The Out to Lunch Gender, Sexuality, and Community is a weekly academic lecture and discussion series with guest scholars and community activists from various disciplines examining a variety of topics related to gender identity, gender expression, and sexuality. Each semester offers a broad sampling of the areas.

Today's lecture is entitled, "Being Trans," and will be presented by Alice Fairfield.

What does it mean to be transgender? Just what is transgender anyway? Alice Fairfield has had to confront these questions over the course of her life. She’ll share some of the answers she’s found, and some of the questions that those answers have prompted. As it turns out, it’s complicated!

Alice Fairfield is a Serials Librarian and the Librarian for Gender and Sexual Minorities Studies at UConn. When she’s not busy dealing with the never-ending stream serials and journal related problems, she supports the research needs of anyone doing research in the interdisciplinary field of Gender and Sexual Minorities Studies. She’s also a member of the University Senate Diversity Committee.

She has a Bachelor’s in Astronomy from UMass, and a Master’s of Library Studies from Texas Woman’s University. She’s worked at UConn since January 2000. Her hobbies include the martial art aikido (she’s an ikkyuu; 1st degree student rank), roleplaying games, computer games, anime, science fiction, and is otherwise a fairly full-spectrum geek. And she’s a transgender woman and lesbian.

Attendees are encouraged to bring their lunches.