Jack Halberstam

Trans: A Quick and Quirky Account of Gender Variability, published in 2018, examines recent developments in the meanings of gender and gendered bodies. Through dissecting gendered language and creations of popular culture, Halberstam presents a complex view of the trans* body and its place in the modern world.

Halberstam is one of six children, including Naomi, Lucy, Michael, Jean and John. Halberstam's father, Heini Halberstam, and mother, Heather Peacock, were married until Heather's death in a car accident in 1971. Heini Halberstam married Doreen Bramley shortly thereafter, and they had a marriage of 42 years until Heini's death on January 25, 2014 in Champaign, Illinois at the age of 87.

Halberstam is openly attracted to women. After a relationship of 12 years, Halberstam has been romantically involved with Macarena Gomez-Barris, a sociology professor from Los Angeles, since 2008. Halberstam has said that he feels no pressure to marry, viewing marriage as a patriarchal institution that should not be a prerequisite for obtaining health care and deeming children "legitimate". Halberstam believes that "the couple form is failing".

Halberstam then speaks of how humans project our worlds onto animals. He explains the term of human exceptionalism, which he defines in two ways: Humans thinking they are more superior, and unique to other animals and Humans using cruel forms of anthropomorphism. He most speaks about anthropomorphism, which is the attribution of human characteristics to an animal. He speaks of a New York Times "Modern Love" article in which the author begins training her husband with the same techniques she saw the trainer in Sea World using on Shamu the killer whale. Halberstam first knocks how committed this shows humans are to failing structures, like marriage, that we think we ourselves are failing and must try different things. He then goes on to explain how drawing on animal behavior makes humans feel heterosexuality is more natural or primal. She imposes her boring domestic lifestyle on the life of this exotic animal, which is anthropomorphism, just to maintain her flawed sense of natural heterosexuality. Halberstam moves on to talk about the successful documentary, March of the Penguins (2005). Like other animal documentaries, this humanizes animal life and reduces animals to human ways of life. He explains how this film perpetuates heterosexuality in a false way. The film leaves out key facts about penguins journey to find love and have a baby. The first fact it leaves out is that penguins are not monogamous; they mate for one year and move on. They also leave their babies after they know they are able to swim in the water. The baby penguins then gain five years of their lives on their own, before starting another mating cycle. Halberstam claims, "the long march of the penguins is proof neither of heterosexuality in nature nor of the reproductive imperative nor of intelligent design" (Halberstam 41).

In a Queer Time and Place: Transgender Bodies, Subcultural Lives, published in 2005, looks at queer subculture, and proposes a conception of time and space independent of the influence of normative heterosexual/familial lifestyle. Halberstam coedits the book series "Perverse Modernities" with Lisa Lowe.

Halberstam begins to define stupidity on page 54 where she says "Stupidity conventionally means different things in relation to different subject positions; for example, stupidity in white men can signify new modes of domination, but stupidity in women of all ethnicities inevitably symbolizes their status as, in psychoanalytic terms, "castrated" or impaired." Stupidity can mean a variety of things depending on the scenario. Right off the bat he gives an example of how stupidity in men is generalized compared to that of women. Stupidity in women seems to be strictly looked down upon, while stupidity in men can be seen as charming. Women have always been oppressed by the idea, which was created by past hierarchy systems, that women are just not as intelligent as men.. "Stupidity is as profoundly gendered as knowledge formations in general; thus while unknowing in a man is sometimes rendered as part of masculine charm, unknowing in a woman indicates a lack and a justification of a social order that anyway privileges men. Though we both punish and naturalize female stupidity, we not only forgive stupidity in white men, but we often cannot recognize it as such since white maleness is the identity construct most often associated with mastery, wisdom, and grand narratives." White males were the symbolization of knowledge and power, not stupidity. The election of 2004, between George W. Bush and John Kerry, was used as an example of how stupidity is beneficial in certain scenarios for men. John Kerry was the well-educated, hard-working, and well-spoken candidate who gets edged out by George W. Bush, a man who sold himself on being a fun-loving, fun to be around type of guy. Bush sold himself to the public in a way to show that he was just an average person like "everyone else". Society loved that he was a Yale student but not a 4.0 kind of student. Stupidity in men does not hurt their chances in society, unlike that of women. In a male-dominated culture, stupidity in men does not have a negative downside. In this case, it actually helped the person. Stupidity can also help shed light on queer culture also.

Halberstam goes on to talk about the movie, Dude, Where's My Car? and how the film used the stupidity and forgetfulness of the main characters, Jesse and Chester, to show that in given situations that would normally be uncomfortable for heterosexual white males, is not uncomfortable at all. The stupidity of Chester and Jesse in Dude, Where's My Car? led to many homosexual and transsexual references throughout the film. Halberstam says that by interjecting this idea of forgetting into Jesse and Chester's characters causes a certain queer phenomenon throughout the film. Jesse willingly knew that he was receiving a lap dance from a transsexual, but forgets the social norms that would typically go along with that. Most white heterosexual men would not willingly accept a lap dance from a transsexual, but Jesse is too stupid to realize what is taking place. His stupidity takes sexual orientation out of the equation because he doesn't think about the fact that it's a transsexual giving him the lap dance. Although Massachusetts was the first state to legalize gay marriage in 2004, Dude, Where's My Car? was released in 2000.). The film brought light to the gay community using stupidity and forgetfulness as a staple. In 2000, gay acceptance was not nearly what it is today, thus making Dude, Where's My Car? somewhat controversial. It was not until 2015 that same-sex marriage had become legal in all 50 states. Even though it is legal in all 50 states, some states such as Mississippi tried to pass a law that protects those who object to same-sex marriage, but was blocked. The queer culture was brought to light in this film when Jesse and Chester share their convincing kiss at the end in their car next to a heterosexual couple. The stupidity of Jesse and Chester was the gateway into the kiss.

