My Gender Is Black

Exploring the complexity of performing and defining Black gender

I don't think that it is possible for Black people, indigenous people, (or racialized people more broadly) to have a gender that is free of politic within a white supremacist paradigm. We say that gender is a construct. And then completely divorce our understanding of this construct from: that of cultural relativism, that of immigration, that of xenophobia, that of survival. And in doing so, we uphold Western and white supremacist notions that assume the countries that we come from (that our parents, or grandparents come from) were incapable of constructing and deconstructing gender as well. And this idea works to the great disservice of Black folks globally.

I've been having conversations with my mom about sex and gender. These conversations in which I - armed with the advanced scientific knowledge that every queer and non-cis person is forced to have - try to explain to my mom that transphobia and misogynoir will always exist hand in hand. I am bolder than I ever thought I would be, and more compassionate, as I tell her that she doesn't know her chromosonal makeup or hormone levels. That her femininity is also constantly under scrutiny by white cis normativity. That her hesitancy in being aligned with trans women is white supremacy at play. That she too performs her gender to convince the world of her femininity, because Black femininity has always been scrutinized.

I tell her this, because she thinks I am a cis woman. So right now I remain well placed to show her the ways in which Black women are consistently pitted against each other in a society where we believe the amount of freedom to be accessed is finite. I tell her all this too, because I hope that when I tell her I am non-binary she will be in a place where she a Black women will not see my gender as something that separates us, but something that brings us together. And maybe, I hope that she will understand that womanhood - here within so called Canada, has never been something that I have access to. Because womanhood, without specificity of Blackness entails white womanhood. Equality for women, assumes the equality of a white cis woman. And so it should be no surprise that historical and contemporary women’s movements that focus on equality instead of liberation center whiteness. The focus of a woman’s right to work is just one example of this. When Black Women work as laborers they do not subvert the patriarchy Because Black womanhood - indeed Black Femininity - has never been defined by its fragility, or its inability to support a familial structure. It could be argued that the understanding that Black femmes will always work - upholds patriarchy and white supremacy. This expectation is foundational to Black Liberation and Feminist Movements.

These ideas of Black Women's labor, their exploitation, and erasure within movements are not new. They have been expressed in numerous ways by people with far more lived experience and theoretical insight than me. I think that to understand our own genders, we have to admit that gender is modelled very differently within different communities - even different Black communities. That the cross section of race, nationality, ethnicity, shade/pigmentation, religion, immigration status, settler status all play an incredible important part in how we individually perceived gender, how we are socialized within a gender and the consequences for our deviation from gendered expectations.

I say all of this to say that these are the gender reflections of a dark skinned Black femme, of Jamaican descent, born and raised in Tkaranto at a specific moment in time. This disclaimer is critical to how I understand gender broadly and how I understand my own specifically. I have never been a white binary afab person, nor a white trans masculine person. But I do know that white trans people in so called Canada are constantly fed and socialized within a paradigm of gender that assumes whiteness and assumes cultural scripts that are grounded in white North American experiences.* I imagine that having consistent messaging about what it means to be a woman or a man or a girl or a boy makes it much easier to recognize when you do not fit into that script. Black people already get inconsistent messaging about what it means to be a girl or a boy or a man or a woman or to possess masculine or feminine energy. And so it becomes much more confusing to discern whether or not you identify with the gender you've been assigned, because the gender you've been assigned has no clear experience.

It means that Black folks may take longer to realize that they aren't cis. And it makes the denial of gender experiences outside of the binary trans norm more pervasive. So many of the queer Black people I see are in a constant state of discovering, rediscovering, and renaming their genders. It exists as a beautiful and confusing jumble of feelings and thoughts and experiences that white transness could never have accounted for. This can be frustrating for us as Black people who aren't cis, who have to work with fitting all that we are into labels that were never meant for us.

I think this is also frustrating for those of us who wish to exist beyond binaries, in labels and presentation. Those of us who will never be women or men even though that is all the world can see. Those of us who are expansively pushing the aesthetics and presentations of what it means to be a woman or a man. Those who exude Black femininity, masculinity, androgyny or their duality will be frustrated to find that every expression of Black gendered joy is policed. That our gender intimidates and threatens in it's irrefutable gorgeous existence.

And so, acknowledging that Black gender is inherently political, also means acknowledging that Black trans people have never had access to the privilege of being assumed as cis in the way that white trans and cis people have. To be perceived as a Black woman or a Black man that is breaking gendered scripts is to be subject to violence. To be a Black person that appears to adhere to their assigned gender performance is to be subject to violence. Our gender expression has never been safe.

This thought could easily give way to despair. But instead I am choosing to imagine the emancipatory possibilities of us as Black people rejecting a gendered paradigm that has only ever harmed us. I am imagining a world in which Black cis people look back to their ancestors that saw the great expanse of gendered possibilities and saw it as a source of strength for our communities. I am imagining a world where we raise Black children to know that they will show up to the world in a new and brilliant ways that we haven't even imagined yet. That they will find language for who they are that we haven't discovered. I am hoping that each Black queer and trans person that may stumble upon this little piece of writing realizes that their very existence threatens systems that feel huge and powerful and overwhelming.

I hope we laugh in the face of their fear and find joy.

*I can't speak to how these scripts play out for white trans people in North America that are first and second generation immigrants from non North American countries, but I would be interested to see how their experiences differ.