revolutionary motherhood

Chilean girls 5-month-long occupation of school

2011-10-14T15:11:00.000-07:00

to demand the return of free public university education:

It began early one morning in May, when dozens of teenage girls emerged from the predawn darkness and scaled the spiked iron fence around Chile's most prestigious girl's school. They used classroom chairs to barricade themselves inside and settled in. Five months later, the occupation shows no signs of dying and the students are still fighting for their goal: free university education for all.
A tour of the school is a trip into the wired reality of a generation that boasts the communication tools that feisty young rebels of history never dreamed of. When police forces move closer, the students use restricted Facebook chat sessions to mobilise. Within minutes, they are able to rally support groups from other public schools in the neighbourhood. "Our lawyer lives over there," said Angelica Alvarez, 14, as she pointed to a cluster of nearby homes. "If we yell 'Mauricio' really loud, he leaves his home and comes over."
For five months, the students at Carmela Carvajal have lived on the ground floor, sometimes sleeping in the gym, but usually in the abandoned classrooms where they hauled in a television, set up a private changing room, and began to experience school from a different perspective.
The first thing they did after taking over the school was to hold a vote. Approximately half of the 1,800 students participated in the polls to approve the takeover, and the yays outnumbered the nays 10 to one.
Now the students pass their school days listening to guest lecturers who provide free classes on topics ranging from economics to astronomy. Extracurricular classes include yoga and salsa lessons. At night and on weekends, visiting rock bands set up their equipment and charge 1,000 pesos (£1.25) per person to hear a live jam on the basketball court. Neighbours donate fresh baked cakes and, under a quirk of Chilean law, the government is obliged to feed students who are at school – even students who have shut down education as usual.
So much food has poured in that the students from Carmela Carvajal now regularly pass on their donations to hungry students at other occupied schools.
Municipal authorities have repeatedly attempted to retake thhe school, sending in police to evict the rebel students and get classes back on schedule, but so far the youngsters have held their ground.
"It was the most beautiful moment, all of us in [school] uniform climbing over the fence, taking back control of our school. It was such an emotional moment, we all wanted to cry," Alvarez said. "There have been 10 times that the police have taken back the school and every time we come and take it back again."

Full story is here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/oct/07/chilean-girls-occupation-school-protest

there's been more than one occupation in NYC

2011-09-27T10:32:00.000-07:00

In August 2011, immigrant mothers in East Harlem (NYC) occupied the office of Councilmember Melissa Mark-Viverito to protest her ongoing promotion of displacement and negligent landlords in our community. In the face of police presence and hostility from office personnel, these luchadoras fearlessly speak truth to power and denounce Mark-Viverito for her profoundly anti-democratic attacks against her East Harlem constituents, our homes and community.

With all the buzz about the Wall Street occupation, these mothers' actions and struggles risk being overlooked.

Please circulate widely.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rA8vZUcpb9c

Don't Have to Do Nothing: Be Free (and still) Be Loved

2011-05-18T05:21:00.000-07:00

Y'all. Don't get sick of Lucille Clifton on my account but I swear she just don't run out of brilliant life-saving gifts. So here is another one. In 1985 in the special 15th anniversary issue of Essence Magazine coordinated by Cheryll Y. Greene, Clifton wrote about the true freedom that women can give to each other: "to fail and not be a failure."

When Lucille Clifton, who stunned audiences with the stark clarity of her poetry from countless stages during her lifetime, was a little girl assigned to recite a poem for the Christmas program at her church, she choked. It was not foreshadowing, it was formative. As she stood unable to remember the poem in front of all the church mothers encouraging her and expecting her to perform her mother stood up for her. She felt pressured. She said "I don't wanna." And her mother stood up in front of God and everybody and smiled at her child and she said one small sentence that changes the meaning of life for black girls growing up in patriarchy and capitalism: "She don't have to do nothing she don't want to do."

Can you imagine? Decades later when we were celebrating Lucille Clifton's birthday with her (we didn't know it would be her last) at the Furious Flower poetry center all of us black feminist poets, teachers, daughters gushed with open jealousy at the power and freedom of that statement. Imagine! She don't have to do nothing she don't want to do. So many negatives adding up to the positive clarity that black girls are inherently valuable, love-able, period. When had someone ever stood up and said that for us? When in a world of forced labor, coerced sex, billions of expectations? When had anyone even dared to suggest that we were not valuable because of what we produced, what we created, who we entertained, how well we pretended to be happy? When had we said it for ourselves? don't have to do nothing.

Now I was raised to know that I only have to do two things: stay black, and live. But my interpretation of "stay black and live" has been contorted by internalized capitalism and a system that still judges me based on what my being produces for the market. The refrain that I thought was my heartbeat said "do something do something do something do something" interrupting any stillness with the imperative to produce, to prove, to perform. But here comes Lucille Clifton's mother: she don't have to do nothing.

And how much do we crave that freedom... in the eyes of black people we love who want us to perform blackness in a way that they can more easily consume, in the eyes of non-black people who want the same thing, in the faces of well meaning would be mentors who think we will only be happy with ourselves if we do it their way, in reflections we catch of ourselves in windows thinking we look lost because there is no name for where we are going.

And so today. I need Lucille Clifton's mother, audacious and willing to stand up in front of anyone and say you do not need to stand on a stage to honor God. You do not need to say or do anything in order to be a reflection of divine love. You already are. Even in a puddle at the foot of your bed you are already supreme beautiful unlikely priceless example of the abundance of life. And you know what? Life if so abundant that it places refractions of that same brilliance in all of us, and so there is no need to do it all, there is no need to own brilliance, there is no need to prove and show and compete because life is so abundant that it happens in our honor even when we don't wake up and make it happen.

Who knew Lucille Clifton's mama circa 1940 was an anti-capitalist? Because capitalism would have us believe that we only deserve to be here because of what we produce, and even in our counter-cultures, even in our movements we reproduce the same idea. We only deserve to be here because of what we can produce that other people will buy with their money, time or attention. Our experience of our own lives is secondary, it is only the means of production, it is the products that matter, and unless we make ourselves into both factories and widgets we are not valuable. We believe that. I know I push myself past that belief about every hour on the hour. One of the major lessons of the Mobile Homecoming Experiential Archive Project has been that because of the steep lean (and lien) of capitalism on even our visionary hearts the tendency is to emphasize the documentary film, the photographs, the podcasts, the archived interviews, the presentations...the products over the experience, the priceless opportunity to be present with each other, which is not for sale. Which documents can only gesture towards. Which cannot be sold.

But luckily Lucille Clifton listened to her momma and told us what she said. We can be free and still be loved. We can be still and still be a movement. We are not failures even when we fail. We are life. Miraculous irregardless.

Maybe we can institute Lucille Clifton's mama moments for ourselves and for each other. Maybe we can step in and affirm each other just because. Maybe we can stand up for each other when even our own communities say to us how dare you not be superwoman every second of the day. Maybe we can save the day in our own way in our own language. Nuh-uh. She don't have to do nothing she don't want to do. She don't have to do nothing. And she is still fierce fly and worth of all praise. All of it.

So here is a spare one for each one of you in the time when no one is there to say it, remember that I already said it: you don't have to do nothing to earn my love. nothing to earn all the blessings of the universe. nothing to earn a symphony in ever pore of your skin playing the song of you. nothing to deserve my deepest gratitude for your existence. nothing to earn a place in my heart that you can always come home to. nothing. you already have it. all praise. you have everything.

love always and already,
QBG Lex

P.S. Get ready for a summer filled with opportunities to see the faces of those of us who will scream at the sight of you and open our arms:

*TONIGHT: Young Black Gift: A Birthday Toast to Lorraine Hansberry (@ the Inspiration Station in Durham)
http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/event.php?eid=145740925499014

*Sunday May 22nd 5pm (@ the Inspiration Station in Durham) Rainbow Reclamations: (Blue) Once I Was Pregnant: Abortion, Miscarriage and Rebirth
http://blackfeministmind.wordpress.com/2011/05/10/blue-once-i-was-pregnant-sharing-stories-of-miscarriage-abortion-and-rebirth/

*Friday, May 27th (@ the Rush Center in Atlanta) THE GEMINI JAM/FIST PUMP FRIDAY featuring a performance by the LOST BOIS, gemini juice and dancing all night long!
http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/event.php?eid=215303695165893

*June 9-15 INDIGO DAYS in Durham, NC
http://indigodays.wordpress.com/

*June 23-26 ALLIED MEDIA CONFERENCE in Detroit (featuring the Shawty got Skillshare, the Generations of Brilliance Track and the Visionary Sci-Fi Track)
http://alliedmedia.org/

*Thursdays in June 6pm (@ the Eleanor on Rigsbee in Durham) Lucille Clifton Shapeshifter Sessions: http://blackfeministmind.wordpress.com/2011/04/17/announcing-lucille-clifton-shapeshifter-survival-school-summer-session-2012/

*August 15-19th Juneteenth Freedom Academy Week-long Intensive: Rituals for Educators

*September 1-4th Queerky Black Girls, Mobile Homecoming and ZAMI NOBLA Black Gay Pride Healing and Connection Retreat!!!

Musings on Parenting and Protest: Then and Now

2011-05-09T13:12:00.000-07:00

Taking New Clear Vision editor Randall Amster up on his challenge to dig up and dust off an old piece of writing, I recently found this essay that I wrote a month before the Republican National Convention was due to hit town in 2004.

I had been feeling paralyzed by the news, by the draconian security measures promised by Mayor Rudy Giuliani, by the added fears as the mother of a small child. I had also been invited to read at a political cabaret in Baltimore that summer. Putting pen to paper reminded me of the importance of struggling to transform the world, especially as the mother of a child who will inherit and live under the policies made (and left unchallenged) now. It also inspired me to push past my fear and, with my daughter in tow (or rather, in stroller), join the week of protests once the Republicans came to town.

* * *

(August 2004, New York City): I have been listening to the news all day. That, in itself, is an unusual occurrence. I have a three-year-old daughter who does not allow me to ignore her for any stretch of time longer than a minute and a half. And I have a dislike for the news. I don’t buy newspapers, I don’t own a TV, I rarely listen to the radio, and I don’t look for it online. But today, my ear has been glued to the radio. All afternoon, I listened for reports from the Democratic National Convention in Denver on NPR.

I imagine vast cages of cyclone fences and razor wires — conveniently located out of sight so as to maximize the futility of protest. The newscaster confirms this: “The protesters are literally caged behind cyclone fences…. You can’t see them when you walk in or out of the convention at all.” I imagine bag searches, ID checks, police with machine guns and snipers on rooftops.

These images fill me with fear.

What will happen here in the coming month? What can we expect from a police force that feels a wallet is justification for pumping 41 bullets into Amadou Diallo, an unarmed man simply trying to go home? Now add in the hype and the hysteria over terrorism and the Office of Homeland Security, the cyclone fences and razor wire and machine guns. Is it any surprise that my nerves freeze? That it seems safer to stay inside with my baby than to be out there risking this terrifying reality?

Four years ago, I felt no such fear.

Tear gas and rubber bullets? Not a deterrent.

Possibility of a two-week detainment? I ain’t a-feared.

Then I became a mother.

And it suddenly became more important for me to build the things I want to see in this world, to raise my voice and protest and tear down the things that I don’t want my daughter to grow up with.

And it also becomes more frightening. The stakes are higher. What if my baby gets tear gassed? What if she sees her mama shoved and hit and then taken away from her? Years ago, during the funeral of Patrick Dorismond — another unarmed black man shot to death by the NYPD — the police clubbed and arrested mourners. A mother was handcuffed and taken away. Her little boy — maybe only seven or eight — was left crying on the sidewalk, along amongst a panicked crowd. No one paused to help him.

What if that mother becomes me? What if I get arrested and my three-year-old is left standing on the curb, crying for her mama whom she cannot follow? What if I get arrested and Child Welfare takes her away? What if she ends up in the foster care system indefinitely because, suddenly, my life is under a microscope and the things that I never thought I needed and never thought to obtain are now used against me?

