Gender Pending: About

Gender Pending is a project created and designed by Bonny Guang and Lowell Reade, two students at Harvey Mudd College, California.

The premise of this project is to broaden the Mudd community's perception of what gender is, and what gender norms are. The thing that bothers us the most at Mudd in relation to queer issues is the complacency of the community in ignoring gender variance on its campus. This project hopes to address this problem by confronting the narrow construction of gender. It draws on the ideas of performance and performativity, and embodies a queer aesthetic by queering the campus through forcing people to see aspects of their peers that were formerly invisible. This is the reason we have decided to title this project Gender Pending. It draws an analogy to title pending, as well as gender bending, and further queers peoples' expectations of a well-defined gender. We hope that this project will spark discussion on campus revolving around gender.

If you have something to say, please comment! We'd really appreciate it.

Gender Pending: Methodology

A range of quotes and pictures are flyered across the entire campus. They include responses to gender-hate, gender-victimization, gender norms, and just plain gender.

We took pictures of 8 Mudd students in their natural gender expression at a location of their choice. They all submitted a quote as well critiquing gender norms or talking about gender identity. We formatted the quote across their picture, printed it black and white onto a tabloid/newsprint sized paper, and then put copies of it up around campus.

All had a link to this blog, which hosts a digital copy of every poster we put up. By scrolling through, you will be able to experience quotes and visuals, develop ideas. We invite you to comment on posters, whether you liked or disliked them, what you thought of them, what they made you think.