Lavender@MIT: The Case for an All-Gender Restroom Paradigm on the MIT Campus
Name
Seaman-mapache-SB-Arch-2022-thesis.pdf.pdf
Description
Thesis PDF
Size
14.92 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
762cf02acb578660331052f8044a457b
Author(s)
Seaman, Elliott S. L.
Advisor(s)
Kennedy, Sheila
Date Issued
May 2022
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
It is obvious that transgender and gender non-conforming students experience MIT differently than cisgender students – what is less obvious is that one of the biggest differences in experiences stems from, ironically, something universally human: the need to use the restroom. In this thesis, we approach the issue of restroom equity (and inequity) on the MIT campus in three areas, offering a window into how nonbinary students experience MIT’s restroom infrastructure, documenting the history and recent progress around all-gender restrooms at MIT, and showing that MIT students have a vested interest in and thoughts about both all-gender restrooms and institutional restroom design in general. Parts I and II offer an account of my personal journey interacting with all-gender restrooms and all-gender restroom policy and activism on the MIT campus, and culminate with a series of proposed physical interventions and a single renovation to both increase the visibility of all-gender restrooms on campus and to act as a possible example for future single-gender to all-gender multi-stall restroom conversions. Part III widens in scope, and acts primarily as proof that the general student body truly does care about the existence of all-gender restrooms on campus, whether they are transgender/gender non-conforming or not.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Architecture
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In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted
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