Sign in

TJ Billard

@billard.bsky.social
1.4K followers 180 following 43 posts

Associate Professor of Communication & Sociology at Northwestern University. Executive Director of the Center for Applied Transgender Studies. Author of Voices for Transgender Equality: Making Change in the Networked Public Sphere (Oxford UP, 2024).

PostsRepliesMedia
Reposted by TJ Billard
Melissa Gira Grant @melissagiragrant.com · 04/09/2026
thinking about all the young people who left ban states and came to New York for care, and now
61620485
Reposted by TJ Billard
Chokely Carmichael🥋 @stewartcoles.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
UW-Madison professor engages in multiple sexual relationships with students, disparages another over their sexual orientation and appearance, creates hostile environment, and department leadership covers it all up. And in true “pass the trash” fashion, moves on to ASU once forced to resign.
captimes.com
UW-Madison students, records detail investigation of professor
Dietram Scheufele resigned after investigators determined he had sexual relationships with two students and engaged in unwelcome sexual conduct with one.
281104370
Reposted by TJ Billard
Teddy Wilson @reportbywilson.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
"We also can’t romanticize the idea that that victory is inevitable, because it’s not inevitable—but it is achievable. They aren’t giving up. But we also won’t and can’t give up either. And we can win." — @billard.bsky.social
assignedmedia.org
TJ Billard on Anti-Trans Disinformation and Media  - Assigned Media
Riki Wilchins interviews expert on anti-trans disinformation, TJ Billard.
0118
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 28/07/2026
Overjoyed to share that my latest article (with two of my PhD students) is out now in Sex Roles! And, thanks to the Big Ten Academic Alliance, the article is open access! So, be sure to read it, share it, and cite it! link.springer.com/article/10.1...
link.springer.com
Pervasive Ambiguity About Gender: Quantifying the Cognitive and Affect Experience of Disorientation Related to Changing Understandings of Gender in Society - Sex Roles
This article introduces the concept of pervasive ambiguity about gender to illuminate how individuals experience the destabilization of gender norms in contemporary society. Specifically, it considers...
111
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 27/07/2026
Submitted the manuscript I finished in last week’s writing retreat to a journal today!
020
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 09/07/2026
Coming soon 👀
Screenshot of an email reading: “Dear Associate Professor Billard: I have received the final version of your manuscript SERS-D-25-00616R2 titled, “pervasive ambiguity about gender: quantifying the cognitive and effective experience of disorientation related to changing understandings of gender in society”, and I am delighted to accept it for publication Sex Roles: a journal of research.“
040
Reposted by TJ Billard
Taylor Agajanian @cyborglibrarian.bsky.social · 17/04/2026
New paper alert, out today in @journalcam.bsky.social with my esteemed colleagues @walkerwestbrewer.bsky.social, @ifra-j.bsky.social, and @billard.bsky.social 🥳 www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
tandfonline.com
The parent trap: The roles of parent status and pervasive ambiguity about gender in public opinion on transgender rights in the United States
The rights of transgender youth have become a defining site of cultural and political conflict in the United States, with parents increasingly positioned as moral and political arbiters. Using nati...
022
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 17/04/2026
New paper out in Journal of Children and Media with three of my PhD students! In it, we explore the distinctiveness of parents’ opinions on transgender rights and how it relates to right-wing media use and gender-focused anxieties. Read it now: doi.org/10.1080/1748...
doi.org
The parent trap: The roles of parent status and pervasive ambiguity about gender in public opinion on transgender rights in the United States
The rights of transgender youth have become a defining site of cultural and political conflict in the United States, with parents increasingly positioned as moral and political arbiters. Using nati...
000
Reposted by TJ Billard
Ross Weistroffer @libraryofbabble.bsky.social · 29/01/2026
"If misinformation stabilizes disrupted worldviews, the solution lies not in better facts, but in better ways of making meaning." Fantastic work on the need for broader lenses to address the disordered discourse that emerges from epistemic collapse (to borrow from @eliothiggins.bsky.social).
