Transgender Employment Experiences

Book excerpt: The complex and changing state of policy protections for transgender communities practically requires trans people to become legal experts just to navigate their everyday lives. It also simultaneously offers a window of opportunity for legal advocates to shape new laws and policies based on the lived experiences of trans people. Using personal interviews, legal case histories, and transgender theory, Transgender Employment Experiences combines policy analysis with the lived experiences of twenty transgender-identified employees, showing how worker protections that should exist under the Civil Rights Act are instead systematically undermined in the case of many transgender employees. Rather than focusing solely on negative experiences, however, Kyla Bender-Baird also highlights the positive experiences her respondents had coming out at work, illustrating examples of best practices in response to transitioning. Bender-Baird covers many forms of discrimination that transgender workers face, such as harassment, gender-based dress codes, income-related inequities, bathroom policies, and background checks. Drawing from this analysis, she argues for protections for gender expression in policy decisions, legislative efforts, and for a multipronged approach to workplace discrimination. With its effective balance of personal stories and legal guidance, this book is a much-needed resource for those in the field of gender and employment, from policy analysts to human resource managers to queer studies scholars.