Constructing subjects that matter:a case of conditional recognition for Pakistani Khawajasiras

This paper examines how media discourses on gender and work play a part in regulating the lives of a community of Pakistani gender diverse people, called Khawajasiras. Devel-oping a critical discourse analysis of media news, we show how this regulatory process results in discursive mecha-nisms positioning Khawajasiras' work as “dirty” and in need of “respectable” and exclusively “feminine” alternatives. This regulatory process revolves around delegitimizing Khawaja-siras' non-normative work and their gender fluidity in the job market. Khawajasiras' recognition is thus conditional upon their reproduction of a socially heteronormative notion of work and gender. We conclude that this regula-tory process not only forecloses possibilities of resignifica-tion for this historically disenfranchised community but also risks producing new forms of abjection by enforcing notions of “fake” (with an implicitly assumed notion of “authentic”) Khawajasira. The findings of this paper ultimately problem-atize contemporary ideals of recognition of non-normative gendered groups.