“Gender study” conveys some sadness around the idea of constraining identity. By contrasting the organic with the constructed, yet keeping the organic in the foreground, the author invites you to consider “personhood,” separate from the meaning that it accumulates with everyone else constructing it.

Riley Collins is a writer and archivist in training living in Chicago. They convert musings about the human condition—and its interactions with nature—into prose or hand-cut collage using post-archive materials. They have a BA in writing and a nearly finished MLIS degree.