Dan Brown Adds "Transgendering" to the Lexicon
Posted by Amanda Hess on Sep. 16, 2009, at 3:12 pm
http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/sexist/2009/09/16/dan-brown-adds-transgendering-to-the-lexicon/#more-6474Yesterday, CBS CBC News reporter Sarah Liss spent 12 hours of her life reading The Lost Symbol, Dan Brown's 509-page sequel to The Da Vinci Code. Only 45 minutes in, Liss comes across this Brown gem:
The act of tattooing one's skin was a transformative declaration of power, an announcement to the world: I am in control of my own flesh. The intoxicating feeling of control derived from physical transformation had addicted millions to flesh-altering practices .... . . cosmetic surgery, body piercing, bodybuilding, and steroids . . . even bulimia and transgendering.
"Ugh," writes Liss. "Sometimes, Dan Brown, loosely adapting Anthropology 101 texts for fiction just doesn't work. Also, why do I get the sense you've never been tattooed—or met a gender-variant person? Also: 'transgendering' is not a verb."
