Julia Michelle Serano ( ; born 1967) is an American writer, musician, spoken-word performer,

transgender A transgender (often shortened to trans) person has a gender identity different from that typically associated with the sex they were sex assignment, assigned at birth. The opposite of ''transgender'' is ''cisgender'', which describes perso ...

and

bisexual Bisexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior toward both males and females. It may also be defined as the attraction to more than one gender, to people of both the same and different gender, or the attraction t ...

activist, and

biologist A biologist is a scientist who conducts research in biology. Biologists are interested in studying life on Earth, whether it is an individual Cell (biology), cell, a multicellular organism, or a Community (ecology), community of Biological inter ...

. She is known for her transfeminist books, such as '' Whipping Girl'' (2007), ''Excluded'' (2013), and ''Outspoken'' (2016). She is also a public speaker who has given many talks at universities and conferences. Her writing is frequently featured in

queer ''Queer'' is an umbrella term for people who are non-heterosexual or non- cisgender. Originally meaning or , ''queer'' came to be used pejoratively against LGBTQ people in the late 19th century. From the late 1980s, queer activists began to ...

feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...

, and

popular culture Popular culture (also called pop culture or mass culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of cultural practice, practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as popular art

f. pop art F is the sixth letter of the Latin alphabet. F may also refer to: Science and technology Mathematics * F or f, the number 15 (number), 15 in hexadecimal and higher positional systems * ''p'F'q'', the hypergeometric function * F-distributi ...

or mass art, sometimes contraste ...

magazines.

Life

Serano, who was assigned male at birth, has stated that she first consciously recognized in herself a desire to be

female An organism's sex is female ( symbol: ♀) if it produces the ovum (egg cell), the type of gamete (sex cell) that fuses with the male gamete (sperm cell) during sexual reproduction. A female has larger gametes than a male. Females and ...

during the late 1970s, when she was 11 years old. A few years later, she began crossdressing. At first, she crossdressed secretively, but she eventually started identifying herself openly as a "male crossdresser." Serano attended her first

support group In a support group, members provide each other with various types of help, usually nonprofessional and nonmaterial, for a particular shared, usually burdensome, characteristic. Members with the same issues can come together for sharing coping str ...

for crossdressers in 1994 while she lived in

Kansas Kansas ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to the west. Kansas is named a ...

.''Serano, Julia. "Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity''," Seal Press, 2007. Soon afterward, Serano moved to the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a List of regions of California, region of California surrounding and including San Francisco Bay, and anchored by the cities of Oakland, San Francisco, and San Jose, California, S ...

where she met her wife, Dani, in 1998. During this time, Serano began identifying as not only a crossdresser but also

and

. In 2001, she began medically transitioning and identifying as a transgender woman.

Career

Serano earned her PhD in

biochemistry Biochemistry, or biological chemistry, is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. A sub-discipline of both chemistry and biology, biochemistry may be divided into three fields: structural biology, enzymology, a ...

and molecular biophysics from

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

. She researched genetics, developmental biology, and evolutionary biology at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

for 17 years. Serano is the author of '' Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity''. Her second book, ''Excluded: Making Feminist and Queer Movements More Inclusive'', was published on September 10, 2013, by Seal Press. It was named the 16th best nonfiction book of all time by readers of

Ms. Magazine ''Ms.'' is an American feminist magazine co-founded in 1971 by journalist and social/political activist Gloria Steinem. It was the first national American feminist magazine. The original editors were Letty Cottin Pogrebin, Mary Thom, Pat Carbine ...

. Her third book, ''Outspoken: A Decade of Transgender Activism and Trans Feminism'', she published herself under Switch Hitter Press, which she founded along with Switch Hitter Records. ''Outspoken'' is a 2017

Lambda Literary Award Lambda Literary Awards, also known as the "Lammys", are awarded yearly by Lambda Literary Foundation, Lambda Literary to recognize the crucial role LGBTQ+ writers play in shaping the world. The Lammys celebrate the very best in LGBTQ+ literatur ...

finalist. Her 2020 book, ''99 Erics: a Kat Cataclysm faux novel'', also published by Switch Hitter, won the Publishing Triangle's 2021 Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction and was an ''Independent Publisher'' Book Awards 2021 silver medalist in LGBT+ Fiction. Her work has appeared in

, and

pop culture Popular culture (also called pop culture or mass culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as popular art pop_art.html" ;"title="f. pop art">f. pop artor mass art, some ...

magazines, including '' Bitch'', '' Clamor'', ''Kitchen Sink'', ''LiP'', ''make/shift'', and ''Transgender Tapestry''. Excerpts of her work have appeared in ''The Believer'' and ''The

San Francisco Chronicle The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and M. H. de Young, Michael H. ...

'' and on NPR. Serano has spoken about

and trans women's issues at numerous universities, often at

psychology Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Its subject matter includes the behavior of humans and nonhumans, both consciousness, conscious and Unconscious mind, unconscious phenomena, and mental processes such as thoughts, feel ...

, and

philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

-themed conferences. In 2023, she gave the keynote address at the Moving Trans History Forward conference at the

University of Victoria The University of Victoria (UVic) is a public research university located in the municipalities of Oak Bay, British Columbia, Oak Bay and Saanich, British Columbia, Canada. Established in 1903 as Victoria College, British Columbia, Victoria Col ...

. Her writings have also been used in teaching materials in

gender studies Gender studies is an interdisciplinary academic field devoted to analysing gender identity and gendered representation. Gender studies originated in the field of women's studies, concerning women, feminism, gender, and politics. The field n ...

courses across the United States. Serano is a slam poet and has given spoken-word performances at universities as well as at events such as the National Queer Arts Festival, San Francisco

Pride Pride is a human Emotion, secondary emotion characterized by a sense of satisfaction with one's Identity (philosophy), identity, performance, or accomplishments. It is often considered the opposite of shame or of humility and, depending on conte ...

Dyke March and Trans March stages, Ladyfest, outCRY!, Femme 2006 and in '' The Vagina Monologues''. She was a guitarist and vocalist for the band Bitesize from 1997 through the early 2000s and has also recorded solo music. Serano organizes and hosts ''GenderEnders'', a performance series that features the work of transgender,

intersex Intersex people are those born with any of several sex characteristics, including chromosome patterns, gonads, or genitals that, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, "do not fit typical binar ...

, and genderqueer artists and allies that has produced 20 shows. She received a grant to curate "The Penis Issue: Trans and Intersex Women Speak Their Minds," a spoken-word event, as part of the 2007 National Queer Arts Festival. She writes social justice articles on the website '' Medium'' about topics like transgender identity, LGBTQ+ visibility, and identity politics.

Personal life

Serano lives in

Oakland, California Oakland is a city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area in the U.S. state of California. It is the county seat and most populous city in Alameda County, California, Alameda County, with a population of 440,646 in 2020. A major We ...

Works

Books

* * * * * * *

Anthologies

* *

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Serano, Julia Living people Activists from the San Francisco Bay Area American women biochemists American molecular biologists American spoken word artists Columbia Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni Bisexual rights activists Bisexual women musicians Bisexual women writers Bisexual poets Bisexual scientists American evolutionary biologists LGBTQ people from California American LGBTQ poets American LGBTQ scientists Slam poets Transfeminists Transgender poets Transgender scientists Transgender women musicians Transgender women writers Transgender rights activists American women evolutionary biologists American women molecular biologists Writers from the San Francisco Bay Area 1967 births Thomas Jefferson University alumni American transgender writers American bisexual writers Transgender bisexual women American transgender women