Travis Alabanza | |
|---|---|
 Travis Alabanza | |
| Born | 15 November 1995 [1] [2] |
| Known for | BURGERZ |
| Notable work | BURGERZ, Before I Step Outside [You Love Me] |
| Awards | Jhalak Prize, 2023 |
| Website | travisalabanza |
Travis Alabanza (born 15 November 1995 [1] [2] ) is a British performance artist, writer and theatre maker.
Alabanza started their career in the London spoken word scene, with their poems were first published in 2015, in the Black and Gay in the UK Anthology and becoming a Barbican Young Poet. [3] Later that year Alabanza went on tour for their theatre show Stories of a Queer Brown Muddy Kid, performing at clubs, bookstores, and performance venues across the United Kingdom and abroad. [4]
They have an honorary fellowship from Rose Bruford College and have been featured as a guest lecturer and panelist at over forty universities in the United Kingdom during LGBTQ and Black History month to discuss issues related to race, sexual orientation, and gender. Their work has been featured at Duckie, Bar Wotever, And What! Festival, Hamburg International Feminist Festival, Late at Tate, the V&A, and Transmission Gallery. [5] [6] They are currently the youngest person to be awarded a residency at The Tate in 2017/2018. [1]
In 2016, Alabanza starred in the five star roundhouse production of Putting Words in Your Mouth by Scottee. In 2017, they began working on a solo exhibition, The Other'd Artist for Transmission Gallery in Glasgow. [5] Alabanza released their first chapbook titled Before I Step Outside. (You Love Me); a compilation of visual art, poetry, diary entries, and essays. [7] [8] They also performed the leading role in the stage adaptation of Derek Jarman's punk film Jubilee . [9]
Alabanza has critiqued mainstream feminism for having been rooted in transphobia and mainstream feminists for often neglecting trans and gender non-conforming people in their discussions of progress. [10]
In 2018, Alabanza created Burgerz. [11] This show focuses on audience participation regarding an incident in 2016 where a person threw a burger at them while walking across a bridge in London. [12] [1] The show ran its first UK Tour from October 19 to November 17 in 2018. [13] It has toured globally since, with Alabanza or other performers in the lead role, closing to a sold out run at Southbank Centre in 2023. [14]
In 2019, Alabanza and Kaulbach, childhood friends, collaborated on an immersive installation titled All the Ways We Could Grow for the Free Word Centre, London. [15] [16] The installation explores the question: "What's it like to be trans?". [17]
In 2020, during the first COVID lockdown in England, Alabanza and Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley gave a live-streamed performance for the Free Word Centre of If I Feel Lonely Maybe U Do 2?. [18]
Overflow, written by Alabanza, directed by Debbie Hannan, and starring Reece Lyons, was produced by the Bush Theatre in London in 2020 and 2021. It later had an Australian version starring Janet Anderson, which opened in Darlinghurst Theatre. [19] [20] [21] [22] The play "explores trans safety and is set in a public toilet". [19]
In 2022, Alabanza released their debut full-length semi-autobiographical non-fiction book None of the Above: My Life Beyond the Binary. The book was listed as one of Waterstones Best Book of 2022: Politics and won the 2023 Jhalak Prize. [23]
In 2023, Alabanza and Hannan co-created Sound of the Underground at the Royal Court Theatre. The play featured drag performers from London’s nightlife scene including Midgitte Bardot (Tammy Reynolds), Ms Sharon Le Grand, Rhys’ Pieces (Rhys Hollis), Chiyo, Lilly SnatchDragon, Sue Gives a F*ck, Sadie Sinner (Mwice Kavindele, founder of the Cocoa Butter Club), and Wet Mess.
Alabanza was born in Bristol and grew up on a council estate. [24] They started making their art when they were 16 years old, helping them work through and process what adversities they were facing as a black, queer person. [25] Alabanza began with their poems just as drafts on their phone, thinking they'd never show them to anyone else. After getting the burger thrown at them, they got fed up with keeping their feelings to themselves and presented their poems to their friend who was going through the same issues, which made Alabanza decide to make their works public. [26] Alabanza identifies as Black, transfeminine, and gender non-conforming, and uses the pronouns they/them. [27] [28] Alabanza speaks out for trans rights and the importance of safe spaces and communities for gender non-conforming and transgender people. [29] In Shon Faye's 2021 book The Transgender Issue: An Argument for Justice , she quotes Alabanza talking about their identity: "When I say trans, I also mean escape. I mean choice. I mean autonomy. I mean wanting something greater than what you told me. Wanting more possibilities than the one you forced on me." [30]
In November 2017, Alabanza was denied access to a female dressing room while shopping at Topshop in Manchester, the fashion retailer owned at the time by Sir Philip Green's Arcadia Group. Alabanza was told to use the men's dressing room. [31] They left the store and filed a complaint through social media. [32] Alabanza accused Topshop of going against their policy to allow trans individuals to use the dressing rooms associated with their preferred gender. [33] [34] The Times published an opinion piece by Janice Turner, incorrectly implying that Topshop's policy was changed because of Alabanza's tweet and claiming the policy would lead to child abuse. [35] [9] Subsequently, Alabanza received online death threats over Topshop's policy. [9]
| Title | Publisher | Date published | Type of work |
|---|---|---|---|
| "The Sea" | OUTspoken | April 2017 | Poem |
| Queer and Now | The Tate | June 2017 | Performance |
| Before I Step Outside. (You Love Me) | July 2017 | Chapbook of poetry, essays, photos | |
| "Who is Allowed to be a Victim?" | TEDxBrum | October 2017 | Performance/TED Talk |
| "TRANZ TALKZ" | Hackney Showroom | October 2018 | Dinner & Performance |
| BURGERZ | Arts Council England | October 2018 | Interactive Performance |
| "THE HEEL OF MARSHA" | Gay Times | October 2018 | Poem |
| All the Ways We Could Grow (collaboration with Denny Kaulbach) | London's Free Word Centre | February 2019 | An immersive bedroom installation [16] |
| MY STUBBLE HAS NO GENDER (collaboration with Denny Kaulbach) | |||
| If I Feel Lonely Maybe U Do 2? - with Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley | Free Word Centre | 9 April 2020 | Live-streamed performance |
| Overflow | Bush Theatre | 2020–2021 | Play |
| Sound of the Underground | Royal Court Theatre | 2023 | Play |
The word cisgender describes a person whose gender identity corresponds to their sex assigned at birth, i.e., someone who is not transgender. The prefix cis- is Latin and means on this side of. The term cisgender was coined in 1994 as an antonym to transgender, and entered into dictionaries starting in 2015 as a result of changes in social discourse about gender. The term has been and continues to be controversial and subject to critique.