But then I remember — I have a daughter.

One whose world, whose options in life in life will grow or shrink depending on whether the Mad Hatter or the March Hare is dictating policy.

I have a daughter who may become a mother at sixteen because no birth control is available to her. Because her body is in the hands of nine wizened men and women who have decided that she has no right to control what she will do with it. And then, if she is a mother at sixteen, she will inherit a world in which she will be shamed on street corners and held up as a scapegoat for every societal ill and tax increase while the safety net that should be catching her and her baby will have long been cut into shreds and taken away to Bangladesh for girls her age to sew into Nike sweatpants.

I have a daughter whose world might include daily disappearances, who might grow up knowing that if she says what she thinks and it is not what her teachers and her bosses and her news broadcaster and her politicians think she should think, she too may be buried behind high walls topped with razor wire and electric fences.

I have a daughter who will inherit the world I leave her.

I have a daughter. That makes it all the more crucial for me to push aside the fear, to shake off the paralysis that freezes between my shoulder blades, to raise my voice in protest, to begin building a world that I will want her to inherit.

I have a daughter who will have her own fears and doubts and reactions to the world around her. I need to show her that she can feel anxious or scared and still push past those feelings to do what is important to her.

* * *

Almost seven years later, so much has changed yet so much seems to remain the same.

My daughter is now ten. I feel less uneasy about taking her with me to protests and demonstrations, although I still would hesitate to take her to an anti-police brutality rally or an action likely to bring in the riot squad (not that it takes much these days). As a mother who has remained politically active (although sometimes on the margins), I have built a support system that I can ask to hang with my daughter when she doesn’t want to go (or when I deem it unwise to bring her). We can have conversations about the issues and I can explain why I feel strongly, passionately, about something. Raising a child to be a critical thinker, she often questions me, forcing me to explain, articulate, and defend my point-of-view. If anyone ever wishes to sharpen their debate skills, they should engage a ten-year-old raised in a social justice movement.

On the political front, it seems that, while things have changed (and wasn’t the last election won on the promise of “Change”?), many things have remained the same, if not worse.

While Lady Gaga encourages people to respect and honor themselves and all others (including transgendered people) with her song “Born This Way,” a transgendered woman was brutally beaten in a McDonald’s. The outcry about the attack focused on harsher punishment against her attackers, a fourteen-year-old and an eighteen-year-old. But where is the outcry around the lack of education about gender, gender identity and sexuality that would have prevented this attack — and future attacks — in the first place? Are such conversations even on the public radar or are we (once again) falling into the trap that safety equals harsher prison sentences?

On the politics-as-usual front, attacks on reproductive rights have not stopped or even slowed, as demonstrated by the attacks on Planned Parenthood. Police executed Oscar Grant in Oakland; New York police fired 50 shots and killed the unarmed Sean Bell. Fahad Hashmi, a Pakistani-American charged with providing material support to terrorists after allowing an acquaintance to spend the night and store socks and ponchos at his apartment, spent three years in extreme solitary confinement under the Special Administrative Measures (SAMS), and is facing another fifteen years of never having human contact. Days before his trial was to start, the judge ordered an anonymous jury, using the call for people to attend and witness the court proceedings to bolster the fear that Fahad was, indeed, a terrorist.

Sometimes it’s hard not to become overwhelmed by all these injustices. I still have days like that day in 2004 when I wanted to bury my head in the sand (or at least under a bunch of pillows) and pretend that nothing was wrong in the world or, if there were, I could do nothing to change it. But I also have days when I realize how important it is to find the strength to keep fighting (and, these days, to remember that transforming the world is a long-term struggle and that we need to take the time to revitalize and replenish our energy as well).

And so, seven years later (and probably seventeen and seventy years later), I stand by those words I penned one fearful afternoon:

I have a daughter who will inherit the world I leave her.

Originally posted on New Clear Vision

Bootcamp Podcast: The Sound of Mothering Ourselves

2011-02-01T09:01:00.001-08:00

Loved ones!!!! For those of you who didn't get to participate in the MotherOurselves Bootcamp in Durham NC this January here is a podcast featuring the insights of the participants and some beautiful music!!! Playlist below.

[audio http://brokenbeautiful.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/bootcamp-podcast-1.mp3]

direct link: http://brokenbeautiful.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/bootcamp-podcast-1.mp3

Also know that for the next week...if you become an Eternal Summerian (monthly sustainer of the Eternal Summer of the Black Feminist Mind) your first gifts will be a mixtape of the meditations of release we did during the bootcamp and the motherourselves manual so that you can bring this work into your life and your community!!!

We can make something out of anything.

Insight from Mariel Eaves and

The Revenge of Ricky Williams "Sweet Wolf Shirt"

We recognize and nurture the creative parts of each other without always understanding what will be created.

"Dear Mom" by Adele Nieves and

Climbing Poetree "I Wonder"

We establish authority over our own definitions.

Affirmations from Miya Binta

Doria Roberts "Dying Man's Wish"

We claim power over who we choose to be, knowing that such power is relative within the realities of our lives.

Estas Mujeres: Covenant by Fabiola Sandoval

Amel Larrieux "All I Got"

We provide an attentive concern and expectation of growth, which is the beginning of that acceptance we came to expect only from our mothers.

"When I Crave Mama" by Fabiola Sandoval

Me'shell Ndegeocello "Solomon"

We affirm our own worth by committing ourselves to our own survival in our selves and in the selves of other black women.

"I Am My Mother's Daughter" by Rashida James-Saadiya

Lauryn Hill "If They Only Knew"

We refuse to settle for anything less than a rigorous pursuit of the possible in ourselves, at the same time making a distinction between what is possible, and what the outside world drives us to do in order to prove that we are human.

"Mother Ourselves" by Julia R. Wallace (JDub)

Santigold "Unstoppable"

We recognize our successes and are tender with ourselves even when we fail.

"My Mother Ourselves Covenant" by Dara Montaque

Res "Bittersweet"

We learn to love what we have given birth to by giving definition to, to be both kind and demanding in the teeth of failure as well as in the face of success without misnaming either.

"Letter of Release to the Next Generation" by Miya Binta

Erykah Badu "My Life"

We lay to rest what is weak, timid and damaged without despisal and we protect and support what is useful for survival. We explore the difference together.

"Mother as Savior" by Miya Binta

Georgia Ann Muldrow "Runway"

We stand toe-to-toe inside rigorous loving and speak what has always seemed like the impossible to each other.

Truth Booth Conversation between Miya Binta and Manju Rajendran

Tata Vega, "Miss Celie's Blues"

As we speak the truth to each other it become unavoidable to ourselves.

ESG "Keep on Moving"

Infinite love,

Lex

MotherOurselves Materials! Gifts for Eternal Summer of the Black Feminist Mind Monthly Sustainers!!!!

2011-01-25T10:35:00.000-08:00

Happy January beloved and far-flung supporters of the Eternal Summer of the Black Feminist Mind!!!!!!

Since it is a beautiful new year...we have a beautiful new gift for our beloved Eternal Summerian monthly sustainers! All existing Eternal Summerians and all NEW monthly sustainers who sign up before the end of the month will receive their very own digital copies of crucial priceless curriculum materials from the MotherOurselves Bootcamp:

*The MotherOurselves Manual (including the mother ourselves manifesta, playlist, activity station descriptions and a 5 cycle meditation of release including direct quotes from across Lorde's body of work...especially Eye to Eye: Black Women Hatred and Anger.

*The MotherOurselves Meditation/Dance Party Mixtape: guide yourself or your group through the cycles of meditation and release with music, poetry and the mesmerizing sound of my voice :)

AND Eternal Summerians who sign up at levels of $20 or more will receive hardcopies of both the Manual and the Mixtape (well CD actually) and a one of a kind collage in the mail!!!

Hooray!!!!! Sign up today or on payday! Thank you for making another year of ETERNAL inspiration possible!!!!

Love,

Lex

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind #4 is here!

2011-01-20T06:30:00.001-08:00

Don’t Leave Your Friends Behind #4

The latest issue of Don’t Leave Your Friends Behind is ready for your wintertime reading! Featuring over 70 pages of stories, experiences and tips on how to support families in your movement or community, including:

Experiencing Critical Resistance 10 through the Children’s Program
Organizing from within an Anarcha-Feminist Childrearing Collective
Mothers Among Us: The Prison Birth Project
A Mother’s Day of action with Young Women United and Mamas of Color Rising
On Fear & Commitments: A father’s reflects on his own childhood in England, Baghdad and the U.S. and the challenges of raising a biracial child in the anti-Muslim and xenophobic climate of the United States today.
Call to Destiny: how even an early morning wake-up call can support students with special needs
Radical childrearing with a queer and sex-positive angle
Tips on supporting pregnant friends
Tips on supporting parents who have lost a newborn infant
Radical Childcare Weather Report: a centerfold from the “Building an Intergenerational Movement for Collective Liberation” workshop at the 2010 US Social Forum

and much, much more

A pdf of these exciting 70+ pages is available here:
http://issuu.com/chinabodina/docs/zine_4_with_cover
Please note that the centerfold is a separate file: http://issuu.com/chinabodina/docs/centerfold.zine4

If you prefer a paper copy, please send $3 (or $5 for two and give the second to an ally in your life!) to:

V. Law
PO Box 20388
Tompkins Square Station
New York, NY 10009

Sad to have missed the chance to contribute your experiences and words of wisdom? Fear not! We are turning this exciting zine series into a book!

Final Call for submissions: March 15, 2011.

See our blogspot for more details: dontleaveyourfriendsbehind.blogspot.com

Everett Anderson's Goodbye as Read by Assata

2010-09-22T09:39:00.001-07:00

Everett Anderson's Goodbye: As Read by Assata from Alexis Gumbs on Vimeo.

Part of the Lucille Clifton ShapeShifter Survival School

This Bridge Called My Baby: Legacies of Radical Mothering

2010-08-04T07:44:00.001-07:00

This Bridge Called My Baby: Legacies of Radical Mothering

http://thisbridgecalledmybaby.wordpress.com/

"We can learn to mother ourselves." Audre Lorde, 1983

All mothers have the potential to be revolutionary. Some mothers stand on the shoreline, are born and reborn here, inside the flux of time and space, overcoming the traumatic repetition of oppression. Our very existence is disobedience to the powers that be.
At times, in moments, we as mothers choose to stand in a zone of claimed risk and fierce transformation, the frontline. In infinite ways, both practiced and yet to be imagined, we put our bodies between the violent repetition of the norm and the future we already deserve, exactly because our children deserve it too. We make this choice for many reasons and in different contexts, but at the core we have this in common: we refuse to obey. We refuse to give into fear. We insist on joy no matter what and by every means necessary and possible.
In this anthology we are exploring how we are informed by and participating with those mothers, especially radical women of color, who have sought for decades, if not centuries, to create relationships to each other, transformative relationships to feminism and a transnational anti-imperialist literary, cultural and everyday practice.

"We don't want a space where kids feel that only adults can imagine ways to strengthen our communities and protect ourselves against the Architects of Despair," Sora said, "and we don't want adults to feel that either. We want to create a space where all of our imaginations help each other grow; but we realize that kids might get bored from sitting still the way that adults tend to do, so we set up the play room with toys and games." Regeneracion Childcare Collective 2007

Sometimes for radical mamas, our mothering in radical community makes visible the huge gulfs between communities, between parents and non-parents, in class and other privileges AND most importantly the wide gulf between what we say in activist communities and what we actually do. Radical mothering is the imperative to build bridges that allow us to relate across these very real barriers. For and by radical mother of color, but also inclusive of other working class, marginalized, low income, no income radical mothers.

