Putting the Trans in Tags: Attitudes toward Transfeminism through Folksonomy

Much scholarship has taken place regarding the web platform Tumblr and its emergent folksonomies. Though Tumblr is often associated with its queer userbase, transgender women remain a minority on the site. The goal of this paper is to connect the use of folksonomy on Tumblr to the philosophy of transfeminism, a branch of feminism that focuses on the effects of patriarchy on trans women. Additionally, it will answer the question of how transgender communities create meaning and discourse through folksonomy. The sample consists of manually collected tags on Tumblr, namely on posts tagged #transfeminism and similar. The data was then coded using the constant comparison technique. Outcomes of this research involve a better understanding of a marginalized community on Tumblr and how online discourse can be shifted from initial topics, as well as a deeper knowledge of prevailing sentiments toward transfeminist theory on the site and their relation to actual transfeminist works.