Research study · University of Colorado Denver · COMIRB No. 26-0869
A qualitative study exploring how multiply marginalized TGE leaders sustain joy, conceive of the future, and experience time in the wake of the 2024 U.S. General Election.
About this study
This study asks different questions than a great deal of previous, important research on TGE people, which has focused on discrimination and its harmful impacts. This study centers joy and imagination as strategy, and the ways TGE leaders build meaning and community, and view futures amid increased threat and attempts at erasure.
Following the 2024 U.S. General Election, TGE communities, particularly those navigating multiple forms of marginalization, are experiencing intensified political, social, and temporal pressures. This research aims to listen to and document how TGE leaders, of all kinds, resist those pressures, how they sustain joy not just as a feeling state but an intention, how they imagine futures, and how they relate to time.
Who this study is for
Ways to participate
One-on-one · Zoom · maximum 100 min
Learn moreSmall group · Zoom · maximum 215 min
Learn moreAsynchronous · maximum 135 min plus mapping time
Learn moreClick any card for a full description of that activity.
A Spanish-language interpreter is available for all live sessions.
You may choose which activities to participate in after reading the full consent form.
Research ethics and values
You help shape how you participate, how findings are framed, and the final form of the research. Co-analysis is available at every stage.
Your stories are not taken from you. You decide what to share, how it is interpreted, whether it remains in the study, and have input into how it may serve the community.
You can skip any question, change direction, or withdraw at any time without penalty. Refusal is a valid form of participation.
This study is trauma-informed but not trauma-centered. The focus is on documenting joy as a strategy for sustenance, leadership praxis, imagination, futurity and experiences of time.
Confidentiality & privacy
No legal names, government-issued identifiers, or legal gender markers are collected at any point. During Zoom sessions, camera use is always optional.
Data is de-identified and stored securely. You may revise or withdraw contributions at any time before the study is finalized. While all steps will be taken to guarantee your anonymity and confidentiality, given the current climate and actions taken by the federal administration to gain access to files and research data, absolute confidentiality cannot be entirely guaranteed, and this study does not hold a Certificate of Confidentiality.
If this study sounds like a good fit for someone in your network, please share this page with them directly.
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Reach out directly by encrypted email or any email of your choice. You may use a pseudonymous or encrypted address (e.g. Proton Mail, Tutanota). There is no obligation for inquiring.
Who is doing this study?
J Dawgert Carlin (they/them/elle)
J Dawgert Carlin is the Principal Investigator and Doctoral Candidate at the University of Colorado Denver. They are transgender with intersecting identities and have served in multiple leadership roles. They are also a licensed psychotherapist (CA MFT34178). This research is not conducted from the outside but emerges from within and is shaped by the researcher's own relationship to joy, time, and futurity as a TGE person navigating this current sociopolitical moment.
J's social position shapes the questions asked, the methods chosen, and the ethical commitments that guide this work. That positionality is named here as a matter of transparency and accountability to participants. J is white, a person with a disability, from a background of economic disenfranchisement, a non-immigrant to the United States, and English is their first language. Additional information is provided upon request.
No obligation. You can stop at any point in the form.
This study uses self-reported eligibility. You decide how you identify and whether this study feels like a good fit. There are no right or wrong answers.
Eligibility criteria
What happens when you take the first step
If you do not complete all questions, the form cannot be reviewed. You are welcome to resubmit at any time.
About the form
The form is hosted on Qualtrics through the University of Colorado Denver's institutional license. Sensitive data including gender identity and intersecting identities is stored within Qualtrics only. Scheduling is handled through Cal.com, which holds only your chosen name and email address. The two systems remain separate at all times.
No legal name, government-issued identifier, or institutional affiliation is collected or required at any point.
The form opens with the full informed consent document. You can take as much time as you need before deciding whether to continue.
Take the first stepYou are welcome to reach out to the researcher directly before completing the form. There is no obligation for inquiring.
You may choose to participate in any one, two, or all three of the following activities. You select your preferences after reading the informed consent form and can change them at any time.
What it is
A storytelling interview is a one-on-one conversation via Zoom between you and the researcher. While there are some prompts to get you started, there are no expectations you answer in a particular way or are linear. Instead you are invited to share your experiences in your own words, in your own structure, starting wherever feels right to you. The researcher will offer prompts as invitations, not requirements. You can respond to them, ignore them, jump between them, or take the conversation somewhere else entirely. You are treated as the expert on your own life and experience. You can also ask the researcher questions.
What to expect
Optional co-analysis session
After the interview you will be invited to work with the researcher to review your transcript for emerging themes, offer feedback on how your words might be interpreted, and shape how your contributions are represented. Co-analysis is entirely optional.
What it is
Freedom Dreaming is a practice most associated with the work of Robin D.G. Kelley and creates space to imagine how life could be different in a more just and caring world, without requiring those imaginings to be realistic or currently achievable. It is a practice of allowing desire, longing, and possibility to emerge without barriers.
In this session, a small group of TGE study participants gather virtually to create dreams together. There is a brief orientation and grounding exercise and then the researcher offers prompts as invitations. You can respond by writing, drawing, speaking, doing movement, or simply listening. At the end, you do not need to share anything you create unless you want to. There are no right answers and no expectation that your responses be polished, complete, or coherent.
This is a group space, which means other participants will be present. While participants are encouraged to use pseudonyms and can choose to keep cameras on or off, confidentiality within the group cannot be fully guaranteed. All participants are asked to respect each other's privacy and not share others participation or expressions outside of the session.
What to expect
Optional co-analysis
Optional co-analysis of the dream material takes place at the end of the session in a collective reflection period. Participants are invited to identify patterns, name what stood out, and help make meaning of what was shared. This is built into the time estimate. Participants can opt out of this portion without prejudice.
If you choose to opt out of the co-analysis portion, the session time is significantly shorter.
What it is
Temporal mapping is a reflective practice that makes visible how time is actually experienced in a person's life, rather than how time is measured by clocks, calendars, or schedules. Instead of a timeline of events, a temporal map focuses on how time feels and functions: where it speeds up, slows down, repeats, gets interrupted, or feels unfinished.
There is no required format. Your map can be a drawing, a diagram, a collage, written words, a digital file, something three-dimensional, or anything else that feels meaningful to you. It can be linear or non-linear, complete or fragmentary. Creativity is not required and artistic skill is not the point. Meaning is.
You create your map on your own time, at your own pace, and then meet with the researcher for a debrief conversation where you share as much or as little as you choose.
One person might create a spiral where certain periods of their life loop back on themselves, feeling circular rather than forward-moving. Another might draw a map where some years take up an entire page while others collapse into a single dot. Someone else might make a collage where images and words float without order, capturing how time feels fragmented or non-continuous. A map could look like a river with tributaries, a weather system, a list with uneven spacing, a body, or something that has no name at all. There is no wrong version.
What to expect
You will select your modality preferences after reading the consent form.