Elevate Difference

Reviews tagged women of color

Hey, Shorty!: A Guide to Combating Sexual Harassment and Violence in Schools and on the Streets

Difficulties concentrating in school, shame, depression, guilt, fear, low self-esteem, poor body image, and powerlessness are just some of the repercussions that victims of sexual harassment at school experience, according to research conducted by Girls for Gender Equity (GGE). This Brooklyn-based nonprofit organization works to “improve gender and race relations and socioeconomic conditions for [the] most vulnerable youth and communities of color.” Joanne N. Smith, Mandy Van Deven, and Megan Huppuch of GGE have collaboratively written Hey, Shorty!, which tells GGE’s story, while providing a model for teens to teach their peers what constitutes sexual harassment and how to prevent it. The book also gives activists, educators, parents and students a hands-on guide to combat sexual harassment and violence in their schools and neighborhoods.

for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf

There is something quite redemptive about the 2010 edition of Ntozake Shange's experimental “choreo-poem,” For colored girls who have considered suicide/When the rainbow is enuf, which is published as a tie-in to Tyler Perry's underwhelming film adaptation, For Colored Girls.

The Necessity of Climate Change: Women of Color Speak from the Ivory Tower

Morgane Richardson graduated from Middlebury College in 2008 feeling that American colleges recruit women of color, but have no idea how to address the issues they face once they are enrolled. As a result, many of these women suffer depression, anxiety, and isolation in silence. Morgane decided to do something about this situation, and less than two years later, she has collected submissions from women all over the country who have had to navigate issues of race, class, and gender at elite, predominately white college campuses. With these stories, Morgane created Refuse the Silence.

Experiments In A Jazz Aesthetic: Art, Activism, Academia, and the Austin Project

In June 2009, I participated in a writing workshop with Sharon Bridgforth, not knowing what to expect and not knowing what I was expected to give. I only knew that I loved music, having already pledged my undying love for jazz at a young age, and that I loved writing; but I never intended to leave with a blueprint for the foundation of how I would put pen to paper from that point on.

Mangos with Chili (7/11/2010)

I was thrilled to be able to attend a special Mangos with Chili show on Sunday night at Bluestockings in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. I was thrilled not just because I consider the founders, Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha and Ms.

Forced to Care: Coercion and Caregiving in America

Evelyn Nakano Glenn is a professor of Women’s and Ethnic Studies at University of California, Berkeley and author of Forced to Care. Perhaps because of her vocation, the book has a bit of a textbook flavor to it, but as it progresses, she lets go and begins to fill it out with a more humanistic view.

Women of Color and Feminism

If many postmodern feminists would have it, colour or “race” wouldn't be of primary concern in theorising oppression; a woman would be seen as much more than her race, class, and sexuality. In other words, every woman's experience of oppression is nuanced, different.

Speak!

“Necesito gritar!” bellows Adele Nieves in response to the question she poses with her spoken word piece entitled “Why Do You Speak?”, which is the first track on the album. Through the unrestrained strength and rage smoldering behind every word, Adele provides a call to action against the overwhelming powers of erasure, invisibility, and silence that is exhaustively pushed upon women of color for centuries. Speak!, an explosive powerhouse of an album created by the [Speak!

Native Speakers: Ella Deloria, Zora Neale Hurston, Jovita Gonzalez, and the Poetics of Culture

Native Speakers places the work of three foundational female folklorists in conversation to illuminate an often silenced part of feminist intellectual history, the ethnographic and folklore scholarship of women of color. Analyzing the ethnographic and fictional work of Dakota ethnographer Ella Deloria, African American folkloris

Feminist Media Reconsidered

Some of the most incisive feminist analysis today is being published in the groundbreaking make/shift magazine. Started by three activists – Jessica Hoffmann, Daria Yudacufski, and Stephanie Abraham, who first worked together as founders and editors of the feminist zine LOUDmouth – make/shift is run by an editorial/publishing collective committed to antiracist, transnational, and queer perspectives.

The Revolution Will Not Be Funded: Beyond the Non-Profit Industrial Complex

The Color of Violence: The INCITE! Anthology was the first publication that documented some of the concerns and challenges addressed at the Color of Violence Conference, which began at University of California-Santa Cruz in 2000. Since then, there have been two more conferences, organizing campaigns and the SISTERFIRE tour of radical women artists.

Mommy's Angel

Most savvy feminists can argue their way through complex social problems such as sexual violence, poverty and drug use. Most savvy feminists, though, could not articulate those issues though a fast-paced, sharply written story like Mommy’s Angel.

Check the Rhyme

Talk about a breaking silences; we finally have an anthology speaking to women of diverse backgrounds, backgrounds usually ignored or tokenized in more traditional publications. Check the Rhyme is a new anthology and one of the first dedicated not only to women of diverse backgrounds, but to both “female poets & emcees.” What do I think? I say: Hallelujah, Hallelujah; thank the stars this anthology exists! For one of the first times, female emcees and poets speak about issues as diverse as hip-hop, hair, Hurricane Katrina, and Black history.
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