Interview with Joanne Borden

Monika: Today it is my pleasure and honor to interview Joanne Borden, a transgender activist from the USA, former industrial engineering consultant, president of two engineering societies, and happy father and grandfather. Hello Joanne!

Joanne: Hello Monika.

Monika: Could you say a few words about yourself?
Joanne: When talking about myself it is rarely just a few words because I’m my favorite topic! In 89 years, anyone would have a lengthy biography so I have a great deal to say about myself. Briefly, I am a transgender woman who was always a happy person. As a friend once said, “You were always a happy person but now (after “coming out”) you are always happy!” I credit that to being a realist.

Interview with Grace Anne Stevens

Monika: Today it is my pleasure and honor to interview Grace Anne Stevens, an American writer, speaker, trainer, blogger, design engineer, and senior engineering manager, with two patent awards. Hello Grace!

Grace: Hi Monika, It is a pleasure to chat with you here. Thank you so much for inviting me.

Monika: Could you say a few words about yourself?
Grace: I consider myself incredibly blessed to have transitioned as a “senior” while working in two workplaces and have lost no one in my life.
Monika: Your resume shows over 40 years in high tech, building successful teams and processes in both startup and large companies; holding Director and VP positions … 
Grace: Yes it does. It took me a long time to realize that even with this apparent successful career there was still something missing. The biggest realization was taking action to discover what that was both in my personal life as a transgender woman and my work and training. I really took to heart the famous quote from George Elliot – “You are never too old to be what you might have been.”

Interview with Anna Kristjánsdóttir

Monika: Today it is my pleasure and honour to interview Anna Kristjánsdóttir, a transgender activist from Iceland, former marine engineer, and co-founder of Trans-Iceland. Hello Anna!

Anna: Thank you Monika for giving me this honour.

Monika: Could you say a few words about yourself?
Anna: As for my education and work, I am educated as a marine engineer officer and still working as a technical person; now working as a control room engineer at Reykjavik Energy, and going out to sea on merchant vessels every summer and also voluntary working as an engineer aboard a SAR boat (Search And Rescue), similar to the RNLI service in Great Britain. 
Monika: Anna, you are the icon and legend of the transgender movement in Iceland. How do you carry this burden?
Anna: I did never try to be such a legend. I tried to go through my transition for myself; it was a pure coincidence that I became the face of the transsexual movement in Sweden in the early 90s and I lost my “virginity” as a transgendered person making the transition in peace. I became known in Sweden and Iceland and the Lutheran bishop of Iceland at that time asked God to save his soul from this terrible person. :)

Interview with Nancy Nangeroni

Monika: Today it is my pleasure and honor to interview longtime transgender activist Nancy Nangeroni. Nancy founded the Boston chapter of The Transexual Menace, a ‘disorganization’ of transgender activists, in 1995. She co-produced and co-hosted GenderTalk for 11 years and GenderVision for 11 programs. She served as Executive Director of the International Foundation for Gender Education and has been Chair of the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition since 2008. An MIT-degreed engineer, she worked in the industry for 20+ years, now focuses on providing leadership and tech empowerment to the broader trans community. Hello Nancy!

Nancy: Hi Monika, thanks for inviting me to join your many amazing interviewees! 

Monika: For many years you have been dealing with transgender advocacy. What has been achieved so far and what are the current challenges for transgender people in the USA?

Nancy: When I began volunteer work for IFGE in 1990, there was little respect shown for people expressing or identifying with the ‘opposite’ gender, and any critique of binary gender thinking was relegated to the radical fringe. Now, we have laws in hundreds of jurisdictions protecting people’s right to freedom of gender identity and expression.
Most people in the USA now accept, if still resisting in some areas, the presence of transgender people in “respectable” society. We’ve forged a credible (some say leading) social movement that continues to grow. And we continue to win respect for people who don’t fit into pre-existing definitions, including definitions of what it is to be “transgender.”