At What Point & Thankful

The undergrad class continues to be a font of bizarre, boring and amusing things. I can't share all of them for fear my classmates will find my blog and I'll get the reputation of "old bitch." Assuming that is not already my nickname, of course. But there are a couple of things...
1. Say you're a white male in your late 20s with a ponytail and you work with a central american solidarity organization in Madison, Wisconsin. And say your name is Steve. Is it ever acceptable to introduce yourself to other Americans as "Esteban"? I don't think so. And the pony tail has a lot to do with my feelings on the matter. I guess I will never be confronted with such an issue, with a name that doesn't change in Spanish. Carlos? Pedro? A million years ago in high school, there was a Molly who swore her Spanish name was Maruja. Some things don't translate.

2. This afternoon, I appreciated my delicate and overpriced college experience when a girl was standing in front of the class talking about the gender binary and heteronormative language and suggested there is an intersection between race and gender. And her classmates totally didn't get it and spent a lot of time whispering and snickering. Poor girl. Some things still don't translate.

Remember when my mom thought I coined the term heteronormative? Well, she may still think that...