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Live Report!
Transgender 101 Workshop Part of Urban Ministries Conference
 (Chicago,
IL - March 10, 2001) Eighteen people gathered in a conference room of
the Congress Plaza Hotel in Chicago to participate in "Transgender 101," a
workshop presented by Mr. Barb Greve, of the UUA Office of Bisexual, Gay,
Lesbian and Transgender Concerns. Greve, who is himself transgender, asked
participants to reflect on several questions, beginning with whether they
knew someone who is transgender, more than one person in this category, or
someone in their congregation who identifies as transgender. This lead to
a discussion of what transgender is. The UUA's Office of Bisexual, Gay Lesbian
and Transgender Concerns (OBGLTC) uses the word as an umbrella term to describe
the following people: crossdressers/transvestites, third gender people, transsexuals,
intersexuals, and any self-identified transgender people.
Following this question, several others were discussed in triads or diads:
- Think about the first time you knew there were boys and men in the world,
and what was your reaction and feeling around that?
- Think about the first time you knew there were girls and women in the
world. How old were you; what was your reaction and feeling around that?
Was it a positive or negative thing?
- Think about the first time you were aware of cross-dressers. Was that
a positive, negative, or neutral experience for you??
- Think about the first time you knew there were transsexuals (people born
in the body associated with one gender but who believe internally that they
are of another gender). Was that a positive, negative, or neutral image?
- Think about the first time you were aware of intersexual people in the
world. And was that a positive, negative, or neutral experience. (Intersexual
is defined by the UUA OGBLTC as a person born with mixed sexual physiology,
with a physical manifestation of genital/genetic/endochronological differentiation
which is different from the cultural norm. Intersexuals often are 'assigned'
a boy/girl gender, and surgery is done soon after birth to 'correct' their
'problem.' The problem, in the view of the OBGLTC, may be our society's
widely held view that there are only two genders).
- Think about the first time you heard of third gender people. Was that
a positive, negative, or neutral experience? (Third gender is defined by
the UUA OBGLTC as a person whose understanding of her/hir (sic)/his gender
identification transcends society's polarized gender system).
- Think about the first time you were aware of transgender people. Was that
a positive, negative, or neutral experience?
- Think about the first time or times that you were aware of your own gender.
Was that a positive, negative, or neutral experience or image?
The group then examined their responses to those questions. Greve, in reviewing
the responses, observed, "I have done this workshop presentation perhaps 85
to 90 times. There are predictable things. We learn about men and women first,
almost always between the ages of 0-5. Then we hear about cross dressers and
transsexuals, usually between the ages of 6-10. The age at which we first
encounter intersexuals differs [from workshop to workshop] - [it tends to
be] younger if we have youth and young adults in the room. [The age at which
we encounter] Third gender people is all over the map, and the age for encountering
Transgender people tends to be in the middle…shifting upward if the age of
folks in the room is higher."
Greve observed, "The shifting of positive to negative feeling tends to be
more toward the positive (around gender role) in UU circles, toward the negative
in non-UU circles." One of the participants in the workshop observed that
the positive/negative feelings shifted in a UU community based on what feels
'politically correct'…Greve noted that he wanted participants to think about
where we fall within that spectrum, and how we deal with it.
Additional resources on this topic are available at the OBGLTC website. See
http://www.uua.org/obgltc/tg102.html
for the Transgender 102 workshop, and http://www.uua.org/obgltc/
for a variety of OBGLTC topics and resources.
Reported and photographed for the web by Deborah
Weiner; formatted for the web by Julie Albanese.
Wokrshop Background:
Transgender 101: An Introduction
Workshop leader:
Mr. Barb Greve, Program Associate, Office of Bisexual, Gay, Lesbian, and Transgender
Concerns Faith in Action: A Department for Diversity and Justice Unitarian
Universalist Association of Congregations 25 Beacon Street Boston, MA 02108
(617) 948-6470 {obgltc@uua.org} http://www.uua.org/obgltc
About the Workshop:
Transgender is a confusing and often misunderstood piece of the work we
do as a Welcoming Congregation. Join Barb Greve as he leads us in a conversation
about transgender identity, issues as they are related to church life, and
shares his stories of learning about transgender identity and experience.
This will be a time to share thoughts and experiences. Questions are encouraged.
Workshop leader biography:
Barb Greve is a Program Associate in the Office of Bisexual, Gay, Lesbian,
and Transgender Concerns. He has served in the OBGLTC since September 1995.
Barb is an active member of his parish in Framingham, Massachusetts, where
he has served as the Board Chair, co-founded and serves their Lay Worship
Leader Group and is sponsored for the UU ministry. Additionally, Barb serves
as the Youth Advisor for the First Parish of Sudbury, MA.
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