Lastly Halberstam talks about monstrous animations and their direct connection to the queer way of thinking. Animation started to create these odd human-like figures that were not human, but not animal either. Halberstam goes on to reference the movie Monsters, Inc. (2001). In this movie the corporate world relies on screams of little children to power themselves. When one monster goes to scare a little girl, and she is not scared, it scares him partially. Halberstam relates this to allowing the child to stand up to its 'boogeyman'-type figure, but at the same time form an affectionate relationship with the figure. This bond is queer in that it lets the child control the transgression of its own boundaries. It interrupts the more conventional romantic bond with a bond that seems odd and misplaced. He ends the first chapter by giving the differences on Pixarvolt films versus regular animated films. The main difference is that regular animated films stress family, human individuality and extraordinary individuals. Pixarvolt films focus more on collectivity, social bonding and diverse communities. Halberstam explains that, "Two thematics can transform a potential Pixarvolt film into a tame and conventional cartoon: an overemphasis on nuclear family and a normative investment in coupled romance" (Halberstam 47). He lastly says how Pixarvolt films show the importance in recognizing weirdness of bodies, sexuality and gender, but do it through other animal worlds.

Focusing on the topic of tomboys and female masculinity for his writings, his 1998 Female Masculinity book discusses a common by-product of gender binarism, termed "the bathroom problem" with outlining the dangerous and awkward dilemma of a perceived gender deviant's justification of presence in a gender-policed zone, such as a public bathroom, and the identity implications of "passing" therein. Assigned female at birth, he accepts masculine and feminine pronouns, and the name "Judith" in addition to "Jack", for himself.

In Female Masculinity (1998), Halberstam seeks to identify what constitutes masculinity in society and within the individual. The text first suggests that masculinity is a construction that promotes particular brands of male-ness while at the same time subordinating "alternative masculinities". The project specifically focuses on the ways female masculinity has been traditionally ignored in academia and society at large. To illustrate a cultural mechanism of subordinating alternative masculinities, Halberstam brings up James Bond and GoldenEye as an example, noting that gender performance in this film is far from what is traditional: M is the character who "most convincingly performs masculinity", Bond can only perform masculinity through his suave clothing and gadgets, and Q can be read "as a perfect model of the interpenetration of queer and dominant regimes". This interpretation of these characters challenges long-held ideas about what qualities create masculinity. Halberstam also brings up the example of the tomboy, a clear case of a youthful girl exerting masculine qualities—and raises the complication that within a youthful figure, the idea of masculinity expressed within a female body is less threatening, and only becomes threatening when those masculine tendencies are still apparent as the child progresses in age.

He gives these animated films a name, calling them "Pixarvolt" films. Pixar, referring to the company that created the first-ever computer-animated feature film. Pixarvolts have themes that would never be seen in adult films, according to Halberstam. These films also make subtle and obvious connections between communist revolt and queer embodiment. Halberstam argues that although Marxist scholars have dismissed queer theory as 'body politics', these films do a great job of showing "that alternative forms of embodiment and desire are central to the struggle against corporate domination" (Halberstam 29). He begins talking about Toy Story (1995), the first movie Pixar created. What made Toy Story such a success was its ability to engage children with the fantasy world of talking, living toys and also capture the nostalgia of older generations by employing the cowboy main character, Woody. He argues that the narratives of the film, past and present, adult and child, live and mechanic, show all the possibilities that this new animation world has created. Toy Story set the themes that are involved in all Pixarvolt film. These films are interested in social hierarchies, the outside world versus the imaginary world, and these films are all powered by revolution, transformation and rebellion. Most Pixarvolt films deal with escape to a utopian freedom. One such film about an escape to utopia is Chicken Run (2000). These chickens escape using a natural solution combined with an engineering solution, which is using all the chicken's flying abilities to power one large plane so they can escape. The queer element of this film is that most all these chickens are female so the utopia is full of free green pastures of chickens with only a few roosters around. "The revolution in this instance is feminist and animated" (Halberstam 32).

Halberstam earned a B.A. in English at the University of California, Berkeley in 1985, an M.A. from the University of Minnesota in 1989, and a Ph.D. from the same school in 1991. Halberstam is Jewish of Bohemian descent.

Jack Halberstam (/ˈ h æ l b ər s t æ m / ; born December 15, 1961), also known as Judith Halberstam, is a tenured Professor in the Department of English and Comparative Literature and the Institute for Research on Women, Gender, and Sexuality at Columbia University. Prior to this appointment in 2017, Halberstam was a Professor of American Studies and Ethnicity, Gender Studies, and Comparative Literature and the Director of The Center for Feminist Research at University of Southern California (USC). Halberstam was the Associate Professor in the Department of Literature at the University of California at San Diego before working at USC. Halberstam is a gender and queer theorist and author.

In Gaga Feminism Halberstam uses Lady Gaga as a symbol for a new era of sexual and gender expression in the 21st century. The book has been noted as "a work that engages in the theorizing of contemporary gender relations and their cultural narratives, and the practice of calling for a chaotic upending of normative categories in an act of sociopolitical anarchy." Halberstam describes five tenets of Gaga feminism: