“Corpo feito no olho para o olhar”: contornos da trans-formação de gênero nas experiências das trans-travestis no contexto de prostituição em Araguaína-TO

Abstract

This thesis aims to understand what the bodies of transgender women who work as prostitutes at the side of BR-153 highway mean by using their gender “trans-formation” narrative. Using an ethnographic collaborative methodology, we conducted the fieldwork from August to October of 2017 alongside with interviews about the life stories of three participants. The research uses three theoretical perspectives to endorse the proposed problematic: gender, sexuality and culture. This research’s main goal was to investigate the body experience in the gender trans-formation narratives of transgender women in prostitution context in Araguaína (TO) The specific goals were: describing and understanding the connection between territory and body in prostitution context; getting to know the life story of these transgender women in social situations such as home and school; understanding their body experience during their diaspora phase and by using prostitution as a profession as well as a means of accessing transitioning technologies. The transgender woman identity formation come from the processes of identification with the opposite sex since early childhood. The research participants’ transformation is a process that happens in the prostitution context and it implies an improvement not only in the general state, bringing self-recognition, happiness, etc., but also in their income converting the body into a “place”.