PIKSI-Rock 2023: Megan Burke, Sonoma State University
Title: The Serious World of Cis
Abstract: This talk considers anti-transgender legislation, particularly that which targets trans kids, as an institution of cis meaning. It is argued that cisness is a “serious world” instituted and maintained by a structure of meaning that enforces a closure of lived space and time. Accordingly, it is suggested that gender freedom, and the freedom of trans kids in particular, has much to do with how and to what extent adults impose meaning onto kids. This account leads to a consideration of the value of gender affirmation in the lives of trans kids as a condition of possibility for moral freedom.
Bio: Megan Burke is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Sonoma State University and is the author When Time Warps: The Lived Experience of Gender, Race, and Sexual Violence (Univ. of Minnesota Press, 2019), which received a 2020 Outstanding Academic Title award from the American Library Assoication. Dr. Burke’s research interests include feminist philosophy, phenomenology, existentialism, and interdisciplinary LGBTQ+ studies. They have authored articles on temporal harm, queer love, genderlessness, and cisnormativity, and they are the current author of the entry on Simone de Beauvoir with the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Dr. Burke is currently working on two books, the first, Simone de Beauvoir: The Basics is part of Routledge’s Basic Books series, and the second is a book in trans philosophy on the ethics of gender affirmation and gender freedom.
