Residence New York City Role Author | Name Kate Bornstein Occupation Performance artist Movies Golden Age of Hustler | |
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Born March 15, 1948 (age 76) ( 1948-03-15 ) Neptune City, New Jersey, U.S. Website katebornstein.typepad.com Books Gender outlaw, A Queer and Pleasant, My gender workbook, Hello Cruel World: 101 Alternativ, My New Gender Workboo Similar People S Bear Bergman, Barbara Carrellas, Leslie Feinberg, Julia Serano, Justin Vivian Bond | ||
Sandy stone and kate bornstein
Katherine Vandam "Kate" Bornstein (born March 15, 1948) is an American author, playwright, performance artist, and gender theorist. Having been assigned male at birth and then received gender reassignment surgery in 1986, Bornstein identifies as gender non-conforming, saying "I don't call myself a woman, and I know I'm not a man." Bornstein has also written about having anorexia, being a survivor of PTSD and being diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. Bornstein has chronic lymphocytic leukemia and in September 2012 was diagnosed with lung cancer.
Contents
- Sandy stone and kate bornstein
- It gets better says kate bornstein
- Early life
- Transition and post op
- Cancer diagnosis
- Works
- Books
- Performance pieces
- References
Bornstein's partner is Barbara Carrellas. They live in New York City with three cats, two dogs, and a turtle.
It gets better says kate bornstein
Early life
Born in Neptune City, New Jersey, into a middle-class Conservative Jewish family of Russian and Dutch descent, Bornstein studied Theater Arts with John Emigh and Jim Barnhill at Brown University (Class of '69). She joined the Church of Scientology, becoming a high ranking lieutenant in the Sea Org but later became disillusioned and formally left the movement in 1981. Bornstein's antagonism toward Scientology and public split from the church have had personal consequences; Bornstein's daughter, herself a Scientologist, no longer has any contact per Scientology's policies.
Transition and post-op
Bornstein never felt comfortable with the belief of the day that all trans women are "women trapped in men's bodies." She did not identify as a man, but the only other option was to be a woman, a reflection of the gender binary, which required people to identify according to only two available genders. Another obstacle was the fact that Bornstein was attracted to women. She had sex reassignment surgery in 1986.
Bornstein settled into the lesbian community in San Francisco, and wrote art reviews for the gay and lesbian paper The Bay Area Reporter. Over the next few years, she began to identify as neither a man nor a woman. This catapulted Bornstein back to performing, creating several performance pieces, some of them one-person shows. It was the only way that she knew how to communicate life's paradoxes.
Bornstein also teaches workshops and has published several gender theory books and a novel. Hello Cruel World was written to derail "teens, freaks, and other outlaws" from committing suicide. "Do whatever it takes to make your life more worth living," Bornstein writes, "just don't be mean."
Cancer diagnosis
In August 2012, Bornstein was diagnosed with lung cancer. Doctors thought that she was cancer-free after surgery, but it emerged in February 2013 that the disease had returned. Laura Vogel, a friend of hers, launched a GoFundMe campaign on March 20 to help fund the cancer treatment.
Works
In 1989 Bornstein created a theatre production in collaboration with Noreen Barnes, Hidden: A Gender, based on parallels between her own life and that of the intersex person Herculine Barbin. Bornstein edited Gender Outlaws: The Next Generation in collaboration with S. Bear Bergman. The anthology won Lambda Literary and Publishing Triangle Awards in 2011. Bornstein's autobiography, titled A Queer and Pleasant Danger: A Memoir, was released May 2012, and in April 2013, she released My New Gender Workbook: A Step-by-Step Guide to Achieving World Peace Through Gender Anarchy and Sex Positivity.