The book Integración social de las personas transexuales en Cuba (Social integration of transexual people in Cuba), penned by Mariela Castro Espín, Director of the National Center for Sexual Education (Cenesex), was presented by its author in the Cuban Association of the United Nations (ACNU), one of the venues of the 27th International Havana Book Fair.
The publication, as described by Sociologist Mayra Espina Prieto, is the result of the research for her Ph.D. degree of Castro Espín, which shows her commitment and activism in favor of the understanding and acknowledgement of the rights of the persons who feel different from the sex they were born in.
Mrs Espina Prieto stressed, among other things, the scientific rigor when putting the book together, its clear and straightforward language, the critical honesty of the author and the relevance of a topic that is still highly controversial these days.
In the back cover of the book it is stated that this is an attempt to answer several questions. Some of them are: Why has society accepted transexuality in some moments wile rejecting it in others?, what are the causal elements and how does social disintegration manifest in these persons? And what strategy would be approppriate to develop to reverse this situation?
The introduction to the topic is followed by three chapters in which several references to classic and modern Sociology are compiled as well as the contributions of feminism to the understanding of transexuality from the category of gender.
In its 248 pages, the book brings the results of the survey conducted among this group of persons and proposes a system of actions to guarantee a more inclusive and just society in Cuba.
Mariela Castro Espín is known for her activism in favor of sexual rights as human rights. She has written several scientific articles and has authored over 10 books published in Cuba and abroad.