Laerte vestido de mulher: an investigation of gender and sexuality representations in the media

Abstract

Hoping to contribute to the understanding of the construction of media representations concerning gender and sexuality, the purpose of this project to be conducted at the Free University of Berlin is based on three axes of investigation, all connected to the current stage of my Masters research. In the first place, this project intends to improve the investigation towards media discourses that combine categories of nation, nationality, gender and sexuality in order to sustain representations that associate the LGBTQI population with human rights violations. Such effort emerges as a result of the analysis of discourses distributed by Brazilian newspapers following Laerte Coutinho's prohibition to go to a female toilet in a restaurant in 2012. In addition, the necessity to study at a greater depth the concept of recognition (FRASER, 2013; BUTLER, 1998) is assumed as a theoretical goal, here understood under the perspective of human rights as a conflictive area (COSTA, 2004), involving power relations and entangled histories of modernization (COSTA, 2004) between countries. Therefore, the project aims to investigate the conditions of existence of a transnational transgender culture, which could inform some of the contents concerning Laerte, most notably those distributed by non-hegemonic virtual media. Finally, assuming that media representations are also historical representations, the effort of this project is to question the aspect of freshness and novelty associated to the cartoonist. By questioning the relation between media representations, the production of history and power relations, it intends to go further on the investigation about trans invisibility in the media. (AU)