Gender is in Western culture a relational concept. And “masculinity” relies on a binary relationship with femininity. Non-binary people have existed since the dawn of humankind, and are now cracking open proscribed Western gender expectations for everyone. People have started to notice the many tiny arrows:
Imagine hundreds of millions of tiny arrows. In times of social transformation, they shift direction—a few at first, and then a lot. Nobody notices for a while, but then eventually people begin to recognize that a new pattern, and a new set of values, has emerged.
David Brooks
It’s not that trans people are “new” so much as that contemporary media genres from high literary modernism to pop art to basic gossip tabloids endeavour to maintain the myth of transgender novelty so that, by rendering us legible “for the first time,” they appear vanguard.
@9BillionTigers
What I’ve realized is that I believe that the matter of gender is practical and relational. It’s not about who you are inside, it’s more about how you would feel most comfortable in the world. It’s not ‘Who are you?’ but ‘How do you want to live?’
Had that been the discourse when I was coming up, I would have breathed a sigh of relief. I don’t have to figure out who I am on the inside, I just have to figure out how I want to live.
Kadji Amin, being interviewed by his girlfriend Jules Gill-Peterson in ‘two transsexuals talk nonbinary’
“Rather than focusing on “shattering the gender binary,” I believe we should turn our attention instead to challenging all forms of gender entitlement, the privileging of one’s own perceptions, interpretations, and evaluations of other people’s genders over the way those people understand themselves. After all, whenever we assign values to other people’s genders and sexualities—whether we call them subversive or conservative, cool or uncool, normal or abnormal, natural or unnatural—we are automatically creating or reaffirming some kind of hierarchy. In other words, when we critique any gender as being “good” or “bad,” we are by definition being sexist.”
Julia Serano, Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity
Fantasy is when the nonbinary character is a whimsical or ethereal being. Science fiction is when the nonbinary character is a robot.
@barilleon
Here are a few authors contributing to the conversation.
EUPHORIA KIDS BY ALISON EVANS (2020)
Australian young adult fantasy
Ever since the witch cursed Babs, she turns invisible sometimes. She has her mum and her dog, but teachers and classmates barely notice her. Then, one day, Iris can see her. And Iris likes what they see. Babs is made of fire.
Iris grew from a seed in the ground. They have friends, but not human ones. Not until they meet Babs. The two of them have a lot in common: they speak to dryads and faeries. They’re connected to the magic that’s all around them.
There’s a new boy at school, a boy who’s like them. He hasn’t found his real name. Soon the three of them are hanging out and trying spellwork together. Magic can be dangerous, though. Witches and fae can be cruel. Something is happening in the other realm Despite warnings to stay away, the three friends must figure out how to deal with it on their own terms.
Recommended for fans of Francesca Lia Block and Studio Ghibli films.
THE PRONOUN LOWDOWN: DEMYSTIFYING AND CELEBRATING GENDER DIVERSITY BY NEVO ZISIN (2021)
Australian non-fiction
Thanks to the efforts of trans and gender-nonconforming activists, gender-diverse experiences are no longer able to be ignored. These lived experiences (the joyful and the painful) are being seen and heard. This book highlights, demystifies, and celebrates the lived experience of trans and gender-nonconforming folk.
The Pronoun Lowdown is an illustrated history of how the gender binary came about, from ancient Greece to now. Alongside personal anecdotes, it provides examples of subversive historical figures, and demonstrates the gender-neutrality of ye olde language (Shakespeare’s and Oscar Wilde’s included).
There are also examples of “how to” and “how to not” ask for someone’s pronoun, and other advice for avoiding generally bad behavior. (We needn’t be gendering a stranger’s dog, people. C’mon!) This book also breaks down how different languages navigate (or, struggle to navigate) pronouns.
FINDING NEVO BY NEVO ZISIN (2017)
Australian autobiography
Meet Nevo: girl, boy, he, she, him, her, they, them, daughter, son, teacher, student, friend, gay, bi, lesbian, trans, h0mo, Jew, d*ke, masculine, feminine, androgynous, queer.
Nevo was not born in the wrong body. Nevo just wants everyone to catch up with all that Nevo is. Personal, political and passionate, Finding Nevo is an autobiography about gender and everything that comes with it.
GENDERQUEER BY MAIA KOBABE (2019)
American, graphic novel, memoir
In 2014, Maia Kobabe, who uses e/em/eir pronouns, thought that a comic of reading statistics would be the last autobiographical comic e would ever write. At the time, it was the only thing e felt comfortable with strangers knowing about em. Now, Gender Queer is here. Maia’s intensely cathartic autobiography charts eir journey of self-identity, which includes the mortification and confusion of adolescent crushes, grappling with how to come out to family and society, bonding with friends over erotic gay fanfiction, and facing the trauma of pap smears. Started as a way to explain to eir family what it means to be nonbinary and asexual, Gender Queer is more than a personal story: it is a useful and touching guide on gender identity–what it means and how to think about it–for advocates, friends, and humans everywhere.
