roma★
"I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas"
𓃗
Not today Justin
No title available
macklin celebrini has autism
Product Placement
#extradirty
Cosmic Funnies
titsay
KIROKAZE
YOU ARE THE REASON
Aqua Utopia｜海の底で記憶を紡ぐ
No title available
cherry valley forever
Origami Around
Kiana Khansmith
No title available
The Stonewall Inn
let's talk about Bridgerton tea, my ask is open
seen from T1
seen from Indonesia
seen from United States
seen from Bangladesh
seen from Panama
seen from Bangladesh
seen from Syria
seen from Honduras
seen from Spain
seen from Colombia
seen from Türkiye
seen from Ukraine
seen from United Arab Emirates
seen from United States
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seen from United States
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@wellesleytransarchive
Navigating the Trans Archive:
Written word submissions are located under #wtarchives written word
Physical media submissions are located under #wtarchives physical media
Student database is located here.
Work organized by year is located here.
Work with content warnings is included here.
Images from Wellesley College's 2022 shadowcast production of the Rocky Horror Picture Show.
Images from the rehearsal of Wellesley College's 2022 shadowcast production of the Rocky Horror Picture Show.
White nonbinary student, class of 2024
These are posters and signs collected after sit-ins organized by Wellesley students.
First-gen, Mexican-American, Queer, Trans, low-income, '24
An uncle of mine died of AIDS in the 90s. My father was with him when he passed away. The uncle is remembered fondly by his brothers and sisters. I never met him. I think a lot about what it would have been like if we did. I have many questions since my father doesn't like talking about him. Was he a gay man living a carefree lifestyle in Los Angeles? Or was he straight and contracted AIDS through an innocent blood transfusion? I don't know but I find myself unable to resist filling in those blanks.
Chalk at Tower Steps, March 2023
Posters made by TArchive and posted around campus in March, 2023.
Photos taken around campus, March 7, 2023
Protest poster on the door to Bates, March 7, 2023
The Billings Penthouse, home to LGBTQ+ Programs and Services, the night of Paula's email
Anonymous, 2025
Not a caption but context? This is my senior year dorm room, which held many a party/game night/crafternoon with a beautiful community of trans/non-binary sibs :)
Quin, 2022
Zine on organizing submitted by Alumni
Nonbinary Alumni, 2018
Blog from trans alumni documenting his transition
itookoutthetrash:
Wednesday October 19, 2011. 11pm on Flickr.
Via Flickr: 75 days on T! Taken in my bathroom in Southie 40mg Prozac // .5mL T Now I look weirdly military Lunch // Chicken snack wraps Reading // Geek Love Playing // Fallout 3 Dinner // Baked Ziti Watching // American Horror Story Rainy // Day I miss // the sun
missed you. great face. Its Tuck “2K10”
Self portrait of trans alum posted to Wellesley Underground Tumblr
We Few, We Happy Few, We Band of Brothers by H. Tucker Rosebrock ‘10 (@Tuckneverending)
I can’t remember exactly when it happened – I’m not sure if it can even be quantified as a moment, or a distinct point in time – but there came a time after I had been on T for a few months and my voice had lowered and I was passing pretty consistently when I realized something:
I’m a white dude now.
I really nailed that one. Seriously, hit it out of the park. Lucked out. Whatever you want to call it. For all the angst that comes along with being trans, I’m still able to regularly cash in on that privilege I am now rewarded, and it’s important to me that I am aware of that.
See, most people have never a met a trans person, at least not that they’re aware of. It’s just not something that registers for them. I’m constantly impressed at the mental gymnastics people will do to explain ‘inconsistencies’ about my history, my body, and my gender. I’ve had people tell me that they ‘just assumed’ Wellesley had gone co-ed, after I told them I had graduated from there, even after mentioning that I had women roommates all four years. Once, I had a guy see my top surgery scars and jokingly ask: “Damn, bro, did you get your tits lopped off?” He didn’t mean it to be offensive (or certainly not that offensive); it was just a joke for him. So when I replied, “Yeah, that’s pretty much exactly what happened,” he laughed again, because he thought I was playing along with him. The entire idea that I was born a woman was just too preposterous to entertain. It never even entered his mind.
Now, I recognize I may be unique in that this kind of stuff doesn’t bother me. I’m very fortunate that I can pass as a white dude almost all the time, so it’s my choice if I want to then explain my trans identity and educate. And, like people in other minority communities, I can take advantage of code switching. But because of my nice blue eyes and blonde hair and deep voice, I get an extra bonus: I can partake in frat boy brodowns and then, with a mention of my transition, join queer spaces with a relative equal degree of comfort.
This is an incredible privilege. One that I am constantly aware of, in awe of, and do my best to be respectful of. When I realized I was now seen by the vast majority of the wider world as a nice white guy, it was a little frightening. I mean, I had never seen myself as a white bro, but that’s how the world saw me now, so it was my duty, my responsibility, to be the best white dude I could be.
