An interview with Jevon Wright from Naming New Zealand and Tranzform, recorded during the community event Queer History in the Making.
Summary
This abstract summarizes the interview with Jevon Wright from Naming New Zealand and Tranzform, as recorded during the community event "Queer History in the Making" in Wellington, Aotearoa New Zealand. The conversation, led by Gareth Watkins, pivots on the core activities and aspirations of these organizations in the 2010s decade in addressing and supporting the transgender and gender-diverse youth community.
Naming New Zealand emerged as a ground-breaking initiative designed to assist transgender, genderqueer, gender-nonconforming, and intersex youth in updating their official identity documents. It recognizes the difficulties encountered by youth in gathering substantial fees required for these updates and seeks to mitigate the bureaucratic and medical hurdles that currently make this process daunting. The genesis of this organization unfolded casually over a coffee between community members and partners at Community Law Wellington, and since its inception, it has garnered significant community support.
Focusing initially on the Wellington area, Naming New Zealand has embarked on a project funneling donations into grants for individuals requiring financial assistance to complete their identity changes on legal documents. This step is illustrated as a transformative journey for the recipients, emancipating them from the previous lines of pretense to establishing their genuine existence that touches on various facets of life from employment to education and personal interactions.
Parallel to the directives of Naming New Zealand, Tranzform is an entity that has been around for eight years, offering a support network specifically catering to transgender youth. Besides the peer support that is facilitated bimonthly, Tranzform has branched out to include social events that further galvanize the community and allow its members to engage in a sphere where they are understood and not isolated.
Over the recent years, despite incremental progress in societal acceptance and visibility, the transgender community in New Zealand continues to combat stark discrimination, paralleling the struggles endured by the gay community three decades prior. This context calls for a push towards recognition of gender identity as a protected human right and an escalation in medical support and resources which currently remain scarce.
Moreover, the dynamic of community interaction has been significantly influenced by the internet and its capacity to bridge the divide between geographic separations. Both Naming New Zealand and Tranzform target an amplified digital presence to provide resources and connectivity to those residing in rural regions or unable to participate in physical meet-ups. This online outreach symbolizes a vital channel for unifying groups while respecting their individuality.
The interview concludes on the note of the community's presence at the "Queer History in the Making" event, underlining the value of collaboration and shared inspiration among various groups dedicated to the cause. This congregation presents an opportunity to forge relationships, exchange ideas, and collectively rejuvenate the pursuit for equality and support within the LGBT+ community.
This summary is created using Generative AI. Although it is based on the recording's transcription, it may contain errors or omissions. Click here to learn more about how this summary was created.
Voices
Tags
2010s, aotearoa new zealand, archives, caitlyn jenner, communication, community, community law (wellington), discrimination, funding, gay line wellington, gender, gender binary, gender dysphoria, gender expression, gender identity, gender nonconforming, genderqueer, health system, history, homosexual law reform, homosexual law reform act (1986), human rights, human rights act (1993), identity, identity documents, insideout kōaro, intercultural, intergenerational, internet, intersex, jevon wright, lesbian and gay archives of new zealand (laganz), misgendered, naming new zealand, national library of new zealand, palmerston north, peer support, queer history in the making (2015), rural, social, trans, transgender, tranzform (wellington), wellington, youth
Tags (computer generated)
access, binary, change, coffee, community law, connect, connections, events, french, fundraising, gay, homosexual, homosexual law reform, inspiration, journey, law, lesbian, library, naming, news, normal, other, pants, people, queer, sexual identity, sport, support, time, transport, website, youth, zoo