Cristopher Marc Bautista is a student studying at both Stanford and Oxford University. He is an English major emphasizing in creative writing and graphic novels.
Lyle Blake, has been active in the LGBT community since 1980. He has lead workshop discussions on maturity, leadership, and body image at conferences across the USA, with an emphasis on reaching out to men of color. He is a co-founder of Gender Identity Foundation for Transmen (www.thegift-foundation.org); a participant and supporter of Transfigurations, the award-winning photo-documentary by Jana Marcus (www.janamarcus.com/docus/docus.htm); and a participant and supporter of the Transgender Oral History Project by Martin Rawlings-Fein (www.feindesign.org/oral-history.html). He is honored and blessed to be included in this distinguished list of authors and activists.
Following his BA Honors degree in Drama from Edge Hill University, Elliott Brooker (aged 22) is currently a post-grad student studying an MA in Theatre Studies at Manchester University UK, focusing on Queer theory and Transgenderism within sociological and community performance. From attending the ever-growing community groups in England, (the Trans Resource Empowerment Centre 'TREC' and the Trans-guy support group 'MORF') he has become an active and very proud member of the Transgender community in the North West. He hopes to further his studies into a career lecturing within the arts, while creating opportunities for Transgender and Queer identified people to use, create, and enjoy performance through active community participation. Living at home with his loving and dedicated family, Elliott owes much to the support, kindness and understanding of his parents Lynn and David, Martin and Char, and his loving and brilliant brother Phil, without which his letter would have been a very different story.
Patrick Michael Callahan born and raised in Northern Michigan currently living in San Jose, California. After serving in the U.S. Marine Corps I obtained my Bachelor of Arts degree (with Honors) in Philosophy from Michigan State University and my Master of Science degree in Criminology from the University of Pennsylvania. I am currently the Director of Security and the Public Information Officer for the Transgender Community of Police and Sheriffs (TCOPS International) www.tcops-international.org I am also a member of the 7-Point Star Group which is a think-tank organization studying the intersection of the LGBT community and public service organizations (police, fire, EMS) as both service providers and as consumers.
Aaron H. Devor, PhD, has been a member of the LGBTQ community for more than 40 years and has been studying and teaching about gender and sexuality for more than twenty years. He is internationally recognized for his books Gender Blending: Confronting the Limits of Duality (1989) and FTM: Female-to-Male Transsexuals in Society (1997) as well as numerous scholarly articles and lectures delivered to audiences around the world. He is an elected member of the International Academy of Sex Research, a Fellow of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality and a nationally-award-winning teacher. He was one of the main authors of version 6 of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health's (WPATH) Standards of Care for Gender Identity Disorders and is a member of the workgroup preparing for version 7. His present research focuses on the life of transgendered philanthropist Reed Erickson (1917-1992) and the Erickson Educational Foundation (1964-84) through which Erickson provided unparalleled leadership in building early support, education, advocacy, and research about transsexualism as well as providing invaluable support to the early gay rights organization ONE Inc. Dr. Devor is the Dean of Graduate Studies and a professor of Sociology at the University of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. http://web.uvic.ca/~ahdevor/
fAe gibson is an advocate, activist and artist. He was featured in a documentary, Gender Redesigner, chronicling five years of his transition from female-to-male. This film by his good friend Johnny Bergmann was shown at film festivals all across the United States and Europe in 2007, it aired on the LOGO channel and is now available on Outcast Films (http://www.outcast-films.com/films/gr/index.html). fAe has been an active participant in LGBT communities all over the country, including New York City, San Francisco, Boston and Pittsburgh. At the turn of the century, fAe was performing as Sir-Lix-A-Lot in New York City. He was a featured drag king on MTV’s Sex 2K: Drag Kings (2000). After moving to Pennsylvania from NYC, fAe joined the Distinguished Iron City Kings drag king troupe in Pittsburgh, where he slashed and hacked at gender boundaries. While living in San Francisco, he hosted and stage-managed Gender Pirates, a variety show that raised money for the annual San Francisco Trans March. While on the west coast, he was also a member of the band Sex Combs. Look ‘em up on Youtube.com for some sonic fury! fAe remains busy with new musical and performance projects. Currently, he’s pushing for change from his farm in rural western Pennsylvania speaking at schools, universities and to various groups about his experience as a trans-man. www.myspace.com/gender_redesigner
Born in Oakland, CA, in 1948, Jamison Green began fighting for civil rights for gender-variant people in 1968, and started his medical transition to male in 1988. He led FTM International from March 1991 to August 1999, has appeared in a dozen documentary films, and now serves on the boards of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health, TransYouth Family Allies, and the Transgender Law & Policy Institute. In 2009 he received the Association of Gay & Lesbian Psychiatrists’ 2009 Distinguished Service Award for his contributions to LGBT mental health, the Transgender Advocacy Award from the National LGBT Bar Association, and the Vanguard Award from the Transgender Law Center. He holds an MFA in English, and he is the author of the prizewinning book Becoming a Visible Man (Vanderbilt University Press, 2004). His next book, The FTM Guide to Sexual Health, is forthcoming from Cleis Press.
Malcolm Himschoot is an ordained Christian minister, a Euro-American trans man living in Colorado with his wife and two young children.
Keith Josephson uses a pen name to protect his privacy. Contact him at: keithjosephson57@gmail.com
Chase Ryan Joynt is a writer, performer and film-maker currently based in Toronto, Ontario Canada. You can read more of his writing in zines, on websites and can follow him on Twitter @ChaseJoynt as he chronicles his quest to write a book, finish a film and find his abdominal muscles.