My time at Wellesley, as well as the large chunk of my life spent living as a woman surrounded by strong, smart women, gave me the foundation and the education to be able to use my newfound privilege for good. It makes me feel like some kind of secret agent, a spy working from the inside of the patriarchy. Because, whether I like it or not, my voice means something different now just because of my perceived gender and the color of my skin. When I talk now, people listen because my voice is deep. And, by contrast, if I’m riding the train home late at night and the only passengers are myself and a woman, it means something different to her if I smile at her, or try to strike up a conversation. That camaraderie we would have once had when I was read as a woman isn’t there anymore, and my actions are seen as potentially predatory (though they clearly are not). I’ve gained many things from my transition, but I’ve also lost some too. To borrow a quote from Hedwig: ‘in order to be free, one must give up a part of oneself.’
So what does this all have to do with the whole trans issue at Wellesley? I’m getting there. It’s a little tough for me because I realized I’m falling a lot more on the conservative end of the spectrum here and that’s a very different experience for me – being conservative – so I’m still sort of working through it myself.
See, the thing about being transgender is that there are just not that many of us. And that’s okay – I would never wish the struggle and anxiety that comes along with being born in a body that feels so wrong on any other person. For those of you who are comfortably ciswomen, I am overwhelmingly happy for you. For all the privilege I do now receive in the world, this is still my personal struggle, and while I ask and expect to be treated with kindness and respect (like any other person), I do not expect the world – nor Wellesley – to change to accommodate my needs specifically. There are a great many other issues facing Wellesley that I would rather talk about first, that affect a much larger portion of the student body – financial aid, mental health resources, increased support for all LGBT-identified students, to name a few. Do I think there are ways Wellesley could help improve life for trans students? Sure, absolutely. But there’s a big difference between being listened to, as one voice among many, and being catered to.
I don’t want to look at numbers too much here, because gender is something that’s very hard to quantify, but I think it’s important we get a sense of scale. The entire College is comprised of roughly 2500 students, with about 600 students per class. Out of those 600 students, how many would identify as male, trans* or otherwise gender-nonconforming? This is where things start to get tricky, and there’s certainly no good way to quantify things. I’ll speak from my experience and say that in my time (2006-2010), I knew roughly one to three, maybe four, people per class who I knew were openly and actively exploring their gender identity while at the college.
That’s about 0.5% of one class. 0.25% of the school.
So it seems presumptuous to demand that the College change its very raison d’etre for me, for us. Certainly, there will be the few of us who are transgender at Wellesley, and while it’s important that we feel safe in this space, we are still men in a women’s space. All I’ve ever excepted is to be respected and treated like human being, and Wellesley has never been anything but accommodating and respectful of my transition and my gender identity and, honestly, I don’t know what else I could ask for. The rest of our lives will be spent as men in a man’s world, so why not use this time at Wellesley to listen to the voices of our sisters, to learn how we can one day promote positive change and gender equality in the wider world?
As Caleb Wolfson-Seeley put it so eloquently, this is not about us. Wellesley is an institution that has a long important history of empowering strong women, and, as a man of Wellesley, I could not be more proud of my alma mater’s commitment to single-sex education. It is the reason I am aware that my male voice carries a different weight and can be louder, and easier to hear, than others. But the very fact that such a privilege exists is why we need places like Wellesley for women.
Wellesley Underground article from trans alumni (class of 2010)
Petition for Wellesley to Accept Transwomen by Marjorie Cantine '13 & Kit Cali '13
There’s a lot of conversation to be had around the NYT article’s various aspects, and a lot of good and helpful stuff has been written here at WU. From those discussions, one need became very clear: Wellesley ought to welcome academically capable trans women to attend. To not welcome this vulnerable population is inconsistent with Wellesley’s mission to educate women. This feeling is shared by many alums, and my classmate, Kit Cali, and I put together a petition. So far we’ve collected over 300 signatures, from both alums and non-alums (we included the option mainly so that trans women could make their voices heard here, too). We will pass on the petition to the recipients once signing closes sometime next week. You can read the petition here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1LIaOLEkiQGBcvpwxQAGyFile9ohJtEXwBrvu9LM5qSQ/viewform?c=0&w=1 and see the signatures here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1_UnoB4sRvRNWr8u0FlmSGUa71hBoIT1GltKrSdNVI0I/pubhtml Most impressive to me are the signatures from many trans women who wish they could have attended Wellesley. Kit and I will be working to make sure the wider world is aware of the petition, as well. As I understand it, Wellesley is not necessarily opposed to the admission of trans women, and in fact has no policy against it. But we believe that Wellesley would benefit from a clearly and publicly articulated policy around the issue. I believe the language of the petition reflects the love of Wellesley motivating us to do this.
If you have any questions, please email [email protected].
– Marjorie Cantine ‘13 & Kit Cali '13
Petition to Admit Trans Women Written by Class of 2013 Alums
** Moderator note: "Trans women" being spelled "Transwomen" is considered a TERF dogwhistle now, in 2023. The discrepancy in language can be attributed to the fact that this was written a decade ago.
2014 Article in the Advocate written by trans alum
