Pozzo, 2017. p. 64] ''odara'' (the travesti head of a prostitution area),
[Falabella, Augsten, Recalde & Orué Pozzo, 2017. p. 70] ''alibán'' (police) and ''fregués'' (clients).
[Falabella, Augsten, Recalde & Orué Pozzo, 2017. p. 71]
Spain
The arrival of the medical model of transsexuality was earlier in Europe than in Latin America, and therefore its impact was different in each region.
In Spain, travesti identities are generally included under the category "transsexual" in academic research, since it is perceived as more "
politically correct".
As a result of the powerful medical institutionalization around transsexuality, calling oneself "travesti" in Spain is considered a discrediting act, due to its close link with prostitution, especially after the migrations of Latin American travestis.
Nevertheless, in the 1970s the term "travesti" was widely used to refer to any people who were assigned male at birth but dressed and lived as women, either temporarily or permanently.
In fact, the few Spanish self-described "transsexuals" who had sex reassignment surgery were not widely accepted by their peers and were seen as "
castrated people".
During the
Franco era
Francoist Spain ( es, España franquista), or the Francoist dictatorship (), was the period of Spanish history between 1939 and 1975, when Francisco Franco ruled Spain after the Spanish Civil War with the title . After his death in 1975, Spa ...
, travestis were persecuted through the creation of a strong legislative and police apparatus.
Between the late 1980s and early 1990s, transsexuals—who no longer called themselves "travestis"—began to organize themselves by creating their own political collectives, demanding the institutionalization of transsexuality in the health system, as well as the end of stereotypes that linked them to HIV/AIDS, prostitution and marginalization—an image embodied in the concept of travesti.
Therefore, the travesti specificity in Spain is usually subsumed under the most consensual medical category of "transsexual" or in more politicized terms such as "trans" or "transgender", as this gives greater social legitimacy.
Since the vast majority of travestis come from poor social environments with very low education, their differences with transsexual activists are also given by the demands of these more intellectualized groups.
Nevertheless, some modern-day people living in Spain choose to label themselves as travestis as a
genderfluid gender identity.
Academic research
Overview
Travestis have been studied by disciplines like
social psychology,
but especially
social anthropology
Social anthropology is the study of patterns of behaviour in human societies and cultures. It is the dominant constituent of anthropology throughout the United Kingdom and much of Europe, where it is distinguished from cultural anthropology. In t ...
, which has extensively documented the phenomenon in both classical and more recent
ethnographies.
[Fernández, 2004. p. 39] Scholarship produced on South American travestis has largely been produced by non-trans academics from both the
Global North and Global South, something that has been vocally critiqued by activists.
Being the country with the largest population of travestis (where they are even invoked as
cultural icons),
[Kulick, 1998, p. 6][Kulick, 1998, p. 7] Brazil is the country with the longest experience in the study of these identities,
and the works written in and about Brazil outnumber those of any other Latin American country.
While academic interest in Brazilian travesti prostitutes began to spread in the 1990s and early 2000s—through international researches like
Don Kulick, Peter Fry and
Richard Parker, as well as local authors such as Marcos Renato Benedetti and Helio Silva—travesti identities became a central theme in the country's
gender studies during the mid-to-late-2000s, attributed to the growing influence of
queer theory,
post-structuralism and
LGBT activism in academic literature.
Anthropological research about the travesti population in the Spanish language is much scarcer than in English and Portuguese, especially among Latin American authors.
Some scholars relate this to the late arrival of the medical model of transsexuality, which has also led to the use of "inappropriate" terms to designate identities that do not adhere to gender norms.
Relevant Spanish-language studies about travestis come from researchers from Spain, Argentina, Colombia, Mexico and Ecuador.
Main hypotheses
According to Argentine researcher María Soledad Cutuli, the most recent travesti ethnographies fall under five main axes of analysis: "gender identity", "corporeality and subjectivity", "health and sexuality", "prostitution and sociability" and, to a lesser extent, "political organization".
Faced with the phenomenon, researchers have generally proposed one of three hypotheses: that travestis constitute a
third gender, that travestis reinforce one of the only two genders available in their society (masculine or feminine), or the perspective of authors who argue that travestis challenge the notion of
binarism, but "far from being their proposal that of supernumerary or multiple genders, what they do seek is the
deconstruction
The term deconstruction refers to approaches to understanding the relationship between text and meaning. It was introduced by the philosopher Jacques Derrida, who defined it as a turn away from Platonism's ideas of "true" forms and essences w ...
of the category of gender itself."
[Fernández, 2004. p. 58] Since the 1990 publication of ''
Gender Trouble'', several ideas put forward by American philosopher
Judith Butler
Judith Pamela Butler (born February 24, 1956) is an American philosopher and gender theorist whose work has influenced political philosophy, ethics, and the fields of third-wave feminism, queer theory, and literary theory. In 1993, Butler ...
—like the claim that the concept of a
biological sex
Sex is the trait that determines whether a sexually reproducing animal or plant produces male or female gametes. Male plants and animals produce smaller mobile gametes (spermatozoa, sperm, pollen), while females produce larger ones (ova, o ...
is itself a gendered notion—have been of great impact for the academic analysis of travestis and
gender studies in general.
