Agnes Torres

Agnes is the pseudonym given to a transgender woman who participated in Harold Garfinkel's research in the early 1960s, making her the first subject of an in-depth discussion of transgender identity in sociology. She is the subject of a 2018 documentary short and a 2022 documentary, both titled Framing Agnes.

Early life Agnes was born in 1939 and assigned male at birth. She was the youngest of four children. Her mother worked in an aircraft plant; her machinist father died when she was eight. Agnes was raised Catholic, but stopped believing in God when she was older. From the age of twelve, she took her mother's post-hysterectomy estrogen pills and feminized her body.

In 1958 she was working as a typist for an insurance company, and had a boyfriend. She resisted his desire for intercourse and marriage, leading to a series of quarrels before she disclosed her details to him. Their relationship continued.

Appearance When Garfinkel first met Agnes, she possessed physiology typically associated with the social categories of "male" and "female" at the same time. She had a penis and testicles as well as secondary female characteristics such as breasts. Garfinkel stated: