“It’s like a happy little affirmation circle”: a grounded theory study of nonbinary peoples’ internal processes for navigating binary gender norms

Abstract

Background: Nonbinary people experience marginalization through discrimination, rejection, microaggressions, and stigma as a result of not always conforming to societal gender norms embedded in the gender binary. There is limited research about how nonbinary Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) living in the United States navigate societally enforced binary gender norms, which is especially important to understand given how racism and Euro-colonization have enforced the gender binary. Better understanding the internal strategies nonbinary people use to cope, embody affirmation, and regulate emotions in response to marginalizing experiences could increase understanding of how to best prevent and address the health disparities experienced by nonbinary people.

Aim: Drawing on the practices of interrogating norms central to queer theory with a sensitization to racism and settler colonialism, this study aimed to identify a framework to understand nonbinary peoples’ processes of navigating gender norms internally through their lived experiences with an awareness of how context impacts these processes.

Method: This qualitative interview study utilized construcitivist grounded theory methodology, guided by queer theory. Twenty-one nonbinary individuals were interviewed over Zoom with 15 being BIPOC.

Results: Participants navigated binary gender norms internally by self-defining affirmative nonbinary ways of being, noticing affirmation in a chosen community that allowed them to experience existing authentically outside of binary gender norms, and internally connecting to an embodied, authentic sense of gender within themselves and in community with other nonbinary people. These internal processes were influenced by two contextual factors: societal and cultural expectations of gender; and the contextual impacts of holding multiple marginalized identities.

Discussion: Understanding the contexts of the gender binary, racism, and cissexism that impact nonbinary people on a daily basis is crucial for mental health professionals, researchers, policy makers, and creators of gender inclusive education and support programs to support and affirm nonbinary people.

Keywords:

• BIPOC
• discrimination
• embodiment
• gender binary
• grounded theory
• nonbinary

Acknowledgments

The authors extend deep gratitude and appreciation to those who participated in this study.

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Notes

1 We are using BIPOC to intentionally acknowledge the history of enslavement and genocide of Black and Indigenous peoples in the U.S. and how this shapes differential racialization experiences among BIPOC, and the on-going racial disparities experienced by Black and Indigenous people in the U.S.

Additional information

Funding

Funding for this project came from the Kansas State University- Robert H. Poresky Assistantship in Family Studies and Human Services.