[Kulick, 1998, p. 230][Fernández, 2004, p. 59]
As a ''third gender''
A very wide range of anthropological studies has investigated travestis based on a hypothesis that states that they should be interpreted as an expression of a third gender or sex,
[Fernández, 2004. p. 41] in the same manner of the
berdaches of North America,
[Fernández, 2004. p. 43] the
hijras of India, the
muxes of Mexico,
the
kathoey of Thailand, the
māhū of Tahiti, the
fa'afafine of Samoa and the
xanith
Khanith (also spelled Khaneeth or Xanith; ar, خنيث, translit=khanīth) denotes a person Sex assignment, assigned male at birth who uses feminine gender expression, including trans women, men who have sex with men, cisgender or Boudi men perc ...
of Oman, among other identities.
One of the first anthropologists to propose the category of third gender were Kay Martin and Barbara Voorhies in 1978, who based their research on the review of classical ethnographies about berdaches.
[Fernández, 2004. p. 40] The idea of a third gender was later put forward in the mid-1990s by authors such as
Gilbert Herdt,
Will Roscoe, Hilda Habychain and Anne Bolin; and extended to other non-Western peoples.
[Fernández, 2004. p. 40] In 1998, Kulick argued that: "Travestis may well be considered to be a 'third,' in some of the senses in which
Marjorie Garber uses that term, but they are not a third that is situated outside or beyond a gendered binary."
[Kulick, 1998, p. 230] Writing for ''
The Guardian'' in 2019, Victor Madrigal-Borloz listed the travesti people from Brazil and Argentina as one of the many worldwide identities that are neither male or female, alongside the ''yimpininni'' of the
Tiwi people in Australia, as well as fa'afafine in Samoa, two spirit in Canada and the United States and hijra in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan.
As a reinforcement of gender binarism
With her 1989 book ''Travestism and the Politics of Gender'', Annie Woodhouse established herself among the researchers within a perspective that considers travestism as a reinforcement of gender identities, in this case the female identity.
[Fernández, 2004, p. 52] Woodhouse argued that travestis see gender as something that is rigidly demarcated between masculinity and femininity and, in this sense, reproduce traditional gender roles that
objectify women.
[Fernández, 2004, p. 52] In her 1993 and 1995 researches on travestism, Argentine anthropologist Victoria Barreda criticized the third gender category, arguing that travestis construct an identity that necessarily takes
gender stereotypes as a reference point.
[Fernández, 2004, p. 50] Another researcher who follows this trend is Richard Ekins, who described trasvestites as "feminized men".
[Fernández, 2004, p. 54] Among the research based on
participant observation
Participant observation is one type of data collection method by practitioner-scholars typically used in qualitative research and ethnography. This type of methodology is employed in many disciplines, particularly anthropology (incl. cultural an ...
, French anthropologist Annick Prieur has been considered a pioneer for her 1998 ethnography on the travesti community from the suburbs of
Mexico City, in which she argued that they reproduce their society's gender binarism.
Brazilian researchers Neuza Maria de Oliveira and Hélio Silva—considered the founders of the ethnography about the daily life of Brazilian travestis—also aligned themselves in this view, as did the latter's follower Marcelo José Oliveira.
Despite these authors' intention of increasing academic visibility to travestis, they have been widely criticized by their successors for using male pronouns when referring to them.
Critically developing upon these early works through the use of
ethnomethodology, Kulick studied the travesti population of
Salvador, Bahia
Salvador (English: ''Savior'') is a Brazilian municipality and capital city of the state of Bahia. Situated in the Zona da Mata in the Northeast Region of Brazil, Salvador is recognized throughout the country and internationally for its cuisine ...
and placed their social stigmatization within the larger context of class and racial inequalities.
[Kulick, 1998, p. 8] Kulick's conclusions are far removed from later
postmodern
Postmodernism is an intellectual stance or mode of discourseNuyen, A.T., 1992. The Role of Rhetorical Devices in Postmodernist Discourse. Philosophy & Rhetoric, pp.183–194. characterized by skepticism toward the " grand narratives" of moderni ...
positions, as he argued that the travesti identity is configured from
conservative social structures.
The author proposed an alternative position, suggesting that travestis base their identity not on anatomical sex differences, but rather on
sexual orientation, identifying themselves as a subtype of
gay men
Gay men are male homosexuals. Some bisexual and homoromantic men may also dually identify as gay, and a number of young gay men also identify as queer. Historically, gay men have been referred to by a number of different terms, including ' ...
.
[Kulick, 1998, p. 227] He used the term "not-men" to refer to travestis, claiming he chose it: "partly for want of a culturally elaborated label and partly to foreground my conviction that the gender system that makes it possible for travestis to emerge and make sense is one that is massively oriented towards, if not determined by, male subjectivity, male desire, and male pleasure, as those are culturally elaborated in Brazil."
[Kulick, 1998, p. 229] He further explained:
It is important to understand that the claim I am making here is that travestis share a gender with women, not that they ''are'' women (or that women are travesti—even if that latter proposition might be a fruitful one to explore further). The distinction is crucial. Individual travestis will not always or necessarily share individual women's roles, goals, or social status. (...) However, inasmuch as travestis share the same gender with women, they are understood to share (and they feel themselves to share) with women a whole spectrum of tastes, perceptions, behaviors, styles, feelings, and desires.[Kulick, 1998, p. 233]
Kulick's research had a much broader international impact than that of his predecessors, due to its insertion in North American academia and for being published in English.
The aforementioned authors have in common the idea that travesti identity does not subvert
gender roles nor
heteronormativity
Heteronormativity is the concept that heterosexuality is the preferred or normal mode of sexual orientation. It assumes the gender binary (i.e., that there are only two distinct, opposite genders) and that sexual and marital relations are most ...
.
