Update?

I haven't been very good about just talking about the things going on. Well, what can I say, a lot has been going on, so I don't write about it, I just do. Well done ending sentences with prepositions.

Well, I am modifying one of my blog posts into a paper. I created an abstract for the UW Women of Color Collective Dialoguing Difference Conference. Here is my abstract, for your viewing dis/pleasure:

"Like a hell-broth boil and bubble":
Reflections of a Half-blood on Mixed Race Invisibility

By Amanda Martin

Women of Color Collective
Dialoguing Difference 2nd Annual Conference: Technologies of Visibility
University of Washington, Seattle
May 14, 2010

2009 was a year particularly notable for media focus on issues of race, and an increased presence of non-white figures. In this paper, I critique some of the better-known and respected weblogs (blogs) for their virtual shunning of the culturally pluralistic identities of public figures, and interracial couples, with the notable exceptions of those who are highlighted for their misdeeds. As a blogger, I have previously commented on some of these particular instances, such as the perception of Barack Obama as the U.S.’s first black versus mixed race president, the virtual absence of conversation surrounding Disney’s first interracial animated couple in the film The Princess and the Frog, and the negative media frenzy surrounding multicultural icon Tiger Woods and multiple infidelities. Furthermore and in recognition of multiracial invisibility, I reexamine Louisiana justice of the peace, Keith Bardwell, and the significance of his refusal to issue a marriage license to an interracial couple.

In this paper, I take an autoethnographic approach, voicing my own experiences and perspections as a multiracial woman throughout. In this manner, I remain true to the roots of the paper, which began as a number of informal blog posts. Having grown up as a fair-skinned Latina of half-Irish American, half-Chilena ancestry, I remember continuously being asked “what I was,” as if having physical characteristics that are not easily tied to a single race, such as green eyes or olive skin, somehow makes one less than human. The question was never “who” but “what.” It is my belief, as argued in this paper, that the dehumanization of the multiracial American contributes to our relative invisibility identity-wise versus presence-wise in the blogsphere.

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Anyway, I'll let you know if I get in.

Also, I am working on getting a draft done of the IRB (Institutional Review Board... I think) application for my Capstone project (like thesis but doesn't have to be so text-based). I'm planning to do a PAR (participatory action research) writer's workshop thing with transgender children-- have them do some autobiographical writing exercises to examine who they are. Basically, I want to study the question of puberty-blocking hormones. Transgender kids may start them around age 13 to prevent puberty from happening, then take more hormones at age 18 to transition to the "other"/true sex. The trouble is, if these kids choose to take the blockers, they will be infertile for life.

What a decision to make as a 13-year-old! So, I would like to work with kids who may be making this difficult choice and get a better idea of what they are thinking versus what their parents think-- goodness, why are all the publications focused on what their parents think when it is the children who will be infertile for life?

Anyway, I'd also liked to interview public figures in the transgender rights discussion. Particularly Dr. Norman Spack, who is one of the leading drs helping children toward this decision and providing treatments.

What else is going on?

I'm reading Shutter Island and it is very draw-in-y so I think I shall go and read some more.

.... forgive me?