Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Bending Gender In French Literature, Jacey Flatte

LSU Master's Theses

This paper looks at French literature that defies binary and heteronormative gender roles and identities. The literature spans from the seventeenth- to the nineteenth-century. My goal is not only to bring these pieces of literature to light, proving that non-binary genders have existed long before the recent liberal LGBTQIA+ movement, but also to help modernize these identities from the past. In doing this, I aim to explain that contemporary gender identities are not new, but timeless. The experiences seen in this literature are strikingly similar to how people experience gender today. As a result, I hope that readers will be …