ABSTRACT

Considering the many possibilities of gender performance in language, this paper discusses the work of the American writer Joy Ladin, a Jewish trans woman, awarded poet and professor, whose writing shows a constant reenacting of performing woman, in a feminine continuum. By reading the poems “It Like Me”, “The Poem and Me” and “Not Unlike” (LADIN, 2017), we highlight the occurrence of what the author herself called a trans poetics and we adopt different notions from feminine literary theory and gender studies, especially the concept of eu lírica (POUBEL, 2020). In this discussion, we understand writing as a space to welcome and express identities that are neither stable nor similar, showing how the performances of eu líricas in Joy Ladin’s poetry can shape various women - self-proclaimed women - in discourse and, based on that, change the way women are seen inside and outside language.

KEYWORDS:
Joy Ladin; trans poetics; eu lírica; gender performances; feminine continuum