“Passing” Stories in Literature and Film in the 20th and 21st Century. Duncan Tucker’s "Transamerica" and Langston Hughes’ "Passing‪"‬

“Passing” and “passing” stories have been a great topic in literature and in the movie scene since the beginning of the 20th century. That does not mean that “passing” has not been a topic in life before, but the literary interest in it began much later.

There are stories and movies about race “passing”, class “passing” and gender “passing”, but class passing does not seem to be too interesting, as there are millions of people pretending to be richer or better than they actually are; it is almost a normal thing in society today. It does not make you suffer hard when you’re not as rich or famous as you would like to be, although it makes you suffer in other ways when you are really poor. But this is not the main topic of class “passing” anyway, the suffering of the poor.

Race and gender “passing” are much more interesting, but not because the people suffer in those stories, but because it takes a great and strong character to race- or gender-“pass”. Race and gender “passing” are much harder to perform than class “passing”.