OutSources: Transitions in Music, Gender and Film

This week on OutSources, Angela Palermo speaks with Shawna Virago, a transgender activist for a number of years and a fixture on the queer music scene in the Bay Area for nearly as long. She has been performing her music as an out trans woman since the early 1990s. Her most recent album Heaven Sent Delinquent was released in 2016. She is also a published author. Her work has appeared in Gender Outlaws: The Next Generation, Trans/Love: Radical Sex, Love and Relationships Beyond the Gender Binary and Take Me There. Shawna is presently serving as the Artistic Director for the San Francisco Transgender Film Festival happening November 10-12, 2017.

They talk about Shawna’s growing up years, her “transition” into the punk rock scene, her recent album Heaven Sent Delinquent, the history and evolution of the San Francisco Transgender Film Festival and her assessment of the state of trans representation in film and television. It was a delight (and honor!) to speak with Shawna.