Congratulations to Associate 教授essor of Law 斯科特Skinner-Thompson，谁的文章?委员会的身份” received a Dukeminier Award recognizing outstanding achievement in legal scholarship related to sexual orientation and gender identity.
Each year, the Williams Institute and students at the UCLA School of Law publish the Dukeminier奖杂志 to acknowledge and distribute the best law review articles concerning various aspects of sexual orientation and gender identity law.
Skinner-Thompson的 article explains that even in school systems that are trying to support transgender students, students’ identities are subject to incredible degrees of scrutiny, 监督, 和监管. 换句话说, for students to live consistently with their gender identity at school, they often must submit their lives to examination by a bevy of gatekeepers including doctors, 治疗师, 学校管理人员, and—at times—the broader community.
“In essence, transgender students’ identities are governed by committee,” Skinner-Thompson explained. “这种方法, while preferable to the many exclusionary laws banning transgender students from living as themselves, nevertheless greatly inhibits students’ self-determination. It also impacts students from different backgrounds unequally: those with supportive parents able to muster the social capital to navigate these bureaucracies may succeed, while those without such resources will not.”
通过他的一些 最近的工作, Skinner-Thompson has detailed the ways in which the lives of transgender people, 包括儿童, are under attack in many jurisdictions throughout the country. While those attacks are being challenged, Skinner-Thompson suggests that more must be done, especially by those that care about transgender lives.
“It is critical that we begin thinking about what kinds of systems we want in place once the exclusionary laws are struck down or repealed,斯金纳-汤普森说. “My research on how purportedly progressive jurisdictions are approaching transgender youth suggests we still have a ways to go in building infrastructure that permits and facilitates transgender lives. 事实上, perhaps the lesson of the research is that we need less infrastructure, 更少的官僚主义, and more freedom when it comes to sex and gender.”
Skinner-Thompson plans to build on this work in the future. One of his current projects deals with a prominent argument against transgender rights that claims recognizing the existence of transgender people will lead to the influence of a particular “gender ideology.更具体地说, it addresses the idea put forth by opponents of transgender rights that asserts people will be “groomed” or “recruited” to be transgender by transgender “predators.”
“My research seeks to situate this argument in a broader context, explaining that to the extent law and society have a ‘gender ideology,’ it is a cisnormative one designed to actively deter and refuse the existence of transgender people,斯金纳-汤普森描述道. “The article also explains how recognizing the existence of transgender people and creating space for gender freedom for those who find themselves questioning the accuracy of their sex assigned at birth does not endanger anyone.”
科罗拉多州的法律 is grateful to 教授essor Skinner-Thompson for his scholarship and engagement as a member of our faculty and looks forward to the impact his research will continue to make in the years to come. Congratulations, 教授essor Skinner-Thompson, on this well-earned recognition!
“I’m deeply honored that research focusing on how society can better support transgender students is being celebrated,斯金纳-汤普森说. “But the real stars are brave transgender kids throughout the country and the world—they risk so much simply by daring to be themselves and, 在这个过程中, they beautifully enrich all of our lives. They are an inspiration, and we owe them a debt of gratitude.”