   
Aren Aizura Narrator   Andrea Jenkins Interviewer 
    
The Transgender Oral History Project Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies University of Minnesota 
October 13, 2016 
 
 
   

 
  
The Transgender Oral History Project of the Upper Midwest will empower individuals to tell their story, while providing students, historians, and the public with a more rich foundation of primary source material about the transgender community.  The project is part of the Tretter Collection at the University of Minnesota.  The archive provides a record of GLBT thought, knowledge and culture for current and future generations and is available to students, researchers and members of the public. 
The Transgender Oral History Project will collect up to 400 hours of oral histories involving 200 to 300 individuals over the next three years.  Major efforts will be the recruitment of individuals of all ages and experiences, and documenting the work of The Program in Human Sexuality.  This project will be led by Andrea Jenkins, poet, writer, and trans-activist.  Andrea brings years of experience working in government, non-profits and LGBT organizations.  If you are interested in being involved in this exciting project, please contact Andrea. 
Andrea Jenkins jenki120@umn.edu (612) 625-4379 
   
 
Andrea Jenkins -AJ 1 
Aren Aizura  -AA 2 
 3 
 4 
AJ: So, good morning.  My name is Andrea Jenkins.  I am the oral historian for the Transgender Oral 5 History Project at the Tretter Collection at the University of Minnesota.  Today is October 13, 6 2016.  Im on campus at the University of Minnesota and Im in Ford Hall on the 4th Floor with 7 Aren Aizura. 8 
AA: Aren Aizura.   9 
AJ: Is it Dr. Aren Aizura? 10 
AA: Yes, it is Dr. 11 
AJ: How are you today? 12 
AA: Im doing great. 13 
AJ: Yay.  Hey, Aren, can you spell your name? 14 
AA: Sure thing. 15 
AJ: Well, first of all, state your name again for our transcriber or transcriptionist.  State your name, 16 spell your name so we make sure we get it all spelled correctly, and your gender identity as you 17 see it right now today, and your gender assigned at birth. 18 
AA: Sure thing. 19 
AJ: And then what pronouns you use. 20 
AA: So, my name is Aren Aizura and that is spelled A-r-e-n A-i-z-u-r-a.  I identify as transgender or 21 trans guy and I was assigned female at birth. 22 
AJ: OK.  What pronouns do you use? 23 
AA: Oh, sorry  I forgot. 24 
AJ: No, dont worry. 25 
AA: I use male pronouns usually. 26 
AJ: Wow.  Where are you from? 27 
AA: So, Im from Australia.  I was born in Melbourne and Ive lived in the states for seven years now, 28 seven and a half.   29 
AJ: Seven and a half years.  Huh. 30 
AA: Yes. 31 
AJ: Whats the biggest difference between Melbourne and Minneapolis? 32 
AA: Definitely the weather, we already talked about this just before.  It doesnt snow there, it 1 doesnt get cold like . . . yeah.  Its a little like fall  winter in Australia is like fall here.   2 
AJ: OK.  Is it . . . its a larger city than Minneapolis I . . .  3 
AA: You know, its probably . . . its a little bit bigger but its probably about the same size as 4 Minneapolis and St. Paul. 5 
AJ: Oh, OK  the metro area. 6 
AA: Yeah.   7 
AJ: So, very urban, very much city like. 8 
AA: Yes, really urban.  There is a big . . . theres lots of queer culture going on there and when I first 9 started identifying as trans, there wasnt very much trans culture going on and now there is. 10 
AJ: Really? 11 
AA: Yeah. 12 
AJ: Whats the trans culture like in Melbourne? 13 
AA: You know, I cant speak for Melbourne now because I havent lived there for a long time, 14 although there is . . . I have friends who still live there who are involved in the activism scene, 15 but there is a trans film festival which has been going for a couple of years now and in the early 16 2000s when I first kind of started identifying as trans or calling myself trans, it was really . . . 17 there wasnt a kind of visible trans culture, it was really quiet and really invisible but what there 18 was was there was maybe one or two small activist groups that were run by two people and 19 there were a couple of social groups that were mainly trans women, mainly white trans women, 20 who were pretty conservative, or some of them were pretty conservative.  The whole . . . kind of 21 being trans in Australia is really influenced by this really conservative medicalization model. 22 
AJ: Really?  How does drag culture play a role in that? 23 
AA: Right.  And then, there was lots of drag culture so lots of drag that happens in gay male spaces, 24 but when I was coming up it was kind of the era when drag kings were really popular, the late 25 1990s  and this was mostly the dyke, kind of lesbian, scene.  There were drag king competitions 26 and actually thats kind of how a lot of my friends starting identifying as trans first  they would 27 perform as drag kings and then they would eventually come out as trans. 28 
AJ: Did you ever identify in drag culture? 29 
AA: I tried it a little bit was I was kind of not . . . I wasnt . . . I dont know what it was.  I would do 30 spoken word performances, that was my thing, at the drag shows but I wasnt into performing 31 as a drag king  I kind of wasnt butch enough.  It was like the butch drag kings over here and 32 then I was . . . I didnt fit into that. 33 
AJ: Wow.  So, let me ask you this, Aren, whats the first thing you remember in life?  Your very first 34 memory  and it doesnt necessarily need to be around your trans identity, though if it is, I 35 mean, thats quite all right. 36 
AA: Thats not . . . I have memories of when I was maybe two or two and a half, of playing at 1 playgrounds and hanging out with my parents and doing . . . I dont know.  Actually I feel like 2 maybe my first memory is being in a crib and actually crying. 3 
AJ: Really?  Wow, you can remember that, huh? 4 
AA: Yeah, which is weird.  I dont remember what the context was or anything but thats a pretty 5 strong first memory. 6 
AJ: Wow, thats interesting. 7 
AA: Yeah. 8 
AJ: You grew up in an intact family?  9 
AA: Yeah, my parents are divorced but they didnt divorce until I was in my 20s.   10 
AJ: Oh, wow.  OK.   11 
AA: So, yeah. 12 
AJ: Siblings? 13 
AA: Ive got a brother who is 11 years younger than I am.  His name is Owen; we got along really 14 well. 15 
AJ: You dont know him that well?   16 
AA: No, we get along really well.  We dont have the close sibling rivalry thing that I see in families 17 that have siblings close together. 18 
AJ: Right.   19 
AA: I think I was more like . . . I was a teenager when he was little. 20 
AJ: Youre more like a role model, so to speak. 21 
AA: Maybe.  I did a lot of babysitting and a lot of . . . yeah, hanging out with him. 22 
AJ: Cool.  But thats it, just the one? 23 
AA: Yeah, just the one.   24 
AJ: So, what was growing up like?  You went to school in Melbourne, right? 25 
AA: Yeah. 26 
AJ: What was school like?  I mean, were you aware of your gender identity or your feelings around 27 gender in school? 28 
AA: I dont think . . . I knew that I was weird, but I never associated it with gender necessarily.   29 
AJ: OK. 30 
AA: I grew up, I guess I had a particular situation where my parents were hippies and they were 1 pretty . . . they werent exactly radicals but they were pretty kind of left, I guess.  And my mom 2 definitely wanted to raise me not playing with Barbie dolls  she didnt encourage me into kind 3 of being a super girly-girl. 4 