"Parenting and being a role model to kids in your community is important because they will be the activists of tomorrow. And they will be our gardeners and mothers and bakers. They will question our generation, they'll write their own history, create new forms of art and media." -Noemi Martinez 2009

We find the idea of the "bridge" useful because we believe that the radical practice of mothering is at once a practical and visionary relationship to the future IN the PRESENT, a bridge within time that can inspire us to relate to each other intentionally across generation and space. We also acknowledge the not-so-radical default bridge function of marginalized mother in society. How our children in particular get walked all over in terms of public policy that criminalizes our mothering and movement spaces that claim to be creating a transformed future without being fully accountable to parents or kids.

"I came into the Third World Women’s Caucus when it was well under way. The women there were discussing the caucus resolution to be presented to the general conference. There were Asian women, Latin women, Native Women and Afro-American women. The discussion when I came in was around the controversial issue of motherhood and how the wording of the resolution could best reflect the feelings of those present. It was especially heartening to hear other women affirm that not only should lesbian mothers be supported but that all third world women lesbians share in the responsibility for the care and nurturing of the children of individual lesbians of color...Another woman reminded us of the commitment we must take to each other when she said ‘All children (of lesbians) are ours." -Doc in Off Our Backs 1979

We see this book as a continuation of the accountability invoking movement midwifing work of the 1981 anthology This Bridge Called My Back in that it:
a. is the work of writers who see their writing as part of a mothering practice, as not career, but calling and who believe that their writing, and their every creative practice has a strategic role in transforming the possible world.
b. contextualizes contemporary radical mama practices in relationship to socialist and lesbian mothering practices experimented with and practiced in the 1970’s by writers including Audre Lorde, June Jordan, Adrienne Rich, Third World Lesbians conference, Salsa Soul Sisters, Sisterhood of Black Single Mothers
c. seeks to speak to those who participated in that earlier practice and who have been informed by it as a primary audience, and to connect those who have not have access to that work to it

We invite submissions including but not limited to the following possibilities:

*Manifestas, group poems, letters, mission statements from your crew of radical mamas or an amazing group from history
*Letters, poems, transcribed phone calls between radical mamas supporting each other
*Accounts of your experience as a radical mama
*Reflections on enacting radical mamacity at different ages
*Motivations for/obstacles in your practice of radical mothering
*Conversations with your kids
*Rants and rages via the eloquence of a mother-wronged
*Your experience of radical grandmothering
*Self-interviews, interviews with other mamis
*Birthing experiences
*Ending child sexual abuse
*Mothering as survivors (survival and mothering)
*Mothering with and without models
*Mothering and domination
*Mama to-do lists
*Mama/kid collaborations...
*Radical fathering
*Overcoming shame and silence in the practice of radical mothering

*Ambivilence, paradox, emotions, vulnerability

*Experiences of state violence/CPS

*Balancing daily survival

*Loss of children, not living with children, custody arrangements and issues
*Sharing your stories from where you live

*Everything we haven't thought of yet! Take a deep breath and WRITE!!!!

Please send submissions via email to
alexispauline@gmail.com
maiamedicine@gmail.com
and china410@hotmail.com
or via snail mail to
P.O. Box 4803 Baltimore Maryland 21211

by April 1, 2011.

A Dream of Foxes: Lucille Clifton Rebirth Broadcast 4

2010-07-18T16:13:00.001-07:00

A Dream of Foxes: Lucille Clifton Rebirth Broadcast 4 from Alexis Gumbs on Vimeo.

And don’t forget to sign up for the Lucille Clifton ShapeShifter Poetry Intensive: http://blackfeministmind.wordpress.com/survival-school/

Amazons: Lucille Clifton Rebirth Broadcast #3

2010-07-11T13:31:00.001-07:00

Lucille Clifton Rebirth Broadcast 3: Amazons from Alexis Gumbs on Vimeo.

This broadcast is part of the Lucille Clifton ShapeShifter Survival School. For more info see blackfeministmind.wordpress.com/survival-school.

To sign up for the Lucille Clifton ShapeShifter Survival Poetry Intensive on August 21, 2010 in Durham, NC click here: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/3LH6G9J

rough draft of my thoughts

2010-07-09T05:03:00.000-07:00

all mothers have the potential to be revolutionary -- all mothers are revolutionary. some mothers stand on the shoreline, we are born here, inside this flux of time and space. our very existence is disobedience to the powers that be.
and that at times, moments, in different ways, some of which we have done and some of which we have not even imagined, we as mothers choose to be on the frontlines. and we make this choice for many reasons and in dift contexts, but at its core is a refusal to obey, even though we could obey. a refusal to give into fear. an insistence on joy no matter what and by any means necessary and possible.

motherhood is love by any means necessary

Lucille Clifton Sunday ShapeShifter Rebirth BroadcastL Birthday Edition

2010-06-27T20:14:00.001-07:00

This week…in honor of Lucille Clifton’s first birthday since her transition to starshine I offer the first of a series of weekly Sunday Rebirth Broadcasts in honor of Lucille Clifton! Today’s exercise is based on her powerful survival poem “won’t you celebrate with me.”

Lucille Clifton Sunday ShapeShifter Rebirth Broadcast: Birthday Edition from Alexis Gumbs on Vimeo.

This series of broadcasts is part of the Lucille Clifton ShapeShifter Survival School:

In honor of the great poet Lucille Clifton, who was also a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, a mother, an artist and self-identified Amazon warrior through her poetry, the Lucille Clifton ShapeShifter Survival School is especially designed for families that are committed to ending childhood sexual abuse and all forms of gendered violence. Informed by Generation 5 and the regional plan of the Atlanta Transformative Justice Collaborative, the ShapeShifter Survival School is part of a holistic process of ending child sexual abuse by creating healing community.

for more details on the 4 components of the ShapeShifter Survival School look here: http://blackfeministmind.wordpress.com/survival-school/

And finally…no one delivers this poem better than Ms. Lucille herself.

Happy Birthday Lucille Clifton: Announcing the Shapeshifter Survival School

2010-06-27T14:03:00.000-07:00

http://blackfeministmind.wordpress.com/survival-school/

Introducing the Lucille Clifton ShapeShifter Survival School in Durham, NC!!!!

The ShapeShifter Survival School has 4 components:

Lucille Clifton Sunday Rebirth Broadcasts: Every Sunday starting on Lucille Clifton's birthday (June 27th) and going until November 7th Lex will video broadcast a poem by Lucille Clifton and a survival reflection/activity.

ShapeShifter Poetry Intensive for Parents (Saturday August 21st 10am-5pm) CHILDCARE AND MEALS PROVIDED (email brokenbeautifulpress@gmail.com if you want to do childcare or donate food or photocopies!)

For all parents and caregivers and survivors of sexual violence who are committed to ending child sexual abuse this poetry intensive will allow participants to reflect on Lucille Clifton's ShapeShifter series and other poems that deal directly with her experience as a survivor of child sexual abuse and to write and share their own poetry of healing and transformation.

Suggested donation: $25-100 (monetary and in-kind donations welcome at any point in the process...we encourage asking for donations from your families of origin and communities as a way to share your vision with them of creating a world free from child sexual abuse)

On Tuesday August 24th participants and allies will reconvene over tea to check-in in a loving affirming space and to make handmade ShapeShifter booklets as a fundraiser for the continued work of the ShapeShifter Survival School .

On Wednesday September 15th we will have another check-in about the process of sharing this work and bringing up the topic of child sexual abuse in our communities.

Everett Anderson Storytime Week! (Monday September 20-Wednesday September 22) (ALL AGES INCLUSIVE DONATIONS WELCOME!)

Lucille Clifton wrote a series of books called the "Everett Anderson Books" for her children and other children that discuss difficult issues, including the loss of a loved one, internalized racism and sexism and witnessing abuse as child. With dinner and cookies and milk we will read these stories together and do a series of activities designed to help us create ways of sharing difficult and important stories across generations in our communities. We believe that sharing stories, truthtelling, is a key practice towards ending child sexual abuse and all cycles of violence in our communities.

All Souls ShapeShifter Story Making Day (Sunday Oct 31st 11am-6pm) (ALL AGES INCLUSIVE...SWEET DONATIONS WELCOME!)

Replete with costumes, candy and storymaking stations this will be a chance for us to make our own collaborative illustrated community story about transformation, facing what scares us and creating a world free from child sexual abuse and all gendered violence. Our beautiful story and our beautiful process of creating together will be a resource for us and for superheroes everywhere.

Applications for the poetry intensive coming soon! Email brokenbeautifulpress@gmail.com to express interest in participating, donating a scholarship or donating food, money, photocopies, DV tapes and other forms of love!!!!!

Notes From Kansas: by MobileHomeComing Interviewee Angela Denise Davis

2010-06-26T16:15:00.001-07:00

from http://mobilehomecoming.wordpress.com/

*Note: We are thrilled to be practicing intergenerational love and we are learning from the best. This piece is a beautiful reflection by MobileHomeComing Interviewee Angela Denise Davis about FINDING her mother's garden.

I know there is a poem in this somewhere. It almost got lost this evening when my mother did a final spray over her garden and did not notice that my laptop was on the patio table.

My mother’s back yard is full of flavor: an old kitchen, ceiling fan turned sideways on a patio column, a black mailbox that peeks from the grapevines, an umbrella on the deck that leans to kiss the umbrella on the patio, and a striped snake whose presence is the reason for a container of mothballs on the table. I wish I had a camera.

Her back yard is her sanctuary. I find shelter in a chair that is snuggled by a palm plant and a family of pots – terra cotta, green plastic, clay, metal, and those invented out of found objects.

She is out there in the morning and in the late evening when the sun is less brutal than at mid-day.

I watched this evening as she cut down wandering vines and swept the patio clean. My father will have work to do tomorrow. I ask if I should put the cut greenery in the garden trash can.

“No,” she says.

“Mama, dad ain’t gonna like seeing this stuff on his fresh cut lawn,” I tell her.

She just replies with a chuckle that he needs to see all the work he should have done. She said he would never recognize her work if she didn’t leave the pile in the yard. She is right, of course. My father says she works too hard, but he enjoys the creation of vines structure and spirit as much as she does.

I listen as the water from the faucet trickles into a bucket she has slid under the attached hose.

“I don’t like to waste water,” she informs me and I take the bucket into her garden. The Marigolds did not get rain last night. They will thrive in their homes made of the holes in the cement blocks that line her rows of tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, and okra.

There is always work to do in this space my mother has created. This evening she wants to place hooks on the beams of her patio roof.

“Who does this when I am not here, Mama?” I ask with the answer already in my head.

“Oh, your dad,” she says. I know that she does not always have the patience to wait for him, though. Tonight, I make sure that she does not over exert herself and reach for the drill in her hand.

I step on the small, metal stool and place the drill over my head, reaching as high as I can. Three hooks later, we place the ferns and other potted plants just beneath the lattice covered with wild vines. She tells me that anyone from Alabama or Mississippi would know the name of the mass of greenery that hangs from the patio roof like a blanket of leaves. I tell her that I will ask Mary Anne about the vine which my mother thinks may be named Ms. Astor.

The night was closing fast around us, but I would not go in the house until my mother was trailing behind me. I knew that she could always find more work to do before calling it quits. She will be 70 years-old next January. She has more work in this life than she will ever finish.

“We’ll get the rest in the morning,” I tell her.

This week has been full of heart work. We have grieved the loss of her niece, my cousin. It has been a loss that has made our distance more regretful. Here, in her green world we seem to be finding our way back home to each other. We are two women working on reconciliation. Perhaps, we are planting new ways of being mother and daughter. I hope so, but do not invest too much time in expecting what the harvest of these days will bring. I am simply satisfied with the knowledge that we have planted something new between us here in her back yard even though there is more work for tomorrow.

-Angela Denise Davis

making a slight change in our lives

2010-06-08T19:11:00.000-07:00

this is a speech/presentation given by my heroine, a palestinian woman/mother who lives in a village in the south hebron hills and organizes women from six neighboring villages in a women’s co-operative. she is a leader and for me one of the most amazing organizers i have ever met. she is the woman who sparked my vision for revolutionary motherhood. her fierceness, perception, vision, sense of humor, and commitment to her community’s life is my inspiration.

