Check out Murray Avenue School's ebooks and audiobooks that explore the LGBTQ+ experience. Ms. Grosso highly recommends The Lumberjanes graphic novel series (which is mainly about friendship, camp & monsters), Redwood & Ponytail (the audiobook is stellar!), and the award winning The 57 Bus (a true story). Students, use your Google SSO at lmtsd.mackinvia.org or click on the image at left and then the individual book you want to learn more about or check out!
Pride is a time for celebration, but also a time for reflection. Follow this link to discover LGBTQ figures who have made lasting impacts on our society, from those who paved the way for gay rights activism, like Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson, to folks who became cultural icons through their work, like writers Virginia Woolf and Ifti Nasim.
From the Editors of Out Magazine
Though there is some overlap with the National Geographic list, this list contains modern contributors like activists Harvey Milk, James Baldwin, and Alicia Garza, politicians Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir and Sen. Tammy Baldwin, and celebrities Laverne Cox and Ellen DeGeneres.
From PBS: The American Experience
Explore this timeline of events that occurred in the United States from 1924 when The Society for Human Rights, the first gay rights organization, was founded in Chicago to 2015 when gay marriage was legalized in all fifty states.
Founded in 1998, The Trevor Project is the leading national organization providing crisis intervention and suicide prevention services to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer & questioning (LGBTQ) young people under 25. Linked here is their Support Center and FAQ for young LGBTQ+ folks who have questions or are seeking help. You can also call or text a counselor here!
The Māhū of Hawai'i
Some people in the LGBTQ+ spectrum don't label themselves using the prevailing social/cultural idea of gender in the United States. Terms to describe gender include nonbinary (gender identities that are neither male nor female), gender fluid (a person with no fixed gender), or gender nonconforming (a person whose behavior or appearance does not conform to expectations about what is considered appropriate to their gender). Click here for a video about why personal pronouns matter!
These are not new ideas, genders beyond male and female have long existed in cultures across the world. The first video is a scene from the PBS documentary Kumu Hina, and it introduces Māhū, the Hawaiian term for people who embody both male and female spirit. The second video introduces Ho'onani, a young Hawaiian māhū, who explains, along with some friends, what it means to be in the middle. You can find the complete film on Netflix, iTunes, or other platforms.