PhD Candidate: Contingency and Meaning for Trans People and their Relatives

Are you fascinated by the human search for meaning? Are you driven to deepen our understanding of experiences of contingency?  And do you wish to gain a profound insight into the existential questions of trans people and their relatives? If so, then come and join this project as a PhD Candidate!

You will study the search for meaning experienced by trans people and their relatives and its impact on experienced quality of life, thereby contributing to the provision of spiritual care for this group. 'Trans people' is used as an umbrella term for people whose gender identity, either binary or non-binary, does not correspond with their birth-assigned gender. You will perform and analyse in-depth interviews with trans people in different stages of their transition and with their relatives, acknowledging that transitions can be non-binary, heterogeneous or even reversed. You will investigate both personal and collective aspects of trans people's search for meaning, aiming to advance theoretical insight into the experience of contingency induced by the incongruence between one's experienced or expressed gender and assigned gender. Based on the results of your research, you will develop recommendations for the provision of spiritual care for trans people and their relatives.

In your research, you will focus especially on the role of religion and spirituality. Although conservative religious traditions tend to criticise decisions and treatments regarding trans people, Christian and Jewish liturgy and rituals have been developed to celebrate gender transitions, and prayer and Quran recitation have been sources of resilience for transgender Muslims. The search for gender identity often co-occurs with the interpretation or re-interpretation of religion and spirituality, which can become sources of meaning and support.

Your research project has a strong interdisciplinary focus, aiming to combine insights from religious studies, theology, gender studies and behavioural medicine. You will be appointed at the Department of Empirical and Practical Religious Studies. Your research will be embedded in the Center for Religion and Contemporary Society (CRCS) and you will be part of the Graduate School for the Humanities (GSH). Two of your supervisors are specialised in empirical research on religion and care (Nienke Fortuin and Hans Schilderman), one is a clinical psychologist at the Center of Expertise on Sex & Gender of the Radboud university medical center (Chris Verhaak), and one is specialised in queer theology (Mariecke van den Berg). You will devote 75% of your time to the research for and writing of your PhD thesis. The remaining 25% will be spent on training and teaching.