I'm a trans and disabled history student, how limited am I?

by stormtatsu

This is a long post, and I greatly appreciate everyone who reads even some of it and every bit of feedback I get. I've been reading through the tagged posts about going into the history field as well, and those have been supremely helpful.

[TL/DR, I'm trans, I don't pass, I have an invisible disability, and I'm an older transfer student who needs to pick languages and an area of focus, like, now]

Some background on my personal situation:

  • I'm assigned female at birth (AFAB), visibly queer and visibly trans. I use he/him pronouns, and although it is possible that with more years of testosterone (and probably weight loss, I got hips) I will be presumed male at first glance (called 'passing'), there is really no way to know. I've been on T for almost a year, but everyone reacts to hormones differently and at different paces, and it really takes 3-5 years to know the extent your changes. Passing in my day to day life is not a priority for me, as although I use he/him pronouns in professional and academic settings my identity is more non-binary. I'm at the point now where I get assumptions in both directions as to what my gender is, and cute little kids saying stuff like "Are you a boy or a girl?!" (usually to the mortification of their parents, but I think its great that they, unlike most adults, are thoughtful enough to ask instead of just guess)
  • I have invisible chronic illness. My disability impacts my life most severely when it comes to my chronic fatigue and my chronic pain. Those two things mean that I am unable to do many activities, and have to ration my energy carefully. I can not walk long distances, for example when I go to conventions or museums I use a mobility aid - a rollator - and when I fly I ask for a wheelchair at the airport since standing to wait in the line at security or to get on the plane is a no-go. In my day-to-day life currently I don't use a mobility aid, and there is no way to tell that I am disabled by looking at me. I am physically unable to consistently get up earlier than 9am due to how my illnesses work, and spending long days on my feet or walking is such a massive energy drain I could only do it if I could rest the next few days. I also have a generally low tolerance for heat, which makes my fatigue so, so much worse that I end up sleeping 10 hours a day in the summer once it starts to be consistently over 80 degrees. Although things with my health are improving, I will never be fully healthy, and there is no way to know how much will change. At this point I'm just aiming for consistency with my health, to be able to control the dips and reduce volatility.
    • Because of this I have never even tried to do the 7-10 day school trips/study abroads my school does. Money is an issue so I would have had to apply for a scholarship, or maybe gotten extended family to pull together to make it happen, but the truth is I've been terrified of trying to figure things out with my health. Complete control over my transportation and access to both food and rest is a major anxiety point for me, and most of these trips have schedules that include a lot of walking and a lot of early mornings. I probably could've figured something out and made it work, but those two big hurdles plus just dealing with my everyday life and being intimidated by what I don't know about them has meant that I haven't even approached the issue.

Some background on my academic situation:

  • I'm 24 years old, and about to graduate with my Associate's in the Social Sciences. (My community college doesn't have a history major.) I've been on and off of college because of above health issues, and have been consistently enrolled in school for a miraculous four semesters. I am currently have a 3.205 GPA and 70 completed credits, with 13 more in progress this semester. I have 18 completed credit hours of 200-level history courses (the highest level at community college, and actually every history course they offer except for the ones that require international trips), as well as the basic 100-level American History class.
  • I'm transferring in the fall to get my Bachelor's, majoring in History. I do have some gen-eds still left to take, as much of my community college career was focused on a. raising my dismal GPA and b. taking classes I was interested in to test if I was actually healthy enough for school. But, considering that with the programs I'm looking at I have only about half of the requirements for a history major left, there's lots of things I need to decide quickly. Most of the schools allow up to 8 credits of 200-level work toward the major, and then require the rest be 300+. The schools also all want you to have a focus area. This maps out to about 3 semesters worth of classes in the major, plus whatever gen eds I will need.
  • The only language I have is American Sign Language. I have taken up through ASL V, which is the last level before you hit interpreter-focused classes, and therefor it more than counts as my undergrad foreign language requirement, but I don't have any languages yet that will be useful for history. (Some universities don't offer or recognize ASL as a foreign language, but I can appeal. Since I will need other languages anyway for history those will likely fulfill the requirement regardless)
  • At this point going to grad school is a given, how and for what I am honestly not sure of yet. I have a deep love for history, but I also get really excited about anthropology and sociology. All of the things I am really interested in are more nebulous, abstract things that often live at the intersection of all three like cultural history, oppression, colonialism & imperialism, or ethnic identity and racialization.
    • What exactly I want to do with these interests is TBD, which is fine. I love educating, I love research, and I love writing, so wherever I end up it will involve those things. Even with the physical limitations I list above, I have lived that hustle life of work and school or 2-3 jobs (to 4 or 5 depending on how you count them...) since I was 16 so the idea of being an adjunct or working freelance for 10 years before finding something full-time I can say with confidence is something I am comfortable with. I'm the kind of person where if I do have a well-paying full-time job it is hard to imagine me not finding other things to do too, like freelancing, volunteering, etc.
    • The single most important qualification for grad school is what kind of health insurance package they will give me. Ideally I will be in grad school in two years, pretty soon after I turn 26, but I may be able to make it work in undergrad for another year after that if I need to.