141
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 29/01/2026
Excited my most recent article is out now! In it, we talk about our work to combat anti-trans misinfo at @transstudies.bsky.social and the research my students are I are doing advancing a new framework for understanding misinfo effects. Give it a read here: www.tandfonline.com/eprint/R6MNB...
tandfonline.com
Combating anti-transgender misinformation: A sociological approach
Anti-transgender misinformation has become a defining feature of political discourse across the Anglosphere, driving a surge in harmful legislation and public attitudes. Learning from the change-ma...
1113
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 01/07/2025
I’ve published a bit in the last few years, but today I just submitted the first major, multi-study, all new data paper from the next phase of my research career. It’s some bold new ideas and I haven’t been this nervous going into peer review in a long time!
060
Reposted by TJ Billard
Sarah J. Jackson @sjjphd.bsky.social · 30/06/2025
It only took me 2.5 hours but I figured out how to give 50 free views with this link: www.tandfonline.com/eprint/PTY45... I'm sorry I can't share the other essays in the forum which are probably less cynical than mine - but the paywall is paywalling. And yes, I know about the typo 🤪
tandfonline.com
On doing public scholarship in public
In this essay, I offer a narrative of my efforts, experiments, and successes in varied forms of public scholarship. I center relationship-building and authenticity. I also share a cautionary discus...
27916
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 25/03/2025
I activated my out of office for my research leave and I could not be more excited. 😭 Don’t expect an email response for the rest of the year, but do expect updates on some major research projects! 📚
030
Reposted by TJ Billard
P&IR Edinburgh @edinburghpir.bsky.social · 05/02/2025
Join us on March 20 for an insightful discussion on Transgender Equality! 📢 Event: Voices for Transgender Equality: Trans Rights Activism Under Trump 📍 Location: Edinburgh Futures Institute ⏰ Time: 4:30 PM – 6:00 PM 🎤 Speaker: @billard.bsky.social 🔗 Book your spot: edin.ac/3PPsewP
edin.ac
Voices for Transgender Equality: Trans Rights Activism Under Trump
TJ Billard offers an insider’s view into transgender activism during the first two years of the first Trump administration.
042
Reposted by TJ Billard
Erin Reed @erininthemorning.com · 21/01/2025
Trump White House's first trans executive order is out. I'll be reading over it here and going through line by line to help you make sense of it. You can find it here: www.whitehouse.gov/presidential...
whitehouse.gov
DEFENDING WOMEN FROM GENDER IDEOLOGY EXTREMISM AND RESTORING BIOLOGICAL TRUTH TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT – The White House
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 7301 of title 5, United
18140411428
Reposted by TJ Billard
kate conger @kateconger.com · 10/01/2025
internally at Meta: -trans and nonbinary themes stripped from Messenger -enforcement policy now allows for the denial of trans people's existence -tampons removed from men's restrooms -DEI programs shuttered -Kaplan briefed top conservative influencers the night before policy changes were announced
621975676
Reposted by TJ Billard
jamelle @jamellebouie.net · 23/12/2024
there is a 24/7 right-wing propaganda apparatus that operates across multiple mediums and it designed to do exactly this: smother any kind of local, material concern with cultural war signifiers and cultivate a “political affiliation as team sport” ethos
15587101912
Reposted by TJ Billard
Krissy Lunz Trujillo @klunztrujillo.bsky.social · 18/12/2024
This is an amazing piece by @billard.bsky.social . So many important points not just for political communication but also political science and the social sciences generally.
2132
Reposted by TJ Billard
Curd Knüpfer @curdknupfer.bsky.social · 18/12/2024
Thanks for being a part of this project TJ! ❤️ This is such an incredibly powerful and well-argued essay.
021
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 18/12/2024
I had so many thoughts that I could have written 10,000 words on this topic, but I tried my best to distill them down to as close to 2,000 as I could get! Please give it a read. 😃
061
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 18/12/2024
The latest issue of @polcomm.bsky.social’s Political Communication Report, on normative dimensions of pol comm research, is out now! Excited to have a piece in the issue alongside so many brilliant scholars I adore. Give the whole issue a read! politicalcommunication.org/issue/fall-2...
politicalcommunication.org
Fall 2024 – Issue 30 “What does PolComm Stand for? Normative Dimensions of Political Communication Research & Theorizing” – PolComm
“What does PolComm Stand for? Normative Dimensions of Political Communication Research & Theorizing”   Letter from the Editor[1]   Curd Knüpfer, University of Southern Denmark Read as PDF    As noted ...
