A Class Diary by Megan Sorley
A semester all about TRANSformation
When I signed up for this class, I had absolutely no idea what to expect. Thank god I did not let my initial apprehensions get the best of me. I am not an RTF major, I have never considered myself a creative person, and I had not done much research in Trans theory before this class. All to say, I was not on the same level as most of the people in the class. For me, this class was not only a means by which to test my academic skills, but also to test my own limits as a social being. Many of the topics that we have discussed, from body modification to drag kings, were completely foreign to me before this class. I came in a blank slate.
Soon I began to really take interest in the subject material of the class, and it did not take long for Trans class's influence on me to spillover into all aspects of my life, outside academia. Trans has become a regular topic of conversation among my roommates and friends. It is clear to me that this class has had an indelible mark on my life, and I want to take my chance to thank Sandy, Holly, and Chris for an amazing semester.
I approached my projects with a mindset of how can I incorporate Trans class into my everyday life. Therefore, my projects ranged from gender hats, in which I got to involve my roommates and friends, to Baby Hermie, which was inspired by own uncertainties in imagining I had given birth to a gender amibguous child. So, when it came time to pick a term paper topic for another class (entitled "Social Justice and the Media"), I wanted it to overlap with Trans. My paper, Misrepresenations of Trans in the American Mass Media, focuses upon the lack of positive images of Trans in the mass media, and the overall excllusionary power of a dual gender system.