POLITICS & CULTURE
GENDER Nonconf or mit y Is Mor e Complicate d Than You Think That’s shown by a brief history of hijra, India’s third gender By Adam Zivo
JANUARY / FEBRUARY 2022
Tanveer (above) is one of the few people in Toronto who self-identifies as a hijra
Some international critics of the LGBTQ community have argued that gender nonconformity is a Western invention, but that isn’t true – there are ample examples of gender divergence around the globe. Hijras are a relatively prominent example of this. Found throughout South Asia, hijras inhabit an ambiguous, occasionally mystical, space in the region’s cultural landscape. They are not exactly men or women, but neither do they neatly conform to the terms “nonbinary” or “trans,” although Western activists and commentators, as well as some South Asian LGBTQ activists, often impose those labels upon them.
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IN MAGAZINE
To better understand the hijra world, I interviewed a Toronto-based hijra, Tanveer, who spoke at length about their experiences and complicated relationship to the hijra identity. While hijras can be found throughout most of South Asia, Tanveer is Bangladeshi and so this article is focused on Bangladesh. SOME BASICS Hijras live highly distinct lives that are defined by far more than just gender nonconformity. Hijras typically live together in quasi-families under the leadership of a hijra guru. They rely on
