Epistemic Injustice against Trans* Citizens in Iran

In this article, I explore how trans* citizens are recognized in Iranian society by analysing the production of knowledge within jurisprudential, legal, and medical systems. I use the concept of epistemic misrecognition as my theoretical tool drawing on Miranda Fricker's (2007) notion of epistemic injustice in consolidation with Nancy Fraser's (2001) work on status misrecognition. Addressing interviews with trans* people, surgeons, activists, and a jurist in Iran, I discuss how the limited knowledge of Islamic jurisprudence, coupled with the medical system's narrow understanding of gender, establish an authoritative sources of knowledge that perpetuate various forms of harm against trans* people at individual, institutional and structural levels in society. Nevertheless, trans* people understand and embody gender independently of this knowledge, struggling for status recognition as equal citizens.