Episode 72: Of Two Spirits

CW: Colonization, Discrimination, Death
Gender diversity is not a new concept! While the contemporary mainstream culture is just now catching up with the idea of nonbinary, agender, genderfluidity, and more, the concept and expression of gender has always been diverse. This episode, we talk about a gender expression that has been anglicized into Two-Spirit, which operates as an umbrella term for Native people expressing a traditional third or variant gender. Delve with us a bit and learn about some famed two-spirit folks!

So sorry about the static in Remy’s audio! The recorder switched to the wrong mic, and we didn’t notice during recording.

We’ve got a video for you today! This video is presented byElton Naswood (Najajo), Ben Lucero Wolf (Kiowa), and Richard Eric Dearmore (Paiute) and they’re talking about Two Spirit people in our modern world.

This link from the Human Rights Campaign talks about the history of Two Spirit identities and talks particularly about two famous Two Spirit people We’wha and Osh-Tisch.

This article is just some further reading for people interested in reading more about sexuality in Native societies. This one in particular focuses on the Wendat society.

The colonization that happened here over the American continent has really effected the way people view sex and gender. This article explores that idea.

This article is going to talk about the Muxes of Central America and Mexico. They resisted heteronormative gender roles imposed on them and to this day they continue to disrupt gender binaries.

This article is another look at the Muxes and goes a little deeper into their look and culture as well as provides some further reading about them at the bottom of the article. Also at the bottom of the article are two more articles about other third gender people in other Indigenous groups around the world!

This is a picture of We’wha, a historical example of a gender nonconforming person in history. We talked about We’wha in this episode. If you click this image, it’ll take you to an article where you can read more about this remarkable person.

The person on the left of this picture in the lovely floral dress is Osh-Tisch, another third gender person we talked about in this episode. If you click on the picture, you’ll find more information about them. They were an amazing person!

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