Mark Transgender Awareness Week with the OU Students Association Pride Committee and guest speaker Dr Leigh Downes for an online talk and Q&A on remembrance, safety, and solidarity.
Transgender Awareness Week is a time to educate, reflect, and act. This session explores:
Why remembrance matters for safety and inclusion today
The lived impacts of stigma and misinformation
Practical, everyday allyship in study, work, and community
Q&A with Dr Downes
Leigh Downes (they/them) is a Senior Lecturer in Criminology based in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at The Open University. Their teaching and research centres on gender, sexuality and social justice, with specific attention to how different forms of violence (state, structural and epistemic) shape contemporary queer and trans life and survival. They serve as a co-chair of the OU Trans Staff Network and co-lead of the International Forum on Gender and Sexual Diversity Research in Criminal Justice. Current projects focus on better understanding the lived experiences of trans and non-binary witnesses and individual respondents involved in protected belief employment tribunals, and the lived experiences of LGBTQIA+ distance students here at The Open University. They live with their partner and two cats, one of which (Pickle) is likely to make an appearance.
Join us
-*This will be our event before our candlelit vigil on the 20th of November at 1800 for Transgender Day of Remembrance and the meeting link for it is here: Candlelight vigil*
Our online events are intended to be welcoming and friendly spaces. Please read our Code of Conduct before joining this session and keep this in mind when taking part.