AJ: Was she a feminist?  Did she identify as a feminist? 5 
AA: Yes, she did identify as a feminist and so she . . . they didnt really ever . . . I dont think they . . . I 6 guess they didnt really police my gender that much so when I was a kid I did . . . I was a super 7 tomboy but it never got articulated in that way.  I rode bikes, I learned to climb trees, I was 8 more happy wandering around the neighborhood than playing house or whatever, but I didnt 9 really associate it with feeling like I was a boy.  I had lots of friends who were boys and then you 10 know how kids get to a certain age, around 7 or 8, and start . . .  11 
AJ: Start sex segregating. 12 
AA: Yeah, and that was really hard because I had more fun playing with boys, I think, or I didnt like 13 the weird, kind of competitive girl things.  Teenage girls are so nasty. 14 
AJ: Which girls?  Teenage girls, OK. 15 
AA: Teenage girls, or even pre-teens. Youre my best friend today and yesterday you werent and 16 tomorrow, sorry  my best friend is this other person.  My parents were like hippies and we 17 were in . . . not a conservative environment but not everybody was like that.  I already knew that 18 I was kind of weird.  I read a lot, that was weird.  I was kind of . . .  19 
AJ: A bookish kid? 20 
AA: Yes, a bookish kid.  So, there were a lot of weird things about me that I already knew about that 21 I . . . not until later, not even until I was in my early 20s, pieced it together and was like, Oh, 22 wait  Im queer, for sure, but I also dont identify as a woman, but didnt figure it out until 23 then. 24 
AJ: So, school was . . . were you bullied at all?  Were you teased? 25 
AA: Yeah. 26 
AJ: Yeah  but not around gender per se.   27 
AA: Not around gender, just around being different  and I think different . . . I just thought I was . . . 28 I just thought that I was somehow bad at making friends or uncool.  But I didnt get beaten up 29 and I didnt get bullied in the sense that . . . I know that lots of bullying is like really intense.  I 30 just wasnt popular. 31 
AJ: Yeah.  So, you said you really didnt come to this identity around queerness and certainly 32 transness until early 20s.  So, did you date guys prior to that? 33 
AA: Oh yeah  all through high school and well into college.  This is the funny thing is that I was 34 always attracted to guys, but I didnt really know . . . because I wasnt . . . I dont even think I 35 met a trans person until I was maybe 18 or 19, so I didnt know that it was possible at all and 36 didnt have . . . there was no cultural kind of . . . I dont even know if I would have identified with 1 that or . . . 2 
AJ: But you didnt even see it. 3 
AA: I didnt even see it, and I definitely didnt have ideas about myself being in the wrong body, that 4 wasnt something I experienced.  So, yeah, I dated guys through high school and then maybe in 5 my second or third year of college, I definitely started having relationships with women and part 6 of that was also just being really disillusioned with straight culture in general.  I was studying 7 gender studies and queer studies in my college classes and I was like, Oh, right.   8 
AJ: This is where I belong. 9 
AA: This is more cool, these people are more my people.  But then it wasnt until maybe three or 10 four years after that, and I dont think . . . I think I thought it wouldnt be possible to transition 11 through that whole time.  I thought I would be completely isolated and that I wouldnt have any 12 support.  I thought about it, backed off  told my partner and a couple of close people, backed 13 off for another couple of years and then . . . yeah, it wasnt until a while after that that I actually 14 was like yeah, I need to do this, this is important. 15 
AJ: About how or when do you think that was? 16 
AA: 2001, so that was when I was 26.   17 
AJ: Oh, wow.  That was 15 years ago. 18 
AA: Fifteen years ago, yeah.  A long time now. 19 
AJ: Its been a while.  What terms have you used to describe yourself and how has that changed 20 over time? 21 
AA: I dont know that its really changed that much.  I knew that I never identified as a transsexual.  I 22 saw that as a medical term that was kind of . . . maybe theres more to say about interacting 23 with medicine, because thats been really traumatic for me, but I didnt follow . . . I knew I 24 wasnt the kind of person that goes from A to B or is identified as a man, a masculine man and 25 that that was my trajectory.  So Ive always identified with transgender and now I guess, for a 26 while, the term was FTM and now its trans guy.  I think that thats been pretty . . .  27 
AJ: Can you just really for the purposes of our conversation, state what the distinction is between 28 transsexual and transgender? 29 
AA: Sure.  Thats funny because in my research I tend to do this a lot  in teaching and writing, so it 30 kind of rolls of the tongue.  So, transsexual . . . I guess the difference in the terms is where they 31 emerged through and who invented them, right? 32 
AJ: Sure. 33 
AA: So, transsexual emerged as this term that was used by sexologists and kind of gender therapists 34 and doctors to describe people that were gender non-conforming or who wanted to be a 35 different gender to the sex they were assigned at birth  who wanted to be a different sex, who 36 wanted to change their bodies.  And then transgender emerged in the 1960s and some people 37 say that Virginia Prince was the person who first used it and other people have now said that 1 maybe . . .  2 
AJ: Transgenderism, I think, was the term she came up with. 3 
AA: Yeah, and she talked about transgenderists as not transsexuals but people who wanted to dress 4 and live as women, so people who were assigned male at birth and wanted to live as women but 5 who werent interested in body modification or surgery.   6 
AJ: Sure. 7 
AA: So theres a real . . . and then that gets kind of . . . in the 1980s and 1990s, people like Leslie 8 Feinberg and a whole lot of people who were thinking really politically about transness, started 9 taking that up as a way to describe everyone from . . .  10 
AJ: From the transsexual all the way to . . .  11 
AA: From the transsexual all the way to people who cross dress on weekends and people who just 12 dont understand their genders as binary.  13 
AJ: Right.  Yeah, the term transsexual, how does that feed into this idea of a binary theory of 14 gender? 15 
AA: I guess because the part of transsexual thats important is the sex part, right?  So, its like youre 16 saying that everyone has a sex and it has to be male or female and transsexuals are just the 17 people who want to change sex from male to female.  But, I think, for lots of people . . . lots of 18 trans people actually experience that so they do want to change their sex and they understand 19 their bodies as expressing the kind of truth of who they are.   20 
AJ: Sure. 21 