(in this she mentions some of my favorite people from the village, hafez, nasser, her husband, and saber. these three men will always hold a special place in my heart for how much they taught me and supported me .)

shukran ktir to joy for posting this.

I want to speak to you about the position of the women in At-Tuwani village. First of all, women in this village suffer from very conservative cultural traditions. In regards to education, which is a right of women to have, unfortunately most of the women in At-Tuwani are illiterate. They have only managed to study through third grade. The role of the women is to work on the fields with the men and to have children and care for them. Five years ago, we gathered the women and decided we needed to make a slight change to our lives.

You should that know that women have rights and even though women’s rights have not been meet, we have decided to form a women’s cooperative. Even though, when we meet and decide what we wanted to do, we still had to consult with the men of the village. At first, they objected very strongly and they said, “Your role is just to care for your homes and your children, and to work in the fields.” We did not accept their rejection and therefore we had to think of activities to do, things that do not get in the way of the traditions and the culture that we live in. So we agreed, as most of the women are quite skilled in embroidery, even though they were not taught it but are skilled because many generations of tradition, we could use that as a starting point.

We came up with the idea of doing embroidery work to improve the economy of the village because of the settlers and the settlements around us and the way they confiscate our land and attack our homes and flocks. All of these was effecting the women of the village and our children. So we had to again bring it to the men of the village because of we had some support, but not a majority. The most important support for me was from my husband, Hafez, and Saber, the mayor of the village.

(…)

Now many girls are able to finish high school and there are three girls in university.

(…)

The women here feel that they have two types of nonviolent resistance: one is against the occupation and one about men. For example, at first the men objected to our work, but slowly they came to see it differently. I see this as our victory. We did it without posing difficulties or causing problems in family or separations in marriages. Gradually, the idea grew.

In terms of the rest of the village, another example of our nonviolent resistance is the building of the school. Initially, the Israeli government forbid it and the Israeli army was arresting the teachers as they were coming to build the school. Despite that, we continued with it. The teachers and the architect would work on the building in the evening and the women would work in the day to make the cement for the school. Whenever the military used to come to see if there were men working on the site, they would see only women. So, they would just pass by. First we built three classrooms. Then we built another nine and now our children have access to further education.

When the Israeli army said that the school was under demolition order, we said ,“Fine. You can do that. We will rebuild it.” The same happened with the mosque up the hill. They demolished it and we rebuilt it. The same thing happened when we built the clinic. The men would work at night when the army was not watching carefully and during the day the women would work.

Now we also have nonviolent resistance about electricity. When Tony Blaire visited Tuwani he said “We have to bring electricity to Tuwani.” The Israeli authorities informed Tony Blaire that it was not forbidden for them to get electricity. The electric company started to work to put up the pylons and the power lines, but then they were forced to stop and haven’t started again. On a winter day in December, we noticed that that was a lot of activity at the bottom of the road, while they were putting up the electric pylons. The whole village went down to the main road and saw that the army had brought bulldozers and police and everything necessary to take down the pylons. They said that they wanted to enter the rest of the village to take all of the pylons. The mayor of the village told us to block the road with stones. The military whenever they saw a man from the village wanting to speak with them, they were ready to arrest them. So the women said to the men, “You stay at home where you are so you are not arrested and we will go in front of the military and deal with them.” It was a very cold, rainy winter day. All of the women went down in front of the army jeeps, arm in arm, with our children in front of us, and forbid the army from entering the village. The commander order the soldiers to throw tear gas to frighten the women away. They were also revving the engines of the jeeps to scare us, but we said “We’re really cold! The warmth from the jeep is good!” Then they opened the door of the jeeps and we were surprised to see many female Israeli soldiers with their army gear. They were ordered to face the women of the village. The military women came towards us. They were ordered to start beating us. We said, “Come on! We’re ready! We’re not wearing the gear that you’re wearing. All we are asking for is our rights and all we are asking for is electricity.” One of the women soldiers guested to the commander, saying “No.” Then she returned for the jeep. The women of the started saying to woman soldiers, “Come, are you afraid? Are you afraid to talk with us? Come and talk with us!” But I said that I believe that they returned to the jeep because they knew what they were doing was wrong and that we weren’t asking for much. The soldiers took down two pylons but they weren’t able to enter the village to remove the rest of them. God willing, we will be continue our struggle to get electricity. Whether by solar power or by something else, we will continue

Poetry is Not a Luxury: The Remix (by School of Our Lorde Poetry Webinar Participants)

2010-06-05T06:00:00.001-07:00

www.summerofourlorde.wordpress.com

(Lex's wardrobe provided by Ammoliscious and sister-comrade Leah Burke)

I LOVE THE SCHOOL OF OUR LORDE WEBINARS!!!!!!

After reading and discussing Audre Lorde's "Poetry is Not a Luxury" the participants in the School of Our Lorde Poetry Webinar collaboratively created these two poems about what poetry IS and what it IS NOT!!!! Much love to Monchel, Chantal, Rosa and Leana for being badass cyber cypher warriors!!!!

not

poetry is not a mask

poetry is not a commercial

poetry is not homogeneous

poetry is not an excuse

poetry is not perverse

poetry is not linear

poetry is not just for white guys with nothing better to do

poetry is not canonized

not a classroom unit

poetry is not a bunch/of line breaks/in random/places

not a grade

poetry is not taught or learned--it's the language we were born with

not death without a birth

poetry is not inhibited

poetry is not brought to you by hallmark

a competition

poetry [will] not be televised

not a "10"

poetry is not about meter

poetry is not an accessory in a psuedo-revolutionary lifestyle

poetry is not oppressive

poetry is not convenient

poetry is not always easy

poetry is not boxable

not a bindi on a dreadlocked white girl's forehead at a powwow

poetry is not the destination -- it is the journey

poetry is not standard english

poetry is not patchouli

is

poetry is my son's smile

my fingers walking across his belly and squirming back

poetry is a heartbeat

yes

poetry is what i say to my reflection when i think no one is listening

poetry is a place to live

poetry is goosebumps!

poetry is breath

poetry is prayer

poetry is a breath of fresh air

poetry is italian ice on a 90-degree day

lol

poetry is your hand in mine

poetry is laughing out loud :P

hee!

poetry is an ecosystem

YES

poetry is painful but not in vain

poetry is a lifeline

poetry is family

poetry is an open heart

poetry is a safe space

poetry is knowing when you've met The One (or The Ones)

poetry is an exorcism

poetry is jabberwocky

poetry is knowing when you've met yourself

poetry is a new spelling of my name and everything else

poetry is the sound of sitting still

the sounds of getting up

poetry is raw

sdrawkcab si yrteop

poetry is forwards

poetry is a yes followed by an oh yes!

poetry is circular

poetry is everpresent

poetry is old

is silent when we're not listening, but still persistently there

poetry is about to happen

poetry is our only hope

poetry is wanted and feared

poetry is your skin knitting itself back together

poetry is omnipresent

poetry is an open door

this language is beautiful

poetry is love

poetry is stinky funky lust

poetry is knowing when to stop

and start again

poetry is what makes you say "aww" when you see a little kid

poetry is putting into words what had no words before

poetry is putting into words what never existed before

poetry is what my heart is saying to my hand

poetry is constantly naming what is so it doesn't get lost

poetry is mothering myself

poetry is how my mom calls my cell phone whenever i say (or type) the word “mother”

poetry is calling for my attention

to join the School of Our Lorde Poetry Webinar email brokenbeautifulpress@gmail.com

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: Don't Leave Your Friends Behind #4

2010-05-12T11:17:00.001-07:00

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS:

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind a Handbook for Radical Parenting Allies

Deadline: September 15, 2010!

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind is a book geared toward the non-parent radical community about how to be an ally to the parent(s) in their midst.

This book is going to be a collection of some of the best minds out there. We're looking for activists, allies, and radical parents to submit the most kicking stuff to make this the best book ever for getting down to business: let's make a better world WITHOUT leaving out the mamas (and papas, partners, child-care providers) and children this time!

We want to know how you do support children and their caretakers in your collectives, organizations or communities.

Parents: What concrete things can those around you do to support you and your family? Send us your list of suggestions!

Radical Childcare Collectives: What are your concrete tips on how you organize with your collective? How do you organize childcare?

We are especially interested in experiences that also take into account factors such as race, class, gender, single parenthood, immigration, disability, and/or mental health issues.

Word limit is from one sentence suggestions to 5.000 word essays.

E-mail questions and submissions to:

china410 at hotmail.com

vikkimL at yahoo.com

For more information about Don't Leave Your Friends Behind, including links to download past issues, go to

http://dontleaveyourfriendsbehind.blogspot.com

Deadline for Zine #4: Sept. 15, 2010

Issue #3 of Don't Leave Your Friends Behind!

2010-04-29T06:52:00.000-07:00

Issue #3 of Don't Leave Your Friends Behind is finished!!

41 pages of ways to support families in radical and social justice movements, including:

organizing the Kids' Track at the Allied Media Conference
a group interview with Revolutionary Motherhood's own Noemi Martinez, Fabiola Sandoval and Maegan "La Mala" Ortiz on supporting single mothers of color
an interview with Diana Block on raising children while underground
what other organizers can learn from La Leche League
Kidz' City!
holistic first aid for all ages
babyproofing for punks

and much much more!

We made a PDF to better share it, so you can print, and distribute as you like: ithttp://issuu.com/strongwindsahead/docs/don_tleaveyourfriendsbehindzine3.bw.final

If you want a paper copy sent to you, please send $3 (or $5 for two and give the second to an ally in your life!) to:

V. Law
PO Box 20388
Tompkins Square Station
New York, NY 10009

Apply for the School of Our Lorde Poetics Unit by January 25th!: Available in Durham and the Diaspora!

2010-01-05T08:56:00.001-08:00

The School of Our Lorde is comprised of 4 units of Thursday evening sessions that allow participants to deeply engage and build on the work of Audre Lorde as transmitted through the committed (obsessive) research of Alexis Pauline Gumbs on the poetics, teaching practices, political implications and publishing interventions of Audre Lorde’s work (and to enjoy delicious local desserts together) on Thursday evenings. Participants will also get coursepacks with some exclusive and unpublished materials on/by Lorde. Participants can choose to participate in one 3 week semester or the entire 4 month process. Engaging, interactive poetic childcare will be provided at every session with amazing activities imagined with and implemented by Beth Bruch!!!! No one who completes an application and can attend will be turned away.

February 2010: Poetics ****Applications Due January 25th 2010****

Poetics: Audre Lorde is best known as a warrior poet. In February, School of Our Lorde participants will get a change to deeply engage Lorde’s poetry (with the benefit of Lex’s archival research on her revisions) and write their own poetry. We will meet over dessert on Thursday February 4th, 11th and 18th (Audre’s b-day!!!!) and the poets will perform their own new or transformed work at a community reading on Saturday February 20th.

Apply for the poetics course here: School of Our Lorde Poetics Application (pdf version)

School of Our Lorde Poetics Application

email applications to brokenbeautifulpress@gmail.com or drop them off at the Inspiration Station (email for directions)

Distance Learning

For those of you who are not lucky enough to live in Durham, NC right now...don't worry. Audre Lorde and I both believe in long-distance love.

You can participate in the School of Our Lorde long-distance in 3 ways:

Host Your Own Satellite Campus!:

Why not have School of Our Lorde at your organization or in YOUR living room!? If you can gather 5 or more people to participate in any unit you can get a course packet with the course readings and worksheets to guide you through each session. You can also participate (along with other satellite campuses) in a monthly interactive BrightTalk session and office hours on LiveStream.

Our vision is that each Satellite Campus will be able to make a sliding scale contribution of $75-200 per unit. No group will be turned away.

To become a host, email brokenbeautifulpress@gmail.com with what session you'd like to host and your vision!

Independent Study:

Let us know how the School of Our Lorde poetics, pedagogy, politics of publishing process can support something you are working on with/for your community. You will get a course packet and worksheets. You can also participate (along with other satellite campuses) in a monthly interactive BrightTalk session and office hours on LiveStream.