As a dislocation of gender itself
Informed by Judith Butler's ideas and
queer theory, recent scholarship analyzes travestis as a demonstration of the
performative character of gender, claiming that their identities are in a permanent process of construction that enters into dispute with gender binarism.
As noted by Spanish anthropologist María Fernanda Guerrero Zavala in 2015: "At the academic level, the approaches to identities and bodies from the ''queer'' point of view, which are gaining strength, are proposed as a way out of the static conception of identities and propose angles of theoretical interpretation based on life experiences."
Fernández addresses the travesti issue using critical
gender theory.
In a 2012 research on Brazilian travesti immigrants in
Barcelona, Spanish anthropologist Julieta Vartabedian Cabral suggested that travestis ''make'' their gender, highlighting the feminization of their bodies and sexual relationships as evidence.
Fellow researcher María Fernanda Guerrero Zavala noted that: "Faced with other theorizations that call for the disembodiment of identities and queer and transgender activism, Vartabedian structures a "body" based on the most carnal experiences of transvestites".
Marluce Pereira da Silva, Josefina Fernández, Juliana Frota da Justa Coelho and Andrés García Becerra
The "travesti theory"
A fundamental part of the existing bibliography was produced by travestis themselves, as is the case of activist
Lohana Berkins, whose articles, conferences, interviews and compilations are the pillar for the study of this community in Argentina.
In recent years, there have been discussions regarding the so-called "travesti theory",
a
critical theory
A critical theory is any approach to social philosophy that focuses on society and culture to reveal, critique and challenge power structures. With roots in sociology and literary criticism, it argues that social problems stem more from soci ...
that proposes the construction of their own
paradigm
In science and philosophy, a paradigm () is a distinct set of concepts or thought patterns, including theories, research methods, postulates, and standards for what constitute legitimate contributions to a field.
Etymology
''Paradigm'' comes f ...
,
epistemology and
ontology, through which the established discourses can be disarticulated in order to produce new
knowledge production modes on the travesti population, from a regional and
decolonizing
Decolonization or decolonisation is the undoing of colonialism, the latter being the process whereby imperial nations establish and dominate foreign territories, often overseas. Some scholars of decolonization focus especially on separatism, in ...
perspective.
Peruvian scholar Malú Machuca Rose described travesti as "the refusal to be trans, the refusal to be woman, the refusal to be intelligible. (...) Travesti is classed and raced: it means you do not present femininely all of the time because you cannot afford to."
According to Rizki, the "travesti theory" constitutes a "
Latin/x American body of work and a body politics with an extensive transregional history", citing South American writers such as Berkins, Giuseppe Campuzano, Claudia Rodríguez and
Marlene Wayar as exponents.
He defined travesti as "a politics of refusal", as it "disavows coherence and is an always already racialized and classed geopolitical identification that gestures toward the inseparability of indigeneity, blackness, material precarity, sex work, HIV status, and uneven relationships to diverse state formations."
According to scholar Dora Silva Santana, travesti is "a negation of an imposed dominant expectation of womanhood that centers on people who are
cisgender,
heteronormative,
able-bodied, elitist, and white."
Marlene Wayar's 2018 book ''Travesti / Una teoría lo suficientemente buena'' has been considered an important contribution to the field.
Wayar explained:
What we are proposing is that travesti is that gaze, that position in the world and we analyze it from Latin America because that is the world we are in. We believe that all the previous and contemporary theories are very good, but we now have to make them pass through our body and territory to know if they give us good or bad results, (...) it has to be a theory that is not brought down from any illuminated territory but is rather built with dialogue.
Living conditions

Travestis are a historically
vulnerable
Vulnerable may refer to:
General
* Vulnerability
* Vulnerability (computing)
* Vulnerable adult
* Vulnerable species
Music
Albums
* ''Vulnerable'' (Marvin Gaye album), 1997
* ''Vulnerable'' (Tricky album), 2003
* ''Vulnerable'' (The Used album) ...
and
criminalized population, victims of
social exclusion and
structural violence.
Discrimination, harassment,
arbitrary detentions, torture and murder are commonplace throughout Latin America.
Several
LGBT activists, journalists and artists denounce that the violence and early death to which the travesti population is subjected constitutes an authentic
genocide.
A study carried out in 2011 in
Central America revealed, for example, that more than 80% of the surveyed population felt they have the right to attack trans and travesti people because of their way of being.
In his pioneering investigation of the travesti population of
Salvador, Bahia
Salvador (English: ''Savior'') is a Brazilian municipality and capital city of the state of Bahia. Situated in the Zona da Mata in the Northeast Region of Brazil, Salvador is recognized throughout the country and internationally for its cuisine ...
in the 1990s, anthropologist Don Kulick found that they are "one of the most marginalized and despised groups in Brazilian society."
[Kulick, 1998, p. 7] According to a 2017 research published by the
Ministry of Defense of Argentina titled ''La revolución de las mariposas'', 74.6% of trans women and travestis in Buenos Aires said they had suffered some type of violence, a high number, although lower than that registered in 2005, which was 91.9%.
The same study indicated that they die on average at the age of 32, well below the average life expectancy of the country.
Similarly, travestis and transsexuals in Brazil have a life expectancy of 35 years.
In 2021, it is estimated that a travesti or trans person dies violently every 48 hours in Brazil, with at least 80 murders in the first half of the year. Brazil is considered "the most transphobic country in the world",
and, according to an annual balance carried out by Trans Murder Monitoring in 2020, the country is at the top of the list of trans people murders.