AA: And its not that I think that that is wrong, but I also think that medicine kind of used that as a 22 way to say, Well only this category of people can actually have access to body modification, to 23 hormones and surgery that is really necessary for people to feel like they can live in their 24 bodies.  And only the people, in the beginning  in the 1950s and 1960s when that started, it 25 was people who were seen as possible, right, to get that.  The doctors were limiting that to 26 people who were kind of respectable citizens who could show that they were kind of employed 27 in a professional capacity or who kind of complied with gender norms pre-transition and post-28 transition.  I just dont . . . gender is so much more complicated than that  sex too. 29 
AJ: Right. 30 
AA: The way that we understand our bodies and how we experience . . . gender and sex is really 31 complicated and theres as many ways to think about it or understand it or self-identify as there 32 are people in the world.   33 
AJ: Wow. 34 
AA: So we have to have . . . 35 
AJ: Eight billion ways? 36 
AA: Yeah, maybe  we have to have more capacious, bigger ways to talk about it than just saying, 1 Right, transsexuals are those people who move from female to male or male to female.  Its 2 like theres . . . maybe lets not even look at it as a continuum from female to male, maybe lets 3 look at it as a constellation or . . . 4 
AJ: Oh, wow. 5 
AA: I dont know. 6 
AJ: What challenges have you personally experienced, Aren, since your decision to live your true 7 gender? 8 
AA: I think that Ive had a really amazingly . . .  9 
AJ: And when I say live, I mean openly live  OK.  I want to be clear that Im not . . . 10 
AA: Sure. I had challenges that I think would be kind of . . . that seemed normal at the time and for a 11 while my parents were like, What the hell?   12 
AJ: WTF? 13 
AA: No, this cant happen. 14 
AJ: Really? 15 
AA: Yeah, in different ways.  They kind of tried to be accepting but they were just really very much 16 like, Were totally confused, what are you doing?  But the biggest . . .  17 
AJ: But they stayed in conversation about it? 18 
AA: They stayed in conversation and its reflective of my relationships with them.  I have a bad 19 relationship with my dad anyhow, so he didnt use male pronouns to talk to me . . . he might still 20 not, even though Ive asked him.  He would always say, Well, it doesnt matter . . . whatever, I 21 never see you. 22 
AJ: Oh, wow.   23 
AA: And I was like, Well, this is reflective of my dad as a person, its not personal to me.  Its more 24 about transness, he just doesnt have a clue.  But my mom has been really super supportive and 25 now is like the person . . . she lives in a country town and shes the person . . . she was a teacher, 26 shes retired now, but she was the person that queer students and trans students would go to to 27 get support. 28 
AJ: Really?  So shes like a resource for queer and trans people?  29 
AA: Yeah. 30 
AJ: Thats awesome.   31 
AA: Yeah, because everyone knew.  I think that the biggest challenge that I had was medical because 32 where I lived in Melbourne, at the time  and its still pretty much like this, to get any kind of 33 surgery . . . you can get hormones from doctors and there are some trans-friendly doctors who 34 will prescribe hormones on a kind of harm-reduction basis or informed-consent basis, but to get 1 surgery you had to go to a gender clinic and at the time that I went, they had a two-year waiting 2 period. 3 
AJ: Oh, wow. 4 
AA: And you had to see a psychiatrist every three months. And basically, because I was kind of . . . I 5 think Ive quieted down a little bit, but in my 20s, I was definitely pretty . . . I was very open 6 about the fact that I had radical politics, I didnt believe in binary gender.  I was kind of . . . not 7 your . . . I didnt look normal.  I had pink hair, I was like pretty punk.  So, I turned up to this 8 gender clinic and the psychiatrist was very conservative and told me that I needed to identify as 9 a true transsexual to get access to top surgery, which is what I wanted.  I kind of was pretty mad 10 about that and she was also . . . she was very shaming and I would hear stories from other 11 people who had gone, like trans women who had gone who would wear pants and then shed 12 say, What the hell are you wearing pants for?  Women wear skirts.  Or she would criticize the 13 way people walked. 14 
AJ: So, a very old school model. 15 
AA: Really old school, yeah. 16 
AJ: Very HBIGDA. 17 
AA: Very . . .  18 
AJ: Harry Benjamin. 19 
AA: Harry Benjamin standards and maybe even a little bit more conservative than that. 20 
AJ: Wow.  I just want to stop  HBIGDA.  H-B-I-G-D-A.   21 
AA: Right.  Harry Benjamin Gender Identity Disorder Association.   22 
AJ: Right. 23 
AA: Which is now WPATH. 24 
AJ: Right  WPATH.  The World Professional Association of Transgender Health Practitioners.   25 
AA: Yeah. 26 
AJ: The P is for Practitioners, I think. 27 
AA: Yeah, yeah.  Anyway, so I went away from this first appointment just feeling really angry 28 because she had . . . she had told me a variety of things. I was in a partnership at the time with a 29 woman who identified as a lesbian and the psychiatrist was like, Well, lesbians who are 30 partnered with trans men usually leave them because . . . 31 
AJ: They want to be with a woman blah, blah, blah. 32 
AA: I was like, OK. 33 
AJ: Again, the binary ideal, right? 34 
AA: Yeah, right.  And . . . I dont know, she just kind of basically just . . . we didnt get along. I had a 1 web blog at the time and I wrote about it. 2 
AJ: You outed her? 3 
AA: People talked . . . and I didnt think anyone read my web blog so I didnt really . . . you know, I 4 was like, I have 10 friends who read this.  But it turned out that there was a big situation going 5 on where that gender clinic was being sued by people who had re-transitioned back to their 6 birth assigned gender.  It was funded by the Christian right, so there was a lot of concern about 7 anyone saying bad things about them.  So, anyway, the psychiatrist kicked me off the clinic.  She 8 said she wouldnt let me have top surgery because I had said these things.  And then three or 9 four years later I went back and she basically told me that she would give me a top surgery letter 10 if I went on the trans email lists and web blogs and forums and said that the clinic was really 11 great and totally professional and that I was having a really . . . 12 
AJ: So, she tried to blackmail you. 13 
AA: She did blackmail me because that was the only way I could get a letter.  I just said, OK, all 14 right. 15 
AJ: Wow. 16 
AA: So . . . yeah. 17 
AJ: How does that feel?  I mean certainly we can get a sense of the urgency of wanting to sort of 18 medically transition to your choice but, you know, you already self-identified that you had these 19 really sort of strong political, radical politics, and then you have to sort of capitulate to this 20 conservative viewpoint and . . .  21 
AA: I mean, I was really angry but also at the time, Im pretty sure I was binding my chest all the time 22 and then I started having asthma or panic attacks and anxiety attacks where I couldnt breath 23 and I would get dizzy and stuff.  I couldnt be around a lot of people, so I feel like psychologically 24 I was really traumatized but I was trying to hold it together.  I was also trying to do a Ph.D., or Id 25 started doing a Ph.D. in the middle of this, had other stuff that I wanted to do with my life and I 26 also knew that this was something that was happening to everyone so everyone who wanted to 27 get any kind of gender confirmation surgery had to go to this place. 28 
