story by Dana Cooper | photos by Addie James
Laverne Cox, an African-American, trans woman who stars as Sophia Burset on the Netflix original series “Orange is the New Black” and who hosts “Glam Masters” on Lifetime, spoke to a packed house at University of Memphis Rose Theater Tuesday night. She was there to tell the story about her journey to live her truth. The audience thanked her throughout the evening with raucous applause and multiple standing ovations.
“I stand here this evening claiming my womanhood in a social context that would often deny it,” Cox said. Black women have been excluded in the struggle for female equality, she said, as far back as Sojourner Truth, an African-American abolitionist and women’s rights activist who spoke of this very thing in her 1851 speech to the (Akron) Ohio Women’s Convention.
What plagues the transgender community most, Cox said, are “points of view that are culturally coded and instituted in public policy that suggest that no matter what I do, I’ll never be a woman. Yet, ain’t I,” Cox said, pausing dramatically to flip her long blonde hair, “a woman?”
During her hour onstage, Cox told the occasionally funny but always poignant story about her early years and the challenges she faced as a transgender girl and woman. Born to a single mother in Mobile, Alabama, Cox’s early childhood was marked by merciless bullying from other children and even teachers who denied her humanity.
She discovered dance as a means of self-expression and pursued it academically at Birmingham’s Alabama School of Fine Arts. Her metamorphosis occurred after her move to New York City, and within the “club kid” scene in the 1990s. For the first time, she said, she felt empowered to live life authentically.
“I didn’t associate being transgender with being successful and accomplished,” Cox said, referring to harmful messages she received from the media and the adults in her life growing up. “Then I moved to New York, and I met real, live transgender people, and I got to know them as people. Eventually, all the misconceptions I had melted away. I was able to accept them—and ultimately, myself.”
Throughout her talk, Cox referenced the scholars who have inspired her journey, such as queer and feminist theorists Judith Butler, author of “Gender Trouble,” and Brené Brown, whose research and publications dealing with shame helped Cox understand and articulate her ideas about what it meant to be a woman in a world with fixed ideas about what womanhood entails.
“You have the right to express your gender in ways that feel authentic to you without being policed, without shame,” Cox said. “We can start that in our lives.”
Among the other topics Cox discussed were statistics regarding unemployment and violence against transgender men and women and the need to recognize the intersections of race, class, gender and sexuality when considering an individual’s identity.
“I am not just one thing,” Cox said, “and neither are you.”
Cox’s responses to questions submitted by the audience offered possible solutions for providing support to and being a good ally for transgender people.
“So many of our experiences are the same, so we have to be in this together,” Cox said. “We have to do the work to elevate the voices of those who don’t have the same privilege.”
After the show, fans flooded into the lobby where they breathlessly praised Cox for using her visibility to provide a voice for so many.
“It means the absolute world to me that someone so iconic is here speaking to us,” said Andrew Phifer, a political science major at the University of Memphis and volunteer with the Stonewall Tigers, the university’s gender and sexuality alliance group and primary sponsor for Cox’s visit.
Jane Doe(*), a high school student and transgender woman of color, was pleased to have spent a part of her evening in the presence of such an inspiring figure.
“I thought [her speech] was very powerful and inspirational, and I think her words can move so many people in a positive direction,” Doe said.
Indeed, Cox set out to inspire others to take action–to live authentically and take pride in the community’s resilience in spite of the current presidential administration’s efforts to roll back federal protection of transgender people of all ages.
“In the face of all that,” Cox said, “we continue to pursue our dreams.”
Right on, Laverne. #TransIsBeautiful.
*For safety reasons, Focus Mid-South does not use the real names of persons who are considered minors without express written consent by their parent or legal guardian.
