Staff Profile

Ruth's PhD was awarded by the University of Warwick in 2016. Her thesis looked at how trans health is differently understood within trans communities, activist groups and professional literatures, with a range of meanings and practices contested within and between these spaces. Findings from this work have been published in the book Understanding Trans Health (Policy Press, 2018).

She is co-Editor of the Community Development Journal, and also sits on the Editorial Board for the Bulletin of Applied Transgender Studies. She is a member of the British Sociological Association, the World Professional Association for Transgender Health the Feminist Studies Association of the UK and Ireland, and the Feminist Gender Equality Network, and also is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Applied Transgender Studies.

You can read more about her work (and access free versions of most of her academic publications) on her personal site: http://ruthpearce.net.

She is interested in how communities of marginalised peoples can work to positively transform their own lives within, against, and outside of social, educational, and political institutions. 

Her research to date has included:

• Understanding Trans Health (2010-2018) - a study of experiences and discourses associated with trans healthcare services in the UK.
   
• Queer, trans, and feminist music scenes (2012-2020) - a series of collaborative mini-projects with Dr Kirsty Lohman, exploring cultural production and grassroots community development within DIY and punk spaces.
   
• Athena SWAN and equality accreditation (2017-2018) - a critical examination of equality accreditation within Higher Education, including a collaborative study with Dr Charoula Tzanakou.
   
• Trans Pregnancy (2017-2021) - international research on pregnancy and childbirth among trans people as part of the ESRC-sponsored Trans Pregnancy project, plus a support role in the NHS-sponsored community project Improving Trans Experiences of Maternity Services (ITEMS). 

She has also written on social research ethics and methodologies, plus trans and feminist politics.

Selected Publications: 

Pearce, R. (2021) Academic freedom and the paradox of tolerance. Nature Human Behaviour, 5(11), p. 1461. (doi: 10.1038/s41562-021-01214-5)

Pearce, R. (2021) Non-Binary Genders: Navigating Communities, Identities, and Healthcare, by Ben Vincent.Community Development Journal, [Book Review] (Accepted for Publication)

Lohman, K. and Pearce, R. (2021) Queering community development in DIY punk spaces. In: Meade, R. and Shaw, M. (eds.) Arts, Culture and Community Development.Series: Rethinking community development. Policy Press: Bristol, pp. 111-130. ISBN 9781447340515

Riggs, D. W., Hines, S., Pearce, R. , Pfeffer, C. A. and White, F. R. (2021) Trans parenting. In: O'Reilly, A. (ed.) Maternal Theory: Essential Readings, The 2nd Edition. Demeter Press: Bradford, Ontario, pp. 807-815. ISBN 9781772583830

Riggs, D. W., Pfeffer, C. A., Pearce, R. , Hines, S. and White, F. R. (2021) Men, trans/masculine, and non-binary people negotiating conception: normative resistance and inventive pragmatism. International Journal of Transgender Health, 22(1-2), pp. 6-17. (doi: 10.1080/15532739.2020.1808554)

Hines, S., Pearce, R. , Pfeffer, C. A., Riggs, D. W. and White, F. R. (2021) Trans pregnancy: fertility, reproduction and body autonomy. International Journal of Transgender Health, 22(1-2), pp. 1-5. (doi: 10.1080/26895269.2021.1884289)

Riggs, D. W., Pearce, R. , Pfeffer, C. A., Hines, S., White, F. R.and Ruspini, E. (2020) Men, trans/masculine, and non-binary people’s experiences of pregnancy loss: an international qualitative study. BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth, 20, 482. (doi: 10.1186/s12884-020-03166-6)(PMID:32831015) (PMCID:PMC7444198)

Dietz, C. and Pearce, R. (2020) Depathologising gender: vulnerability in trans health law. In: Dietz, C., Travis, M.and Thomson, M. (eds.) A Jurisprudence of the Body.Series: Palgrave socio-legal studies. Springer, pp. 179-203. ISBN 9783030421991 (doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-42200-4_8)

Pearce, R. (2020) A methodology for the marginalised: surviving oppression and traumatic fieldwork in the neoliberal academy. Sociology, 54(4), pp. 806-824. (doi: 10.1177/0038038520904918)

Pearce, R. , Erikainen, S. and Vincent, B. (2020)Afterword: TERF wars in the time of COVID-19.Sociological Review, 68(4), pp. 882-888. (doi: 10.1177/0038026120934712)

Pearce, R. , Erikainen, S. and Vincent, B. (2020) TERF wars: an introduction. Sociological Review, 68(4), pp. 677-698. (doi: 10.1177/0038026120934713)

Vincent, B., Erikainen, S. and Pearce, R. (2020) TERF Wars: Feminism and the Fight for Transgender Futures [Guest Editors]. Sociological Review, 68(4)

Riggs, D. W., Pearce, R. , Pfeffer, C. A., Hines, S., White, F.and Ruspini, E. (2019) Transnormativity in the psy disciplines: constructing pathology in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders and Standards of Care. American Psychologist, 74(8), pp. 912-924. (doi: 10.1037/amp0000545) (PMID:31697127)

Tzanakou, C. and Pearce, R. (2019) Moderate feminism within or against the neoliberal university? The example of Athena SWAN. Gender, Work and Organization, 26(8), pp. 1191-1211. (doi: 10.1111/gwao.12336)

Pearce, R. , Moon, I., Gupta, K. and Steinberg, D. L. (Eds.) (2019) The Emergence of Trans: Culture, Politics and Everyday Lives. Series: Gender, bodies and transformation. Routledge (Taylor & Francis). ISBN 9781138504103

Pearce, R. and Lohman, K. (2019) De/constructing DIY identities in a trans music scene. Sexualities, 22(1-2), pp. 97-113. (doi: 10.1177/1363460717740276)

Pearce, R. , Steinberg, D. L. and Moon, I. (2019)Introduction: the emergence of ‘trans’. Sexualities, 22(1-2), pp. 3-12. (doi: 10.1177/1363460717740261)

Pearce, R. (2019) Moving through the world as a woman.In: Crimmins, G. (ed.) Strategies for Resisting Sexism in the Academy: Higher Education, Gender and Intersectionality.Series: Palgrave studies in gender and education. Palgrave Macmillan: Cham, pp. 17-34. ISBN 9783030048518 (doi: 10.1007/978-3-030-04852-5_2)

Pearce, R. and White, F. R. (2019) Beyond the pregnant man: representing trans pregnancy in A Deal With The Universe. Feminist Media Studies, 19(5), pp. 764-767.(doi: 10.1080/14680777.2019.1630925)

Pearce, R. (2018) Trans temporalities and non-linear ageing. In: King, A., Almack, K., Suen, Y.-T. and Westwood, S. (eds.) Older Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans People: Minding the Knowledge Gaps. Routledge: London ; New York, pp. 61-74. ISBN 9781138644939 (doi: 10.4324/9781315628462-5)

Pearce, R. (2018) Understanding Trans Health: Discourse, Power and Possibility. Policy Press. ISBN 9781447342359

Adams, N., Pearce, R. , Veale, J., Radix, A., Castro, D., Sarkar, A. and Thom, K. C. (2017) Guidance and ethical considerations for undertaking transgender health research and institutional review boards adjudicating this research. Transgender Health, 2(1), pp. 165-175. (doi: 10.1089/trgh.2017.0012) (PMID:29098202)(PMCID:PMC5665092)