Transphobia consists of negative attitudes, feelings, or actions towards transgender people or transness in general. Transphobia can include fear, aversion, hatred, violence or anger towards people who do not conform to social gender roles. Transphobia is a type of prejudice and discrimination, similar to racism, sexism, or ableism, and it is closely associated with homophobia. People of color who are transgender experience discrimination above and beyond that which can be explained as a simple combination of transphobia and racism.
Non-binary and genderqueer are umbrella terms for gender identities that are outside the male/female gender binary. Non-binary identities often fall under the transgender umbrella since non-binary people typically identify with a gender that is different from the sex assigned to them at birth, although some non-binary people do not consider themselves transgender.
The Sylvia Rivera Law Project (SRLP) is a legal aid organization based in New York City at the Miss Major-Jay Toole Building for Social Justice that serves low-income or people of color who are transgender, intersex and/or gender non-conforming. The organization was formed in August 2002 by attorney and transgender civil rights activist, Dean Spade. The project was named for Sylvia Rivera, a transgender activist and veteran of the 1969 Stonewall Riots, who died the same year that SRLP was formed.
Julia Michelle Serano is an American writer, musician, spoken-word performer, transgender and bisexual activist, and biologist. 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, feminist, and popular culture magazines.
A transgender person is someone whose gender identity differs from that typically associated with the sex they were assigned at birth.
Transmisogyny, otherwise known as trans-misogyny and transphobic misogyny, is the intersection of transphobia and misogyny as experienced by trans women and transfeminine people. The term was coined by Julia Serano in her 2007 book Whipping Girl to describe a particular form of oppression experienced by trans women. In a 2017 interview with The New York Times, Serano explores the roots of transmisogyny as a critique of feminine gender expressions which are "ridiculed in comparison to masculine interests and gender expression."
Feminist views on transgender topics vary widely.
Tranny is an offensive and derogatory slur for a transgender individual, often specifically a transgender woman.
TERF is an acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminist. First recorded in 2008, the term TERF was originally used to distinguish transgender-inclusive feminists from a group of radical feminists who reject the position that trans women are women, reject the inclusion of trans women in women's spaces, and oppose transgender rights legislation. Trans-inclusive feminists assert that these ideas and positions are transphobic and discriminatory towards transgender people. The use of the term TERF has since broadened to include reference to people with trans-exclusionary views who are not necessarily involved with radical feminism. In the 2020s, the term "trans-exclusionary radical feminism" is used synonymously with or overlaps with "gender-critical feminism".
Deadnaming is the act of calling a transgender or non-binary person by their birth name after they have chosen a new name. Many transgender people change names as part of gender transition, and wish for their former name to be kept private. Deadnaming has the effect of misgendering its subject, and potentially outing them as transgender. It may occur accidentally, or be done as a deliberate attempt to deny, mock, or invalidate a person's gender identity. Deliberately using a transgender person's deadname is considered extremely offensive.
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Kathleen Mary Linn Stock is a British philosopher and writer. She was a professor of philosophy at the University of Sussex until 2021. She has published academic work on aesthetics, fiction, imagination, sexual objectification, and sexual orientation.
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The LGB Alliance is a British advocacy group and registered charity founded in 2019 in opposition to the policies of LGBT rights charity Stonewall on transgender issues. Its founders are Bev Jackson, Kate Harris, Allison Bailey, Malcolm Clark and Ann Sinnott. The LGB Alliance describes its objective as "asserting the right of lesbians, bisexuals and gay men to define themselves as same-sex attracted", and states that such a right is threatened by "attempts to introduce confusion between biological sex and the notion of gender". The group has opposed a ban on conversion therapy that includes trans people in the UK, opposed the use of puberty blockers for children, and opposed gender recognition reform.
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Transphobia in the United States has changed over time. Understanding and acceptance of transgender people have both decreased and increased during the last few decades depending on the details of the issues which have been facing the public. Various governmental bodies in the United States have enacted anti-transgender legislation. Social issues in the United States also reveal a level of transphobia. Because of transphobia, transgender people in the U.S. face increased levels of violence and intimidation. Cisgender people can also be affected by transphobia.
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