Matt Kailey is an author, speaker, and storyteller focusing on transgender issues. He is the author of Lambda Literary Award finalist Just Add Hormones: An Insider's Guide to the Transsexual Experience (Beacon Press, 2005), the editor of Focus on the Fabulous: Colorado GLBT Voices (Johnson Books, 2007), and the winner of the Poets & Writers, Inc. Writers Exchange Award for fiction. His short stories and essays have been published in various anthologies and collections, and he has appeared in five documentary films, including Matt Kailey: A Conversation. Kailey lives in Denver, Colorado, where he plays bass in the garage band Mixed Message, blogs at www.tranifesto.com, and continues to make mistakes, thus garnering more wisdom to impart. He can be reached through his Web site at www.mattkailey.com.
Raven Kaldera is a queer FTM intersexual shaman. He lives with his MTF wife Bella and his FTM partner Joshua on a little homestead in central Massachusetts, and is an activist for everything that he is and does, as well as being a shaman for the Third Gender Tribe. He is the author of 21 books and innumerable articles, including Hermaphrodeities: The Transgender Spirituality Workbook. His "hub" website is www.ravenkaldera.org, and all his other websites can be found linked off of that one. 'Tis an ill wind that blows no minds.
Zander Keig is a post-op trans man living in San Diego, CA with his wonderful wife Margaret. Zander has been engaged in and invigorated by his many community organizing, public speaking, diversity training and mentoring projects in the LGBT community since 1987. You may connect with Zander on Facebook and LinkedIn. Zander Keig is a co-editor and featured writer in Letters For Our Brothers.
Tucker Lieberman has published essays in Zeek, Whosoever, and Fresh Yarn and in several anthologies including Nobody Passes: Rejecting the Rules of Gender and Conformity (Seal Press, 2006). His flash fiction has appeared in Glossolalia and his poetry in Snakeskin, Ariga, and Flutter. He studied Journalism at Boston University and Philosophy at Brown University where he won the 2002 Casey Shearer Memorial Award for Creative Nonfiction. He recently co-edited the literary zine Never Hit By Lightning (Lulu, 2009) and co-organizes TranScriptions, an open mic in Boston. After a fifteen year career working for major museums and zoos, drag queens sent
Aaron Raz Link to the Dell'Arte International School of Physical Theatre, making him the only known historian and philosopher of science ever to graduate from clown school. He is author of What Becomes You, a memoir of change in two voices with Hilda Raz. The book was published by the University of Nebraska Press in Tobias Wolff's series American Lives, and was a 2008 Lambda Literary Award finalist in both Gay Men's and Trans categories. Currently, Aaron lives beneath a small shrine to Erving Goffman in Portland, Oregon. He teaches creative writing, curates exhibit and performance projects, and is at work on a book about comedy.
Megan M. Rohrer received a master of divinity at Pacific School of Religion in Berkeley, where Megan is currently a candidate for the Doctorate of Ministry degree. In addition to serving as the Executive Director of Welcome serving the homeless and hungry, Megan is currently researching gay and trans youth from 1964-70 in San Francisco’s Tenderloin with the GLBT Historical Society. Megan is the creator of Wilgefortis Press and publishes books about queer, disability and poverty issues, the author of Queerly Lutheran and the co-editor of Letters For Our Brothers.
Dylan Scholinski was born Daphne Scholinski. As a young girl growing up in the Chicago suburbs, she played first base in Little League and preferred drawing to playing with dolls. When she was 15 years old she was locked up in a mental hospital diagnosed as "an inappropriate female", and spent the rest of her high school years undergoing extreme femininity training. At 18, her insurance ran out and she was discharged. Now 43 years old, Dylan resides in Denver, CO and is a distinguished artist, author, and public speaker . Dylan has appeared on 20/20, Dateline and Today to discuss his experiences and has been featured in a variety of newspapers and magazines. Recently his award-winning book (The Last Time I Wore a Dress: A Memoir - Penguin/Putnam) was listed in the Top 10 Must Reads in Out Magazines first Transgender Issue. His work not only portrays the anguish of his hospital years but also his ultimate triumph. Dylan is the founder/witness for the Sent(a)Mental Project : A Memorial to GLBTIQA Suicide. He spends much of his time working in his studio, public speaking, creating zines - such as Freedom of Depression, Please Forgive Me For Judging You, Sent(a)Mental - and frequently opens his studio to a variety of Denver Metro youth to provide safe space to explore and discover ways of expressing and empowering themselves without bringing harm to themselves or others.
Lou Sullivan could be called the father of the contemporary trans male movement. The creator of FTM (now FTM International), Lou wrote letters to thousands of transmen across the globe before he became the first trans man to die of AIDS in 1991. Photos of Lou’s transition, additional letters to David and video interviews of Lou before his death are currently on display in Man-i-fest: FTM Mentorship in San Francisco from 1976-2009, curated by Megan M. Rohrer in partnership with the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco and available online at Out History.
Reid Vanderburgh is a therapist in private practice in Portland, Oregon. Reid began transitioning in 1995, and started taking hormones in 1997, at the age of 41. With a B.A. in Psychology from Portland State University in 1998, Reid received a M.A. in Counseling Psychology (specialization Transpersonal Psychology) from John F. Kennedy University's Graduate School for Holistic Studies in 2001. Reid is the author of Transition and Beyond: Observations on Gender and Identity.
