Culture

Transgender Visibility at SMC

Sosana Shelah | Opinion Editor

On Tuesday, Nov 15, Santa Monica College’s Pride Center kicked off Transgender Visibility Week with guest speaker, Jacob Tobia: American LGBTQ+ rights activist, writer, producer, television host, and actor. Tobia was invited to SMC to read excerpts from their published memoir, “Sissy: A Coming-of-Gender Story” that talks about their personal experiences growing up as gender-queer.

Tobia moved many SMC students and faculty with their outspoken words, witty jokes, and light-hearted ways of conversing about the hardships that they have experienced being a member of the LGBTQ+ community.

Tobia said, “I need everyone to think about gender with a thirdgrade mind… Our adult minds are not useful when thinking about gender because our adult minds have already been made up … I don't think the way we come at gender and identity as adults serves us very well.”

Inviting the audience to radically shed their adult skin, Tobia reads three different fragments from “Sissy: A Coming-of-Gender Story”, discussing experiences from their childhood all the way up to their current adult life. Tobia reads the opening of their memoir that discusses their experience being so comfortable with their naked body: As a child they would urinate outside because they did not see any issue with a normal bodily function and reflected on how discomfort with their body was learned.

Tobia also read their book proposal that spoke about how identifying as non-binary and being transgender was extremely hard for them. The amount of people who did not view gender-queer individuals as part of the transgender community added to these difficulties.

Lastly, Tobia shared parts of their experience hiking in the Appalachian Mountains for two weeks with a group of their fellow students in college. There was no judgment, no thoughts on gender, no worries about looking too masculine or seeming too feminine, they had found gender freedom.

SMC Librarian Bren Antrim is also apart of the non-binary community. Antrim shared their thoughts on having a gender-queer guest speaker at SMC.

“It means hope because I’m almost sixty and most of my life there was not anyone speaking that I could relate to on this issue,” Antrim said.

Gender Sex Alliance Club Vice President, AJ Sohrabi shared his thoughts on Tobia coming to SMC to speak on behalf of the LGBTQ+ community.

“Honestly I am really glad that we can have an opportunity like this at SMC because I am sure there are countless colleges in this country that would never recognize something like this.” Sohrabi said.

Jacob Tobia, at their panel “Beyond the Binary, Behind the Trauma: Musings on Trans Storytelling”, reading an expert of their book “Sissy, A Comming of Gender Story”.

More Than A Podcast Reis Novakovic | The Corsair

Cecil Alsanussi | Design Editor Eva-Love Jopanda | Staff Writer

Santa Monica College (SMC) hosted Artist in Residence Matika Wilbur for a live showing of the fourth season of the “All My Relations" podcast and accompanying film festival on Friday, Nov. 18, and Saturday, Nov. 19.

The podcast recording was held at the SMC Center of Media and Design from 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m., while the first-time film festival was held at the John Adams Middle School Performing Arts Center from 5 to 9:30 p.m.

Wilbur, who is of the Swinomish and Tulalip tribes, hosted two different episodes of the podcast with various Indigenous creatives alongside co-host Dr. Adrienne Keene, a Cherokee Nation academic researcher.

The first recorded episode, “The Borders Crossed Us - Part 2,” guest-starred Jon Ayon, from the Comáac and Pipil tribes. They spoke about the struggles many Mexican and Indigenous immigrants face due to displacement and government restrictions, despite it being their native land. The episode concluded with a brief introduction to Ayon’s short film, “No Soy Óscar.”

The film follows the story of a Salvadoran-American father visiting the U.S.-Mexico border to find where a Salvadoran immigrant and his daughter drowned.

The Saturday podcast premiere began with an introduction of the hosts. The first section centered on the short film "Daughter of a Lost Bird," a film based on the real story of Kendra Mylnechuck's first reunion with her Native birth mother April. The story was told by director Brooke Pepion Swaney, alongside Mylnechuck herself.

The emotional recording— while humorous—brought attention to the Indian Adoption Project's ongoing effects on the Indigenous community.

As the night was wrapping up, the applause was roaring as the show concluded with a Q&A with Reservation Dogs showrunner Sterlin Harjo together with writer and director Ryan Redcorn announcing the show's renewal for its third season.

A group of SMC students worked on the campaign for the Matika Wilbur gallery showing over the spring and summer.

Karen Willert, an SMC Art History major looking to transfer to UCLA, reflected on her involvement with the film festival. "I can bring this experience with me in my upper divisions," she said.

Willert attributes her experience working with Wilbur to making her feel more at ease being one of the older students. "As an older student my job is not to be invisible, and watching Matika—she is unapologetic about who she is,” she said. “As a human, she's just bigger than life."

Jorge Devotto | The Corsair Matika Wilbur speaking during the Q&A after her short Documentary “One Small Thing” at the All My Relations Film Festival at the JAMS Theatre, Santa Monica, Calif. Saturday Nov. 19