1103
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 17/12/2024
It’s crazy to watch the plot of Wicked play out in real time while the film is actively playing in theatres. www.nytimes.com/2024/12/17/n...
nytimes.com
Luigi Mangione Charged With Murder in UnitedHealthcare CEO Killing
A grand jury formally indicted Luigi Mangione in the killing of Brian Thompson, the chief executive of UnitedHealthcare.
040
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 10/12/2024
The amount of fun people are having on Twitter with The Claims Adjuster versus the amount of buzzkill scolding people are doing on Bluesky is why I doubt I’ll ever spend that much time on here.
010
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 04/12/2024
Honored to have made GCN’s list of books you should read this winter! gcn.ie/queer-books-...
030
Reposted by TJ Billard
The Onion @theonion.com · 29/11/2024
theonion.com
Teen’s Eyes Begin Glowing Red While Reciting Forbidden Knowledge From Book On Critical Race Theory
FORT MYERS, FL—His bedroom walls quivering and cracking the moment he opened the secret tome, local teen Charlie Donnell reportedly found his eyes beginning to glow red Thursday as he recited forbidde...
198168882030
Reposted by TJ Billard
Michael Hankinson @hankinson.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
We're hiring in American Politics at the junior level. Position will be affiliated with GW’s Institute for Data, Democracy and Politics. Applications due January 2nd. I'm on sabbatical, but I am happy to answer questions about the dept., broadly. DM me. www.gwu.jobs/postings/116...
gwu.jobs
Assistant Professor of Political Science
The Department of Political Science invites applications for a tenure track professor (Assistant Professor) in American Politics. The position will start in Fall 2025 and is pending final budgetary ap...
02824
Reposted by TJ Billard
Cindy Ma @cindyxma.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
It was a pleasure to reflect on the themes of the Anti-Racist Media Manifesto, alongside Maitrayee Basu! A thread running through our conversation: the "centre" has never been unproblematic or neutral, an idea I explore further in a recent essay for PolComm: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
tandfonline.com
Overcoming Far-Right Respectability: The Case for Systemic Approaches to Studying White Supremacy
This contribution to the Forum collection traces the rhetorical strategies taken up by far-right actors to cast white supremacist ideas as “respectable” in the post-civil rights era, including the ...
1249
Reposted by TJ Billard
John E. Richardson @discodiscourse.bsky.social · 23/11/2024
Open access >> Political Communication Research is Unprepared for the Far Right Curd Knüpfer,Sarah J. Jackson & Daniel Kreiss www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....
tandfonline.com
Political Communication Research is Unprepared for the Far Right
In this introductory piece to a special issue of the Forum, we explore the inadequacies of the field of political communication in addressing the rising threats posed by illiberalism and the far ri...
12913
Reposted by TJ Billard
Election Analysis @electionanalysis.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
🚨🗳️ The 2024 elections saw a surge in anti-trans political ads, as the Republican Party capitalized on gender panics and cultural divides. @billard.bsky.social explores the effectiveness of these ads and the radicalization of the right in his latest analysis. Dive in here: bit.ly/4eBbfs0
051
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
Great to watch my student Walker West Brewer present their year-long ethnography of political socialization among LDS women, which I supervised, at #NCA24!
290
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
Popped by New Orleans to pick up an award at #NCA24! (Ignore the fact the title is wrong on the plaque.)
030
Reposted by TJ Billard
Deana A. Rohlinger @deanarohlinger.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
Incredibly cool collection about the 2024 election.
031
Reposted by TJ Billard
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
Honored and excited to have a short entry in this rapid-response election analysis book alongside so many incredible scholars. Read what I have to say about Republican anti-trans ads in the 2024 election! www.electionanalysis.ws/us/
electionanalysis.ws
073
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
Honored and excited to have a short entry in this rapid-response election analysis book alongside so many incredible scholars. Read what I have to say about Republican anti-trans ads in the 2024 election! www.electionanalysis.ws/us/
electionanalysis.ws
073
Reposted by TJ Billard
Jillian Whitton 🏳️‍⚧️, rising @jillianw.bsky.social · 08/09/2024
Post-conference thoughts, now that I've recovered. Spending 3½ days in the company of ~800 of the smartest trans people in the world was phenomenal! Great presentations, great conversations, and I'm looking forward to working with some of the people I met. Another one, please!
