Queering the Center by Centering the Queer: Reflections on Transsexuals and Secular Jews

This chapter deconstructs the privileged subjectivity inherent in social "norms of selfhood," by decentralizing paradigmatic definitions of sex, gender, race, and religion. Heterosexuality and Christianity are upheld as pinnacles of morality at the expense of other beliefs and practices, disregarding what would be considered "normal" for those marginalized groups. To rectify this, the author suggests employing a Wittgensteinian "confusion" in order to better comprehend the context-by understanding the "unintelligible" nature and perspectives of the marginalized, in order to appreciate the history and normativity particular to each group and come to a proper sense of unity.