AJ: So, it wasnt like you were an outlier. 29 
AA: No, not at all. I was just one of the people who had a bad experience with this psychiatrist who 30 basically saw everyone.  So, some of my other friends . . . and at the same time, I think that we 31 were a threat to her because I was also involved in this trans activist group that was running 32 health trainings with the Department of Health about how practitioners could be more trans 33 friendly.  So, she thought that I had some kind of power and I think that was why she kind of was 34 like . . .  35 
AJ: Tamping you down  yeah.  36 
AA: Yeah.  But, it was pretty hard, it wasnt . . .  37 
AJ: What medical . . . if you dont mind answering this question, feel free to answer it as fully or as 1 less fully as you like.  But, what medical transitions have you undergone related to your 2 transition?   3 
AA: Yeah.  Ive been on testosterone since 2002 and for the first five or six years, I was on a pretty 4 low dose.  I wanted to be on a low dose, that was also a problem with a psychiatrist  she was 5 not impressed with that. 6 
AJ: Oh, really?   7 
AA: No, she was like . . .  8 
AJ: You cant control your own future, only I can do that. 9 
AA: Or, You dont want to be a man?  Whats wrong with you?   10 
AJ: Exactly. 11 
AA: And I had top surgery eventually in 2006, which is after I finally got the approval letter.  I guess 12 thats pretty much all in terms of medical transition. 13 
AJ: So, Aren, I happen to know that you are a parent. 14 
AA: Thats right, yeah.   15 
AJ: You are a trans man who gave birth to a human being  like you made a baby. 16 
AA: I did, oh my God.   17 
AJ: What was that experience like?  Did you have to stop testosterone?   18 
AA: Yeah. 19 
AJ: And, what does it mean to you  because you are a . . . we started out saying, Dr. Aizura, and 20 so you think about gender and gender studies a lot. 21 
AA: Yeah, I do. 22 
AJ: So, how does it feel to be a male-identified person who gave birth?  So, what was the 23 experience like? 24 
AA: What was it like and then how does it feel?   25 
AJ: And then how does it feel and then the hormones  that whole process?  So, yeah. 26 
AA: It didnt come about because I ever had this total desire to give birth.   27 
AJ: You werent growing up like, Ive got to have a baby.  That wasnt your thing. 28 
AA: No.  It mostly came about because my partner and I have been together for a long time and we 29 knew that we wanted to have kids  or a kid at least.  Im the person who has always been . . . 30 the person with the higher-intensity career, I guess.  Hes an artist and he works really hard but 31 he doesnt . . . we kind of knew that he would end up being more of the primary care because 32 Im always going to have a full-time job.  So, we always just assumed that he would be the one 33 who would get pregnant, and he is also trans.  Already it would be one of either of us who is a 1 transgender, trans guy, getting pregnant. 2 
AJ: So, you both are trans? 3 
AA: Yes. 4 
AJ: Let me just stop right here.  You both are trans and you both have the capacity to give birth, 5 right? 6 
AA: Yes.  And wed both been on T for a really long time and that was pretty stable.  And then the 7 reason why I decided to . . . we were thinking about it and talking about it and then I was like, 8 Well, maybe it should be me because otherwise theres going to be this huge kind of division of 9 labor and Ill end up being the more, kind of traditional dad who is like . . .  And I didnt want 10 that to happen.  And then I also kind of knew that . . . I just thought that I was capable of doing 11 it.   12 
AJ: Physically? 13 
AA: Yeah.   14 
AJ: You also have the health insurance and all the sort of practical stuff. 15 
AA: We had money which is like . . . we had some money saved because it wasnt a case of . . . I 16 guess we probably . . . we made a decision we were going to use donor sperm, so we had money 17 to buy donor sperm from the sperm bank and then do insemination  although we could have 18 just as easily found a friend who was going to . . . that would have been cheaper but that was 19 just the way that we . . .  20 
AJ: Decided? 21 
AA: Yeah. 22 
AJ: So, the whole process sounds like it was a communicative, planned decision. 23 
AA: Yeah, we really planned it and we talked about it for a long time before we did anything, and 24 then I got pregnant on my third insemination so after trying for three months, which is really 25 lucky. 26 
AJ: Yeah, thats pretty good. 27 
AA: Some people try for a really long time.  And then there was the getting pregnant bit which, I 28 think, maybe would have been OK but my mom had this too but basically I was sick the whole 29 time  just puking every day. 30 
AJ:  For the whole nine months?   31 
AA: Well, finally for the last three months I went on really intense anti-nausea medication so I didnt 32 puke as much, but then I tried to be like, Maybe Im off it, and the last week before I gave 33 birth I was like, Maybe this is fine now, and then I puked again.  So, I was pretty miserable.  34 But other than that, I think that maybe its my feeling about how bodies work, but bodies are 35 really weird and even just doing their normal thing, bodies are weird.  Pregnancy is 100 times 1 weirder than anything else because youre growing something inside you, its sucking your 2 energy and all of your nutrients, its just basically like . . . ssssss.  So, youre hungry all the time, 3 youre tired, and then its pressing on your bladder.  But, I kind of . . . I think also I feel like some 4 pregnant guys that Ive talked to have experienced really high levels of dysphoria or feeling 5 uncomfortable with feeling pregnant and I think I did experience that because I came off 6 testosterone and my hips grew back and all of my beard hair got fairer or lighter and started to 7 disappear.  It was like that. 8 
AJ: And the estrogen just sort of rushes back when youre pregnant. 9 
AA: Right, huge amounts of estrogen and progesterone in your body, but I guess I just was like, OK, 10 this is just something Im going to deal with and sit with in order to get the baby at the end and 11 Im just going to see how it goes and take it day-by-day.  It wasnt . . . I think if I wasnt sick it 12 would have been way easier.  But also, pregnancy hormones . . . a lot of it was like, How are 13 people going to look at me?  Am I going to pass?  What does this look like from the outside 14 world?  And Im really lucky that I have family, mostly my partners family, who I see on a 15 regular basis  they live here, that they were super fine.  They never questioned us, maybe a 16 couple of extended family people got my pronouns wrong occasionally, but they basically were 17 just like, Right, OK, we get it- cool.  So that is . . .  18 
AJ: So, while you were . . . you know, like seven months pregnant you had facial hair and . . . 19 
AA: Yeah, the most funny . . . I was also pregnant in winter, I gave birth in December.   20 
AJ: OK. 21 
AA: So, for the last trimester, I think I was pretty good with big coats and stuff . . . 22 
AJ: Right, yeah. 23 
AA: And I also didnt get giant  I dont know what happened, but I just didnt get huge.  I lost a ton 24 of weight. 25 
