[peanut goes for the gold]

The children's book "Peanut goes for the Gold", published January 2020, is about a non-binary guinea pig.

Peanut Goes for the Gold is a charming, funny, and heartfelt picture book that follows the adventures of Peanut, a gender nonbinary guinea pig who does everything with their own personal flare....
This upbeat and hilarious picture book, inspired by Jonathan's own childhood guinea pig, encourages children to not just be themselves—but to boldly and unapologetically love being themselves.

From Harper Collins

Should be an interesting read if it meets the publisher's description. 

** Since posting this originally, I took the book out from the public library. Not that interesting and definitely not a "I've got to have my own copy" kind of book.

I do wonder, though, if anyone has done any studies as to the impact of books featuring animals versus those featuring human characters. Is there a difference in how children relate to and take in the message?

---

I asked Kristi who works in education and literacy, about this. While we are not aware of particular research about this, here are parts of our conversation.

Certainly there is a positive impact when people see themselves or their own situation reflected in characters in a book, movie, TV show, etc.

A wide variety of characters and situations can be helpful to normalize a range of differences.

Seeing something first in a non-human character (like a guinea pig) who plays a human-like role might make it easier for someone who finds ideas like nonbinary new or unnerving might make it easier for them to later relate to a person who is nonbinary.

The use of non-human characters might also expand our understanding of binary. What I mean is, while some animals are clearly understood to have male and female (think cow and bull, or male and female birds with very different plumage), some others are not as obvious (think squirrels) and some ... well, I have no idea if worms even have gender. Or what about those guinea pigs? I imagine they are male or female, just like the gerbils I had as a child, but I don't think about male or female when I see one.

The connection for the reader could be the character species, the artwork, the humour, or any number of aspects of the book or show.

Kristi also said,
"I do feel it is so important for kids and adults to get a wide range of literature and if being exposed to characters in all situations helps you recalibrate and check who you are all the better. I also think it’s really important to have a huge variety because it can help 'normalize' ideas and situations too."

Would love to hear your thoughts... 

gendered events and two spirit people

In the spring of 2019, I attended a Two Spirit Ceremony and Workshop. Now, those of you who have attended Indigenous events like pipe ceremonies will know that it is not uncommon for the women to be asked to wear long skirts or dresses at such events, while there is usually no particular requirement for the men. And non-binary people and Two Spirit people are not often mentioned.

In this particular case, Warren Winnipeg was the cultural lead. In advance of the event, he sent out this note:

All ceremony participants are to wear a wrap‐around, blanket or full length skirt to the
ankles. This can be a throw‐blanket that one can tie around their waist.

Pretty simple, huh? The men mostly had a blanket tied around their waist, which went down to their feet. Most women had skirts but those who don't like skirts used blankets or wraps. Non-binary and Two Spirit people could also pick whatever they prefer. Including everyone doesn't always have to take a lot of work...

---

Jennifer Brockman, a Woodland Cree Metis with Scottish, British, and Italian ancestry, has written about their experience as a Two-Spirit participating in ceremonies. The article concludes with some tips on how to create ceremonial space for Two-Spirit people.
          Coming into the Circle – Welcoming Two-Spirit People in Ceremony

[quiltbag & glass bookshop]

In Edmonton and looking for something different? Here are two ideas ...

glass bookshop

Visit the Glass Bookshop at City Centre Mall West, focusing on "Canadian writing with special attention paid to LGBTQ2SIA and IBPOC {Indigenous, Black and people of colour} writers, as well as the independent publishers who help to produce their work."

Fiction, non-fiction, cookbooks (somewhere in between fiction and non-fiction!), cards, pronoun pins, and more. Knowledgeable friendly staff who are well-connected to the literary and arts community here in Edmonton.

P.S. if you are reading this in the spring of 2020, the store is probably at its new location - check the website for the address.

https://www.glassbookshop.com/



quiltbag

"The QUILTBAG is an LGBTQ+ retail shop carrying queer & trans wares... The shop carries an always changing assortment of custom and curated used & new clothing; accessories like pins, pronoun buttons, patches, stickers; art by local artists; small gifts; and trans gear including chest binders and compression underwear."

Located at 7603 104 Street NW (Calgary Trail).

https://thequiltbag.com/

[towards an inclusive church]

Progress report: 

1. The church bulletins have had the Treaty statement (bottom of page) and a rainbow on the cross (upper left).

2. The church has started a "Towards an Inclusive Church" Committee, which I've been asked to be part of.

3. This week, the following appeared in the bulletin, and the committee was asked to come to the front where the priest prayed for us. 