Lohana Berkins reflected in 2015: "Reaching old age is for a travesti like belonging to an exclusive club, because the mishaps that accompany
marginal life—which lead to a death that is always considered premature in terms of population statistics—are the perennial consequences of a
persecuted
Persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or group by another individual or group. The most common forms are religious persecution, racism, and political persecution, though there is naturally some overlap between these terms ...
identity."

In recent times, the concept of "travesticide" (Spanish: ''travesticidio'')—along with "transfemicide" or "trans
femicide"—
has been extended to refer to the
hate crime
A hate crime (also known as a bias-motivated crime or bias crime) is a prejudice-motivated crime which occurs when a perpetrator targets a victim because of their membership (or perceived membership) of a certain social group or racial demograph ...
understood as the murder of a travesti due to her gender condition.
In 2015, the murder case of activist
Diana Sacayán became the first precedent in Argentina and in Latin America to be criminally
judged
Judgement (or US spelling judgment) is also known as ''adjudication'', which means the evaluation of evidence to make a decision. Judgement is also the ability to make considered decisions. The term has at least five distinct uses. Aristotle s ...
as a "travesticide".
According to Blas Radi and Alejandra Sardá-Chandiramani:
''Travesticide''/''transfemicide'' is the end of a continuum of violence that begins with the expulsion of home, exclusion from education, the health system and labor market, early initiation into prostitution/sex work, the permanent risk of contracting sexually transmitted diseases, criminalization, social stigmatization, pathologization, persecution
Persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or group by another individual or group. The most common forms are religious persecution, racism, and political persecution, though there is naturally some overlap between these term ...
and police violence. This pattern of violence constitutes the space of experience for trans women and ''travesties'', which is mirrored in their waning horizon of expectations. In it, death is nothing extraordinary; on the contrary, in the words of Octavio Paz "life and death are inseparable, and each time the first loses significance, the second becomes insignificant".

Most travestis assume their condition at a very young age,
and are usually perceived by others as overly
effeminate boys during childhood.
[Fernández, 2004, p. 79] This mostly conflicts their relationships with their families and with the
educational system, which are marked by discrimination and later abandonment.
[Fernández, 2004, p. 80] Most are either expelled from their families or left them of their own accord—
[Kulick, 1998. p. 179] generally between the ages of thirteen and eighteen—and in most cases judge the occasion as the beginning of their new lives as travestis.
[Fernández, 2004, p. 88] They are usually forced to leave their towns or even countries in search of less hostile locations.
In her pioneering 2004 research book ''Cuerpos desobedientes'', Josefina Fernández found that most of the travestis surveyed had been victims of
child sexual abuse, although she noted: "I must clarify, however, that it is a topic that I approached with great caution (...), in order to avoid any 'adventurous' readings that might associate rape with travestism in terms of cause-consequence."
[Fernández, 2004, p. 78]
The association between travestis and
prostitution
Prostitution is the business or practice of engaging in Sex work, sexual activity in exchange for payment. The definition of "sexual activity" varies, and is often defined as an activity requiring physical contact (e.g., sexual intercourse, n ...
constitutes one of the most widespread "
common sense representations in Latin American societies".
As their living conditions are marked by
exclusion from the formal educational system and the
labor market, prostitution is constituted as their "only source of income, the most widespread survival strategy and one of the very few spaces for recognition of the travesti identity as a possibility of being in the world".
This in turn, has an important—or defining—
role in the construction of their identity.
[Fernández, 2004. p. 97] Brazilian organization ANTRA estimates that 90% of travestis and trans women of the country resort to prostitution at least once in their life.
According to ''La revolución de las mariposas'', 88% of travestis and trans women from Buenos Aires never had a formal job, while 51.5% never had a job of any kind.
70.4% of those surveyed said they earned their living from prostitution, and of this group, 75.7% had been doing so from an age less than or equal to 18 years.
87.2% of these travesti and trans women surveyed who currently work as prostitutes wish to leave the activity if they were to be offered a job.
The expulsion of travestis from the
educational system is a necessary element to understand the use of prostitution as an almost exclusive means of support, since the "hostile circumstances that mark the schooling experience of the majority of travesti girls and adolescents severely condition the possibilities of these subjects in terms of social inclusion and access to quality employment in adulthood."
The strong
stigmatization
Social stigma is the disapproval of, or discrimination against, an individual or group based on perceived characteristics that serve to distinguish them from other members of a society. Social stigmas are commonly related to culture, gender, rac ...
towards travestis and the sex work that they carry out generally conditions the service they receive from medical personnel.
[Falabella, Augsten, Recalde & Orué Pozzo, 2017. p. 99] Fear of rejection by health workers often leads them to
self-medicate
Self-medication is a human behavior in which an individual uses a substance or any exogenous influence to self-administer treatment for physical or psychological conditions: for example headaches or fatigue.
The substances most widely used in s ...
and to attend health institutions when conditions or diseases are already at very advanced levels.
[Falabella, Augsten, Recalde & Orué Pozzo, 2017. p. 13] Due to the strong stereotype towards travestis in relation to prostitution and
HIV
The human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) are two species of '' Lentivirus'' (a subgroup of retrovirus) that infect humans. Over time, they cause acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), a condition in which progressive failure of the immu ...
, they are usually automatically referred to
HIV/AIDS centers every time they attend a medical center, ignoring their other health needs.
[Falabella, Augsten, Recalde & Orué Pozzo, 2017. p. 117][Falabella, Augsten, Recalde & Orué Pozzo, 2017. p. 118] Even though the high prevalence of HIV/AIDS in travestis is real, it stems from a process of social exclusion that "ends up incarnating in travesti bodies and
confirming the stereotype."
