Understanding The Spectrum

When I first started writing this blog, I can't say I was excited because this was a part of the school assignments and not something we decided to do on our own. Also, I'm not good at posting something online so I was really worried about it.  But now that I am done with it, I am really glad that our teacher made us do that because I don't think I would have been able to have the experience of writing a blog if it weren't for the grades. Through the course of making the blog, not only did we get to learn how to write blogs and post them, but we also got to learn more about "gender identity", which was our topic and it helped us prepare for the final presentation on a fictional NGO we created that works to protect LGBTQ+ people. Because we did this blog, our knowledge and understanding of the topic deepened, and could give a great presentation.    

  By Vivi Starting this blog as a mandatory assignment, I initially approached the topic of gender identity with only basic understanding. My knowledge was limited to simple concepts like the knowing the difference between gender and sex, as well as the existence of non-binary identities. However, doing further research on the subject showed a new side to this controversial topic. What I discovered was a complex issue, something way different from the oversimplified portrayals that I see on my phone or on the news.  Other than gender identity, I was able to learn how to use different platforms when searching for information through the Internet. Even if a website looks legitimate, by factchecking and crosschecking with different websites, it can turn out to have false information. Using surveys and questionnaires were a first for me as well. I had never thought to create my own data instead of looking for them.  Reflection on Presentation Although I believe we did a good ...

 By Vivi In this post, I will write a brief history on non-binary people, mainly in the US. Early Times While it wasn't until the 1990s when the term "transgender" was used widely, there has been non-binary people throughout history.  ・ Gala and galli (priests assigned male at birth who cross genders in their worship of a variety of goddesses in ancient Sumer, Akkadia, Greece, and Rome) ・Two-spirit people within Indigenous communities  ・ Hijra (nonbinary people who inhabit ritual roles in South Asia) Mid-20th century During the 1950s, transgender rights activists started to push for wider societal acceptance in the US. ・1952 - Christine Jorgensen became the first visible transsexual in the media in the US ・1959 - Transgender people, drag queens, and others fought back against Los Angeles police who had been targeting trans women in random arrests at Cooper Do-nuts (a café popular with the LGBTQ community) ・1960 - Establishment of Transvestia (magazine for the tr...

 By Vivi In this post, I will talk about my observations on the image I attached below. This was created by Wordclouds.com , a Dutch Word Cloud generating site that allows you to produce attractive and informative images with ease. To create this, I have used an article by the Gurdian on anti-gender identity.  From this word cloud, we can see that the repeated words are "gender", "anti-gender", and "ideology." This seems obvious since the whole theme is about anti-gender ideology. I found the word "feminist" interesting to see within the word cloud. According to the article, this is because the LGBTQ+ movement coincided with the feminist movement.   Butler, J. (2021, October 23). Why is the idea of “gender” provoking backlash the world over? . The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/commentisfree/2021/oct/23/judith-butler-gender-ideology-backlash

This is a PowerPoint presentation on our fictional NGO about gender identity. Please feel free to check it out. Again, this is a fictional PowerPoint. https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1u8RhXyQIECjGH6UNwle8Uu200wO1kRe0b1Dr1OU0BSA/edit?usp=sharing

  By Kana I searched on COCA for the occurrences of the word "Gender Identity" and in this post, I'm going to show you what I got. From looking at this chart that I got as a result, you can see that the topic "Gender identity" is talked about a lot, especially, on the web and in academic papers. It is also frequently featured in the blog as well. However, the frequency rate in the sections of TV and Movies is extremely low, which I think is due to the fact that this particular topic is very controversial. They don't want to risk getting criticized for leaning towards one side over another. What is also interesting to note is the drastic increase in the frequency rate from the year 1990 to 2019. From 1990 to 2004, it is rarely talked about in any of the categories. The number started to rise gradually from 2005 and in 2019, the number hit 432 in frequency, which is the highest in the past 30 years. This is probably because about 10 years ago, the word "G...

 By Vivi      Media has always played an important role in shaping personalities, values, and other major human characteristics. For example, how many times have you watched TV commercials or seen a pop-up ad on your phone trying to sell you diet products because they want you to fit the "beauty standards" of today's society? Even though you might not notice it directly, the media does have a powerful influence. The same can be said for shaping gender identity.       Let's talk about gender stereotypes. The constant exposure to stereotypical content is incredibly effective towards teaching children what the culture expects of a boy and a girl to be. A poll done by CNN on about 1000 parents found that they believe the media has a significant influence on their kids, from the look and behavior of girls to how boys’ beliefs about themselves is affected through seeing violence. While gender inclusive movies and TV shows are being created, doing their ...