What I need to figure out:

  • In regards to being trans, I feel like I can't reasonably pick certain areas of history. How can expect to effectively research a region if I can't safely travel there? And even if I can technically safely travel there thanks to the protections granted by being American and white, if it is a country where being trans as a citizen is dangerous or illegal, then will cultural barriers make working there prohibitively difficult, especially as an AFAB trans person?
  • If I am to travel anywhere, that travel would have to be at a different pace and with different expectations than an able-bodied person. I can't do a $20 hostel to save grant money, I can't just toss on a backpack and rely solely on public transit, my feet, and the generosity of strangers to get me somewhere. I'm industrious and hard working, and would sacrifice time and energy to do something out of the ordinary that I know I would have to physically pay for later if I had to, but I really don't know how much this will affect things long-term. I'm a stellar problem solver - I have to solve problems of access and energy all day, every day. I could figure it out. But will it hurt my prospects, reputation, or opportunities? To travel as a group I would not only have to 'out' myself in the details of my disability in a way I don't typically, but everyone with me would have to move at my pace.

[TL/DR, I'm trans, I don't pass, I have an invisible disability, and I'm an older transfer student who needs to pick languages and an area of focus, like, now]

The sum of it:

I need to pick an area of focus and languages to take, and I need to do it soon.

  • What areas/focuses, if anywhere, should be on the 'impossible' list? For example, would is be insane for be to try and learn Arabic or want to research anything in Southeast Asia?
  • What am I not considering in how to tailor my education?
  • Are any of you trans or disabled? What has your experience been like? How conservative is the cishetero establishment? I benefit from privilege in being white, and from being transmasculine, but being AFAB still has an impact, obviously as does being trans.
  • Any general advice? (Beyond "don't get a PhD" or "don't go into academia" which seems to be pretty well trodden in the tagged posts.)

​

Thanks everybody <3

611131

Without knowing you, my gut instinct is to say that you should just focus on your BA and your personal health; deal with all the grad school questions in a year or two once you've done a great job on the BA. Moving to a new school or a new program will take some adjustment. You need to do a good job in your classes and write good papers, all while dealing with your health issues. You will need to get good letters of recommendation, which means you will need to get to know your professors, but in the process, perhaps they will also be able to offer much more personalized advice than you'll get from random people on the internet. None of this will be easy, so put the bulk of your energy there.

I see why you're asking about graduate school research, even though it is very very very far off. You want to do research somewhere where you will be able to be successful and safe, which means starting off on a trajectory that can take you there. Keep in mind that one's interests change frequently as your path through grad school meanders along. When deciding what language to learn as an undergraduate, perhaps aim in the very general direction of your interests. I cannot tell from your post where your interests lie, but you'll want to decide on a geographic area and temporal interests (your general thematic interests sound like hot topics at the moment, so that's good). Geographic and temporal interests point you towards languages that might be useful to you. Perhaps it is too obvious to say that if you want to learn about Chicano farm workers, then you probably shouldn't learn Mandarin haha. If you want to learn about Polynesian seafarers, then don't learn Quechua.

Then again, let's be realistic. The chance that you actually do make through your BA, then into a top-level PhD program where you do groundbreaking work, and then become a professor is very very very small. That's just the reality for everyone, not just you. THe chances are really really small. Most people split off eventually and end up doing something else. That's fine! The odds are stacked heavily against everyone, and the humanities are contracting at an alarming rate. So maybe picking a language that will be useful and interesting for you IF you end up outside of academia is more important than nailing a research language in the long run. Again, I think you should aim for your general interests and go from there. Why not like what you're doing while the ship is sinking?

