Elliott DeLine, award-winning transgender author, to speak

Elliott DeLine, an award-winning transgender fiction and non-fiction author, will conduct a book reading and signing at McEwen Hall Room 202 on Tuesday, Nov. 5, at 6 p.m.

DeLine’s provocative debut novel, “Refuse,” won a silver medal in the 2011 LGBT Rainbow Awards for Best Bisexual/Transgender Fiction. His work has been featured in several publications, including the Modern Love essay series of the New York Times and “The Collection: Short Fiction from the Transgender Vanguard,” which won a 2012 Lambda Literary Award for Best Transgender Fiction.

Students enrolled in Introduction to Gender Studies, a course taught by Interdisciplinary Studies faculty member Dr. Jeffry Iovannone, are reading Elliott's novella,"I Know Very Well How I Got My Name," while those in his Trans/National Queer Studies class are reading DeLine's short story, "Dean & Teddy," from, "The Collection: Short Fiction from the Transgender Vanguard."

“His work stands out amongst his peers because in his fiction he departs from conventional ‘coming out’ narratives of transgendered persons -- that the transgendered character's story concludes when they outwardly identify themselves as existing outside the gender binary,” Iovannone explained. “Rather, DeLine represents transgender persons as more fully complex human beings wherein their identities are not wholly subsumed by their gender.”

“I Know Very Well How I Got My Name,” was published in August. DeLine, based in Syracuse, is managing editor of Trans-Genre.net and a regular blogger for, Original Plumbing, the premier FTM magazine. He earned an undergraduate degree in English at Syracuse University.

The Women’s and Gender Studies program, Women’s Student Union and Pride Alliance are sponsoring DeLine’s visit, which is free and open to the public.