a journey of transformation
This is from a chapter in Pleasure Activism authored by someone who experienced childhood sexual abuse, and although that has never been my experience, the paragraphs at the end of the chapter deeply resonated with me. This was specific to the author’s timeline of arriving at college, this narrative could just as easily have been…
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What I loved about reading this book is that she spoke so directly to so many of my life experiences, particularly when it comes to Black exceptionalism, overachieving, and adherence to respectability. While we decidedly had very different economic upbringings, it was like we experienced the same social frustrations and racial animosity of instructors and…
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The price we pay for being ourselves is worth it. –Eartha Kitt As kids we were regularly admonished to “use your inside voice!” or some variant of the phrase. Usually spoken by an older matriarchal figure, a grey-haired teacher (a librarian in my case), whenever you got just a little too animated and loud in…
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(above: Djoniba Dance Centre’s 2012 spring show; Senegalese Sabar w/ Marie Basse-Wiles) I ran across this list of advice, Rules for Life, when I was living in NYC between 2011 and 2012. I remember being struck by this list. So much so that I created a little art project for myself: I wrote each rule on a piece…
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like black butterflies 