Events
Maps of Childhood/Travesti Cartographies with Marlene Wayar and Susy Shock
*Live video broadcast will be available here starting at 6:00 pm (EST)
*The presentations will be in Spanish. Consecutive interpretation into English will be provided.
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Argentine activists Marlene Wayar and Susy Shock assume a Travesti identity—”Trava” in the local Argentine lexicon—only in order to immediately question it. For them, these categories name a gender identity, but in a way that presupposes adulthood. Thus, in this conversation, they propose to question these taxonomic rigidities from the perspective of childhood. “We see ourselves as children,” Wayar and Shock reflect, “and we see the violence that we suffered at the hands of the heterosexist and adult-centric regime—what we desired and what was crushed. In Travesti experience, what should interest us is not ‘what I am,’ but rather ‘who I am being today,’ the best version of myself.” Marlene Wayar will read from her recent book Travesti, una teoría lo suficientemente buena (2018) and Susy Shock will read poems from her book Crianzas (2016), and maybe sing a song or two.
20 Cooper Square, fifth floor
New York, NY 10003
Marlene Wayar is a Travesti activist from Argentina. She directed El Teje, the first Travesti newspaper in Latin America. Wayar studied social psychology at the Popular University of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo. She is the General Coordinator of Transgender Future and Co-founder of the “Silvia Rivera” Trans Network of Latin America and the Caribbean. Together with Lohana Berkins, she founded the Nadia Echazú Textile Cooperative, named after the famed trans rights activist. In September 2011, she received the Lola Mora Prize for El Teje, awarded by the Legislature of the City of Buenos Aires. In 2018, Marlene published her first book Travesti, una teoría lo suficientemente buena.
Susy Shock was born in December 1968 in Buenos Aires. Daughter of a father from the pampas and a mother from Tucumán, she has been acting, signing, and writing for over 30 years. She defines herself as a ‘trans sudaca artist.’ Susy has collaborated with SOY, the LGBTI supplement of Página/12, Revista Caja Muda, published by the School of Philosophy and Letters of the University of Córdoba, AJÍ magazine from Tierra del Fuego, among others. She currently writes opinion pieces for MU magazine and publishes regular installments of a graphic novel in Maten al mensajero. In 2007, she published her first book of poetry Revuelo Sur, which was followed in 2011 by Relatos en Canecalón and Poemario Trans Pirado, all published by Ediciones Nuevos Tiempos. In 2014, she toured nationally and internationally with her Poemario Trans Pirado (a show of poetry and songs) and also put out her first album, Buena vida y poca vergüenza. In 2016, she received Honorable Mention in the National Award for Tango and Folklore for her song “Con mi carro voy,” and published Crianzas, and Hojarascas the following year. In 2019, Susy released her second album, Traviarca, with la Bandada de Colibríes, and embarked on a world tour.
This event is co-sponsored by NYU’s Department of Spanish and Portuguese.