Travestis are in an extremely vulnerable situation when it comes to the virus.
A study published in ''
Culture, Health & Sexuality'' in 2009 found that they are one of the groups most affected by HIV in Mexico; while a research published in ''
Global Public Health'' in 2016 found that there is a 30% prevalence of the virus in the travesti population of
Lima, Peru.
Some health systems continue to include travestis under the
epidemiological category of "
men who have sex with men" (MSM), with little consideration of their unique situation and needs.
Recent studies indicate the need for multilevel
HIV prevention campaigns that prioritize the travesti population.
Access to housing is one of the problems that most affects the travesti community. In Buenos Aires, 65.1% of travestis and trans women live in rental rooms in hotels, private houses, pensions or apartments, whether authorized by the competent body or "taken" by those who manage them irregularly.
According to a study carried out by
INDEC and
INADI
The National Institute Against Discrimination, Xenophobia and Racism ( es, Instituto Nacional contra la Discriminación, la Xenofobia y el Racismo, link=no, INADI) is a state agency of the Government of Argentina (answerable to the Ministry of J ...
in 2012, 46% of the travesti and trans women population in Argentina lived in deficit housing, while another study carried out by ATTTA and
Fundacion Huesped in 2014 indicated that one third of them lived in poor households, particularly in the
Northwest region of the country.
Activism
Argentine movement
1990—2004

Travesti identity has an important history of
political mobilization in Argentina, where it is proudly claimed as the "political locus par excellence" of resistance to the policies of
gender binarism and
cissexism
Cisnormativity or cissexual assumption is the assumption that everyone is, or ought to be, cisgender. The term can further refer to a wider range of presumptions about gender assignment, such as the presumption of a gender binary, or expectations ...
.
Argentine travestis began to get organized between the late 1980s and early 1990s, in repudiation of persecution, mistreatment and police violence, as well as the police edicts (Spanish: "''edictos policiales''") in force at that time.
A pioneering figure was that of Karina Urbina, the first transgender rights activist in the country, although not framed under the term travesti but rather transsexual.
Unlike the scandalous public attitude of travestis, transsexuals like Urbina showed themselves in television as sensitive and affected, qualities they most associated with femininity.
Another initial difference between the two groups is that travestis fought against police edicts and demanded their annulment, while transsexuals sought to be recognized as women and to be registered as such in their documents.
The travesti political movement began in an organized manner with the founding of the Asociación de Travestis Argentinas (ATA; English: "Association of Argentine Travestis"), in 1992
or 1993, depending on the author.
Others consider that the creation of Travestis Unidas (TU; English: "United Travestis") precedes that of ATA, and regard it as the first travesti organization in the country.
It was founded by Kenny de Michellis alongside three friends in May 1993.
She first came into contact with local
gay activism in the early 1990s through Gays DC, an organization formed by
Carlos Jáuregui, César Cigliutti and Marcelo Ferreyra in 1991 after separating from the Comunidad Homosexual Argentina (CHA; English: "Argentine Homosexual Community").
The three men founded the CHA in 1984 and Jáuregui had been its most visible member, becoming the first person to openly defend his homosexuality in Argentine mass media.
The members of Gays DC encouraged De Michellis to form Travestis Unidas and offered her to write a column on the situation of travestis in their official magazine.
Her involvement as an activist was fundamentally through her appearances in mass media,
as she became the first travesti to appear on national television.
At that time, the "exercise of visibility" was considered one of the optimal and preferred ways of approaching travesti activism.

María Belén Correa, another of the travestis that began to organize in the early 1990s, also became involved with activism through Gays DC, which she contacted in 1993 seeking legal help.
The association's lawyers encouraged her to form her own group and Correa founded ATA, which was later joined by Lohana Berkins and Nadia Echazú.
Correa recalled Carlos Jáuregui's role in their activism:
Carlos said that we had brought a new air to ocal homosexualactivism. They were occupied with the civil union rojectand we were saying "we cannot live, we cannot walk, we cannot go to the supermarket." Things were literally this way. He was the first one to come to our meetings (...) He wrote our press releases, our speeches, because we didn't know how to do them. (...) He began to tell us that we were activists and taught us to behave as such. We didn't even understand the concept of transsexuality (...), we became activists almost without realizing it.

One of the first major political struggles of travestis occurred within the context of the
1994 amendment of the Constitution of Argentina
The 1994 amendment to the Constitution of Argentina was approved on 22 August 1994 by a Constitutional Assembly that met in the twin cities of Santa Fe and Paraná. The calling for elections for the Constitutional Convention and the main issues t ...
and revolved around the inclusion of an article of
non-discrimination based on sexual orientation in the new constitution of the city of Buenos Aires.
Noting that the project excluded travestis, they began to demand that the broader LGBT movement focused not only on sexual orientation but also gender identity issues.
At the same time, travestis took part in the discussions to repeal the police edicts under which travestis and sex workers were regularly detained.
These edicts were replaced by the Código de Convivencia Urbana (English: "Urban Coexistence Code"), which confronted travestis with Vecinos de Palermo, a group of residents of
Palermo
Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan ...
who demanded more police repression and tougher regulations to eradicate prostitutes from their neighborhood.
Within these debates, travestis came into contact with
women's rights groups and soon began to be included into spaces of
feminist
Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...
discussion.
Their contact with local feminism during the mid-1990s is regarded as a key moment in the development of the Argentine travesti rights movement, as it directed their concerns towards the concept of gender identity,
and marked the beginning of
transfeminism in the country.
