Unlocking Gender: The Literature of Release by Caitlin

Unlocking Gender: The Literature of Release by Caitlin - July 2014 Scholarship Essay

Writing has been my sanctuary since I could put paper to pen. After a sputtering start to college where I foolishly forced myself into a Biological Sciences degree, figuring that future job security was more important than utilizing my talents, I settled into a British Literature degree with ease, finding comfort in writing papers that others found tedious and opting for extra assignments while others were complaining about word counts and minimum page lengths. However, I have always been a shy and withdrawn student, struggling to make friends and fit in. My professors have often been the only people with whom I have made a connection during my time in college, especially as I have struggled with mental and physical health issues that have made the politics of friendship a battleground better left to other people.

During my junior year of college, I was struggling with my gender and sexual identity to the point where I had nearly completely pulled myself away from all contact outside of my Internet friends, the only place where I felt accepted and comfortable. I am pansexual and agender – a facet of transgenderism where the person does not identify as male or female, but as some middle place, like a castaway stuck in a maelstrom of swirling gender roles, attacked on all sides by concepts of what a person should be, what a person should feel inside about being a person in a gendered role. Figuring that I could take my own struggles with gender and sexuality and use them for my education, I signed up for a Gender and Sexuality in Literature class.

I was unaware that this class, and this professor, would completely change my life.

A laid-back Texan divorce attorney with hearing aids and tattoos, the professor ran his class like a water cooler chat, encouraging each student to speak up about his or her experiences and explaining that when discussing gender and sexuality, all of our experiences are integral to understanding the work as every person has something to share about gender and sexuality, being as it is something that colors every part of our experience. As we read through the literature assigned for the class, he would provide historical perspective and ask us to write a short journal assignment each day about a topic relevant to the reading, and a few people would read theirs each day. I found myself looking forward to this – not just to read my own, but to hear everyone else’s. I began to withdraw from my shell and actually want to talk to the people around me because the professor made it clear that this was a safe space for everyone, no matter their gender or sexual orientation – and he meant it, strictly enforcing bullying rules and directly asking people if they felt safe.

While I have always been a meticulous and hard-working student, I began to work even harder in this class, even though it was an elective and would barely affect my GPA. With his permission, I wrote an 18-page paper for a 5-page assignment which he later said was graduate-level work and encouraged to get published. Where only months before I had been considering dropping out of school because of my mental and physical health issues, I was finding myself working 15-hour days to continue working on this opus magnum, just for an elective class – because I was inspired.

This laid-back Texan reminded me that education is supposed to be personal; it’s supposed to be a labor of love, of pleasure and excitement, and if you’re not loving what you’re doing, then something is wrong. Working with him reminded me what I love about writing in the first place: those feverish nights of crafting every line to hit the reader right in the gut, the exhilarating moments in the middle of the chase for the end of the paper where I stop for a smoke break and take a big breath and just smile because I am so in love with the process of writing.

If it hadn’t been for him, I probably would not be contemplating graduate school for a degree in conflict studies, focusing on issues in gender and sexuality, especially sexual violence. His class reminded me of my deep love for research, communication, and writing, and reminded me that sometimes going above and beyond is that teaches you the most not just about the material, but about yourself.