"This is a well-written and thought-provoking contribution not only to transgender studies but also to our debate about how we necessarily and constantly refashion ourselves." — Sander L. Gilman, Critical Inquiry
“An exceptionally well-written book, based on highly engaged fieldwork . . . and filled with elegant and innovative theoretical insights about the material (in)stability and social urgency of sex/gender.” — Christine Labuski, American Anthropologist
“A wonderfully terse and insightful first book. Eric Plemons’s work counts as the best of trans studies.” — Cressida J. Heyes, American Journal of Bioethics
“In The Look of a Woman, Eric Plemons gives us a very thoughtful, well-researched, and important statement about the role of facial feminization surgery in trans-medicine.” — Juliana Hansen, Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery
“The Look of a Woman is a new and important examination of the world of trans medicine, particularly the question of gendered identity, facial physiognomy, and most importantly the face-to-face determination of sex. An excellent and enriching engagement.” — Bernadette Wegenstein, Medical Anthropology Quarterly
"Makes contributions to the area of trans-aesthetics. . . . Plemons’ blending of qualitative and theoretical research is nuanced." — Zowie Davy, Anthropos
"Asking critical questions about the making of gender without neglecting the reality of what it is to live as trans-, with all of the political and personal vulnerabilities such an identity brings, is like walking the delicate edge of a surgical blade. Plemons’ text walks this edge skilfully, providing an insightful account of the logics structuring FFS. His book is a welcome addition to scholarly accounts of not only gender, but medicine more broadly." — Paula Martin, Sociology of Health & Illness
"In both style and content this book is eminently teachable: a great demonstration of how to build and hone an argument. It is an admirably slim volume, afforded its modest size by Plemons’ writerly technique. The prose is lucid and not unnecessarily adjectival. The more complex ideas benefit from a clarifying portrayal that will bring non-academic readers on side. . . . The book’s clarity lends it an effortless feel, which I suspect is actually an effect of labour at every scale: word, sentence, chapter, argument. This labour has certainly paid off: The Look of a Woman is a lovely addition to anthropology’s bookshelves." — Courtney Addison, The Australian Journal of Anthropology
"This book brilliantly raises some fundamental and very broad questions about the link between medicine and social norms, sex and gender, the body and the self." — Andrae Thomazo, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute
"In the early 1990s, Judith Butler theorized a new performative model of sex/gender; now Eric Plemons provides us with an exemplary ethnographic analysis of how that discursive model materialized as surgical practice, transforming medical treatment for transfeminine people along the way. It is a readable, well-argued, and deeply informed account of how what counts as 'sex' has shifted from genitals to faces over the last few decades. It is of interest not only to members of trans* communities, but to anyone working in the history or anthropology of medicine, and to scholars of gender, sexuality, and embodiment more generally." — Susan Stryker, coeditor of The Transgender Studies Reader
"What does a woman look like? This fascinating ethnography of facial feminization surgery made me see that question in a new light. There is much here that troubles social constructionist accounts of gender. Sex inheres in skulls and jaws. By reshaping them in line with sex-specific population norms, surgeons help their patients to reach the ultimate frontier in 'passing' as women. But equally Eric Plemons shows that transient beauty ideals and different surgical practices guide sex transformation. A rigorous analysis that is also a sensitive portrayal of the embodied experiences of trans- people." — Alexander Edmonds, author of Pretty Modern: Beauty, Sex, and Plastic Surgery in Brazil