Using Gender-Inclusive Language with Children & Families: 7 Tips
The Gendering of Language When you pay attention, it’s hard to miss the fact that gendered words are part and parcel of everyday language. For most of my life, I just took these habits for granted. But, raising a gender-expansive child and learning from the LGBTQ+ community has made me more aware of how deeply ingrained gendered language is, and how harmful it can be. Most gendered words are binary; they make room for only two genders (girl/woman or boy/man). In Western society, and many other cultures, we are taught to make a snap...
read moreWhat’s Gender Diversity Got to Do with My Nonprofit?
Published by Neon CRM on July 26, 2017, here. There’s a gender revolution going on. Young people are busting out of gender boxes and expressing who they are in many ways. Growing numbers of children, youth, and adults are identifying as transgender. Important progress has been made as the result of many years of struggle, and the work of many leaders and activists, both past and present. This includes growing awareness that gender isn’t either/or and growing support for gender diversity in many communities. Tragically, our society, our...
read moreMy Son Inspired My New Children’s Book
Published on Huffington Post 09/05/16 Being a mother has called me to do things I never thought I’d do. Now, here I am, about to become a published children’s book author! What inspired my book? Let me take you back to when my son Danny was in kindergarten, over 20 years ago… COVER ART BY ROBERT LIU-TRUJILLO, 2016 Danny with a picture of the princess he wants to be in the school parade. Danny is five and he’s already starting to get teased and called a girl. He likes to wear purple and sometimes wears pink socks and a unicorn...
read moreWhat I Wish I’d Known About Gender When I Became a Parent
Published in Huffington Post here. “You had a beautiful baby boy.” Those were the first words I heard after my child was born. I named him Daniel and started dressing him in clothes made for boys. But, raising a child is often full of the unexpected. It soon became obvious that Danny was different than other boys. He loved Barbie dolls, dressing up in skirts and shimmery things, and preferred playing with girls. I didn’t know there were other children like Danny, and felt lost. Was there something wrong with him? Was I...
read moreDiversity, Equity, and Inclusion Work: Eight Questions for Building Readiness and Steering Clear of Pitfalls
Diversity, equity, and inclusion work can transform organizations and help them do their work more effectively. This work can be most successful when people are fully invested and have a good idea what is involved. Without this, organizations sometimes set themselves up for failure and bring consultants in with unrealistic expectations. If you are thinking of launching into work around diversity, equity, and inclusion, this post may help you think about how to set yourself up for success. The questions below may serve as a useful checklist for...
read moreMy Son was a Princess for Halloween and I Became a Better Parent
(published in Huffington Post on September 30, 2015. Also published in Polish, here. See related story on Good Morning America, here.) A few weeks before my son Danny’s 4th birthday, I asked him what he wanted to be for Halloween. “I wanna be a princess,” he said. He didn’t hesitate for a second. But I did. I cringed inside and tried hard not to show it. “My reaction was clouded by visions of children teasing, of parents whispering and passing judgment, and the fear of not fitting in.” My reaction was...
read moreUndoing Patterns of Privilege as We Learn
In my work with organizations around race, power and privilege, I’ve noticed a pattern. Sometimes we anticipate defensiveness on the part of white people in the group and plan our sessions to accommodate this defensiveness. I’ve begun correcting this pattern and setting goals more proactively. At the same time, I have become hyper aware that a primary reasons we’re doing this work is that people of color may feel unsafe, unsupported, and even silenced. I’ve been wondering how to make their needs a higher priority in the...
read moreTransgender Women’s Lives: A Family Matter
Also published in the Huffington Post, here. This year we’ve broken a record, and it’s not a good one. More transgender women have been killed in the U.S. than in any other year on record. I’m heartbroken and angered that women keep dying, most of them women of color, most of them Black. Most were between the ages of 17-25, just coming into adulthood, when their lives, dreams and futures were stolen. They were sisters, daughters, granddaughters, aunties and more. I cannot even imagine the devastation I would feel if this...
read moreSeeing and Naming Racism in Nonprofit and Public Organizations
In light of the unrelenting and vicious assaults on the Black community, and in response to the #BlackLivesMatter movement, I have asked myself what more I can do to challenge racism, particularly anti-Black racism. One thing I am doing is challenging myself to be more aware and forthright in noticing and speaking out about the racism I see when I work with non-profit and public organizations. This post is an effort to name those things that often go unnamed to facilitate dialogue and action. “For white people, their identities rest on...
read moreDiversity & Equity: Closing the Leadership Gap
Thanks to my colleagues Steve Lew, Senior Project Director, CompassPoint Nonprofit Services and Maura Bairley, Interdependent Consultant for Social Change, for their contributions to this piece. When I work with organizations around diversity and equity[1], I start with managers, because I believe that their buy-in and investment is essential for the work to succeed. Lately, I’ve been struck by a gap I see between what it takes to build diverse, equitable organizations and how prepared many non-profit managers are for this work. In this...
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