What Is Texas Womanhood?

I should confess that I've always been more of an observer than a participant in Texas Womanhood: the spirit was willing but I was declared ineligible on grounds of size early. You can't be six feet tall and cute, both. I think I was first named captain of the basketball team when I was four and that's what I've been ever since.' Molly Ivins

That was an interesting quote by the late Molly Ivins about herself that I found myself pondering since you know I'm a proud child of the Lone Star State.

It also got me musing about just what is the Texas Womanhood she spoke of?

Is Texas Womanhood an offshoot of womanhood in general with a Texas twang shaped by our state's culture?   Does being born in the Lone Star State, living here or transitioning here impact the concept of womanhood because we are either native or naturalized Texans?

Is there a distinct definition of womanhood based on our shared experience of living inside the Lone Star State?

Probably yes and no. Out of the over 25 million people who reside inside the borders of the Lone Star State there are 12,673,281 who are female according to the 2010 US Census

Those 12.6 million women are a diverse bunch and one that defies stereotyping. We don't all have big hair that is blonde or white in color and sprayed into place within an inch of its life. 

Some of us wear our hair in dreds, loced, ultra short, permed, bleached, braided, weaved to our butts or in a natural style in a wide variety of colors and shades.  

We can be either deeply spiritual church going sisters or not.   We don't all speak with a sassy, witty, sharp tongued drawl like our former governor (God, I miss her) Ann Richards   For many of us Texas women English is not our primary native language.  Spanish is along with many other languages from around the globe.  

Many of us aren't blessed with the writing prowess of Molly Ivins or Linda Ellerbee, the oratorical skills of Barbara Jordan, the head turning beauty and social justice conscience of Eva Longoria, the regal elegance of Tony Award winning actress Phylicia Rashad, the bootyliciousness of Grammy award winning singer Beyonce Knowles, the singing voice of Yolanda Adams or want to grow up to be Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders, wear the Miss Texas crown or be Mary Kay reps.

But yet, we still share that common experience of being Texas women. 

Some of us were caught up on the other side of the gender fence once upon a time but we got to our Texas womanhood status as fast as we could.  

Nobody appreciates something more than when you have to fight for it such as we Texas transwomen have had to do such as Toni Mayes, Judge Phyllis Frye, Christie Lee Littleton, Nikki Araguz, Cristan Williams, Vanessa Edwards Foster, and some African descended Houston based transwoman who pens an award winning blog y'all might have heard about just to name a few. .

We Texas transwomen have trailblazers and leaders in our ranks as well and a proud history to go with it.  Much of the trans history that was written in the 90's and 2K's has a Lone Star brand to it with Texans providing major leadership voices in the community at the local, state and national level or being involved in the struggles to achieve trans human rights.

We are still providing that leadership today and as Texas transwomen we also bring to the table more questions to ponder and more diversity to the table when we discuss what exactly comprises this Texas Womanhood that Ivins spoke of  

I love Molly, but I think the Lone Star statuesque sisters would dispute that part of her comment that you can't be six foot tall and cute.   Model Jerry Hall fabulously pulled that off during the 70's.  So does gospel singer Yolanda Adams who was a former model.   When I'm feeling it don't have a problem doing so either.  

Some of us are trailblazers.in a wide variety of fields be it the political, fashion, education, business, science, military, sports or entertainment worlds. 

Pick one of those fields and you'll find a woman with a Texas birth certificate or who now resides here who had or still has some major influence in it.

Think I'm kidding about the trailblazing part?   Lets see.  How about Barbara Charline Jordan, the first Black woman elected to the Texas Senate and later the first to the US House since Reconstruction. 

She was on the Judiciary Committee during the 1973 Watergate hearings and an ethics advisor to Gov. Ann Richards. 

Barbara Jordan even blazed a trail in death as she became the first Black person to be buried in the Texas State Cemetery in Austin.   

There's my current mayor, Annise Parker.  She the first openly gay person to be elected to Houston city council and did so in an at-large seat, and our controllers office.   She was the first to not only do so in Texas, she holds the distinction of being the openly gay mayor leading the largest constituency, since Houston has over 2 million inhabitants.   

Parker followed the playbook to the Houston mayoral chair written by the woman that blazed that groundbreaking trail in the late 70's and 80's she followed in Kathryn J. Whitmire.

So what is Texas Womanhood?  Shoot, even we Texans are trying to figure out exactly what that entails and those arguments can be contentious at times..

But what is clear to me is that Texas Womanhood is an evolving, lifelong process and we are a diverse bunch.

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