Two Spirits "Two Spirit" comes from Native American people. Two spirit is the generic term adopted by the Native GLBT Two Spirit community for persons claiming both sexes or genders. In many native tribes these are spiritual leaders, healers and teachers, and are very special people in their tribes, very respected and very much leaders. The Anthropological term has been berdach, which is of persian origin,and means male (and usually young male) sex slave. This term was used by the Spanish when they first came to the Americas to describe two spirit people, whom they considered to represent the absolute depths of depravity. The Native Two Spirit community is working to get the anthropological community to use "two spirit" rather than "berdach". More than 160 tribal languages have terms for men who live as women and/or women who live as men. This phenomena was driven underground by the negativity of Western culture towards this kind of behavior, and particularly by the attempts by missionaries and the Bureau of Indian Affairs to destroy the Native culture and replace it with western values. As the Buffy Saint Marie song says: And even when Germany fell to your hands, Consider dear lady, consider dear man that you left them their pride And you left them their land But what, what have you done for these ones? Two spirits (and this is my own definition) can be gay, bi, lesbian, transgender, transsexual. The thing that differentiates the Two Spirit is that they are both male and female, but neither male nor female. In other words they reside in the middle ground, where most religious mystics have been. There is a great deal of literature even in the Christian tradition describing the androgeny of those who minister, including Christ. They are said to bring together the spirit and the flesh, as well as the male and the female. I would add that they are connected to seeing the world both as process and as structure. There are now at least two significant groups of Western Two Spirits, one based in the Transgender Community, centered around the work of Holly Boswell and her Kindred Spirits Transgender Retreats. The other I am aware of but not connected to, and it comes from the gay community. The Native Two Spirit community just had their 10th annual international Two Spirit Gathering August 27-31 in Minnesota. For further reference see "The Spirit and the Flesh", I am uncertain of the publisher--my copy is out on loan), by Walter Williams, and the "Zuni Man/Woman" by will Roscoe, University of New Mexico Press, 1991. Hope this is helpful! Use as you see fit. Annie
	9/10/97 - Anne L. Johnson
	"Two Spirit" comes from Native American people. There is a great book called "The Spirit and the Flesh" by Walter L. Williams and is based in his research in the Native American poopulation (we preferred the Natives term only, because we do not wish to make differences between our tibes like the European division, so we are Cherokees, Aztecs, Mayas, Incas, etc. but we are all natives of the Americas.) In many tribes around our land you will find people practice a little different but the meaning is similar, for example Mayas Indians still use a "berdache" for their cermonies. When Europeans first arrived to our land, they were very phobics in many cases and of course they also where "macho" chulvinistics and they though if a man in women clothes, was like an insult to their male believes, so they killed lots of berdachis, this scared many natives, and until this days some tribes have to practice their ceremonies in a secretly form to protect our berdachis and our traditions. Of course they kill our people in the Name of God and the Queen!! Daniel
	9/10/97 - Daniel Kundia Soto
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