When Madeleine Shaw was 12 years old and about to hit puberty, she wished her community would recognize the important time in her life.
Reached by phone, the 49-year-old founder of G Day – an ethnically diverse celebratory rite of passage for girls – explained how her own experience has inspired the events.
“The idea of becoming an adult woman – because that was how I felt drawn gender-wise – felt amazing to me,” she says. But, in her culture, “there was nothing to kind of mark that time, or no special form of recognition or ceremony.”
G Day, explains Shaw, is a non-religious rite of passage, like a graduation, where community members give 10-12-year-old girls a “tangible experience of mattering.”
“We’re giving the girls kind of an emotional shot in the arm as they head into a culture of hyper-sexualization and kind of crazy social competition,” Shaw explains.
Since its launch in Vancouver in 2014, G Day has spread to three Canadian cities. It’s seventh event takes place in Vancouver on Oct. 20. The day includes presentations by community members who each share a story about their experience as pre-teens. The young girls also participate in a series of fun, team-building and personal development exercises. Later on, the “Champions” (parents, grandparents, friends and neighbours, of all genders) symbolically receive them for a closing ceremony.
Identifying as an intersectional feminist, Shaw says the team she gathered to launch the event includes women of diverse origins, and the event takes care to not appropriate from other cultures. G Day’s upcoming Vancouver event will include a presentation by Vanessa Richards, a multi-disciplinary artist and facilitator, who among other contributions to the community, helped lead the Black Lives Matter March on Pride this past summer.
Local human rights activist Tru Wilson, 14, will also speak at the event. A former G Day participant, Wilson is known for her trans rights advocacy. She says she’s excited to return to G Day in a new role.
“It kind of feels like going back to your old elementary school as a teacher. And I'm really honoured, because I've [had] an effect on a lot of adults, but not as [many] kids,” she says. “I watched a lot of films and documentaries when I was first transitioning [around age nine]. And it really helped me a lot knowing that there are a lot of other kids out there like me. And, hopefully, I want to do that for other girls.”
•G Day takes place on Friday, Oct. 20, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Ismaili Centre in Burnaby (4010 Canada Way). Tickets $50, with some scholarship positions. Sold-out event, waitlist only.
