"Why Seahorse?" I asked her.
Gina was from NYC and a million and one years ahead of me in lived experiences. "Because you're unusual for a boy. You care about things and are always nurturing to others around you." It didn't mean anything at the time, because I already realized I was a Frog, but I didn't mind having another creature to think about. Later, down the road of years some, I would read about Seahorses and see them in exhibits. The males nurture the newborns. They are the caregivers and ones who give birth to the next generation. At 19, I wouldn't know I would spend a lifetime teaching and eventually working parentally from home in an odd, beautiful, and totally coincidental household of many cultures. The Seahorse mantra sort of stuck.
I offered students questions to kick off the evening. Each chose a different book representing a wide-variety of gender identities to discuss in class and I offered free writing to lead the way. When was the first time you came aware of identity, its fluidity, and began thinking intellectually about sex and gender? How has such thinking made an impact on your thinking and growth as a human being? Particular moments? Milestones? Thought-provoking incidences?
My own writing came out poetic (it usually does) and I recalled Grannie Annie's theory of XX, XY, and multiple variations in-between, my Aunt Joanie, cousins, middle and high school, college, teaching, colleagues, and beyond. It ended up being a rhythmic time capsule of gender, sexuality, difference, safety, acceptance, and what it means to be a human being. Others wrote about relatives, classmates, friends, their own experiences, growing up in hateful, over-religious homes, etc. and that opened the door way to say, unequivocally, identity and bound parameters are a false narrative. There are so many variations on being human, so why do we set such restrictive boundaries on what counts as good, just, and acceptable?
Afterwards, I shared with them the Genderbread Person, which does a job of labeling expression, sex, orientation, and identity, and I allowed them to critique the one-page guide for what it has right and wrong. They did. It made sense to me, but I wanted them to tell me how they felt. Most found it useful, and the two who debated it, also succumbed to its accuracy, stating that it is difficult to ever define who they are without the Western patriarchy and Judeo-Christian framework that has set forward the ways language gets used. They just wanted to be without having to be labeled or made to feel outside "normal."
"I hate that word, normal," one said. "There's no such thing. Are you not paying attention to the world?"
normal, gender bending, social justice warriors, a/pan/bi/demi, two=spirited (indigenous), androgyny, gender presentation, inter-sex, AFAB (assigned female at birth), gender, cis gender, cis-het, heterosexual, homosexual, heteronormative, bisexual, non-conforming, non-binary, gender fluid, inclusivity, identity, trans, fluidity, Queer, transiting, dead-naming, cultural production, pronouns, feminism, masculinity, drag
I asked for definitions of the terms when I wasn't clear. I've feared witness to the complexities of being human, but I didn't have the terminology.
From there, I asked students to think about the Genderbread image, the readings they did for the week, and the vocabulary they gave me to ask open ended questions to think about as readers of books and thinkers of the wide spectrum of human experiences. They came up with:
- How is identity constructed in the novel?
- Are there conflicts that stem from a character's identity?
- Who's included and who's not?
- How does a character's identity shape their lived experience?
- How does the presentation of the characters' identity/gender differ from your own ideas about identity and gender?
- What aspects of identity are presented as shocking in the story?
- How do mainstream constructs of good and bad impact what are meant as private and/or public presentations.