Grant: DRA: Canada Impact+ Research Training Awards - Doctoral

Gender affirming healthcare has become more widely accessible in recent decades. Yet, significant access barriers remain, including health systems factors (e.g., financial burden on patients, limited provider availability) and broader social narratives (e.g. politicization and pathologization of transgender identity). Transgender community-generated knowledge systems play a crucial role in supplementing formal healthcare structures to enhance access to gender affirming healthcare, through mechanisms such as local knowledge of trans-affirming providers, material/financial support networks, and healthcare navigation expertise. However, their transformative potential remains understudied. This research explores how community-generated knowledge systems support access to gender affirming healthcare amidst societal discourses of politicization and pathologization of transgender people. Objectives include: 1) investigate language and discourse that transgender communities use to describe supportive efforts, and 2) explore how community-generated knowledge systems are contextually bound by socio-political rhetoric. Through a lens of queer- and trans- theory, critical discourse analysis (CDA) will support understandings of how prominent ideologies, political power, and subjugated knowledges related to gender affirming healthcare are embedded in transgender communities. Methods include interviews with N=20-25 transgender adults (Obj. 1), and a review of Canadian media articles pertaining to gender affirming healthcare in the past 10 years (Obj. 2). CDA will guide analysis of all data. Knowledge will be mobilized among policymakers, health systems administrators, and healthcare professionals to enhance gender affirming healthcare access in Canada.