Maxwell Deborde Oral History Interview

Deborde begins by talking about his childhood and how he was interested in World War II history, planes, and sports such as lacrosse, skiing, and soccer. He remarked that the biggest factor influencing his understanding of his gender was realizing that he was attracted to women. He then described how his role model was his father, who is very self sufficient, aware of how he treats others, and emotionally open. He considered how being raised in Hood River, Oregon and being on social media may have affected his gender, but decided that they did not, but that just being around his peers helped him to form it the most. He shared that his hopes for himself is to work on being a better person by being more level-headed, in control of his emotions, and acquiring skills to protect those around him, which he considers an important aspect of being a man. To do that he has been doing jujitsu, which is where he feels most at home in his body. For his object he brought a hammer, which he was using to help his girlfriend build a bookshelf, representing his desire to help those around him through acts of service.

Maxwell Deborde is from Hood River, Oregon and is studying Accountancy at OSU. At the time of the interview, he identified as a cis man.

This interview was conducted in support of interviewer Jozie Billings' honors thesis project titled, "Beyond the Binary: Multimodal Oral Histories of Navigating Gender and Finding Identity from Gender-Diverse and Cisgender Students." More information about that project is available in the finding aid for the OSU Queer Archives Oral History Collection (OH 34).