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Two Tune Tuesday: MIA & Annabella

This week maybe an odd mix, but maybe not: MIA is Tamil, Annabella’s Burmese. How often do women of southeast Asian descent show up in the pop charts?

There were so many Bow Wow Wow tracks to choose from, but I couldn’t resist this one. There’s so much about Annabella’s early appearances as BWW’s front that are – erm, problematic, as a feminist. Manipulations by svengali McLaren that got her to pose naked for a BWW album cover, naked, at age 15, among them. & Yet. & Yet: there was something about Annabelle that said something to me when I was 15 about being cool & tough & sex-positive. With a mohawk.

Get a playlist!

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Drag Day

Today is the 1st annual Drag Day at Lawence University. Okay, it’s just the first, but I’m hoping it’s not the last. The students in my Trans Lives course expressed a desire to play with gender, and I thought it’d be safest on a day that’s already a little nuts: Mardi Gras.

So laissez les bon temps rouler & have a good Drag Day!

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Agile Gene Splitting

“Similarity is the shadow of difference. Two things are similar by virtue of their difference from another, or different by virtue of one’s similarity to a third. So it is with individuals. A short man is different from a tall man, but two men seem similar if contrasted with a woman. So it is with species. A man and a woman may be very different, but by comparison with a chimpanzee, it is their similarities that strike the eye – the hairless skin, the upright stance, the prominent nose. A chimpanzee, in turn, is similar to a human being when contrasted with a dog: the face, the hands, the 32 teeth, and so on. And a dog is like a person to the extend that both are unlike a fish. Difference is the shadow of similarity.”

Gorgeous, eh? It’s the first paragraph of Matt Ridley’s The Agile Gene, a book I’m currently teaching in Lawrence University’s Freshman Studies program.

It articulates in a new way the old adage about lumpers & splitters, or hedgehogs & foxes, but then it adds what I’d call a postmodern spin: lumpers can’t be lumpers unless there are eras when splitters hold sway.

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Philly in Spring

I won’t be at the Femme Fever Ball I blogged about yesterday because I’ll be speaking in Milwaukee, but I will be back on the East Coast this spring, in early May, in Philly, for the Liberty Conference. Some of my fellow presenters include:

Dr. Richard Doctor, Arlene Lev, Dr. Jeffrey Spiegel, Dr. Sherman Leis, Dr. Jennifer Burnett, Dr. Sandra Simmons, Dr. James Thomas, Dr. Richard Hauer, Dr. Mark Zukowski, Dr. Maureen Osborne, Rev. Karla Fleshman, Allison Lang, Jan Brown, Stephanie Battaglino, Mona Rae Mason, Lady Ellen Melissa Clark, and Georgie Jessup

I’ll be speaking at the Saturday Luncheon about relationships in a talk called “How We Love You: Let Us Count the Ways” which will address issues of identity, intimacy, compromise, sex, family, and marriage.

You can read more & register at www.transeventsusa.org.

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Here I Am GH

Aeneas on the coffee table where I frequently grade papers, re read texts, and watch Law & Order. & Eat. In other words, Aeneas as usual near my center of attention.

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Law & Order: “Transitions”

Law & Order‘s show tonight is about a trans teenager who is accused of attacking her father who insists she’s a boy and is trying to get custody of her from her mother.

9:59 PM definitely sympathetic. hopefully indicative of a sea change. still problematic in some ways, but pretty damn good for within the context of a police procedural.

9:57 PM crying.

9:54 PM history, violence, genitals.

9:52 PM oy.

9:51 PM hooboy. non trans advocate of trans youth loses her mind.

9:48 PM the kid can ACT. (& he’s from Poplar, WI.)

9:46 PM wow. sympathy for the loved ones of the trans person who don’t get it! & also the anger & frustration & sadness of the trans person, too.

9:39 PM getting worse. & worse than that. fast.

9:34 PM hooboy. weird turn. righteous trans youth activists who knock off pharmaceutical companies.

9:27 PM hrm. so far so good. inaccurate information, sure, but so far sympathetic. nearly an after-school special.