By C.S. Bryson
The quiet shuffle of students’ shoes down a linoleum hallway is a common sound on any college campus in America. Filled with the desire for knowledge, laptops under arms, they engage one another in hushed conversations about the day’s upcoming lecture. However, this is no common campus. This campus sits in a remote part of Northern California, and the conversation is not about lectures from class, but about the lessons learned from attending classes in a correctional environment. Likely the first trans woman to graduate from an in-person baccalaureate program while incarcerated within the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR), Angie D. Gordon (she/her), a resident at Mule Creek State Prison in lone, California, shared her experiences navigating the path to higher education in a carceral setting.
“My completion of this program, to a certain extent, is bittersweet.” said Gordon, who will graduate from the California State University Sacramento’s Transforming Outcomes Project this year. The project enables the University to provide the opportunity for incarcerated students to pursue a Bachelor’s of Arts degree in Communications.
“My success makes it appear that it is possible for all incarcerated trans women when the reality is that a segment of my [community] faces more adversity than I do, and that impacts the likelihood of their success.” Her level of insight is a product of Gordon’s academic journey, both prior to, and during, her incarceration. She stated, “I was homeschooled through the 8th grade. That was only possible because of my 
family’s financial resources.” The ability for her parents to provide her a stable upbringing and solid educational foundation, she believes, contributed significantly to her ability years later to achieve academic success despite being incarcerated. Combined with Gordon’s physical appearance, a tall, sandy haired Caucasian woman, she describes herself as having benefited from the “White Privilege” that one may consider largely irrelevant in a correctional education environment. “I’m white, financially stable, and I was already educated.” said Gordon. “I have had an easier time because prison employees tend to respond more favorably towards white femininity. I am more traditional in my gender presentation, which has less negative stereotypes associated with it, and by result I have an easier time than trans women of color.”
The notion that perception is reality does not cease to exist simply because it is placed inside 15-foot razor wire fencing. Individuals in any setting, when placed in a position of authority, assume the right to normatively judge another person based on the way that person looks and speaks. If you can speak in the same manner as those in that position, even if you do not look like they do, you have an opportunity to alter their perception of you. This is an especially valid concept inside of a prison. As an incarcerated black man, I can somewhat relate to Gordon’s sentiment in that regard. I have been asked by many officers before, “Why can’t so-and-so carry themselves like you?” Throughout my own incarceration, I have found myself being treated in a distinctly different manner than that of other incarcerated black men, simply because of my level of education and how I present myself to those in positions of authority over us all. However, Gordon attributes the added aspect of her skin color as both providing opportunities for her to succeed and preventing her from experiencing adversities that have held back other incarcerated trans students.
Having been enrolled in college programs since 2015, she has seen a number of trans women ostensibly forced out of education due to predatory behavior, stigmas, and hostile staff. As she explained further, “Look, girls get followed to the bathroom, but mainly to make sure that they aren’t up to inappropriate activity, like the assumption is that they are only in school for that. They face getting deadnamed on rosters and by teachers, being misgendered by staff and peers, and facing plain old transphobic views and animus. It takes some resiliency to manage all those adversities, and some girls who have more adversities on their plates have a harder time with it all. I’ve seen a number of girls run off, and it’s tragic really.”
Along her path to higher education, there have been incidental achievements credited to Gordon, such as persuading the University and CDCR to allow gender affirming names online in the CSUS’ Canvas platform utilized for class discussion forums. “In that sense there was a sort of trailblazing element, but my success should not be looked at outside of the immense racialized privilege that exists even within a marginalized group.” said Gordon, whose perspectives are partly informed by her academic mentor, Dr. Emily Lenning. A professor of criminal justice at Fayetteville State University in North Carolina, Dr. Lenning teaches a criminal justice course called, “Gender, Sexuality and the Law.”
During the last two weeks of that class, Dr. Lenning’s students constructed a project on incarcerated trans-populations, in which they wrote letters to a person who is transgender and told them what to expect after having studied reports of the experiences of trans-folx. Students were then tasked with coming up with hypothetical questions they would ask an incarcerated trans-person who has been incarcerated for 15 years if they had the chance. Dr. Lenning then revealed to the class, “The trans-person to whom the questions were directed is an actual person, and I will be sending your questions to her.” In a full-circle moment, Gordon was then able to surprise the students via an institutional phone call during one of their classes. “I called and spoke to her class about their questions. It was a humbling experience and an honor,” described Gordon.
Speaking about their connection, Gordon explained that she became familiar with Dr. Lening in 2019 after reading her book, Queer Criminology, and writing to ask if she would like to correspond. The pair are currently working on co-authoring an article based on another article by Lenning titled, “The Trifecta of Violence: A socio- historical comparison of lynching and violence against transgender women.” The theory proposed by Lenning constructs a theory focused on the way that violent ideologies come together in distinct socio-political systems. Gordon asserts that her experience and those of other trans-folks in prison is an example of an environment where symbolic acts of violence against trans-people are conditioned by an environment stoked with violent ideologies and violent laws, as evidenced by the adversities that lie in their path to higher education.
Gordon’s efforts in navigating the criminal justice system as a trans woman, while simultaneously pursuing and achieving a bachelor’s degree, is an accomplishment the merit of which will undoubtedly pave the path down linoleum hallways for the marginalized folx who will follow in her footsteps.
C.S. Bryson is incarcerated at Mule Creek State Prison