AJ: You didnt gain weight?  You lost weight? 26 
AA: I gained some weight eventually, but I lost a ton of weight because I couldnt eat.  I wasnt 27 anything all the time  I was super sick. 28 
AJ: Yeah, because you were barfing all the time. 29 
AA: So, I had big coats, but the last three months the only thing that made me feel like I was 30 physically good was swimming.  So, Id go to the Midtown Y and I was wearing a little kind of 31 gym shirt and shorts, gym shorts, and just swimming laps.  People would really stare. 32 
AJ: Really? 33 
AA: They were like, What?  What are you?   34 
AJ: Is it OK if I laugh? 35 
AA: Yeah, totally, I mean . . . it was funny. 1 
AJ: Im laughing at the peoples . . . not you, but peoples reaction. 2 
AA: It was funny and then I think that if Id been less . . . I mean Ive been trans for a long time, Ive 3 been out for a long time, and in the first 10 years . . . I did have, like, Oh, my God, this is 4 terrible, I cant handle being mis-pronouned, I cant handle . . . everything is going to explode if 5 Im not recognized right.  I think Im a little bit more mellow now.   6 
AJ: Sure. 7 
AA: So, that helped because I was in this fog of pregnancy hormones and I was just like, Im 8 swimming  you can stare all you want, Im just doing my thing  thank you laps.  Yeah. 9 
AJ: Which locker room?  Ive got to ask. 10 
AA: Oh, because . . .  11 
AJ: Because youre swimming, youve got to . . . 12 
AA: Midtown Y, luckily, has family changing rooms so I never had to go into the mens or womens.  I 13 think if Id have had to go into a gender segregated restrooms, I wouldnt have been able to do it 14  that was just too weird.  And here at work too, theres an old gender restroom right opposite 15 my office. 16 
AJ: Oh, nice.  Where is work?  Talk about work a little bit. 17 
AA: OK, so where is work?  I work in the Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies department of the 18 University of Minnesota.  Im an assistant professor and I teach, I do research, and my field is 19 transgender studies so I write about this all the time. 20 
AJ: Right, were so lucky to have you.  What kind of classes?  Name a few of your course titles. 21 
AA: Sure.  So, some of my course titles are Transgender Studies Now, which you visited last year.  I 22 also teach, Trans National Sexuality Studies which is about different sexualities and genders 23 across the world and how to understand them, how to understand race and gender and culture 24 differently, the way different kind of people do gender and sexuality differently.  I teach a 25 course called Skin, Sex, and Genes which sounds really sexy. 26 
AJ: Yeah, it does. 27 
AA: But its about . . .  28 
AJ: I would sign up for that class. 29 
AA: Yeah, its about feminist science studies and the way that science and genetics and biology look 30 at race and gender and sexuality. 31 
AJ: OK, maybe I wouldnt sign up for that class. 32 
AA: It sounds sexy and then people are turned off.  Theyre like, Were not going to learn any actual 33 biology?  This is feminist science studies. 34 
AJ: Were not talking about Jordache jeans and how they make your butt look like . . .?   1 
AA: No, but were talking about . . . for example, were reading this really amazing author, Dorothy 2 Roberts.  Shes a black legal scholar and she writes a lot.  Shes written this amazing book about 3 how lots of scientists are like, Were over race, but theyre just kind of putting racial difference 4 back into the picture. 5 
AJ: Dorothy Robertson? 6 
AA: Dorothy Roberts. 7 
AJ: Dorothy Roberts, OK.  Cool. 8 
AA: Anyway, so thats . . . yeah, I feel so lucky to actually have a space in a university to be a teacher 9 where I get to teach what I care about, but that also my identity is accepted here. 10 
AJ: Its not only accepted, its valued. 11 
AA: Its valued, yeah. 12 
AJ: Theyre paying you to teach this stuff. 13 
AA: Yeah, which is not something that I ever expected to happen, right?  I did a Ph.D. in Melbourne 14 and I was writing on transness and I knew that it was something that people would turn their 15 noses up at or kind of be like, Oh, thats weird.  And thats part of the reason why I moved to 16 the U.S. is because just culturally there is . . . the U.S., I think for lots of historical reasons the 17 U.S. has got a more visible trans culture going on and more happening in the academy. 18 
AJ: So, you just took me down a whole little rabbit hole now.  Ive got a lot of questions.  What do 19 you think the landscape is like for transgender scholarship across the United States?  Is this a 20 field of study and sort of whats the breadth and size of it?  And then, I want to ask, from your 21 expert opinion, what has been the movement, the transgender movement, in the United States?  22 So, two broad questions. 23 
AA: Yeah, sure.  So, the first . . . I mean, transgender studies or being able to write about trans topics 24 in the academy, its better than its ever been right now, I think.  There are huge . . . yes, its 25 become a field.  Its a little bit like in the late 1980s and early 1990s when people started 26 suddenly talking about something called queer studies and then that became a thing and now 27 people are professors of queer studies. 28 
AJ: Right. 29 
AA: So, thats just starting to happen in transgender studies.  I guess Ive been a part of it because 30 Ive co-edited, with Susan Stryker, I co-edited . . . there was a transgender studies reader that 31 was published in 2006 and we did a second version of it with all new material.  Its 50 chapters 32 and this is a sample of the scholarship thats been out there from 2006 to 2012, when it came 33 out  and its huge. 34 
AJ: So, you literally wrote the book on transgender . . . you literally. 35 
AA: Yeah. 36 
AJ: Or edited the book. 1 
AA: Yeah, edited it. 2 
AJ: Other people wrote a lot of this . . .  3 
AA: Other people wrote a lot of it and we edited their chapters and put them together and kind of 4 made . . . I dont know, made some sense to the topics. 5 
AJ: Sure. 6 
AA: I mean, I think its amazing and I also think that it comes with some really . . . now at the 7 University of Arizona there has been a transgender studies cluster hire so that means that four 8 professors get hired on the same broad topic in different departments of the university and they 9 get to do programming.  There was just a conference there a month ago  this huge transgender 10 studies conference.  Ive only seen that happen . . . there was a conference in 2008 in Vancouver 11 that was really similar that Susan Stryker put together and that was the first time . . . I got to go 12 because I was a grad student and go to go to Vancouver and that was the first time that Ive ever 13 seen that many trans people in a room at the same time. 14 
AJ: Wow.  About how many people were there? 15 
AA: There were like 200-300, maybe 400.  Yeah, it was mind blowing for me but it was also . . . I was 16 like, This is where I want to be, this is the people I want to be talking to.   17 
AJ: Sure. 18 
AA: And at this conference, I mean there was so many grad students doing really incredible, amazing 19 work on all aspects of trans politics and trans existence.  At the same time, its amazing and at 20 the same time theres like all these things about becoming institutionalized within the university 21 that mean you have to kind of play to the middle in this way. 22 