The inclusion in particular was that of Berkins, who got into the women's rights movement through meetings with
lesbian feminists
Lesbian feminism is a cultural movement and critical perspective that encourages women to focus their efforts, attentions, relationships, and activities towards their fellow women rather than men, and often advocates lesbianism as the logica ...
such as Alejandra Sarda,
Ilse Fuskova, Chela Nadio and Fabiana Tron.
Following this approach to gender theory,
ATA was split into two new organizations in 1995: the Organización de Travestis y Transexuales de la República Argentina (OTTRA; English: "Organization of Travestis and Transsexuals from the Argentine Republic") and the Asociación Lucha por la Identidad Travesti y Transexual (ALITT; English: "Struggle for the Travesti and Transsexual Identity Association").
The former—led by Echazú—defended prostitution as a valid way of life, while the latter—led by Berkins—generally rejected it and mainly focused on the social recognition of their identities.
They sought to distance themselves from ATA's position that argued that in order to change the living conditions of travestis, they should first of all modify the image that society had of them, ignoring the issue of prostitution.

Between 1993 and 2003, ALITT collaborated with the City of Buenos Aires'
Ombudsman
An ombudsman (, also ,), ombud, ombuds, ombudswoman, ombudsperson or public advocate is an official who is usually appointed by the government or by parliament (usually with a significant degree of independence) to investigate complaints and at ...
's Office (Spanish: ''Defensoría del Pueblo'') in a series of initiatives aimed at the transvestite community.
One of the first initiatives promoted by the Ombudsman's Office was the ''Informe preliminar sobre la situación de las travestis en la ciudad de Buenos Aires'' in 1999, a statistical report on the living conditions of the city's travestis.
Between 1995 and 2005, travesti organizations were strengthened by working with other groups, interacting with the academia and articulating with different political parties.
Around 1995, the gay magazine ''NX'' organized meetings to discuss the problem of sexual minorities in the country and travesti groups were invited to share their life experiences.
These gatherings led to a 1996 national meeting of activists organized in
Rosario
Rosario () is the largest city in the central provinces of Argentina, Argentine province of Santa Fe Province, Santa Fe. The city is located northwest of Buenos Aires, on the west bank of the Paraná River. Rosario is the third-most populous ci ...
by the local group Colectivo Arco Iris, which is considered a milestone in the travesti movement, since they widely convinced the rest of the attendees to recognize them as part of the broader Argentine LGBT movement.
The irruption of travestis in the Argentine academic environment occurred through the Colectivo Universitario Eros (CUE; "English: Eros University Collective"),
a student collective from the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters of the
University of Buenos Aires (UBA), which pioneered
queer theory in the country and remained active from 1993 to 1996.
In 1997, members of this group formed the Área de Estudios Queer (AEQ;English: Queer Studies Area) within the Centro Cultural Ricardo Rojas (also of the UBA),
and travesti activists Lohana Berkins, Marlene Wayar and Nadia Echazú soon joined.
According to Berkins: "Our appearance in the academic field was through the Grupo Eros, which included Flavio Rapisardi, Silvia Delfino, Mabel Bellucci, and which later dissolved. Then they formed the Área Queer, where they also sat us next to an intellectual and we began to argue, on our terms, with our abilities, but we began to argue."

During the late 1990s and early 2000s, travesti activists claimed to have felt "invisible" by the broader LGBT movement, which mainly focused on the passing of a civil union law.
As a result, the group of travesti activists led by Berkins was closer to the feminist and
sex worker rights movements.
In a 1997
landmark case,
Mariela Muñoz
Mariela Muñoz (24 December 19435 May 2017) was an Argentine transgender rights activist and politician. She raised twenty-three children over the course of her life. In 1997, she became the first trans woman to be officially recognized by the ...
, became the first transgender person to be officially recognized by the Argentine state and was granted the
custody of some of the children she had raised. This distancing was also due to the reconfiguration of the local LGBT movement in response to the
HIV epidemic.
Following international prevention policies against the virus, the category of "men who have sex with men" (MSM) was established, within which the travestis were included.
Berkins' ALITT group objected to this definition on the grounds that it undermined the fight for their identity, while ATTTA, on the other hand, requested and managed resources to finance prevention projects focused on MSM.
These efforts by ATTTA occurred in parallel with its articulation with other local NGOs working on HIV/AIDS, such as Nexo and Fundación Buenos Aires Sida.
In 2004, OTTRA was dissolved following the death of Echazú, due to complications derived from HIV/AIDS.
2005—present

Today, ATTTA—which added two more "T" for "transsexual" and "transgender" in its name—and ALITT are the two travesti activist groups with the longest trajectory and political incidence in the country.
Between 2010 and 2012, a judicial strategy was carried out jointly by ATTTA and the Federación Argentina LGBT's (FALGBT; English: "Argentine LGBT Federation") legal team, resulting in a series of judicial appeals that established antecedents in the recognition of travesti and transgender identities.
On May 9, 2012, the
Argentine National Congress
The Congress of the Argentine Nation ( es, Congreso de la Nación Argentina) is the legislative branch of the government of Argentina. Its composition is bicameral, constituted by a 72-seat Senate and a 257-seat Chamber of Deputies. The Senate ...
passed the
Gender Identity Law (Spanish: ''Ley de Identidad de Género''), which made the country one of the world's most progressive in terms of transgender rights. It allows people to officially change their gender identities without facing barriers such as hormone therapy, surgery, psychiatric diagnosis or judge approval.
