Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies

Upcoming Events

SAVE THE DATE!

WGSS Graduate Conference

Friday, April 5th 2019

"Asking for a Friend (of Dorothy): What to Expect When You’re Expecting The End of the World”

Keynote: Shanté Paradigm Smalls, Assistant Professor, English, St. John’s University

**CFP Extended to January 20th!**

SEE ALL EVENTS

News and Announcements

Follow the WGSS Department:

We invite graduate students, undergraduates, faculty, and staff across the university to read our statement below, and sign as a statement of solidarity and support, and to elicit a response from the university administration. Click here to add your name.

A statement of Solidarity with Trans People put together by the WGSS Graduate Students:

#WontBeErased

On Sunday, October 21, 2018 the New York Times published an article that indicated the current presidential administration is considering a restrictive and reductive reading of Title IX that would collapse the nuanced complexities of gender into a binary categorization of sex assigned at birth. This would severely diminish the political rights of transgender, intersex, and non-binary individuals in the United States and add to the ongoing structural violence these communities face. The administration’s efforts are being led by the Department of Health and Human Services, which has also called on the Departments of Education, Labor, and Justice to adopt this narrow definition of gender in their enforcement of Title IX. We fear that a likely outcome of such a maneuver would result in the invalidation of the legal documents these communities rely upon to affirm their identities and maintain livable conditions and personal safety.

As graduate students in the Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Stony Brook University, we reject any and all transphobia and any efforts to limit or curtail people living in a way that affirms their gender. We call upon faculty and university administration to respond in kind. As emerging scholars of feminist and queer theory, we understand that all oppression is interlinked and therefore we also condemn any attempts to deprive justice and civil rights to Muslims, women in general and specifically - black women, latina/x women and asian women, people of color, queer people, people with disabilities, immigrants, undocumented migrants, refugees, asylum seekers, indigenous peoples, the working poor, and religious/ethnic minorities. We strongly advocate for establishing processes that acknowledge the intersectionality of this moment and seek solidarity across these identities. The developing attempt to legally define gender in a narrow, regressive manner will have serious implications regarding how people interact with police, access healthcare, citizenship and visa documentation, safety and mobility in public spaces, and more. This is further compounded for people whose identities are multiply marginalized

We stand in strong support of trans people. We call on the university to allocate its resources to ensure that the trans students and all students enrolled at Stony Brook who find themselves targeted by the government are protected. Any such response should include a timely and forceful condemnation of any and all transphobia, racism, homophobia, and misogyny that our colleagues, students, faculty, and staff may be exposed under such autocratic conditions. We seek to build solidarity across student, faculty, and staff groups and organizations by voicing collectively our unequivocal condemnation of the proposed legal measures.

We demand that our university administration and faculty respond to this increasing threat to the lives of the trans students in concrete ways. This should include an actionable plan that will address the logistical questions and issues this threat raises as it regards student confidentiality, campus safety, housing, student health services, funding, research, scholarship, and employment.

View the Full Statement Here

(names will be added daily)