Fill out the application for the appropriate unit here: http://summerofourlorde.wordpress.com/registration/

and get 7 people to financially support your participation. Our hope is that each independent student will raise between $50-150 to contribute to the School of Our Lorde. No one will be turned away!

Lorde as Our Witness:

You can participate in the School of our Lorde through this blog. There will be weekly video blog updates and reflections from the local participants and you can always post comments and questions here and I'll respond. Feel free to spread the good news in your community so one day you can host a School of Our Lorde institute where you live!

AZ Sheriff Joe Arpaio Forces Woman to Give Birth While Shackled

2009-11-30T10:17:00.001-08:00

The news team for Telemundo 52 recently reported on Alma Minerva Chacon, a women who was terrorized by Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Unfortunately, she is just the latest in a long line of Latinos who have suffered at the hands of the ruthless Sheriff whose personal goal is to rid Arizona of all "illegals" and just maybe, all Latinos. Arpaio has repeatedly stated that he is breaking no laws and just enforcing the constitution by arresting more than 600 Latinos a year. But the problem with his tactics is that less than half of those arrested are even in this country illegally.

The most recent atrocity committed by the self-proclaimed "America's Toughest Sheriff" involves a woman who was detained while 9-months pregnant. Alma Minerva Chacon's case has been receiving media attention due to the brutality with which she was treated. The very same night of her arrest, Chacon went into labor and found herself afraid and alone, being rushed to a local hospital with her hands and legs chained in shackles.

Once she reached the hospital, nurses repeatedly begged the Sheriff's staff to allow them to unchain the mother, but they refused and Chacon was forced to give birth while still shackled to the bed. At one point, the nurse asked for them to release her so that she could be escorted to the bathroom for a urinalysis, but even that request was denied. But the worst came once Chacon gave birth to her baby girl.

Still chained to the bed, Arpaio's police staff refused to allow Chacon to hold her newborn baby and then warned her that if no one came to pick up the child within 72 hours, she would be turned over into state custody. Telemundo 52 sat down with Chacon and let her tell her side of the story.

Check out the interview here and if you don't support Sheriff Arpaio's barbaric practices sign the petition at www.SheriffJoeMustGo.com

Be Bold Be Re(a)d: The Podcast

2009-10-29T20:51:00.000-07:00

3 years ago women of color came together and transformed what it meant to transform terror on Halloween, declaring October 31st Be Bold Be Red Day, a day for women of color and allies to speak out against violence against women. And 30 years ago women of color came together to respond to violence in the same critical and poetic spirit.

Towards the world the we all deserve, fully transformed from the misogyny and internalized racism we face in popular music to the frightening expendability of the lives and bodies of women of color this podcast places the brave voices of women telling the truth about gendered violence over the remixed sounds of Miles Davis. This year we take every sound back, starting with our own voices and the background that seeks to silence them.

Listen with your community, your class, your friends, your study group, your church, your crew, pass the link on or listen by yourself and see, hear and wear red.

listen here

[audio http://brokenbeautiful.wordpress.com/files/2009/10/real-be-bold-be-red-podcast.mp3]

or download here: http://brokenbeautiful.wordpress.com/files/2009/10/real-be-bold-be-red-podcast.mp3

the divine survivors clinic

2009-08-31T00:36:00.000-07:00

welcome to the divine survivors clinic!

my name is mai’a.

i am offering free reiki treatments to us– the lovers, the fighters, and the survivors. a way to reduce pain, cleanse and strengthen the body, balance the emotions and experience more clarity and vitality in our lives.

the divine survivors clinic began as a vision i had at dawn listening to the fajr call to prayer.

i have seen that many of us as doing amazing life-changing work and yet suffer from long terms and short term illnesses. we do not have the time, money, energy to eat well, laugh, meditate, move, and mother ourselves. we live on the edges of society, enduring and resisting with every breath, the various and connected forms of violence.

reiki is a specific frequency or wave of energy. i tune into this energy. connect with your mind and body (no matter where you are in the world). and then reiki vibrates throughout your being. allowing you to relax, de-stress, and transmutate toxins in the body.

selah.

The quality of light by which we scrutinize our lives has direct bearing upon the product which we live, and upon the changes which we hope to bring about through those lives.
–Audre Lorde

* is a safe, gentle, non-physical healing practice that reduces stress and promotes relaxation and transformation of all kind of ailments and disease.
* can never act harmfully.
* is not controlled by the practitioner, but by the needs of recipient’s bodymind.
* is not limited by time nor space. and thus can be activated across distances and times, allowing us to commune across oceans, heal the past and create a joyous future.
* transforms toxins and illness in the physical, emotional, and psychological systems.
* is not a religion and belief in reiki is not necessary for it to work.

Eternal Summer of the Black Feminist Mind Podcast!

2009-08-12T05:08:00.000-07:00

Check out this FIRST EVER PODCAST as part of the BrokenBeautiful Press educational campaign "Eternal Summer of the Black Feminist Mind." Black Feminism LIVES by every means necessary.

What does it take to survive a year like 1979?

This first podcast is about the year 1979 and how the world, and black feminism began and ended in some crucial ways that year. With the election of Ronald Reagan, the Boston Murders, the Atlanta Child Murders and the Greensboro Massacre all attacking the the lives, minds and spirits of black women 1979 was a crucial year. This podcast focuses on how Audre Lorde, Alexis DeVeaux, June Jordan and Barbara Smith reach(ed) across time and space to transform the meaning of survival. (And there is some good period appropriate and anachronistic music too!)

[audio http://brokenbeautiful.wordpress.com/files/2009/08/1979.m4a]

download to your itunes here:
http://brokenbeautiful.wordpress.com/files/2009/08/1979.m4a

Please leave comments here!

p.s. Sorry about the moments of outburst distortion. A sista is clearly super exuberantly excited about black feminism and promises to stay a little further away from the mic on podcast number two! :)

Mami Vs. Mommy, Mami’hood vs Motherhood

2009-08-10T04:21:00.000-07:00

Mami Vs. Mommy, Mami’hood vs Motherhood

from mamita mala

Hermana, Resist Says:

Like seriously, I’m supposed to explain to someone who doesn’t even get what the difference between Mami and Mommy means, I’m supposed to explain sanewhy my form of media is valid in their movement? I’m supposed to try to sell you on my career?

What career? This is my life, my kids life, our sanity.
And for the record, no we don’t start or “media” after we get funded and no we don’t start working on “media” when we’re up for a sabbatical. No we don’t start any “movement” after our grant gets accepted. Some money might come along the way, some one will donate $10 or $50 or someone gets a scholarship to attend a conference that’ll be critiqued the hell outa.

It gets tiring having to explain Mami vs mommy, mother, mom. I probably shouldn’t frame it as a vs. cuz it’s not like mommy media makers, mom 2.0′ers and mamis are fighting each other. Most of the time we’re ignoring each other. I can’t say exactly why the moms/mommies/mothers ignore radical mami’s of color, especially us single media maker ones, like when at the Women’s Equity Media Summit I had to ask that Mommy be changed to Mami up on the paper in the front of the room, or like when I after I explained why mami (Mami based in my Latina/WOC identity, based in the hypersexualization or the diminishing of my sexuality, based because my mami’hood is a fucking community that I am working every damn moment to create and live in not some marketing tool or playdate), the woman walked away and gave two other mamis and me her back.

“Guess she’s not a mami” one of us said shrugging.

When the two other mamis and I came up with lists, words, stanzas and lyrics about who/what we were (cuz we have a long ass history that Ms. China Martens is gonna help me document by coming to casa mala so I can write ::wink wink::), the people in the room of that Women’s Equity Media Summit fucking cheered. These were some of the ideas that came out of the mami conversations.

Pero when the applause and the patting on the back stops, when the one on one conversations in corners that amount to nothing but some white mujer telling us thanks for doing/saying the things I’m too lazy/privileged to be bothered, where is the support or the “resourcing” that women media makers are supposed to be doing?

Not that we’re holding our breath or anything. When I ignore you, fail to link to you, not attend your conference, think about why.

aniysah

2009-08-10T04:19:00.000-07:00

Crossposted from VivirLatino

Women of color are not paranoid when we say that we fear our children being taken away. It happens all too often.

It happens again and again:

On March 3rd, 2009 six year old Aniysah was taken from her mother’s arms and thrown into a legal shuffle of unaccountability, instability and discrimination. There were no records verifying that she would be taken to a safe living environment or that she was enrolled in school. Questions about her health and well-being went unanswered. That was 150 days ago. To date, Aniysah remains lost in the legal system. A system where black and brown children go missing everyday. A system where black mothers like Aniysah’s are often left to fend for themselves in a brutal, dogged battle just to make sure their children are safe.

It’s time to hold the legal system accountable. Document the Silence asks that you join them in the “Where’s Aniysah?” campaign by posting information about this case on your blogs, online social networks and throughout your community. You can find out more about this campaign to stand against injustices against our children in the legal system by visiting the Document the Silence website .

Where’s Aniysah? What you can do!

* Show up! – Are you going to be in the NYcity area August 24th? Come to Aniysah’s court date and show the judge and the law guardian you care! Even if you can’t make it, invite your friends who can! there’s an attachment below that you can copy and send to your folks! The deets:The next court date is August 24th, 2009 at 11AM and the address is :
IDV Part
Courtroom E-123, Annex Building
Justice Fernando M. Camacho
Queens County IDV Court,
Queens County Supreme Court
Criminal Term 125-01 Queens Blvd
Kew Gardens, New York 11415

* Spread the word!- send this website out to everyone you know. tell them why this is important. post to your facebook account. forward on your many list serves. post Aniysah’s mom youtube clip on your facebook page. write a blog about her story. email everyone you know and don’t know.

* Speak up! – do you know of other children of color who have been lost in the legal shuffle? Let’s document the silence of court sanctioned kidnapping that is happening to black and brown women and children across the country! email us at beboldbered@gmail.com and we will add your story to the website.

motherful

2009-08-10T04:16:00.000-07:00

cross posted from littleblackbook

"The Silent Revolution of the Domestic Worker" Nikki Giovanni, 1975
"Throughly Black Feminism" interview with Barbara Smith, 1983
"An Interview with Audre Lorde," Joseph Beam, 1984
It's A Family Affair: The Real Live of Black Single Mothers, Barbara Omolade, 1986 (Kitchen Table Press, Freedom Organizing Series #4)
"Adolescent Pregnancy: The Perspective of the Sisterhood of Black Single Mothers, Khadijah Matin, 1986
"A Press of Our Own: Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press" Barbara Smith, 1989
"Knowing the Danger and Going There Anyway," Cheryl Clarke, 1990
"Brother to Brother: An Interview with Essex Hemphill," 1991
The Black Back Ups, Kate Rushin, 1993
"The Fight is for Political and Economic Justice," Barbara Smith, 1998
"Transferences and Confluences: Black Poetics, the Black Arts Movement and Black Lesbian-Feminism, Cheryl Clarke, 1999
Erasure, Percival Everett, 2001
Erzulie's Skirt, Ana-Maurine Lara, 2006
The Fullness of Everything, Patricia Powell, 2009
"Reproductive Technology, Family Law, and the Postwelfare State: The California Same-Sex Parents' Rights "Victories" of 2005", Anna Marie Smith, 2009
"Race, Gender and Genetic Technologies: A New Reproductive Dystopia?" Dorothy E. Roberts, 2009

In the 1970's and 80's the Sisterhood of Black Single Mothers, an organization created by and for black single mothers, answered the media blitz, and intra-racial debates about the pathology of the "fatherless" home with a poetic question that reframed everything. Fatherless? They ask, Why not Motherful?

Brilliant brilliant brilliant. That one question is also followed up by their innovative programming and their creation of community support systems led by black single mothers, and black single fathers who were inspired by their model! Refusing to define black single mothers, regardless of age as a void, a source of darkness and the end of the world (as people sitting in congress and on war on poverty turned welfare reform boards were indeed insisting) this group of black single mothers made a poetic space for the obvious truth. Black single mother's themselves are the greatest resource for black female-led families. Only a black single mother knows what a black single mother needs. Black single mothers are experts. Act like you know America.