A HOUSE FOR EVERYONE: A STORY TO HELP CHILDREN LEARN ABOUT GENDER IDENTITY AND GENDER EXPRESSION BY JO HIRST AND NAOMI BARDOFF (2018)
Australian picture book
Jackson is a boy who likes to wear dresses. Ivy is a girl who likes her hair cut really short. Alex doesn’t feel like ‘just’ a boy, or ‘just’ a girl. They are all the same, they are all different – but they are all friends.
At lunchtime, all of Tom’s friends gather at school to work together building their house. Each one of them has a special job to do, and each one of them has a different way of expressing their gender identity.
A very simple story that challenges gender stereotypes and shows 4 to 8 year olds that it is OK to be yourself. An engaging story that is more than just an educational tool; this book will assist parents and teachers in giving children the space to explore the full spectrum of gender diversity and will show children the many ways they can express their gender in a truly positive light.
MIDDLE GRADE NOVELS WITH NON-BINARY CHARACTERS
i honestly don’t think it gets talked enough about how gay men can have a very nuanced relationship with gender, complex genders, and “contradictory” identities a lot of the time. i think a identifying as a man only gets forced on to gay men a lot these days, but so many gays identify as nonbinary, transfem, women, bigender, genderfluid, genderqueer, gnc, a crossdresser, a lesbian, and many more things. i love you, gays with weird genders
genderpunks on Tumblr
gender is violent for many reasons, one of them being that it categorizes each of us and predetermines how we are to exist and how that existence should be maintained. if we can agree that the formulation of the slave is violent, we can agree that gender is, too.
“it categorizes each of us and predetermines how we are to exist and how that existence should be maintained.” this needs to be highlighted!!!!
@DaShaunLH
Some Christians are using sacred texts to embrace a broader understanding of gender by Deena Prichep at NPR
The Number Zero: All numbers are either positive or negative. That’s just basic math.
MATH CONCEPTS THE STATE OF FLORIDA FINDS OBJECTIONABLE by CARLOS GREAVES at McSweeneys
Discovered in the deep: the rainbow fish that’s born female and becomes male, The Guardian, referring to the rose-veiled fairy wrasse.
There is no definition of woman which includes all cisgender women and excludes all others.
EVERYBODY MAKES GENDER (NOT JUST GENDERQUEER PEOPLE)
MUCH GENDERING IS UNNECESSARY, ACTUALLY
BE MOAH CONFUSING
FUNGI AS NON-BINARY MASCOTS
EVEN IF IT’S “A PHASE”
QPR IS TO RELATIONSHIPS WHAT NONBINARY IS TO GENDER
STOP ASKING FOR PEOPLE’S ASSIGNED GENDER AT BIRTH
BEING CISGENDER IS NOT AN OPTION FOR MANY INTERSEX PEOPLE
ATTEMPTS AT INCLUSIVE LANGUAGE
Australians are split on how they think about gender diversity beyond the traditional framework of males and females, new survey data suggests.
Forty-five per cent of Australians somewhat or strongly agree that there are more than two genders, however, 38 per cent disagree and 15 per cent are neutral.
The question was one of the most divisive issues in the ABC’s Australia Talks National Survey of more than 54,000 Australians.
Are there more than two genders? Australia Talks survey reveals split in opinions Posted Wed 20 Nov 2019
Nonbinary LGBTQ Adults in the United States, June 2021, UCLA School of Law Williams Institute
Why is it so hard for a scientist like Richard Dawkins to understand the difference between sex and gender? from Crossdreamers
BINARYTHIS: EVERYTHING YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT GENDER BUT WERE TOO AFRAID TO ASK
Gender, like autism, exists on a spectrum. In the 1990s, as growing numbers of children sought care related to their gender identity, clinicians and researchers began to notice a trend: An unexpected number of these children were autistic or had autism traits. The observation has spurred researchers to work to quantify the association.
The field is beginning to get a clear picture of the extent to which the two spectrums overlap: Gender identity and sexuality are more varied among autistic people than in the general population, and autism is more common among people who do not identify as their assigned sex than it is in the population at large — three to six times as common, according to an August study1. Researchers are also making gains on how best to support autistic people who identify outside conventional genders.
Gender and sexuality in autism, explained by Laura Dattaro
