Histories and Narratives of the First Generation of Travestis in Rio de Janeiro

Friendship as Power-Resistance

Abstract

This article investigates and problematizes the emergence of friendship networks that empowered trans experiences, specifically among those historically identified as travestis, in the city of Rio de Janeiro in the 1960s. Based on the narratives of Aloma Divina, Suzy Parker, and Yeda Brown, we analyze how friendship, with its fractures, dilemmas, and affections, potentiated subjectivation, ways of life, exchanges, and resignifications of self among gender-sex dissidents of cisheteronormativity