AJ: So its taken the edge off the radicalization, in some sense? 23 
AA: Maybe, I dont know if it is necessarily.  There are still people . . . theres a lot of people who are 24 still writing radical work but I think that theres a real danger in a lot of . . . its like look at the 25 people who get to go to college or get to go to grad school  middle class people who can afford 26 the debt and its really racially segregated a lot of the time.  Theres a real schism and I think 27 people are kind of trying to grapple with this at the moment  where, like if you look at what the 28 important things that are happening to trans people . . . theres a lot of . . . finally after people . . 29 . finally theres a visibility that is like trans women of color who are kind of intersectionally kind 30 of oppressed in all sorts of ways, who are usually the targets of violence so if you look at the 31 violence statistics, its overwhelmingly trans women of color, trans people of color are finding it 32 harder to get employment, and then in the academy theres a really big, amazing formation of 33 trans students of color scholarship happening, which I feel like you know lots about. 34 
AJ: Yeah, Im aware.  I mean I still think its a small section of that. 35 
AA: Small within this larger thing and I think . . . my politics are that we need to be looking . . . we 36 need to be kind of uplifting and raising the voices of people who dont get heard and so I really 37 worry about how trans studies can kind of not become this space of white trans people talking 1 to themselves and kind of institutionalizing this idea that transness is respectable or that 2 transness is kind of this new normal thing when the movement is built on the labor of people 3 like Sylvia Rivera and Marsha Johnson, who were street queens, who were not interested in 4 respectability particularly, who wanted . . . you know, they were doing jail solidarity and . . .  5 
AJ: Anti-poverty programs. 6 
AA: Anti-poverty programs and working with the Young Lords and the Black Panthers, and doing real 7 important racial justice work as well.  So, I think that that is like this huge part of the movement 8 that needs to be front and center within trans studies  like how do we kind of make those 9 things speak to each other and acknowledge that you can be a theorist in the academy as a 10 university professor, but that doesnt mean that your words are more valuable or more kind of 11 smarter than . . .  12 
AJ: Than the lived experiences of . . .  13 
AA: And theres tons of people outside the academy who are kind of doing intellectual work too, it 14 just looks different.   15 
AJ: Yeah. 16 
AA: So thats like . . . 17 
AJ: I think of Reina Gossett.  18 
AA: Exactly, yeah.  Like Reina, or Laverne Cox for a while had this amazing section of her website 19 where she would write essays.  I dont know if some of it is still up there, but she was writing 20 this really incredible stuff about gender and intersection of race and gender and sexuality. 21 
AJ: I feel like Janet Mock has sort of popularized some of these theoretical concepts that youre 22 talking about. 23 
AA: Yeah, so there are people working all over and I feel like the trans movement, at the moment, is 24 in a weird place because for the first time transness is visible and theres a trans tipping point, 25 right? 26 
AJ: Right. 27 
AA: So, the mainstream media has gotten a hold of it and TV is exploding. 28 
AJ: Modern Family has a trans character apparently  a kid, like a young child.   29 
AA: Yeah, and Hollywood seems to be starting, a little bit, to kind of get the idea that trans 30 characters should be played by trans actors . . . very minimally. 31 
AJ: Theyre very slowly walking up to the starting line.  Im not quite sure if theyre there. 32 
AA: Theyre thinking about it  theyre thinking about it.  Theyre being told that they have to think 33 about it. 34 
AJ: There are trans characters, at least. 35 
AA: Right.  I dont know  maybe that will get better.  But I feel like its like the issues that are 1 important and the issues that get public visibility are really different.   2 
AJ: Wow, you think about this a lot and I loved the way you weaved this whole whats the landscape 3 and then the movement  that was beautiful, thank you.  But, what is the relationship between 4 LGB and T?  And, I cant remember if you threw queer in there as an identifier for yourself or 5 not. 6 
AA: Yeah, I identify as queer, yes.   7 
AJ: How then do we, as a movement going forward, work within this broad sort of family of lesbian, 8 gay, bisexual and then transgender?  Because it didnt get added for a long time and now theres 9 a low res movement to try to push it off to the side and trans people themselves are saying, 10 Hey, why are we engaged in this?   11 
AA: Why are we a part of this?  Yeah, totally.  I feel like to get to the roots of it you have to look at 12 how . . . in a way, it has a lot to do with how U.S. politics works and in a way . . . theres a kind of 13 model for a minority to kind of make itself into a recognizable group and then to be like, We 14 want a slice of the pie.  Then, the problem is that all the minorities are kind of set up in 15 competition with each other.  So, you have LGBT but thats separate, for example, from people 16 of color over here or Black communities or Latino communities or disabled communities over 17 here. I feel like theres this wave, that thats really reductive because all of those identities kind 18 of intersect with each other all of the time, right?  But then when you look at the broader LGBT 19 movement or the lesbian and gay movement, thats the only way that we have to think about 20 gender and sexuality politics  is like LGBT.  The bigger kind of . . . well, the most well-resourced 21 parts of the lesbian/gay community were really, really focused on marriage for the last 20 years, 22 that was their thing, right? 23 
AJ: Yeah. 24 
AA: So, a lot of money in the movement went to that. 25 
AJ: Energy and . . .  26 
AA: Energy, resources . . .  27 
AJ: Yeah. 28 
AA:  . . . peoples time, and that was considered to be the thing that would really make people kind 29 of equal.  I guess, my perspective is that the United States is not founded on everyone being 30 equal, thats the story that we were told  its founded on colonizing and a place where Native 31 Americans were and still are. 32 
AJ: Is colonizing a sort of academic word for theft? 33 
AA: Yeah, totally. 34 
AJ: OK, I just want to be clear. 35 
AA: Stealing  stealing, yeah. 36 
AJ: Labor, land and . . . 1 
AA: And then violently displacing people and violently bringing people in to do labor, to steal 2 resources from the land, to make money off it.  So its hard in that context to feel like well then 3 we end up with this political system that says everybody is equal and if you identify in this 4 recognizable identity, then well listen to your claims and give you rights and then feel like those 5 rights are going to be necessarily meaningful or . . . Im a real pretty anti-nationalist and anti-6 statist, but in terms of the lesbian/gay movement and how a T fits into that, its really hard to . . 7 . you have the same thing with bisexuality as well, where its part of this acronym but theres 8 tons of lesbian and gay people who are still super biphobic and transphobic and maybe one of 9 the useful things would be to politically organize around the issues that we want or the vision 10 that we have of the world rather than saying were all this identity, or these identities, so 11 therefore we should all agree about the kind of things . . .  12 
