Professor lives as 'full-time' transgender woman

[Shana A]

Professor lives as 'full-time' transgender woman
By Karen Hunley
The Auburn Villager

http://www.auburnvillager.com/story.html?1214491873013674

As a polymer and fiber engineering professor, Dr. Gwynedd Thomas teaches Auburn University students about the correct composition of protective body armor. In a way, she says, this instruction is a metaphor for the protective yet false shield she carried around most of her life. Until recently, she begrudgingly accepted and portrayed her birth gender—male—so she wouldn't have to face the social repercussions.

About four years ago, Thomas decided it was worth the risk to be herself.

"There comes a point in everyone's life, often as you're approaching the end of your life, that you've got to express yourself as yourself," she says.