In a moment (right now) where CNN and Essence Magazine (ala Marry Your BabyDaddy Day!!!!) and black radio (Micheal Baisden just said the other day that "real women" need to step back and let a "real man" lead in their families. Yesterday!!! On August 4th 2009) are still selling the narrative that a black woman is incomplete without a patriarchal structure I want to raise the question again. Why not Motherful?

But actually I know why. Corporate media cannot acknowledge the fullness that single mothers, young mothers, mothers of color, co-mothers, grandmothers bring to our families because consumer capitalism is NOT HAVING IT!!! If we acknowledged that young, queer, poor, working-class, disabled, single, and racialized mothers are perfectly good at love and perfectly brilliant at supporting and sustaining life even if (or especially) they decide NOT to be bullied into a c-section by know-it-all doctors, how on earth would we get oppressed people to buy so much stuff despite their negligible disposable income? How would we get people to feel so inadequate about their their whatever"lessness" maybe it's "worthlessness" that they give up on the messy delicious sustenance of honest relationships between people and turn to the refuge of value by proxy...buying cool stuff. Because my people aren't dumb you know...and the only way you get brilliant people to act competely in opposition to their own interests is through a concerted effort to trample their self-esteem and believe that they will be loved. Why would maybeline et.al pay Essence Magazine so much for their adspace if black women were not killing themselves trying to be straight, bouncy and clean enough for some perpetual marriage without which their life means nothing?

No no no. Motherful is dangerous, like the fulness of the erotic, like "no mirrors in my nana's house," like telling little black girls that they are smart. You know...free stuff. Danger us.

And of course the state doesn't want no Motherful propaganda neither. No way. Even though it would totally save billions of dollars to support single poor and working mothers in their efforts to sustain their families instead of pathologizing them for not being able to do the impossible perfectly every second and just waiting with drool and glee to take their children away...just waiting with glee to lock their children up for childlike misjudgements, just licking its lips to the tune of fatherless....the state knows the danger of a motherful household.

What would it look like housesful of mothers, biological and chosen mothers, co-mothers, and mothers from next-door raising amazing children together. Proving the fact that marginalized, young, mothers of color can do anything together...imagine them proving that...right in front of the children. You might get a whole generation of children who are not supposed to be powerful who believe that they are. A whole set of mothers who organize to build and support education and free food and free healthcare in their communities. A whole generation of folks who realize that the state needs them more than they need it and that they are in charge. Nope. They don't want that.

Beware the motherful household.

And the certainly don't want young brothers and sisters like me and my siblings walking around proclaiming proudly that every thing we accomplish with our brazen badass brilliant selves was enabled by the fact that we were raised in a motherful household.

Nope. They don't want no Motherful propaganda.

I guess I have some t-shirts to make.

my mamas words

2009-08-10T04:14:00.000-07:00

cross posted from fabmexicana

She used to tell me “Mija, vete de aqui” to leave from the States for a couple years to college. She tried to connect me with an aunt in Morelia, but then she (my mom) became terminally ill. In my 16 year-old perception she did this to expand my world outside of Los Angeles, she specifically pushed Morelia, Mexico City, and Guadalajara (where I had a distant family member and she was Mexican so yea) for me to want actual wings before getting too established after being in one city for too long and doing the college thing to the eventual j-o-b, a car note, a serious relationship, and/or a baby.

She passed away in between her worldly wisdom and advise to my 16 year-old mind and I became pseudo-momma for younger bro. Leaving to Mexico or anywhere over 20 miles from here only happened in dreams and books.

Then when I had a sliver of opportunity (after college) I fell in love hard (like the kind that Mexican ballads sing about) and had a child (pretty quickly) in my early 20s. That married me to L.A. and separation in my mid 20s with active other parent, sealed my marriage to the city for the long haul. You blend with facts and make the best of your choices and the circumstances that come with the package. So what do have, roots that dig too dip, intimate ties to L.A., a pride that freaks nomadic types and solid relationships in such a grand city and your world narrows to the boundaries of it. That’s most of the world you’ve known.

I leave through words and vicarioulsy by those that do say goodbye and on occasion I do escape for short periods of time. I send her kisses and remember her words, I’ll share them with my nena and with others.

She got it though and so I told my good friend this morning, chica vete (leave) as she contemplates to leave or to stay. Home will always be home. Your roots here can only get stronger. We are nomadic by nature, set roots elsewhere do it while you can.*

I became “mi mama” for a second, she was a wise woman. I cherish my homebody L.A. ways but her words echo in my mind, and so I’ll repeat what she saw as a woman who left Mexico when she was 28, my age, a single woman. She was fierce.

*I understand if this appears condescending and valuing leaving over staying. Things are never black vs. white. Never, neither is this entry. But I take ownership for the slant, any questions please feel free to comment or e-mail me.

mommyhood versus mamihood

2009-08-10T04:11:00.000-07:00

cross posted from flip flopping joy

I was going to leave this comment on this thread here at feministe (where the totally rawking Plain’s Feminist is guest blogging!)–but I felt like it got too ranty and long and not connected to the actual point of the post, even though it was in a way.

first comment for context:

I was at a conference just a bit ago, and although daycare was provided for the kids, it was clearly marked in the itinerary when children were “allowed” into the big people room–and my kid–who is an older kid, was bullied by one of the conference organizers. I almost left, but other mothers stood by me and we confronted the situation together. But new mothers who are BF aren’t going to go to that space because the “rules” state kids can only be in the space during X times. And this was a feminist space. So if a woman isn’t working for pay and decides to organize instead so that she can get that emotional and intellectual stimulation–what is she supposed to do when she is treated to such unfriendly and hostile spaces like that?

I mean, that feminist space was telling mothers, you’re only wanted here if you make your child and your motherhood as invisible as possible–*we* don’t want anything to do with your motherhood. Which helps to create that “you must be a super mom” mentality, even as feminism is *saying* it’s critiquing it. When a woman isn’t even welcome in feminist spaces what other choice does she have but to sit and stare at her child all day and try not to eat her own tongue from boredom?

second comment that I didn’t post at Feministe:

btw, that feminist space was created by largely white feminists and the feminist who bullied my kid was white. the women who stood by me and said let’s fix this and we’ll walk out if we need to were women of color–some mamis and others not–but all with the analysis that mamihood (rather than mommyhood) is not just left at the door when you walk into a room. That the “real” work of feminist organizing happens when a single mami knows that her child is supported and loved and looked after by everybody in the room, not just her.

Another example: at that conference, the childcare shut down earlier than what I was expecting it to. I didn’t have my phone on, so although the childcare place called me repeatedly, I never got the message. I wasn’t aware ANYTHING was going on until I was walking down the street to go pick up my kids from the childcare and women of color (mamis and non-mamis) were walking towards me with my kids–the women took my kids and were in the process of finding food for everybody.

When I thanked the other women profusely, they all said ‘no big deal, you’d do the same for me.’ and one of the woman without children sort of looked at me like I was crazy and asked “are you kidding me? what would I have done, left them there?” The thought of NOT being responsible to my kids was offensive to her.

Which makes me wonder if that’s why the divide between working and stay at home mamis is just not the same as it is between mainstream largely white moms. When the borders between different spheres in your life aren’t so harshly drawn, it makes less sense for certain women to be isolated from the community.

One of the women in that group is a woman that I call the mother of my children. She has made the choice to take on the role of caretaker and coparent of my children. She has not had biological children, she is partnered to somebody else, but we raise my children together. I have this relationship with two other women of color in my community.

when the core idea of what “woman” is is challenged repeatedly, it makes less sense to say, you had the child, raise it yourself. when the core idea of what “mom” is is challenged repeatedly, it makes less sense to say, you had the child, raise it yourself. when the core idea of what “partnered” is is challenged repeatedly, it makes less sense to say, you had the child, raise it yourself. when “sexuality” and what it is and what it can lead to is constantly challenged, it makes less and less sense to say, you had the child, raise it yourself.

Every mami, every mommy, should be able to feel the feeling that I felt when I saw my kids laughing and joking along in the group of other women/mamis. And I guess the point for me is that books, no matter how good, are not going to teach us all how to build a community where children are being raised collectively–not because of kumbaya dreams that everybody is a parent–but because of practical reality that children are a part of our communities and we owe accountability to them, just as we insist that they are accountable to us.

Learning how to raise children collectively is only going to come through actually doing the work of learning how to trust again–how many people in your life do you know and trust enough to help you raise your children–even if they aren’t the biological parent who is living with you and legally partnered with you?– And by pointing at the *real* problem, which is not so much that AP’ing is stifling and obscene on so many levels (holy jesus, it is)–but that collectively in the U.S., we have no fucking idea what “community” means–but at the same time, we all seem to think that deciding who will stay hidden within the community isn’t one very powerful and violent way of deciding what community really is.

Gospel: Body, Deviance and Soul

2009-05-20T04:14:00.000-07:00

Greetings Fam,

Check out my review of Samiya Bashir's new book of poetry from independent black gay and lesbian publishing company RedBone Press. Here is an excerpt, please read the full review and join the conversation at Blackademics.org

love,

lex
If the body is a sacred manifestation of spirit in it’s full expression of the vibration of song and the sensation of life, what do the legal, medical and social limits we place on our bodies cost us?

“Topographic Shifts” which gracefully and painfully describes the amputation or “correction” of a baby girl born with twelve fingers and twelve toes, raises key questions as it forces us to imagine the pain of dismemberment without consent.

How is it done-
Remolding body into
Image of body?

Reminding us of Lucille Clifton’s extra digits, which haunt her writing hands like phantom antennae, this poem asks the reader to confront the ethical dilemma of the difference between how the body actually manifests, and the “image of body” what we want it to be. The poem ends with an ironic cliché that uses shallow words of comfort to disturb the reader. After detailing the process of using ether and string and scissors to “…rip. Root. Cauterize.” the “offending” or “wasteful” extra limbs of the newborn, the narrator comments that

This condition
is more common
than you’d think.

If the “condition” is “common” then what is the purpose of the violent imposition of conformity on the body of a baby? What does it mean for your body to be “wrong” from the moment you enter the world? What does it mean when we redefine our own bodies, in their natural diversity, as “offending” and “wasteful”? Whose bodies are usually marked as offending and wasteful? Is this not a question of race and class? Whose genitals are modified by doctors hoping to cure ambiguity in the birthing room? Is this not a question of gender and sexuality?

Speak Listening Party in Brooklyn! Benefit for Radical Mamis!

2009-05-15T08:54:00.001-07:00

Forget Hallmark: Why Mother's Day is a Queer Black Left Feminist Thing

2009-05-07T07:54:00.000-07:00

The Anti-Social Family by Michele Barrett and Mary McIntosh (1982)
Fear of a Queer Planet ed. Micheal Warner (1999)
Aberrations in Black: Towards a Queer of Color Critique by Roderick Ferguson (2004)
"Of Our Normative Strivings: African American Studies and the Histories of Sexuality" by Roderick Ferguson (2005)
"Queerness as Horizon: Utopian Hermeneutics in the Face of Gay Pragmatism" by Jose E. Munoz (2007)
"A 'New Freedom Movement of Negro Women': Sojourning for Truth, Justice, and Human Rights during the Early Cold War" by Erik S. McDuffie (2008)
Blood Dazzler by Patricia Smith (2008)
Something Like Beautiful: One Single Mother's Story by Asha Bandele (2009)*

My mother is black. So the means through which I was produced is a matter of national instability. My mother is black. So the trace of slavery waits every moment to ink my body with meaninglessness. My mother is black. So my living is a question of whether or not racism will be reproduced today. My mother is black. This same piece of information threatens my survival. But my mother is black, which is at the same time the only thing that makes my survival possible.

