Lectures | Performances
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"I wanted to thank you for your rich and informative visit to the college last week.
Thank you so much for putting such complex issues into a creative and powerful
language. Your message is one of possibility instead of boundary, of the questioning
and critique of the structural practices we so habitually take for granted as natural."
- Heather Merrill, Executive Director, Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues, Dickinson College
Lectures
**New!**
Sex and The Very Serious Transperson
The process of de-sexualizing transpeople in order to make us respectable and non-
threatening is nearly complete - but where does that leave us (besides sitting bolt
upright and fully dressed with all four feet on the floor)? An exploration of the social
and sexual norms imposed upon the trans* community, what happens to those who
break them, why we love to hate them (and hate to love them), and what sexual
orientation means to someone whose gender is a subject of debate.
Life, Liberty, And The Pursuit of Gender
Just exactly what is a transsexual, anyway, and how do they get that way? How is
transsexual different from transgender, exactly? And what is genderqueer, and why
do the words keep changing, and none of these newspaper articles make sense, and
can't you kids today just make up your damn minds!? An informational and personal
lecture about hormones, surgeries, 'social gender', gatekeepers, identification (and
its discontents), and all the nuts, bolts, mechanics, fears, hopes, and dreams before
and beneath a gender change. Rated M for mythbusting.
Sing If You're Glad To Be Trans
While the difficult narratives of trans life are valid and deserve our attention, is it
not perhaps enough with the all-misery-all-the-time tranny channel? Being trans
is not a reason for pity, scorn, shame, or apology. This lecture celebrates trans
bodies, communities, awareness, sex, love, particular talents, successes and self-
creation with a faultless logic and good humor that may just make you appreciate
transfolks (or being trans) in a whole new way. Highly recommended as a Trans Day
of Remembrance companion event.
GLBT, Tikkun Olam, and Me
Talk and learn being the product of a double diaspora, living an activist life as
religious service, and how growing up Jewish turned out to be excellent training for
being a queer tranny. This lecture also includes a number of the topics discussed in
Bear's chapter in the Hillel International LGBTQ Resource Guide. Offered for Hillel/
Jewish Student Unions in particular and an excellent choice for Hillel groups in the
process of movement toward LGBTQ equality and inclusion.
Gathering Light out of Darkness
Designed for the period of time near or between Trans Day of Remembrance and
Chanukah, an incredibly strong lyrical lecture/performance about remembrance,
mourning, and resistance. This piece draws strong connections between trans,
queer, and Jewish experiences of community and oppression, and makes some new
parts of both stories available to people who are unfamiliar with either. Another
opportunity for co-sponsorships between Hillel and LGBTQ centers.
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