Hijras, Sangomas, and Their Translects

This essay focuses on hijras in India and on male women sangomas in Zulu gender-differentiated possession cults in South Africa. We approach these individuals through the travelling concept of “translects”, in the sense in which hijras and sangomas as “transgender individuals” cultivating a culture-specific, gender liminality use words to refer to themselves, their body parts, sexual orientation, societal rituals and practices, usually not in the dominant or standard language and often in a language form intelligible only to them.