Panel: Trans Athletes Speak Up

P&T Knitwear is pleased to celebrate Pride Month and gear up for the World Cup with the panel, Trans Athletes Speak Up, featuring Eli Erlick, Chris Mosier, Michael Waters, & Andraya Yearwood!

Join four experts in transgender athletics in a timely discussion on trans people in sports. Between the Olympics abruptly banning trans women to the erasure of trans sportsmen, trans athletes are being targeted like never before. But trans communities are fighting back. An athletic renaissance is blooming with new LGBTQ+ teams and leagues opening every year. The four panelists will discuss common questions, critical talking points, and the forgotten histories of trans athletes. Why are trans athletes under attack? Why are trans women barred from certain competitions, despite the overwhelming evidence that they do not have an unfair advantage? How could we rearrange sports categories beyond gender? How can we defend trans athletes? Q&A and book signing will follow.

Doors open at 6:30pm with the panel starting closer to 7pm. Come early and grab a drink from the !

Tickets and books are available both on eventbrite and at the door.

ABOUT THE PANELISTS
Eli Erlick is an internationally acclaimed author, activist, and educator. Her first book, BEFORE GENDER follows the trailblazing lives of thirty trans people who will radically change everything you've been told about transgender history. Her forthcoming book, Belonging Through Exclusion: Understanding the Transgender Far Right (University of Chicago Press, 2026), explores why right-wing transgender people adopt their views and what we can do to prevent others from joining them. She completed her PhD at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and is currently the program director of the New York City Trans Archives, the largest transgender archive in the Eastern United States. She is also the founder of Queer Archery League, the world's largest LGBTQ+ archery group. She currently lives in the Lower East Side, where she is working on her next manuscript.

Chris Mosier is a trailblazing athlete, coach, and founder of TransAthlete.com, the leading resource for transgender inclusion in sport. In 2015, he made history as the first openly transgender man to earn a spot on a U.S. Men’s National Team, a milestone that helped catalyze policy change by the International Olympic Committee on trans athlete inclusion and earned him the title of "the man who changed the Olympics." A decorated multisport athlete, Chris is an eight-time Team USA member, five-time Men’s National Champion, and Men’s All-American. Chris’s advocacy extends far beyond competition. Through his writing, speaking, and policy work, he has influenced trans-inclusive practices at every level of sport, from high school athletics to professional leagues. Chris's book, "Fair Game: Trans Athletes & The Future of Sports," (2026) busts four major myths about trans athletes while sharing the stories of athletes of all levels through their own words.

Michael Waters is the author of The Other Olympians: Fascism, Queerness, and the Making of Modern Sports, which was a winner of the Lambda Literary Award for LGBTQ Nonfiction and a finalist for the Los Angeles Times BookPrize. His next book, tentatively titled Give Me Some Credit, will be published in fall 2027.
Andraya Yearwood (born 2001) is an American track and field athlete and activist who gained national prominence as the first openly transgender high school students to compete in girls’ sports in Connecticut. After a successful year of high school track in 2017, she found herself under attack from the ultra-conservative non-profit “Alliance for Defending Freedom” seeking to bar trans girls from competing in girls’ events and strip records set by trans athletes. Instead of letting that fight define or diminish her, she has grown into a scholar-activist, collaborating alongside social justice organizations like the National Center for Transgender Equality, Diáspora Africana de la Argentina (DIAFAR), and the New York Transgender Advocacy Group to demand that Black, trans, and queer youth not only survive our institutions, but be welcomed fully into them. Academically, Yearwood’s musings on quare experience have been featured in UCLA’s Mester, Black Feminist Collective, and University of North Carolina Press. Yearwood’s scholarship has received funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Point Foundation, the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, and the Lemann Center for Brazilian Studies, among others. She earned an M.A. from Columbia University in the City of New York, after dual B.A. degrees from North Carolina Central University.

Housekeeping notes:

• This is a ticketed in-store event with limited amphitheater-style seating.
• Doors open at 6:30pm, with the talk starting around 7:00pm.
• Books will be available for purchase at the event.
• Cost of a book bundle ticket reflects the total cost of the feature event book (MSRP plus tax). Each book bundle ticket guarantees ticket holders one (1) copy of the feature event book.
• The talk will be followed by a book signing. Books signed at P&T Knitwear events must be purchased from P&T Knitwear.
• If you would like a signed copy and cannot attend the event, we're happy to take your pre-order. We ship most places!

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