You have a particularly unique set of personal circumstances to balance, but you are still in the "exploratory" phase of your career. Based on what you wrote, it does not seem like you are at the stage yet where you need to stress too much about grad school research beyond general interests. Read widely and take a variety of classes if you can. Write a few different papers that focus on totally different things. Take a few theory classes. Explore the thematic intersections you alluded to in your post. All of this will point you towards useful interests and approaches. To get through graduate school, you need to be interested in your topic. Your research will be a part of your life for ten years or more if everything goes well. I cannot imagine working on a project for that long without liking it. Please don't pick a research topic solely on where you can research. That might lead you to research something that is crushingly dull for everyone. There has to be a spark of passion somewhere and you want to have a topic that makes a contribution to interests that the field has.

You can get around the challenges you outlined. Many graduate students and professors have travel limitations. Some for political reasons, LGBTQ+ reasons, health reasons, family reasons, etc. They still complete their research, if they strategize. Fortunately, we are entering into a period where more and more primary sources are digitized. Many print sources in Europe and the U.S. are already widely accessible. Many archival collections are partially or completely online. Additionally, some research libraries hold copies of other archival collections in other inaccessible countries. You're not completely limited, but you'll have to strategize to get around your personal needs and limitations (everyone does).

Last thought is that the history of the academy made it so that structurally, the academy at its core is not made for anyone who is not a healthy white cis male. Everyone else plays on a higher difficulty level. It is better than it used to be, but all sorts of bias and systematic problems still subtly underlie the academy that you will need to overcome (see the controversies in classics and medieval studies for evidence of the continued existence of systemic problems). You will move through spaces that a century ago were meant for you. Now that does not mean that you are not allowed to be there now, that you should not pursue your interests, or that you will find everyone hostile. Quite the opposite, you'll be in the spaces that developed the theories that underlie the very questions you've asked here. I think most people in academia agree that diversity is good for the field, and there are lots of people from all walks of life pursuing advanced degrees. You will build a support network, but building a career will be extra taxing for you because well-meaning people accidentally harm diverse students frequently (often because they don't know or realize they are doing it), and the structures of the system still don't work well for everyone. This is tiresome for many. TBH I think your personal health will be by far your biggest challenge; I think academia is only now starting to realize that physical and mental health are major, unaddressed problems. A century of activism in the academy has made it more aware of LGBTQ+ issues; but personal health? I dont think so. That ship is still sailing in the complete wrong direction if you ask me.

So make sure you advance with your eyes open to the challenges ahead and make sure you go to graduate school for the right reasons (deep, passionate interest in research and future career goals). Be aware (as it seems you already are) that going to grad school is probably a bad idea (for everyone, not just you). Perhaps take a year off before considering grad school to save up money and try other career opportunities. If you do go to grad school, understand that you probably won't end up where you think you're going (and that is ok). There is still value in advanced history degrees. If not, that's ok too. There are many other great careers out there.

KooperBelt

I don't personally have a ton to say but. As with your situation, I am trans, invisible disability, and a history major. I found that going to a reputable online school (Southern New Hampshire University in my case) with a great set of academic advisors and mental health counselors will go a long way to helping you. Being all online means I have to set my own schedule and keep it up, but I don't have to do it alone and all the resources I could ever need, from librarians to advice, are accessible at a touch. I can also go anywhere in the world and as long as I have a reliable Internet connection and a computer running or simulating Windows, I can do my school stuff. As for what you might not want to study, it's a tough question. Mostly because there's so much you can study without gender roles being the focus! I'm personally working towards a big project on ancient Persian culture and Mediterranean trade, and while you could look into the gender/sexuality side of things (there's a whole subset of history dedicated to researching and understanding those roles), it isn't so over prevailing that you must. I can say that looking into Arabic culture has bought up a lot of questions in the treatment and expectations of men and women, without many nb folks to speak of, so perhaps the areas you're looking to avoid would be cultures that focus so heavily on the differences.

As for the language question, I also don't have much input there. I have a Hawai'ian trans bud and their native culture has concessions for trans folks, so perhaps going with cultures that include "third gender" pronouns (I believe that's the official term) may be what you're looking for. Best of luck to you!