How to Change the Sex Designation

I've written a post (or two) about changing one's sex/gender marker on one's Canadian Passport. (For this post, I'm just going to use "sex" instead of sex/gender or any alternative.) This post is about changing one's sex designation on a British Columbia birth certificate. That's my province of birth, and it's the one with which I have the most experience. Others have been writing about the Ontario process (which, by the way, doesn't require genital surgery -- although how the bureaucracy is handling the cases is pretty poor). I'm including some files that aren't available elsewhere (that I'm aware of) on the web. I had to obtain them through email from the BC Vital Statistics Agency. [...]

Short Answer: No Idea, Stop Asking

Every once in a while I get asked about how guys think. The implicit, or sometimes explicit, presumption is that I must have some sort of insider information, since -- they seem to think -- I used to be (or still am?) a guy. This post is about how that's so very, very false. Truth is, my whole pre-transition life was spent faking being male. (Yes, I use sex/gender terms interchangeably, since I don't think they're as separate as people seem to like to think). In fact, I was so good at faking it, that people were shocked when I came out as trans* and told people about my transition plans. [...]

Do You Know About Yours?

Many of us carry around at least some form of privilege. Some have many forms of privilege. Of course, we often didn't ask for this privilege, and we often didn't do anything to gain the privilege, but that doesn't mean we're not responsible for it. Privilege is essentially an unfair advantage afforded to some group, for no "good" reason, due to social structures. Examples include: White privilege, heteronormative privilege, cis privilege, class privilege, male privilege, and so on. This post is about some of mine. The first step to taking responsibility for one's privilege is recognizing that one has it. [...]

An All-Too-Rare Email

This may surprise you, or maybe it won't, but people rarely reach out to give feedback about this blog. I sometimes hear, eventually, that people really enjoy it, but they never directly tell me that they're enjoying it. I sometimes hear that it's really helping people, but, again, most people aren't going through the (albeit small) effort to let me know. So when someone sends me a direct email thanking me, it means a lot. I wanted to share with you (most of) a recent email that I received from another philosophy professor. [...]

In Response to Complaints About Being Mispronouned

I've written a few posts related to some misponouning incidents in my old department (I've since moved departments to take up a postdoctoral position). I want to keep pushing this, because not only were the incidents themselves horrible, but the responses by others -- people who're ostensibly allies -- has been equally bad. This post is on how allies responded by gaslighting me. [...]

Or, Do I Identify as Disabled?

If you don't know about the Disabled Philosophers blog, you should, and you should check it out! A relatively recent post by a trans* woman got me thinking: am I disabled because I'm trans*? In the post, the anonymous philosopher offers a bit of her story and why she considers herself disabled. In this post, I want to offer some of my reflections on the issue, particularly since my thinking on this topic has evolved. [...]

...About One's Lived Experience as a Trans* Academic?

A recent email exchange with a colleague prompted this question. I've been writing this blog for a little under a year now (just shy of 11 months, actually). I was prompted to start the blog by a collague's blog post that included a short wishlist of blogs that she wished people would write. This blog was on that list. I'd heard the suggestion to start a blog about my experiences about transitioning, and life as a trans* woman academic, before, but that blog post was the final impetus to my starting metamorpho-sis. [...]

For an Apology That Probably Won't Come

This is something I wrote early December 2012. As the title suggests, I woke up this morning waiting for an apology that probably won't come. I was out late, and I slept in a little, and I awoke hoping that there might be an email message with an apology that would mean a lot, even if it wouldn't fully right the wrong. You see, last night, I was mispronouned pretty harshly. And it wasn't just once: it was four or five times within a single, short anecdote about something that happened three months ago. [...]

...When They Misgender or Mispronoun Someone (Including You!)

My last post went a little viral. (Also, I'm sorry for the hiatus.) That's really nice, though certainly unexpected. Some of the responses to that post made me realize that my way of handling being mispronouned doesn't quite communicate to people just how hurtful being mispronouned really is. People see a calm (usually smiling) person gently correcting them and moving on like it's no big deal, so they think it's no big deal. Well, as I tried to convey in my last post, it's a really big deal! So I'm writing this post to discuss how to handle situations where someone mispronouns another person (which may include you). This is mostly a post for allies, but trans* people may find it helpful, too.

Some Rules, Some Suggestions, Some Pleading

I've been meaning to write this for a while now. I've hesitated for a lot of reasons. One is that there are many "How to be a trans* ally" pages on the intertubes. I was prompted to write this, though, because there are some things that allies I know do that I want to comment on, things that aren't necessarily in these other guides.