Prayer & Blessing for the ‘Towards an Inclusive Church Committee

In response to the last General Synod of the Anglican Church of Canada, our congregation expressed a strong desire to be a more openly and explicitly welcoming congregation. To that end, Vestry has appointed a group of individuals in our parish to lead our congregation through the process of becoming and being a community that openly welcomes and embraces people of all sexual orientations and gender identities. One might say: surely, we are already such a community! And they would be right! We are a community that welcomes all people, but we feel it is important to go through an intentional 'Welcoming Process' in the life of the faith of our congregation.

So there is indeed progress being made at Christ Church, which  after a long time waiting is exciting...

[Honor Song - Jeremy Dutcher]

I've been listening to the music of Jeremy Dutcher lately -- and have heard from several friends who have seen Jeremy in concert in the past few months...


           direct link if video does not appear above

About Jeremy Dutcher

Performer, composer, activist, musicologist — these roles are all infused into his art and way of life. His music, too, transcends boundaries: unapologetically playful in its incorporation of classical influences, full of reverence for the traditional songs of his home,and teeming with the urgency of modern-day struggles of resistance.

A member of Tobique First Nation in New Brunswick, Jeremy first did music studies in Halifax before taking a chance to work in the archives at the Canadian Museum of History, painstakingly transcribing Wolastoq songs from 1907 wax cylinders. “Many of the songs I’d never heard before, because our musical tradition on the East Coast was suppressed by the Canadian Government’s Indian Act.” Jeremy heard ancestral voices singing forgotten songs and stories that had been taken from the Wolastoqiyik generations ago.

As he listened to each recording, he felt his own musical impulses stirring from deep within. Long days at the archives turned into long nights at the piano, feeling out melodies and phrases, deep in dialogue with the voices of his ancestors. These “collaborative”compositions, collected together on his debut LP Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa, are like nothing you’ve ever heard. Delicate, sublime vocal melodies ring out atop piano lines that cascade through a vibrant range of emotions. The anguish and joy of the past erupt fervently into the present through Jeremy’s bold approach to composition and raw, affective performances enhanced by his outstanding tenor techniques.

“I’m doing this work because there’s only about a hundred Wolastoqey speakers left,” he says. “It’s crucial for us to make sure that we’re using our language and passing it on to the next generation. If you lose the language, you’re not just losing words; you’re losing an entire way of seeing and experiencing the world from a distinctly indigenous perspective.”
       (from https://jeremydutcher.com/biography/)

Further reading:
http://muskratmagazine.com/jeremy-dutcher-on-climate-change-two-spirits-and-the-ethos-behind-wolastoq-music-and-the-indigenous-cultural-renaissance/

https://www.cbc.ca/arts/the-extraordinary-rise-of-jeremy-dutcher-2018-gave-canada-the-two-spirit-polaris-prince-we-need-1.4931935

https://calgaryphil.com/interview-with-jeremy-dutcher/

[all people and all genders...]

This is at the top of our church bulletin. I like that it says "all peoples and genders"... nicely includes non-binary people as well as Two Spirit people, which is very appropriate in a Treaty statement. Also a small but fitting indicator of being an affirming parish.

an affirming and embracing parish

Our parish announced this summer that they are an inclusive parish and that they will perform same-sex marriages. Subsequently, I was asked to be on a committee to help make this a reality.

The following mind map contains some of the ideas I've been thinking about in preparation for our first meeting:

Click image above for a bigger version.

Click here for a PDF version of this mind map
Note: the PDF version may be more recent.

conference emcee

Hey guys! As good as some of the other resources I highlight have been, I know you've all been waiting for another original cartoon from me -- and here it is!

I work in an office environment where the majority of staff are female, and "guys" is the most common form of address in a meeting of any size. What's worse is "your guys's" as in, "I read your guys's report...".

I remember when the transition from "man" to "human" and from "mankind" to "humankind" was taking place. It was hard for some people to grasp how using the same word for both "all members of a group" and "one specific type of member of a group" should not be done, how it made that one specific type of member the standard for the whole group.

Imagine if there were four kinds of dogs: German Shepherds, Dachshunds, Shih Tzu Bichons, and Dogs. How would that work?

Alternative words to use in welcoming remarks, greetings and more:
Colleagues
Folks
Kin
Friends
Everyone
Participants
Team
Occupational titles as applicable (I.e., Teachers, for a teachers' conference, Social Workers for a social work conference, etc.)
Fellow workers (note that "fellow" here is an adjective, not the noun for a guy. ...)
Members of our community
Neighbours
People
(Or, simply skip "Guys" and better alternatives, and just say "Welcome to our conference!")

Here's some interesting ones shared in a graphic:

[indefinite arts centre]

The Indefinite Arts Centre, based in Calgary, is Canada's oldest and largest disability arts organization. Here's what they say on their site:

We are proud to be Canada’s oldest and largest disability arts organization, founded in 1975 and now serving close to 300 artists per week in our 11,000+ square foot studio and gallery space in southeast Calgary.

