Conceptualizing Cuy(r)ness: Knowledge Production Regarding Gender & Sexuality in Ecuador

Abstract

Ecuadorian and Latin American communities have diverse experiences of gender and sexuality. In the Global South, academics and activists alike challenge the narrative that the cuir/cuy(r) community in the Global South grows in tandem with the Global North's understandings of gender and sexuality. Lo cuir/cuy(r) encompasses theory, activist movements in Latin America, and the constantly fluctuating conceptions of sexual and gender dissidence. Citing scholarly accounts of how the terms cuir/cuy(r) were created to challenge the Global North's dominance over knowledge production, transfeminist activist movements in Ecuador, and first hand accounts of cuir/cuy(r) people, this paper highlights the importance of recording cuir and indigenous expressions of sex and gender. Discussing the experiences of cuir/cuy(r) Ecuadorians prior to colonial influence and in current academic and political spaces establishes Ecuador's position as a site of knowledge production in the Global South.