September 15, 2014 - 13:55
Eli Clare found solace in a community in which he could embrace parts of his identity that were stifled, that were oppressed by the community he grew up in on the basis of rural Washington having been simply a different culture. In many ways, his story is paralleled by many who come to Bryn Mawr. Although the security blanket of what is familiar and safe—for some, simply just leaving and losing home—is pulled away, the oft-revered “Bryn Mawr community” has a track record of being accepting and embracing.
Our acceptance of fellow students regardless of gender is, although not perfect and certainly not unconditional, at the very least widespread, something that cannot be said for many, many other places. But this community is, at the moment, restricted by the presence of standards and ill-founded beliefs that prevent it from being fully inclusive, from being accepting and embracing of everyone. And even if the rules change, it will still not be a veritable contact zone. In the policy changes that are being brought to attention, Bryn Mawr College as an institution may welcome transwomen on paper. But as a college, as a community, as a network of Mawrters and a historical name, it will not. In its current state, a transwoman who comes here will be dangerously towing the line between a student of a ‘new’ Bryn Mawr and a diversity token, a way to show off to the world how accepting we are even if there still is not a space here for transwomen to be accepted and embraced. We talk about the Bryn Mawr community, often forgetting (or consciously neglecting) its shortcomings. For us to accept transwomen or other dmab folks holds immense power in that we are opening up a space for them. We are validating an identity that is challenged by every other walk of life: government, doctors, healthcare, schools, religious life and hometown politics and even families. We are furthering a mission stated over a century ago to provide a top-tier education to women by actually providing that education, to all women.
But for us to accept transwomen means that we need to focus on that space and, in doing so evaluate ourselves. And as a result, they will have as great of an effect on us as we will have on them. We still have many changes that need to be seen in our health services, given that in many ways they still can’t even provide fully for all the students who are currently here. On a larger scale, we must also look closely at our traditions. They are for many students a central part of life here, and we certainly advertise them as such to prospective students*. Furthermore, having had this role for decades, they are a major part of what connects current and former Mawrters. But many aspects of our tradition are centered around the physical, embracing the cisgender female body (and doing so in a very public way) in a manner that does not readily include those who are not dfab. Traditions then brings us to our alumnae(i) network, and the shifts in values that are liable to bring about conflict on a larger scale if transwomen are accepted by the current community but are not as readily embraced by former Mawrters.
*This introduces an additional issue. The traditions as they stand will alienate non-dfab students, but their legacy is liable to do just as much, if not more, damage. On paper and to prospective students, many details are left out, and it is not until we are actually here and actively involved in them that we can see how focused they are on the cis female body. The massive gap that exists in between will lead to expectations that will be unmet or contradicted altogether and leaves room for a high risk of alienation—room for the space we create for transwomen to suddenly be eliminated when they realize that, on some level, they can’t actively relate to these parts of our traditions.