The University of Colorado, Boulder’s TRANSforming Gender conference is celebrating its 10th year! This 3-day conference, to be held March 10-12, hosts national and local transgender, genderqueer, intersex, and Two-Spirit activists. This week, we visit with Morgan Seamont, the conference organizer and Assistant Director of CU’s Gender and Sexuality Center, who previews the conference and talks about its meaning for the trans movement.
The symposium features two and a half days of workshops and keynote talks on a range of trans-related issues, as well as entertainment and lots of opportunities for networking. Three keynote talks by nationally known activists in the trans movement will highlight the conference.
The keynote speakers are:
CeCe McDonald, a Trans African American woman, who was convicted of manslaughter after she fought off a racist, transphobic attack, and was sentenced to 41 months in a men’s prison. Since her release, CeCe has become a national leader in the transgender movement. A new film “Free CeCe,” to be released in 2016 and produced by Laverne Cox and Jac Gares, confronts the issue of trans-misogyny and the epidemic of violence against trans women of color.
Jennicet Gutiérrez, a transgender Latina activist and organizer from Mexico, may be best known for her recent interruption of President Obama at the White House as she tried to bring attention to the torture and violence trans undocumented women face in detention centers. Jennicet’s work focuses on the deportation, incarceration, and criminalization of immigrants and all people of color. http://fusion.net/story/175990/jennicet-gutierrez-interrupted-president-obama/
Jennicet Gutierrez photo: https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTSt6DfMmfCC_iBBX44au-7A-T0xwAy6hSDhYhAEmlDyAUleNiP
Tiq and Kim Milan are activists in the LGBTQ movement, both individually and as a couple. Tiq is a Black Trans man who serves as national spokesperson for the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, and has written for Ebony, BET, New York Times, and the Huffington Post. Kim is a writer, artist, and activist facilitating radical community dialogues. Her work has been featured on NPR and CBC radio, and in Out Magazine and the Huffington Post. She is the co-founder of The People Project, a movement of queer and trans people of color and allies.
The TRANSforming Gender conference is totally free and open to the public, and all identities are welcome. As a bonus, on-campus parking is free on the weekends at the lot directly across from the conference, which will be held in the Center for Community (C4C).
Map of the CU campus showing C4C.
Registration is available online online or in person at the conference.
More information about the TRANSforming Gender symposium.
So much to learn, so little time!