Yes, our niche is to serve artists with disabilities, but our vision is to provide them with a platform to stand strong on their merits and their efforts – as artists. Throughout our website, we hope to give you a glimpse into how we provide artistic training, creation and exhibition opportunities for our artists – and at the same time, advocate for more meaningful, inclusive arts policies that shine the light on the creativity of artists living with disabilities.

Read more about them at https://indefinitearts.com/

[standing up for people being called what they want to be called...]

Here's an interesting clip from a TV show, which nicely shows the challenges of challenging other people when they use derogatory and disrespectful terms for others. Ironic though not surprising that the person doing the challenging is a QPOC (queer person of colour).

Watch how this discussion evolves, and some of the classic responses that those challenged pull out.

🚧 SPOILERS AHEAD 🚧 This was a very important scene in the latest installment of @TalesofTheCity. Watch the whole thing on @netflix. https://t.co/LkbYB9T0gh

— GLAAD (@glaad) June 21, 2019

If the tweet and embedded video do not show up above, click here.

Read CBC's article "We need to talk about the dinner party scene in the Tales of the City reboot"

[stranger god: meeting jesus in disguise, by Richard Beck (book)]

"When Richard Beck first led a Bible study at a maximum security prison, he went to meet God. His own faith was flagging, but Beck still believed the promise of Matthew 25, that when we visit the prisoner, we visit Jesus. And sure enough, God met him in prison.

With his signature combination of biblical reflection, theological reasoning, and psychological insight, Beck shows how God always meets us in the marginalized, the oppressed, and the refugee. And stories from Beck's own life illustrate this truth - God comes to him in the poor, the crippled, the smelly.

Psychological experiments show how we are predisposed to like those who are similar to us and avoid those who are unlike us. The call of the gospel, however, is to override those impulses with compassion, to "widen the circle of our affection." In the end, Beck turns to the Little Way of St. Thérèse of Lisieux for guidance in doing even the smallest acts with kindness, and he lays out a path that any of us can follow." (from Amazon)

Read what Richard says about this new book on his blog Experimental Theology.

Read quotes from other things that Richard has written, sometimes with commentary and sometimes with great cartoons (by yours truly), right here on my blog.


Buy the book here: https://www.amazon.com/Stranger-God-Meeting-Jesus-Disguise/dp/1506433758

[150 acts of reconciliation]

Crystal Fraser and Sara Komarnisky have written 150 Acts of Reconciliation. "Many of these are small, everyday acts that average Canadians can undertake, but others are more provocative that encourage people to think about Indigenous-settler relationships in new ways." 

The act in the above poster would be one of the more provocative ones. I had already previously been disillusioned about Canada being better than our southern neighbour after reading about our own "lack of human rights" record. Now, seeing our first prime minister was key in starting the Indian residential schools sure puts a different perspective on our country. You can read more about that in this article by Sean Carleton, a professor in Calgary.

Get a printable list of the 150 Acts here.

Read more about this project here.

Order posters here.

update from Rob

You may have noticed that I am posting far less often than before. That's mostly because of other projects I'm involved in:

• Diversity and Inclusion initiatives at my workplace, including co-leading the development of Employee Resource Groups
• Related: a great resource for employee resource groups that I created during my personal time, called "Employee Resource Groups for the Flourishing of Employees"
• Part of the Reconciliation Committee at my parish
• Reading a lot about Indigenization, Reconciliation, Decolonization, etc. (mostly from Indigenous academics) -- plus reading about Two Spirit peoples (mostly articles by Two Spirit academics). When do I read, you ask? Mostly on the bus to and from work.

Not sure how all this will result in blog content, but I am definitely keeping it in mind.

Rob

[Black Madonna of Czestochowa celebrates Pride...]

... but not everyone is happy.

Elzbieta Podlesna, a human rights activist in Poland who made this poster of the famous Black Madonna of Czestochowa with pride colours in the halos, has been arrested on charges of "offending religious beliefs".

(Read more about it here.)

Personally, I think it's quite beautiful - black and queer together - though I wonder why the Madonna was so sad to begin with...

ancient and modern

Last Sunday June 16 was Trinity Sunday, and the church bulletin included this picture of The Hospitality of Abraham, painted in 1411 by St. Andrei Rublev. Though showing the three angels who visited Abraham in Genesis 18, it is considered to be the "quintessential icon" of the Holy Trinity.

The point was made that this icon illustrates the mystery of the Trinity, the three-in-one, and of how the Trinity is about relationship -- the three all share the colour blue, they are looking at each other, they are sitting around the table in mutuality, etc.

What I personally really love about it is how it illustrates the timelessness of the Holy Scripture in the way it also reflects the people of today...