It's early morning. I am a little bit drunk on the sound of rain, but it occurs to me that I should get (you) ready for mother's day. It is very easy to notice that I am obsessed with mothering and mothers. Mother is the single most interesting and confusing word that I know. Next to black.

And here comes mother's day. For me, this year mother's day means a million things. Expectancy, fear, obligation, inspiration, joy, admiration, deep reflection. A few weeks ago my mother told me that she thinks I will be "such a great mother." It struck me that while I have always dreamed of becoming a mother, and intended to become a mother, it still comes as a surprise when anyone affirms that it is something that I can do, SHOULD do even. Because I live in a culture that criminalizes black mothers for creating and loving black children, a culture that criminalizes black kids for being born. And latino kids too. I have been taught that mothering is something that happens to you, and you deal with it, and fight for it, swallowing down shame and living with the threat that the state wants nothing more than to take your kids away from you in every way imaginable.

But it is not my mother who taught me that. My mother repeats again and again that mothering us is her greatest accomplishment, like asha, mothering is her enduring joy and triumph despite everything. And trust, she has other great accomplishments. My mother, not through perfection, not through ease, but through sincere struggle, intense and sometimes even overwhelming love taught us something in her very being. My sister (now an ambitious account exec in New York) once confessed to me that though it might seem unfeminist, the only thing she really cared about, the one thing that she knew she wanted to do for sure in life was to be a good mother. And I told her what I more recently wrote in a poem to one of my feminist theory students, who blessed us by bringing her daughter to class, "mothering is the most feminist act of all." My mother, like every black mother, has been slandered. But we know a lie when we see it. My brother wanted to punch every producer of CNN's disgusting "Black in America" series for daring to suggest that being raised by a black mother was the key liability destroying the life chances of black people. How dare they? How dare they? When our black mother is the only reason we know how to breathe and survive despite the toxic racism filling this world. How dare they?

It is no mystery why it is a cultural truth that talking about a black person's mother is a great way to unleash a universe of anger. Our mothers are slandered every single second of every single day. The media does it like it's its job. And indeed it is.

And here is the risk. All this talk of mothering, all this affirmation and priviliging of mothering puts me at risk, not only in a mainstream narrative working to reproduce a nation built on racial hate and genocide, but also on the academic queer left. It is not very queer of me to keep talking about my mother this way. In fact (as Micheal Warner suggests) the only queer way for a black person to talk about a mother is the "irony" of the house mother in black gay ball culture. CNN is dead to me. The deeper betrayal is that queer studies participates in the slander of the black mother, agreeing with the story that says she should not exist.

Has Warner not considered (as Cathy Cohen makes very clear in Punks, Bulldaggers and Welfare Queens) that black mothering is already a queer thing? Because we were never meant to survive. So the Queen Mother in the house movement is not just throwing shade, the queen is doing the necessary work of mothering. Of saying these bodies black and queer almost to redundancy, these spirits that every facet of our society would seek to destroy, MUST survive and WILL transform the meaning of life whether you like it or not. That is what a black mother does. Sincerely. No irony. It is no joke.

So this week I have been picking a bone with a queer theory narrative that sees mothering as the least radical thing one can do, in so much that it becomes irrelevant to the majority of the discourse on queerness. Clearly, like Moynihan, they don't know my mother. Asserting that the labor of mothering is always in collaboration with the a reproductive narrative, reproducing heteronormativity ignores the fact there has been a national consensus for centuries that black people should not be able to mother and every force, from coercive sterlization, to the dismantling of welfare has been mobilized to try to keep them from doing it. Where has dominant (read white) queer theory been while politicians have been ranting and raving about how welfare queens, (which despite the actual statistics becomes a code name for poor and racialized mothers) are going to destroy civilization as we know it by not only creating black surplus children, but by influencing these children with their deviant and risky and scary behavior? And isn't this the organizing desire of queer theory....to destroy civilization as we know it?

I just wish everyone would listen to Cathy Cohen (who by the way is a black co-mother to a beautiful fierce black girl-child) so I wouldn't have to stand here screaming (or more accurately sit here taking, deconstructing and rebuilding the premises of queer theory all week long). But here is the quick and dirty of it...mainstream queer theory as inaugurated by Warner's edited volume and influenced by a Marxist feminst tradition of critiquing the heteropatriarchal family as a complicit force in the reproduction of capitalist oppression throw the black babies out with the bathwater of their universalism. The "tyranny of motherhood" as described by Barrett and McIntosh does not leave room for those other deployments of "mother" and "hood" (excuse me "inner-city") in the American vernacular of culture of poverty discourse.

This is why Hortense Spillers should be required and repeated reading for queer theorists. Four words. Mama's Baby Papa's Maybe. Which means there is no reason that the act of mothering would reproduce patriarchy, or even take place within the confines of patriarchy along normative lines because the practice of American slavery has so fundamentally ripped the work of mothering from the bodies of black mothers (forcing them to do the labor of mothering for white and black children while fully denying them any of the authority of motherhood by killing and selling away and raping and mutilating their biological children and their chosen kin. (I have posted here before about my discovery, while reading slave code, that even a free black mother had no legal right to defend an enslaved daughter from abuse by a slave master.)

The complexity of the term mother (next to black) requires a queer theory that deuniversalizes race and highlights the function of racism in reproducing the heteropatriarcal status quo. Cathy Cohen, Roderick Ferguson and Jose Munoz do this work of reminding us that Third World Feminism and the Third World Gay Liberation movement are an alternative starting point (contemporary with the Marxist feminist arguments that Warner's version of queer theory inherits). Their work is crucial because it says something very obvious. We are people of color. The whole system wakes up every day trying to exterminate our bodies and our spirits. Our very survival is queer.

We were never meant to survive, and if mothers are part of why we are here (and they are), then they are the queerest of us all. But this is not even news. If we remember what black women have been up to in the United States we can just go ahead and let go of the assumption that mothering is conservative or that conserving and nurturing the lives of black children has ever had any validated place in the official American political spectrum.

Eslanda Robeson
Charlotta Bass
Shirley Graham Du Bois
Mary Church Terell
Maude White Katz

Take the fierce black women writers, mothers, publishers, actresses, activists
who would become the Sojourners for Truth and Justice and their work starting in the 1940's to protest the imprisonment of Rosa Lee Ingram, a black mother who was sentenced to death for standing up for herself, and defending herself against a white man who tried to rape her. It was black women activists who changed her sentence to life in prison and then eventually (after 12 years of incarceration) got her released from prison. And always, always the key word in their organizing strategy was "mother." Their understanding of Ingram who was willing to fight to keep this violent man away from her body and away from her children, epitomized the term "mother" for this set of black woman revolutionaries. They framed the state's violence against Ingram as a violence against black mothering itself. How dare this black woman take a stance against rape. Standing against rape is a mothering act. How dare she threaten the perceived truth about what happens to black people, that black bodies are infinitely rapeable. How dare she stand ferocious, daring and teaching. This is what will happen to you if you come at me. This is the act of mothering that mobilized a national movement, black women gathered twenty-five thousands signatures for a petition in 1949...way before the era of the text message e-blast petition. They made it an international human rights issue, contacting every single member nation of the UN. And I need you to know this, remember this if you remember nothing else:

On Mother's Day, exactly 60 years ago the black left internationalist feminists of the Ingram Committee sent TEN THOUSAND MOTHER'S DAY CARDS to the White House and scared Harry S. Truman so bad that he made up an excuse to miss their scheduled meeting the next day.

Ten thousand mother's day cards from black women to the white house. Stolen holiday. No justice, no peace in the form of ten thousand paper-cuts. A floral dare saying: celebrate this. This is what mothering means: organized support for radical self-defense. A complete refusal of rape by any means necessary. Ten thousand Mother's Day cards. A threat saying we are black mothers. We are survivors. Try us.

Forget hallmark.

Have a revolutionary Mother's Day people.

*(Outside of the above timeline, sit Audre Lorde's "Litany for Survival," Cathy Cohen's "Punks, Bulldaggers and Welfare Queens" and Hortense Spillers's "Mama's Baby Papa's Maybe" which i did not reread this week...but have completely internalized such that I should be understood to be citing them no matter what I am saying about anything.-apg)

Flamboyance

2009-04-27T03:54:00.000-07:00

Hey all. This is a talk I gave yesterday at Radical Intersections a performance studies conference at Northwestern University. Let me know what you think!
love,
lex

Flamboyance: The Queer Survival of Black Feminism

Alexis Pauline Gumbs

Dedicated to Pauline McKenzie and Andria Hall

May I begin with an invocation?
This instant. This triumph. Black feminism was never meant to survive. This instant. This triumph. This is ritual. This instant and this triumph. Black feminism was never meant to survive. But here I am. Here we are. That is the queer thing. In 1981 by the time I was in my mother’s womb every explicitly black feminist organization in the United States was defunct, and the black women’s writing publishing trend was effectively over. Some say that black feminism went academic, went textual. Some say black feminism went new age, got touchy feely, stopped taking to the streets. Some say black feminism is anachronistic, useful only as a referent, a supplement, a precedent for something else. Black feminism (remember) is how we got this idea of interlocking systems of oppression, demarginalizing the intersection. But I have not heard anyone talk about the Combahee River Collective here. I have not heard us lift up the name Kimberlé Crenshaw yet at this conference about Radical Intersections. Hmm. It seems, black feminism was never meant to survive. And the queer thing is, here we are.

This is how I make my body legible to ancestors who I cannot choose or name. This is how I make my work accountable to swallowed rage in the mouths of people who were not invited. This is how we commune with the forgotten, reframe the possible, this is how we remember that we don’t know where we come from. This is makeshift reverence for pathways that do not meet, a time space that is not continuous. This is what her hand writing has to do with my slow breathing. This is what her late nights have to do with my early mornings. This is what his bitten tongue has to do with my declaration. This method is survival as performance, speech as meditation, memory as clothing, ocean as audience. This room is full of something that I will name black feminism. Tell me when it starts to burn.

Flamboyant. First an architectural term describing the construction of castles with framing blades, the colonial understanding of flowering trees, the Oxford English Dictionary remembers that flamboyant meant many things before it meant us, those of us who do not know better than to hide our brilliance, the transformative ones, burning like hell as we walk the earth. This meditation examines the way that black feminism survives in the queer bodies of work, bone, muscle and breath that remain, invoking the little known work of the Flamboyant Ladies, a performance group created by black lesbian feminists Alexis De Veaux and Gwendolyn Hardwick in their living room. This presentation situates the forgotten work of the Flamboyant Ladies, who created radical t-shirts, performance pieces, salons and a full day presentation about the impact of the nuclear moment on black communities in the 1970’s as a haunting, illegible precedent for the more contemporary work of UBUNTU and BrokenBeautiful Press, two initiatives based in Durham North Carolina that similarly use embodied poetics to respond to systemic violence, against women of color in the wake of the Duke Lacrosse and Dunbar Village cases and the torture and sexual assault of Megan Williams.
Seeking an embodied poetics of queer intergenerationality, a relationship between ancestors, elders and youth that survives by rejecting the social reproduction of oppression, rejecting the assumption that queerness and intergenerationality are mutually exclusive especially given the mandate that some of us are criminalized when we reproduce life and create family, this piece takes Flamboyance, that dangerous, queer stance, as a trajectory for the livelihood of feminism, taking seriously the (often cancerous) impact of the unceasing labor of and punishment for radical feminist work on the bodies of queer elders and ancestors including De Veaux, Hardwick, and collaborators, June Jordan and Audre Lorde. This is a work towards healing and survival. Healing and survival are queer methodologies for oppressed communities because we were never meant to survive. This is a collaborative offering of our bodies across time to the intergenerational work of performing, and making possible, the world we deserve.
The Flamboyant Lady Should Not Exist
Flamboyant Ladies co-founder and radical black lesbian feminist Alexis DeVeaux explains, “By the time Reagan came to power, opportunities for black women writers and artists, began to dry up in drastic kinds of ways. Publishers say ‘we have enough black books.’ The NEA becomes explicitly conservative.” Black women artists cannot support themselves with grants and publishing contracts from a lustful consuming public fascinated by the glamour of the self-articulation of black and feminine subjectivity. The novelty has worn off, it is no longer interesting that someone can be a woman and a black person at the same time. In fact by 1981 the Moynihan’s matriarchy thesis has become law and the danger of black women has become apparent. Reagan has by this time, coined the term welfare queen, that black woman who threatens the new neoliberal economic order by the criminal act of bearing black children, expendable and expensive drains on an increasingly anti-social economy, that black woman who threatens the logic that flesh and labor have differential values by loving black children as if they were priceless, that black woman who threatens the anti-social norms of late capital by raising children that will not consent to the terms of the economy, this crazy black woman who lives as if housing, and education, and food were community concerns. That crazy black woman, with the nerve to survive and to wear bright colors, big hair and a loud mouth while doing it. She is a problem.