AJ: Right, that matter. 13 
AA: But then, you know, a lot of people are queer and trans or a lot of people experience being in 14 queer or lesbian and gay settings sometimes before they come out maybe, or find space there.  15 Its also this weird thing where if you just talk about the lesbian and gay movement, you kind of 16 paper over the fact that it used to be that people who were understood as lesbian and gay were 17 gender non-conforming, lots of them were.  And now you have this weird thing where the trans 18 people are over here or the trans and gender queer and gender non-conforming people and 19 then theres like these normatively gendered lesbian and gays, lots of whom arent normatively 20 gendered anyway  or they think that theyre supposed to be, so its so weird the way that trans 21 kind of . . . that way of identifying everyone or separating off transgender from lesbian and gay 22 means that all the queer people dont get to be gender non-conforming anymore and all the 23 trans people have to . . . you know, everyones gender has to be trans or . . . I dont know.  So, I 24 think that thats not a very good way to organize politically, but thats the way that we have so 25 we just have to make do with it and get what good stuff we can  or use it strategically. 26 
AJ: So, Im looking at your bookshelf and Im fascinated.  I see at least four titles that say . . . the title 27 of the book is, Intersectionality.  So, clearly youre interested in this topic. 28 
AA: Yeah. 29 
AJ: Clearly a lot of people are writing about it.  Define intersectionality and what it means within the 30 trans movement. 31 
AA: Sure.  So, I should say that partially thats because this semester I was looking around for new 32 texts that were about intersectionality and Ive got lots of . . . I had lots of texts already but I was 33 like, Whats a good short essay introduction to intersectionality that I can give my students, so 34 thats why that book stack is there. But, I am really interested in it and I teach it all the time.  So, 35 intersectionality, I guess I would say, comes from Black feminist thought and it comes from Black 36 feminists in the . . . like a history of Black feminists who have talked about this all the way from 37 Sojourner Truth on but talking about the fact that if you have feminism then you can just talk 38 about women, right?  Because feminism is supposed to be about women.  Then you have Black 39 rights or Black civil rights over here that just talks about blackness and a lot of the time that 1 ends up being taught . . . or Black men are the subjects of that. 2 
AJ: Right, from a paternalistic sort of . . . yeah. 3 
AA: But what about . . . they were trying to think about, especially in legal cases, what if you have 4 both oppression based on gender and oppression based on race happening at the same time?  5 Thats not just happening separately but that is like totally involved with each other and kind of 6 cause each other, like its impossible . . . so, I guess the theory of intersectionality is that all of 7 the different identities that we inhabit are intersected or intersectional and that actually you 8 cant think one without the other and that the way that we understand gender in the west is 9 racialized so you cant ever . . . to isolate all those things from each other isnt helpful to 10 understanding how it works.  I guess its also about . . . I guess for me its also about, like this is a 11 theory that came out of Black feminist thought and so its also about understanding how 12 powerful it is to think from the perspective of people of color in this society which is so designed 13 to exclude that. 14 
AJ: And I would say more specifically, women of color. 15 
AA: Yes, totally women of color. So, the history of women of color feminism is basically where its at 16 for me.   17 
AJ: Yeah, centering women of color, which is trans inclusive. 18 
AA: Which is trans inclusive. 19 
AJ: Right, and has to be in order to be intersectional.   20 
AA: Yeah, but its so interesting that, you know, people talk . . . like there are so many people writing 21 about how 1970s feminism was kind of exclusive of trans women, and a lot of the time that was 22 white feminists.  Whereas, if you read some of the founding texts, the really important texts, 23 that women of color were writing at the time, its not particularly . . .  24 
AJ: So, I had a really amazing opportunity to sit down and have a conversation with Barbara Smith. 25 
AA: Oh, wow  yeah. 26 
AJ: Who was a part of the Combahee River Collective and really . . . they wrote this manifesto which 27 many consider sort of the foundation of Black feminist thought. 28 
AA: Totally. 29 
AJ: And, she sort of admitted that it wasnt literally exclusive but it didnt explicitly include either. 30 
AA: Right. 31 
AJ: And I think certainly many of the women, most of the women who were involved, were queer 32 identified  Audrey Lorde and . . . oh, the poet.   33 
AA: Cheryl Clarke. 34 
AJ: Cheryl Clarke and Barbara Smith as well.  And so, many of these women were sort of butch 1 appearing and sort of gender non-conforming but it has, I think, over time  particularly Angela 2 Davis and bell hooks have really made a more explicit inclusion of trans women in that 3 conversation.   4 
AA: Yeah, and thats taken some work, I think, too by people . . . like a lot of behind the scenes 5 talking to people and being like, Lets talk about trans issues.  Yeah, I dont know, I think that 6 when we talk about 1970s feminism, we kind of often make this . . . I dont know, most people 7 are like, Its this particular thing.   8 
AJ: Right. 9 
AA: But there was more going on with it.   10 
AJ: Oh, yeah.  It was actually two sort of trains running  there was feminism and then there was 11 womanism.   12 
AA: Yeah. 13 
AJ: Wow.  Its fascinating to talk.  Were you going to say something? 14 
AA: I cant remember what I was going to say.  Im interested to know more about you talking to 15 Barbara Smith.   16 
AJ: Oh, yeah  well, this is your interview, Aren, so we want to try to stay focused.  I would love to 17 talk about that later.  Have you . . . you teach in gender studies so maybe this question is 18 redundant, but have you worked or volunteered in trans or LGBT-specific organizations in your 19 career? 20 
AA: Yeah. 21 
AJ: Which ones?  22 
AA: I guess . . .  23 
AJ: Well, you talked about some in Melbourne.   24 
AA: Yeah, mostly in Melbourne, and I started an organization in Melbourne  it was really small and 25 it was basically because there wasnt a space . . . there wasnt a support group space or an 26 advocacy space that was welcoming to people who didnt identify as kind of binary transsexuals 27 in Melbourne at the time, so me and some of my friends just started this group that was called 28 The Trans Melbourne Gender Project.   29 
AJ: OK. 30 