The law has been celebrated as a great victory for the local LGBT movement. Nevertheless, activist Marlene Wayar soon criticized the law claiming that travestis can only choose to change their legal gender to "female", a disacknowledgement of their perceived identity.
Since the implementation of the Gender Identity Law, there have been efforts by activists in search of the
legal recognition of non-binary genders such as travesti.
In early 2020, activist Lara Bertolini made news for claiming that her national ID should be legally registered as "travesti femininity" (Spanish: "''femineidad travesti''").
She initially obtained a favorable ruling from a Buenos Aires judge, which was later rejected by the Chamber of Appeals (Spanish: ''Cámara de Apelaciones''), with its three judges citing the
Real Academia Española
The Royal Spanish Academy ( es, Real Academia Española, generally abbreviated as RAE) is Spain's official royal institution with a mission to ensure the stability of the Spanish language. It is based in Madrid, Spain, and is affiliated with ...
's official definition of "travesti" as their reasoning.
In July 2021, the country became the first in Latin America to recognise non-binary gender identities in its national identification cards and passports, allowing to choose the letter X as a third option besides male (M) or female (F).
The measure was criticized by various travesti and non-binary activists, who say that the letter X makes their identities invisible and that it actually reinforces the binary by
othering othem.
On June 24, 2021, the Argentine Senate passed the travesti-trans job quota law (Spanish: "''cupo laboral travesti-trans''"), which established that the state must hire at least 1 percent of the public administration staff to travesti and trans people.
The official name of the law is Law for the Promotion of Access to Formal Employment for Travestis, Transsexuals and Transgender Persons "Diana Sacayán - Lohana Berkins" (Spanish: ''Ley de Promoción del Acceso al Empleo Formal para Personas Travestis, Transexuales y Transgénero "Diana Sacayán - Lohana Berkins"'').
Brazilian movement
Travesti activism—located within the broader transgender rights movement—has been marked by its tensions and differences with transsexual-identified groups.
Historically, the creation of travesti organizations followed one of two models: on the one hand by self-organization and, on the other hand, from the action of NGOs linked to the homosexual movement or the movement against AIDS.
In the late 1990s, gender identity-oriented activism emerged in Brazil, which adopted the terms "trans" and "transsexual" on the recommendation of foreign activists.
The undertaking and demand for sex-reassignment surgery is recurrently used as a distinguishing factor between both groups, with travestis choosing not alter their genitality.
The Associação Nacional de Travestis e Transexuais (ANTRA; English: "National Association of Travestis and Transsexuals") was founded in 2000 and remains the main organization of the transgender movement at the national level.
As of 2003, travestis remained underrepresented within the broader LGBT movement, as well as in the growing Brazilian "
pink market", since it emphasizes the aesthetics of masculine, gay men.
As a result, the emerging Brazilian travesti movement of the 1990s and early 2000s has been developed mainly through AIDS-related funding, which resulted in the emergence of their own formal organizations, programs and venues.
Travesti involvement in the Brazilian response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic dates to the mid-1980s, when São Paulo travesti Brenda Lee founded a support hospice for travestis living with the virus.
The number of travesti-led and travesti-related programs in the country grew from a handful in the early 1990s to approximately twenty in the early 2000s.
In a 1996 speech, Lair Guerra de Macedo Rodrigues—former Director of Brazil's National Program on Sexually Transmissible Diseases and AIDS—asserted: "The organization of travesti groups, especially following the advent of AIDS, is evidence of the beginning of the arduous task of defending citizenship."
In 2005, the transsexual-focused Coletivo Nacional de Transexuais (CNT; English: "National Transsexual Collective") was founded, which progressively moved away from the spaces of the LGBT movement towards women's right groups.
The CNT was the target of criticism and accusations of division within the trans movement, and was criticized by travesti activists for its "lack of political commitment".
In December 2009, the XVI Encontro Nacional de Travestis e Transexuais (ENTLAIDS; English: "XVI National Meeting of Travestis and Transsexuals")—held in Rio de Janeiro—was marked by an intense debate for the "political definition" of the categories "travesti" and "transsexual" within the broader transgender rights movement.
It was held following the dissolution of the CNT and the subsequent involvement of many of its members with ANTRA.
Activist Luana Muniz was the most recognized voice defending the transvesti identity during the meeting, who pointed out the social class differences that are involved in the delimitation of the categories "travesti" and "transsexual".
In 2018, Muniz defined being travesti as: "being daring, having the pleasure of transgressing what they say is normal."
Other notable travesti activists include Majorie Marchi, Keila Simpson,
Amara Moira, Indianara Siqueira,
and Sofia Favero.
Unlike countries like Argentina, where there is a quota law for travesti and trans people in the public administration, Brazil is far from institutionalizing the labor inclusion of the trans community, although there are many travesti-led projects, such as Transgarçonne, an initiative of the
Federal University of Rio de Janeiro; Capacitrans, founded by Andréa Brazil; and TransEmpregos, created by Márcia Rocha, the largest job platform for trans people in the country.
Chilean movement
On April 22, 1973, a group of young travestis gathered in the
Plaza de Armas in
Santiago, holding the first protest of sexual diversity in the history of Chile.
A key figure in the Chilean travesti movement and cultural scene is the poet Claudia Rodríguez, who began her activist career in the 1990s.
Paraguayan movement

Paraguay is one of the most restrictive countries in the region with respect to the rights of transgender people.
The first demonstrations of travestis and trans women took place in the late 1990s and early 2000s, mainly to defend their ''paradas'' (the places where sex work is carried out) and to protest police mistreatment and murder of their peers.
