Abstract
The objective of this article is to analyze how subjects produce social agency at the interface between identities, sexualities, rights and family. Our argument revolves around Geni’s different trajectories as a transsexual woman and mother by adoption whose birth certificate does not include any gender modification. Geni lives in a long-term relationship with Jonas with whom she has adopted five children in the last 30 years. She took the first two into her care informally, having had no contact with the courts. The last three became Geni’s children with the full approval of the Juvenile Court, when she and Jonas filed an adoption action as a “same-sex couple”. Geni acts within a field of possibilities produced by ordinary life. Her action is not manifested in a heroic way, paraphrasing Veena Das (2007)DAS, V. Life and words: violence and the descent into the ordinary. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007., but through the strategic mobilization of her gender identity as configured in the various scenarios through which she transits, and according to her different maternal experiences.
Keywords:
adoption; transsexuality; motherhood; moralities