AA: And we were really influenced by stuff that we were reading that was coming out of the states 31 about being non-binary or being trans guys who were also queer and who wanted to be 32 fabulous, who werent just interested in being totally masculine. 33 
AJ: So, like Dean Spade . . .  34 
AA: Yeah, this is like directly because I started reading Dean Spades blog in . . . I guess, 2000, and 1 then we started emailing each other and I was like, Oh, my God, this person is amazing 2 politically.  We have a lot of shared political thought, but he also was trying to make space for 3 trans to not just be kind of this binary thing.  And so, it kind of started as a support group and 4 then we eventually got a phone line and we started to be fielding people who were looking for 5 more kind of advocacy.  It never got really formalized, we never got funding, but out of that 6 came this other group that started talking to the city and to a variety of kind of government 7 groups about getting a dedicated transgender clinic and kind of support space and a space that 8 had counseling going on  that was kind of holistic and had a kind of clinic where you could get 9 hormones but also therapy, not for the purpose of getting a diagnosis but for the purpose of 10 helping people and supporting people and then support groups and then a kind of dedicated 11 space where community stuff could happen. I left Melbourne to move to the states before that 12 really happened but now, it just happened last year  for a long time, the government gave us 13 money to do trainings for . . . I dont know, health practitioners and social services, but finally 14 they put dedicated money and opened a clinic.   15 
AJ: Wow, so the work that . . . that sort of unstructured volunteer work really lead to this. 16 
AA: It led to this and its a lot of other people who took that up, but basically . . . it was a long-term 17 process of trying to make that happen that I was a part of at the beginning and then dropped 18 out of.  So, a lot of when I was doing grad school, my other job was basically fielding phone calls 19 from people who would be like, Help, I want to transition, I dont know how to go about doing 20 it.  Or, Im having this really bad time with the DMV, or, Legally, how do I change my name?  21 or, How do I get my parents . . . can you send me some resources?  And a lot of it was young 22 people.   23 
AJ: Wow. 24 
AA: So, thats kind of the activism experience that I have. 25 
AJ: Thats awesome.  Man, I ask this question of everybody and you already said earlier the 26 academic voice is not more important than sort of the less academic, for lack of a better term.  27 But, Im really interested in where do you see the trans movement, trans community, or just 28 more broadly this idea of gender in 50 years from now? 29 
AA: You know, Im so excited about it and the thing Im most excited about is I cant even imagine 30 what its going to be like. I feel like . . . 31 
AJ: You cant imagine, right? 32 
AA: I cant imagine.  I have no idea and thats really exciting to me.  I think that in some ways it looks 33 to me like gender kind of is becoming this . . . gender non-conformity or being gender non-34 conforming is becoming this thing that is more and more OK, that people are just OK with  at 35 least in the United States, and that there is kind of a wide mainstream . . . its like its all right to 36 be trans now.  On some levels, its not  but on a lot of levels, you can make it work and you 37 dont have to pretend that youre not . . . you dont have to be stealth, you can be out and 38 theres a way in which that is becoming acceptable.  So, thats awesome but I feel like . . . 39 because I teach college-age students and theyre always coming up with new terms. 40 
AJ: Wow. 1 
AA: And then Im like, Whoa, Ive got no idea that that was really important.  OK, teach me the 2 terms that are going on at the moment.   3 
AJ: Like an example? 4 
AA: You know just the way . . . a really good example is the way that 10 years ago, no one used cis 5 gender. 6 
AJ: Right.  7 
AA: And now everyone uses cis gender  well, a lot of people in the trans community use cis gender 8 as this basic term that everyone should now the meaning of. 9 
AJ: Sure. 10 
AA: Or gender queer, for example, had this moment of ascendancy like . . . I guess 10 years ago or 5 11 years ago or something and now all my students are like, Oh, my God, gender queer is so old.   12 
AJ: Oh, really  OK. 13 
AA: Yeah.  We identify as non-binary, gender queer is not cool. 14 
AJ: All right. 15 
AA: So, I feel like there is a way in which having that experience of students constantly re-inventing 16 terms or inventing their own terms means that I actually . . . Im pretty excited about the fact 17 that I dont know what our kids kids are going to be identifying as or using to describe their 18 gender or doing to their bodies even.  It will be wild, you know, forms of body modification that I 19 can only imagine.  But, I also think that this country is in a really bad place in terms of having 20 justice and economic equality and at some point theres got to be some kind of crunch where 21 we turn that around.  So, what Id love to see in 50 years is that weve got a more equitable 22 society. 23 
AJ: I feel like, and I guess maybe this . . . Ill pose this as a question.  That full gender equality, 24 because of this emphasis around intersectionality and Black womens theory of change, might 25 be the impetus to lead to some of that equality.  Would you agree? 26 
AA: Oh, my God, I sure hope so  yeah.  That would be amazing.  Yeah.  I feel like . . . I mean, were in 27 this moment where politically there are so many amazing . . . I mean, its a hard moment but its 28 also . . . so many amazing things are happening  like Black Lives Matter was started by queer 29 feminists. 30 
AJ: Its one of the most powerful movement moments of my life. 31 
AA: Yeah, and its . . . I mean, its like the movement for Black Lives policy stuff that came out a 32 couple of months ago, I mean its really inclusive of stuff like gender.  So I feel like its more and 33 more of this movement that we have to think of all of this things holistically  but, I dont think 34 that there can be good trans justice without racial justice and economic justice.   35 
AJ: Right. 1 
AA: Theres some really basic things that have to happen in order for us to get to a point, but its all 2 happening at the same time  where everyone is fighting for everything at the same time, which 3 is kind of amazing rather than it being like, No, we have to defeat capitalism.   4 
AJ: Exactly. 5 
AA: No, we have to . . .  6 
AJ: Reproductive justice. 7 
AA: Or equality for women or . . . its like this really holistic . . . its really amazing and something I 8 feel really lucky to be alive for and be able to be part of in a small way. 9 
AJ: It is inspiring.  You are inspiring, my friend. 10 
AA: Youre inspiring.  11 
AJ: Thank you so much for your generosity, your brilliance, and your willingness to be a part of this, 12 what I think is an important project and conversation.   13 
AA: Well, I know that I am so excited to read and watch the other interviews and to see this come to 14 being  its exciting to be a part of it.  Thanks. 15 
AJ: All right.  Well, thank you, Aren, and until we meet again, my friend. 16 
AA: Totally. 17 
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