The Path of Friction

This article takes the twenty-five-year anniversary of C. Jacob Hale's “Suggested Rules for Non-transsexuals Writing about Transsexuals, Transsexuality, Transsexualism, and Trans___” (1997) to reflect on the nature of accountability to and within trans communities. Against the backdrop of interviews with Hale and his thought partners for the piece (e.g., Talia Bettcher, Jack Halberstam, and Naomi Scheman), Zurn draws out the historical context of the “Rules,” but also the affective, theoretical, and political frictions (and intimacies) that underlie them. Generated in the late 1990s scene of trans theory and activism, Hale's “Rules” were more than a corrective to cis-centric “positions” on trans people circulating at the time (esp. by Bernice Hausman); they were also a testament to friendship, as well as to the philosophical insights of María Lugones, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Sandy Stone. Although written for non-trans writers, it was Hale's intention that the “Rules” also apply in trans-trans contexts. Indeed, in a world today where trans people are in fact leading trans studies, Hale's injunctions to humility in our approach to trans* peoples and to faith in the existing wisdom of trans life is prescient. So is his invitation to theorize on the rough ground of living and struggling together.