A Review of the Book "No One Taught Me How to be a Man" by Shannon TL Kearns

Title: No One Taught Me How to be a Man

Author: Shannon TL Kearns

Publisher:

Year: 2025

224 pages

From the Back: No one ever taught Shannon Kearns how to be a man. As a trans man, Shannon was presumed female at birth and constructed his relationship with masculinity after his transition, using bits and pieces he gathered from the world around him: male behavior, pop culture portrayals, and cultural expectations for men that seemed to be in the air he breathed. But rather than separating him from the experiences of cisgender men, Kearns's self-taught approach to masculinity connected him with other men in surprising ways. As he lived more and more in the world of men, he discovered that cis men's relationship to masculinity was similar to his. No one taught them how to be a man either. They worried they were doing it wrong. And they were almost universally worried about being "found out," exposed as not being a "real man."

    In No One Taught Me How to Be a Man, Kearns takes masculinity head-on. He uses his experience to "see" gender in ways cis men cannot, making masculinity visible. Without arguing that masculinity should be done away with, or that there is no real difference between men and women, he bravely points toward a form of manhood built for the well-being of the world, and for people of all genders.

Personal Thoughts: Just as with his first book, In the Margins, you can tell the Shannon TL Kearns is a story teller. Kearns once again becomes vulnerable with his readers by sharing stories from his life that are relatable and heartfelt. As a transgender man myself, I could see my life in these pages. There are so many life lessons you miss out on by being raised as the gender you don't identify with - particularly for me things like learning how to shave, learning how to act in public, and learning how to be with other men in conversation are all things I had to figure out on my own. Reading Kearns' book revealed to me that I'm not the only one out there feeling out of step with both sides of the gender binary - seeming to fit in neither with women or men.

    I am very grateful that Kearns is willing to be publicly vulnerable so that people like me - a transgender Christian man trying to find a way to fit into society - can know we're not alone in our experiences and that we can learn together how to navigate life.