Administrative/Biographical History

The Museum of Transology (MoT) is the UK’s most significant collection of material culture surrounding trans, non-binary and intersex lives. Each donor had autonomy over the object they contributed.

A brown swing tag with a hand written message explaining the object’s significance is attached to the artefact. This means both story and object are archived as two parts of a whole, in a deliberate strategy to ensure the experiences surrounding trans, non-binary, and intersex people’s everyday lives are recorded in their own words, in perpetuity.

The collection has therefore been designed to halt the erasure of trans lives from history, to tackle the misrepresentation of trans people in the political sphere, and to combat the spectacularization of trans bodies and experiences by the mainstream media.

The Museum of Transology’s collection was built by E-J Scott as a form of curatorial direct action designed to halt the erasure of transcestry. Scott established the MoT with the collection of artefacts they had saved from a gender affirming surgical procedure (including human remains, medical documentation and hospital room ephemera).

In 2014, Scott launched the MoT’s community collecting project in Brighton, thought to be home of the largest population of trans people in the UK. Rather than asking trans, non-binary, and intersex people to go into the museum environment (of which they were sceptical), Scott ran community collecting workshops in queer community spaces. This built trust within the broader trans community over the intent and integrity of the project, and it swiftly grew in scale.

The Museum of Transology was therefore built by the trans community, for the trans community. The project has been designed to be open-source, with all workshops, artefacts, logos, object photography, collections documentation, and exhibition interpretation – including the community-built exhibition set – free to borrow, use, or replicate.

The MoT’s ambition is, therefore that, with this support, other trans communities will be able to establish their own Museum of Transology collections. This will ultimately make more museums and archives recognisably more welcoming for trans, non-binary, and intersex visitors.

Scope and Content

Artefacts, interpretation tags, exhibition set pieces, and digital surrogates of the Museum of Transology, including: hormone replacement therapy medications, needles, and boxes; clothing, shoes and handbags; gender affirming body accessories, including chest binders and prosthetics; items from hospitals, including clothing and miscellaneous artefacts; hair and beauty products, including make-up, personal hygiene products and hair accessories; books; poetry and creative writing; paper tags; and correspondence regarding gender reassignment procedures (c2015-2020).

Extent

213 files; 280 artefacts; 155 paper tags; 435. Jpg