Sign for the 2nd International Trans Studies Conference, at Northwestern University. White text on pink background.
192
Reposted by TJ Billard
K R @kringelberg.bsky.social · 04/09/2024
So glad that #TransStudies2024 allows hybrid presentation and virtual attendance. Really doing the work of inclusion in both geographic and accessibility terms, and I can't help but notice a lot of Bluesky denizens are presenting (aka why I keep trying to love social media).
151
Reposted by TJ Billard
Robin Skyer @robinskyer.bsky.social · 18/05/2024
My review of TJ Billard's 'Voices for Transgender Equality: Making Change in the Networked Public Sphere' has been published in Sage Journals Sociology. Link below! @billard.bsky.social
doi.org
Sage Journals: Your gateway to world-class research journals
Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.
042
Reposted by TJ Billard
Sarah J. Jackson @sjjphd.bsky.social · 10/04/2024
Dr @billard.bsky.social just gave an amazing talk to my social movements class on their work on transgender activism. Please check out their book, which is so great at theorizing contemporary flows of media activism I wrote a blurb for it
global.oup.com
Human Verification
1156
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 08/04/2024
REMINDER: There is ONE WEEK left to submit an abstract to the 2nd International Trans Studies Conference—a fully hybrid conference hosted at Northwestern University and online 4–7 September 2024. Abstracts are due 15 April 2024. More details at www.transstudiesconference.org/call-for-sub...
040
Reposted by TJ Billard
Avery Everhart @averyeverhart.bsky.social · 15/01/2024
Absolutely beside myself and overjoyed to announce The 2nd International #Transgender Studies Conference! Yes the long awaited sequel to 2016’s Trans* Studies Will be in September 4-7 2024 at Northwestern University (Evanston, Illinois, USA) and hybrid online www.transstudiesconference.org
transstudiesconference.org
The 2nd International Trans Studies Conference
22713
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 30/11/2023
Hit an important career milestone today.
030
Reposted by TJ Billard
jay h. wu @jayhwu.com · 25/10/2023
finally got my copy of @billard.bsky.social's book 😍
Background: a bookstore window display with an unlit neon sign that says "books sold here" in the upper part of the window and various books on the ledge. Foreground: a copy of Voices for Transgender Equality by Thomas J Billard.
031
Reposted by TJ Billard
Gillian Branstetter @gbbranstetter.bsky.social · 18/10/2023
Found your dad's memoir
Branstetter, Gillian, 35-37, 43-45, 58-67,
78-85, 100-1, 106, 112-16, 118-
21, 147-50, 154-59
4412
Reposted by TJ Billard
Brooke Foucault Welles @foucaultwelles.bsky.social · 19/10/2023
Hot off the presses, my very own copy of Voices for Transgender Equality by @billard.bsky.social I’m only 3 pages in but it’s already 🔥
Photo of a hand holding the book Voices for Transgender Equality by Thomas J Bollard.
1163
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 19/10/2023
It’s here! My debut book, finally in my hands! 😭 Thanks so much to everyone who helped get me here—many, but certainly not all of whom are in the acknowledgements. I’ve read so many books in that familiar Oxford typesetting before. But now they’re my words. Surreal!
0120
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 12/10/2023
I can’t believe I get to say this, but: My TWENTIETH peer reviewed journal article is finally out! It’s also my first foray into history, drawing on the work I did building an historical archive of the trans movement at ⁦‪NCTE in 2018. academic.oup.com/jsh/advance-...
academic.oup.com
The Origins and Development of the National Transgender Rights Movement in the United States of Amer...
Abstract. This article examines the emergence of a national transgender rights movement in the United States in the latter half of the twentieth and first decad
041
Reposted by TJ Billard
Laurel Powell @laurelpowell.net · 12/10/2023
hey @billard.bsky.social check it out
an amazon bestseller list showing "voices for transgender equality" as #1 in the media studies category
021
TJ Billard @billard.bsky.social · 11/10/2023
It’s my birthday AND my book ships out to preorders today! If you missed out on placing a preorder but want to be sure to get it on the official publication date, you can get your copy at voicesfortransequality.com. Consider it a birthday present to me!
240