Saying your name is no big thing to most people, but for a trans-person I bet they can recall the first time they said their name to someone else. For me it was at the first support group meeting that I went to back in September 1999.
Last week I introduced myself again, this time it was at a conference, New England Conference on Multicultural Education and the keynote speaker was Lee Mun Wah. He gave an excellent seminar on cultural diversity and one of the exercises that he had us do was to meet someone new. He told the audience to go and find someone that you would like to meet and we all stood looking around. Most of the other attendees had come with someone, but a few like me came alone to the conference.
So I was standing there when this black woman came up to me and said that she would she would like to partner up for the exercise. She asked if I was trans and I said yes and we talked a little about our background, she was surprised that we both know the conference organizer. I told her I was on the Safe Schools Coalition with him and that I had my MSW and she told me that she was the Diversity and Cultural Competency Director at a nearby school.
As part of the exercise we had to answers four or five questions. I only remember a couple of the questions, one was what have you giving up and another was what is your story. Since I had the shorter hair, I had to listen to her answers of the questions and then I gave my answers to the questions. She said that she had given up her accent to blend in with us Yankees and I said that I had to give up my past. When the exercise was over we exchanged business cards and promised to keep in touch.
I came away from the exercise with two things that we are all alike for probably 99.9% but it is that 0.1% that makes us unique. The other thing that I learned was to take the time to know the person next to you. As trans-people when we walk into a room people are judging us. They form that judgment within the first 10 seconds and they are not only are judging you but they are judging the whole trans-community.
Earlier Thursday I was up at the University of Connecticut giving a talk on the “Politics of Gender’ and for the class I wore a beige turtleneck sweater, jeans and denim jacket. I was going for an image that college could identify as a “teacher”. I wanted to make a good first impression, I wanted to be able to connect with the students (from the follow-up email from the professor, I achieved my goal, “Thank you again for your presentation today. I know my student's soaked it up.”). Then I went to change for the conference, I wanted a more business causal look, I wanted to look more professional.
When I say, “Hi, My Name Is Diana” I want to make a good impression, we may not like being judged or being a role model for the transgender community, but we are and we do not have any choice in the matter. I believe last Thursday it did.
My Story is a weekly series of blog posts about my transition and observation of life as a trans-person.
Last week I introduced myself again, this time it was at a conference, New England Conference on Multicultural Education and the keynote speaker was Lee Mun Wah. He gave an excellent seminar on cultural diversity and one of the exercises that he had us do was to meet someone new. He told the audience to go and find someone that you would like to meet and we all stood looking around. Most of the other attendees had come with someone, but a few like me came alone to the conference.
So I was standing there when this black woman came up to me and said that she would she would like to partner up for the exercise. She asked if I was trans and I said yes and we talked a little about our background, she was surprised that we both know the conference organizer. I told her I was on the Safe Schools Coalition with him and that I had my MSW and she told me that she was the Diversity and Cultural Competency Director at a nearby school.
As part of the exercise we had to answers four or five questions. I only remember a couple of the questions, one was what have you giving up and another was what is your story. Since I had the shorter hair, I had to listen to her answers of the questions and then I gave my answers to the questions. She said that she had given up her accent to blend in with us Yankees and I said that I had to give up my past. When the exercise was over we exchanged business cards and promised to keep in touch.
I came away from the exercise with two things that we are all alike for probably 99.9% but it is that 0.1% that makes us unique. The other thing that I learned was to take the time to know the person next to you. As trans-people when we walk into a room people are judging us. They form that judgment within the first 10 seconds and they are not only are judging you but they are judging the whole trans-community.
Earlier Thursday I was up at the University of Connecticut giving a talk on the “Politics of Gender’ and for the class I wore a beige turtleneck sweater, jeans and denim jacket. I was going for an image that college could identify as a “teacher”. I wanted to make a good first impression, I wanted to be able to connect with the students (from the follow-up email from the professor, I achieved my goal, “Thank you again for your presentation today. I know my student's soaked it up.”). Then I went to change for the conference, I wanted a more business causal look, I wanted to look more professional.
When I say, “Hi, My Name Is Diana” I want to make a good impression, we may not like being judged or being a role model for the transgender community, but we are and we do not have any choice in the matter. I believe last Thursday it did.
My Story is a weekly series of blog posts about my transition and observation of life as a trans-person.
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