  By Kana In most languages, people use pronouns when referring to someone else. Pronouns are used to replace the nouns and make the conversation go smoothly without having to repeat the same words. But they also play an important role in expressing your identity and can be used as a way to show your acceptance and recognition towards how other people identify as well. Pronouns are crucial, especially for trans people and non-binary people, who identify with something different from their original biological gender. In this post, I'm going to talk about the important role of pronouns in acknowledging someone's gender identity. Pronouns are something people use to refer to you, other than your name, and getting others' pronouns right can show your respect for them and their choice as well as avoid making assumptions about someone's gender based on their appearance. Using the correct pronoun when referring to them can lead to creating an open and welcoming environment, pa...

  By Kana As you know, in today's society, the two most recognized genders are "male" and "female". But did you know that there are some cultures that have always recognized and valued various gender identities other than the conventional gender categories, long before the word "gender identity" was invented? And often in those cultures, people who identify themselves as something different are considered sacred and suitable for serving as priests and ceremonial leaders. In this post, I will introduce you to some of them to help you get familiarized with the unique relationship between cultures and gender identity. 1. Hijra... Hijira is the most common non-binary gender identity in Hindu society. Many of the Hijras are born with a male body and male characteristics and also, the community includes intersex people. Hijras are said to have the ability to bless others and often occupy religious and spiritual positions. 2. Calalai, Calabai, and Bissu... Th...

  By Kana (This post has nothing to do with our topic, gender identity. It is my summary and opinion on a class assignment on distinguishing good and bad web content.) As part of our class, my partner Ryo and I were assigned an article and we had to read it to figure out if it was legitimate or false. Our article was about male pregnancy and it said that a man named Lee Mingwey was the first pregnant man in history. At first, it had us fooled for a while because it showed the process of how men get pregnant in so much detail that it looked to us like something that could really happen, also there was a video interview where Mr. Lee talked about how he felt about being the first man ever to have gotten pregnant, which also looked really real. After we spent a little more time reading the article, we realized this was a hoax, because when we clicked on the title, it went to some strange Vietnamese betting page, and also the hospital that had supposedly published this article didn't a...

By Vivi (This post has nothing to do with our topic, gender identity. It is my summary and opinion on a class assignment on distinguishing good and bad web content.)      Today, in class, I partnered with YUTO to try and figure out whether a website relating to "ecopods" is actually real. At first glance, the website looked sketchy. There were pictures of acorns on the header and the title wasn't "ecopods" but "ARKA Acorn Urns". I was able to figure out that ecopods were biodegradable coffins that were meant to be ecofriendly. At that time, they were unavailable and were selling biodegradable urns instead. There was also no information on the price and just referred to other funeral sites.       However, after further digging on its reliability, I came to the conclusion that ecopods were real. On the website, they mentioned the designer of ecopods, Hazel Selina. I googled her to see if she was a legitimate person and found a BBC article talking about h...

By Kana Have you ever heard of the word “theyby”? I’m assuming that most of you haven’t, so in this post I’m going to explain what it means and why some people want to raise their children as gender neutral. First of all, the word “theyby” is a blend of the word “baby and the pronoun” they”. It is used to refer to a baby or a child raised in a way that is gender neutral. The term “theyby” was first introduced in 2017 and was popularized in 2018, although, the idea of raising children as gender neutral goes back to as early as 2009. Lately, more and more parents are starting to employ this idea and incorporate it into their parenting style. The whole idea behind this word is to wait for the child to understand what gender is and allow them to explore their own and express it themselves, rather than just assigning them a gender based on the anatomy they were born with. The word reinforces the idea that gender and sex should be considered totally different things, meaning that sex is ...

We are conducting a survey and a questionnaire on gender identity. By participating in these surveys, you will help see how much of an understanding people actually have on this controversial topic. Both are anonymous, so don't worry about your answers being known to us. Of course, if you don't feel comfortable answering some personal questions, please just skip. Click on the links below to start now. Thank you! Survey Monkey: https://jp.surveymonkey.com/r/GC3RJ5B Google Form Questionnaire:   https://forms.gle/oKxgRmkvsMpVcowF7