4A
NEWS
THE UNIVERSITY DARY KANSAS
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 21, 2006
Transgender person addresses sexuality, acceptance
BY ANNA FALTERMEIER
David Nielsen left his job as a high school librarian for the weekend and returned the following Monday as Debra Davis.
Davis, who has lived as a transgender person for eight years, told a group of about 75 KU students Monday night that it was important for everyone to accept people's differences.
"Everyone has closets and life becomes a whole lot easier when you come out of those closets," she said.
Davis spoke in honor of Transgender Day of Remembrance, which was Monday. The day is held in honor of a transgender woman who was murdered in Boston in 1998.
Davis said about 400 transgender people were murdered between 1971 and 2006.
Davis said she remembered playing house with the girls and wanting to wear girls' clothing as a child. She said she went through phases where she wanted to get rid of women's
Ta said he hoped Davis' speech would open eyes to what being transgender was about.
clothing and accessories and repress
thoughts of wanting to be a woman.
KU Queers and Allies sponsored the event.
In college, she was president of her fraternity. Davis said she went out of her way to be explicitly male to make up for the fact that she felt like a female inside.
Debra Davis, a transgender person, spoke to students Monday about accepting others. She said that everyone had closets they needed to come out of.
She worked in Minneapolis, Minn., as a high school librarian for 32 years and was married to a woman, with whom she had two children. After more than two decades of marriage, Davis decided to come out as a transgender person.
Davis said she had a completely successful transition into life as a transgender person.
She won't discuss whether she's had surgery. She said it's not important.
She said her family was very accepting. She remains friends with her ex-wife, and her children understood her change.
Kansan staff writer Anna Faltermeier can be contacted at afaltermeier@kansan.com.
"What's important is what's in your head."
"I was blessed. The vast majority of transgender people aren't," she said.
"They're discriminated against even by gays, lesbians and bisexuals in the KU community," he said.
Davis estimated there were at
least 300 transgender people at the University of Kansas. She said a lot of people confused transgender with transsexual.
She said a transsexual person is someone who gets surgery to physically change his or her sex and a transgender person is someone who feels conflicted about his or her gender.
David Ta, events chair for KU Queers and Allies, said transgender people were discriminated against at the University of Kansas.
Edited by Aly Barland
ARTS
Lawrence resident named next Kansas poet laureate
Low will become the state's second poet laureate beginning July 1.2007. She received her bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees in English from the University of Kansas and a master's of fine arts in creative writing from Wichita State University,
The Kansas Arts Commission chose Lawrence resident and University of Kansas alumna Denise Low as the state's first female poet laureate Nov. 15.
She said the times at KU were periods for meeting an eclectic collection of poets such as Allen Ginsberg and Robert Bly.
"Growing up, I'd always been around poetry," said Low, interim dean of the College of Humanities and Arts at Haskell Indian Nations University. "My grandmother loved poetry. When I was young, I would come home to find her reading Asian poems."
The mission of the poet laureate is to develop a greater appreciation for the writing and reading of poetry. The two-year position was created by the Kansas Arts Commission.
"Dr. Low is a wonderful selection for our new poet laureate," said Governor Kathleen Sebelius in a press release. "I hope her exemplary work will inspire Kansans to further explore Kansas poetry and literature."
"The most important part in the judging, to me, were the candidates' plans to advance poetry in Kansas," Bird said. "She spelled out her plan of carrying on the work of our first poet laureate, Jonathan Holden, and proposed some interesting projects of her own."
Roy Bird, director of the Kansas Center for the Book, a division of the Kansas State Library, was on the panel that chose Low.
Holden established a series of readings and conversations by and about Kansas poets called "Shoptalk."
From "Denise Low; New and Selected poems 1980-1999"
Kansas Grasslands for William Stafford
only this grass changes colors, mauve by the Wakanaus River, and yellow, and by roadside the bleached fox-tall grass Grass seed bundles brush against the sky, their long-tied knots lose at last.
"Kansas poets, I think, are isolated, subject to extreme weather and they have an abiding sense of fellowship," Low said. "Someone once told me that Kansans are the best friends. They take their friendships very seriously. Poetry is about human relationships and in Kansas those relationships are deep. When you commit to a relationship it's a lifetime commitment."
Kansan staff writer Ben Smith can be contacted at bsmith@kansan. com.
We track deer, not 'Oregon whales,
in their waves, but still we drown
under eight-foot stalks of bluestem.
Switchboard grass; too, splays
fronts over, like eagle-feather fans.
Big blue stems around us gullivers, alive at home men's seem alive in wind. This is the grass Stafford wrote as though it were "the sky of forever."
This imperfect circle is Staffhorn bottom a curve line to start staining from spills, a line through the air, a attached edge a path through the air, a path traveled by back and forth.
Low said she thought Kansas was a wonderful state with wonderful poets.
Bird said the selection panel scored the six nominees based on their poetry excellence, professionalism and plans to bolster the reading and writing of poetry in Kansas.
"I want to bring people's attention to the miriad of Kansas poets," Low said. "There are so many fine communities and writers, so many native communities."
Low said it was a poet's job to synthesize culture in a specific community.
Edited by Dianne Smith
STATE
Man sentenced for meth manufacture in murder case
WICHITA - A federal Judge sentenced a Bronson man to 13 years in prison for his part In a drug conspiracy at the house where Greenwood County Sheriff Matt Samuels was fatally shot, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.
Billy G. Nowell, 37, pleaded guilty in August 2005 to one count of conspiracy to manufacture meth and one count of possessing
a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime.
In his plea agreement, Nowell said that he joined Scott Cheever, Matthew Denny, Darrell Cooper and Bellinda Cooper in making meth at the Hilltop home on Jan. 19, 2005. Nowell acknowledged he saw Cheever was armed and talked to him about the manner in which Cheever was brandishing the weapon.
Samuels was shot as he was about to go upstairs where the meth lab was located.
Associated Press
Red Lyon Tavern
A touch of Irish in
downtown Lawrence
044 Mass.
832-8228
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