Yren Rotela
Yren Ailyn Rotela Ramirez (born 9 January 1981) is a Paraguayan activist for the rights of LGBT people and sex workers.
Biography
Yren Rotela was born on 9 January 1981 in the Obrero neighborhood of Asunción, Paraguay. She is the second of seve ...
is one of the leading figures of the Paraguayan movement for the rights of travesti, transgender and transsexual people, founding the Panambí association in 2009, which she chaired until 2017.
She also inaugurated Casa Diversa in 2019, which in addition to being a home, is a community center for sexual diversity.
When asked about her local references, she replied: "I can't forget the survivors of the dictatorship who taught me a lot: Liz Paola, Peter Balbuena, Carla. But above all, my murdered companions are always my great leaders, my greatest examples of struggle."
Other active travesti activists today are Alejandra Grange, Fabu Olmedo and Reny Davenport.
At the international level, the main references of the movement are from Argentina, including Diana Sacayán, Lohana Berkins, Marlene Wayar, Marcela Romero, Diana Zurco, Camila Sosa Villada, Susy Shock and Alma Fernández.
In a 2020 interview with Mexican independent media Kaja Negra, Alejandra Grange —founder of the Transitar organization and the Radio Travesti program—stated:
For me it is very important to say that I am a travesti because it is a word that was born in the Latin American context that we are resignifying because it was a medical term, a man who dresses as a woman to achieve sexual satisfaction and all those things. But it is not that. For me, when I tell you that I am a travesti, I am telling you that this is resistance, for me this is happiness, it is struggle, being with my friends, it is a way of saying ''japiró'' to the system, Guaraní expression of anger and rage">Guaraní_language.html" ;"title=" Guaraní language">Guaraní expression of anger and ragego to hell, because I can exist within all of this.
Uruguayan movement
Uruguayan travesti activism emerged in the 1990s, during the neoliberal presidencies of Luis Alberto Lacalle and Julio María Sanguinetti, which "promoted a subordinate integration model of sexual dissidence anchored in the notion of toleration".
In this context, the claims of the Mesa Coordinadora Travesti (English: Travesti Coordinating Board) and later the Asociación Trans del Uruguay (English: Uruguayan Trans Association), focused on the conquest of "
negative rights": the end of discrimination and of police persecution.
In 2002, the law on sex work was passed, legalizing the activity and undermining police surveillance in the streets.
During the progressive governments of the
Frente Amplio, the conquest of "positive rights" was achieved: in 2009 a law was approved that allows changing the gender and name in the identification documents and, in 2018, the Ley Integral para Personas Trans (English: Comprehensive Law for Trans People) was approved.
Writing for ''
La Diaria
''La Diaria'', also styled ''la diaria'' () is a Uruguayan newspaper established in 2006. It is aligned with the independent left
Left may refer to:
Music
* ''Left'' (Hope of the States album), 2006
* ''Left'' (Monkey House album), 2016
* "Le ...
'' in 2020, Diego Sempol and
Karina Pankievich
Karina Pankievich is a Uruguayan trans rights activist. She is the president of Asociación Trans del Uruguay (ATRU).
Life
Karina moved to Montevideo at the age of 13. Since the age of 15 years, she worked as a sex worker during the dictators ...
pointed out that "the debates on the
ey Integral para Personas Transwere written in stone in the social imaginary and formatted trans memories in the public sphere," leading to the appearance of a series of testimonies that "broke a prolonged silence that put into discussion the recent Uruguayan past and the official accounts of state violence
civic-military dictatorship">Civic-military dictatorship of Uruguay">civic-military dictatorship.
See also
*
Feminist anthropology
*
Feminist views on prostitution
*
Feminist views on transgender topics
Feminist views on transgender topics vary widely. Third-wave feminists and fourth-wave feminists tend to view the struggle for trans rights as an integral part of intersectional feminism. Former president of the American National Organization f ...
*
History of cross-dressing
*
HIV/AIDS in Latin America HIV/AIDS has been a public health concern for Latin America due to a remaining prevalence of the disease. In 2018 an estimated 2.2 million people had HIV in Latin America and the Caribbean, making the HIV prevalence rate approximately 0.4% in Latin ...
*
List of people killed for being transgender
*
List of people with non-binary gender identities
*
LGBT linguistics
*
LGBT people in prison
*
LGBT rights in the Americas
Laws governing lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights are complex in the Americas, and acceptance of LGBT persons varies widely.
Same-sex marriages are currently legal in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, ...
*
LGBT stereotypes
*
Outline of transgender topics
*
Postfeminism
*
Timeline of transgender history
The following is a timeline of transgender history.
Transgender history dates back to the first recorded instances of transgender individuals in ancient civilizations. However, the word ''transgender'' did not exist until 1965 when coined by ps ...
*
Trans bashing
*
Transmedicalism
Transmedicalism is the idea that being transgender or transsexual is contingent upon experiencing gender dysphoria or requiring medical treatment to transition. Transmedicalists believe individuals who identify as transgender, do not experience ...
*
Transgender health care
Transgender health care, also known as gender-affirming care, includes the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of physical and mental health conditions, as well as sex reassignment therapies, for transgender individuals.Gorton N, Grubb HM (2014) ...
Footnotes
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
*
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External links
* (in Spanish), Argentine organization.
* (in Spanish), Argentine organization.
* (in Spanish), Paraguayan organization.
* (in Spanish), travesti periodical
* (in Spanish), Paraguayan organization.
{{LGBT slang terms
Effeminacy
Femininity
Gender systems
LGBT terminology
Transgender in South America
Transgender identities