BEYOND PRONOUNS: DECOLONISING GENDER & NON-BINARY GENDERED SUBJECTIVITIES

Abstract

This thesis seeks to elucidate the multiplicity of challenges faced by nonbinary individuals in Singapore and situate these challenges in the broader context of coloniality. Based on interviews with 10 non-binary individuals, I argue that the root of the marginalization faced by non-binary gendered subjectivities in Singapore is the pervasiveness of the colonial/modern gender system. The predominant way of understanding gender today in a binary and cisnormative manner is not timeless or universal, but is the product of the colonial/modern gender system which was violently imposed on indigenous, gender pluralistic populations in Southeast Asia during colonialism; non-binary gendered subjectivities are a decolonial gendered response to the colonial/modern gender system. The Singaporean state and Christianity are the most significant institutions perpetuating the colonial/modern gender system; they do so by reinforcing the gender binary and cisnormativity in different ways that ultimately erases non-binary gendered subjectivities. To move towards a better future for my informants, material changes like degendering public toilets and uniforms as well as symbolic changes like socially and legally recognizing non-binary gendered subjectivities must be made. At the same time, these material and symbolic changes must be accompanied by a strong commitment to decoloniality which can take the forms of decolonising subjectivity within and beyond the non-binary community and a decolonial epistemological shift towards an ecology of knowledges. This combination of changes will significantly and meaningfully attenuate the oppression of non-binary individuals in the long-term, lest the material and symbolic changes may be tokenistic or performative.