The intersection is not a radical sexy place of queer and salient knowledge production at this point. The intersection is the place where June Jordan, Gwendolen Hardwick and Alexis DeVeaux have guns pulled on them by the New York City police occupying black neighborhoods in Brooklyn. That intersection has much more in common with the intersection that Crenshaw actually described, the traumatic scene of a violence that neither the law or the existing anti-oppressive theory could fully address, than with the logic of accumulation that we use to market ourselves as increasingly complicated scholars in an academic industrial complex primed to consume our difference. So maybe what these black feminists created at their particular juncture has something to teach us, now.
*
I never knew that waking up every morning with a new idea and ironing it on to a t-shirt for two years was an apprenticeship. I didn’t know that navigating the issue of socially transformative childcare with the idea that queer folks should dance and prisons should be abolished forever was a vigil I participated in towards the survival of my elders, I didn’t know that enacting healing as performance with a women of color led group of survivors of gendered violence was much older news than I could have imagined. I thought that I and we were, to quote Essex Hemphill, “making ourselves from scratch.” Our stories are not recycled and distributed on the wings of capital, so I became an eclectic priestess, ritualizing cotton, stickers, and the word yes. Experimenting in community with how our needs became analysis. I had no idea that I was an initiate in a practice called black feminism because the mode of black feminism that I practice, that we practice in my community is the forgotten, unpublished part of the story. But here we were speaking the lines, setting the scene, dancing the navigation home.

This is the only way I know how to tell you about the experience I had one day in the files of the African Ancestral Lesbian Archive, files of an archive that no longer exists, held in the all volunteer run brownstone of the Lesbian Herstory Archives in Brooklyn. My hand brushed across a flyer, a woman and then that same woman printed twice, partially hidden by the other’s hair, because it was big hair wild hair familiar hair, from my standpoint. Huge earrings, and full open mouths, the Flamboyant Ladies were hosting a performance in their living room to benefit “No More Prisons” a campaign by women to stand in solidarity with women in prison followed by a “women’s only” party with free childcare. I didn’t breathe as I turned to the next sheet with those same mirror image women thanking a community for supporting the daylong festival and t-shirt making initiative they had held about the question of how the anti-nuclear movement impacted black communities in the United States. I found an invitation to a traumatic (playing on the term dramatic) mythic performance designed to ignite healing by examining the sound, feel and timbre of embodied oppression. Alexis DeVeaux who held writing workshops and instigated public performances and self-published anthologies in her living room laughed on the phone when I finally got up the nerve to call her up and ask her how and why she did everything, but I nearly cried, because she was never meant to survive. And I had never expected to make sense.

Alexis DeVeaux uses the language of survival to describe the tactics that she and other black feminists who created their own alternative means of production used during that time period. “We did what we had to do to survive, if white publishers wouldn’t publish us, we would publish ourselves our resistance to being completely silenced was to be deeply creative. We are going to be here.” Looking at the work of the Flamboyant Ladies, an eclectic and radical black feminist performance group that has been almost completely forgotten by black feminist scholars and performance scholars alike, and meditating on the queer way in which that work survives, unintentionally and often unknowingly in the lives of some other, loud, belligerent creative, underfunded radical black women who came late to the game of black feminism, we have the opportunity to meditate on survival as a performance. Survival as a queer echo, a manifest lust in the bodies and work of those of us, who were never meant to survive. I think that this examination is especially crucial in this political and economic moment, which like the Nixon and Reagan eras is characterized by the gutting of social services, the channeling of huge amounts of public funds to the private sector and of course military interventions around the world in the name of so-called democracy. If we would survive, in any material sense, we must take heed of the strategies enacted by these earlier social actors.

So first let us remember that performance is not a stable mode of social reproduction, in fact, like the criminalized black mother, performance can be policed, paid, begged and pleaded with the re-establish the terms of the status quo, but it cannot never be trusted to do so. Homi Bhabha makes a famous distinction between the performative and the pedagogical in the imagination of the social and political unit of the nation reminds us that performance is queer, that is non-reproductive, and as we know the vast majority of performances remain undocumented, like classrooms, moments of possibility that you either witness, hear about after the fact, or miss completely. I have never seen any of the performances of the Flamboyant Ladies, and I never will. And before I was born all the black feminist organizations had fallen apart. And Audre Lorde, June Jordan, Gloria Anzaldua, Barbara Christian, Pat Parker…so many of my strongest feminist ancestors who would barely be elders by now are dead. Never meant to survive. But the queer thing is they do, and that survival is performative and it is happening right now. This performance of survival, the survival itself, protests and makes visible the conditions that make it unlikely, but it also threatens those conditions with the fierce reminder that, as Wahneema Lubiano has said, “Power is never complete.” This form of survival demands a queer rethinking of time and space, a queer reframing of body and memory, a diasporic inhabitation of the temporality of trauma, that our gaps in knowing, our post-dispersion decalage does not mean that our herstories are not everywhere waiting. This is research and it is also ritual because it requires action and faith. Does it burn? This is your part:

Consider the flame. Flickering. Transformative. Changing shape. That heat. That glow around those of us that, according to every story that keeps this anti-social society together, should be burning in hell. What is your flamboyance? That which keeps your flame alive, that which lives on you, bright through you that power had intendend to incinerate. Where on your body, where on your lips, where in your fingertips, where in your hair, does the blackened narrative emerge? What hollowed out remnant do you dance in now and what is the significance of what your longing remembers? Consider the flame. What cannot be forgotten even when it is not known? What will not destroy us even when we are flagrantly ourselves? What will we create instead?

This instant. This triumph. In you, something queer survives.

from Revolutionary Mother and Vancouver Activist Cynthia Dewi

2009-04-15T19:37:00.001-07:00

i am root in rock
waterless
my throat tilted towards sky
throbbing with thirst
for rain
acid rain
small and heavy rain
rain that bullies and breaks apart
rain that trickles in the creases
of your elbows
and eyelids
rain that pounds your skin raw
any rain at all

this room is shrinking
chains grow around my ankles
glass lights shine obstinately
sad substitutes for the sun
making live leaves
that pine for eternal sleep
it is getting harder to breathe

single mother
seventeen
stupid
stigma
sinful
slut

less than 24 hours
before my father was laid to rest
under a pine tree
his life a kaleidoscope of humiliation
dentist disguised as dairy queen server
in the land of dead dreams
where he learned to destroy
mine

i was married off.
i couldn't even eat the cake
my skirt barely fit.

and my father's humiliation became
my heritage.

i don't know how to convey the loneliness that is single motherhood.
where it begins and where it ends, for example.
or whether it is a symptom or root of late modernity.
what are its form and character.
what it takes from you while compelling you to give
of every fiber in your body.
sometimes even more is demanded.

do we have an analysis of loneliness inside our politics? inside our organizing?
i know we have a language around "social isolation",
the "alienation that is produced by colonial and capitalist relations of power"...
i know we have potent, immediate, accurate accounts of oppression
within/across the multiple dimensions of our lives...

but how do we understand
the production of
loneliness? or love?

can we even talk about it?

and please don't misunderstand me.
i am not requesting sympathy.
i am trying to understand my experience.
and part of that is saying this out loud to you,
to have that direct transference of sound waves
from my vocal chords to your ear drums.
because i cannot understand
what i am going through
as an indicator of suffering
in someone else's
policy plans.

summertime
and the livin is easy
fish are jumpin
and the cotton is high
oh your daddy's rich
and your ma is good lookin
so hush little baby
don't you cry

paul's lullaby
as an infant
and a five-year-old
is a total fusion
of tenderness
and enslavement

i am root in rock
planted here by the hands of history
and the mimic of agency
watching the river flow by
arms caught in stone crevices
i am unable to reach
make a cup with my palms
and drink

i cry, beg, plead, scream
seduce, pray, offer sacrifices
but i cannot beckon
that river to change its course

so i learned to make do with the
rock
that is simultaneously
home and
prison

paul was less than a week old when he got diagnosed with acute jaundice
if we had caught it a couple hours later
i would have buried my son
and my dad in the same year
we couldn't find his father anywhere
not then not after
when he learned to walk
to talk
to caress my face
and say,
"Mama, I love you, I love you more than counting stars."

not when i lost my hair
my health
my mind
not when my heart cracked
like a shell
under the onslaught
of a hammer

and to this day i don't understand
what goes through a father's head
when he decides to walk away

i looked for different stories everywhere
stories of survivors turned warriors
and slaves turned liberators
i sought for comfort
and for company
in the arms of audre
of june
of lee

scholarship
politics
poetry
became my battleground

i could not find weight in the world or in the lives of those i loved
so i sought it out in words
research, discuss, debate, relate
organize
as i trade body parts
for partnership
sometimes for employment too
because poverty is not as easily exorcised
as demons

the wind began to splinter my face
and some days it was all i had
to access basic necessities
i could not move
so i repositioned myself

so i turned my head
and cast my gaze
beyond the river

if i had to describe motherhood i'd say it includes at the least the following:
-manic confusion and oh, so many contradictions
-willing and invisible labor
-lots of multitasking
-knowing how stretch a dollar
-a constant state of being interrupted (while working, eating, thinking, conversing, making love)
-a constant process of de-bordering between self and other
-a quest for self-determination inside a dynamic of unequal dependency
-unlimited intimacy
-unreasonable love
-unreasonable faith
-unreasonable joy

do these things have a place in the communities we are building?

and my love
my anchor
i don't know how to raise you to be free
on colonized ground
i don't know how to give you a home
when my soul has not met Belonging
i don't know how to offer you safety
when my heart does not know
how to trust

i can only try
today tonight
this is me trying

single mother
solitude
spiritual
silent
stars

raven's eye is here

2009-03-20T08:26:00.000-07:00

so yall know whats up?

Raven’s Eye!!!!!!!!

Beautiful, inspiring, amazing writing and art from us, women and genderqueer folk…

We have been organizing ourselves for years on the internet. We have started blogs, and e-zines, social networking spaces, list serves, conferences, conversations, groups, websites, cd’s and more. We are incredibly prolific, visionary, each of us coming to this space with individual and collective visions of self-expression, survival, sexuality, business, teaching, learning, community, organizing, solidarity,art, dreams, healing, and love.

Check it out.

Every day we will be posting more and more work by us, highlighting the diversity, the community, the changing landscape of our lives.

We are creating a space where our voices, work and lives are centered and celebrated.

Join us. Become a writer with Raven’s Eye. Participate in the conversations. Tell every one you know.

If you have any questions please feel free to contact us at: ravenseyeblog@gmail.com

SPEAK!: Words of Radical Womyn of Color

2009-03-09T15:26:00.001-07:00

Greetings loved ones,
I am THRILLED to let you know about the release of a CD created by SPEAK! a Radical Womyn of Color Media Collective that I have been learning and growing in for the past few years. SPEAK! the self-titled CD is an amazing resource and I'm so proud to be a part of it because I truly believe that it is fierce and transformative in the tradition of This Bridge Called My Back. I know that being part of this process has changed my life.

The CD is available for purchase at www.speakmediacollective.com. The CD is part of a pilot grassroots fundraising project to fund young mothers of color to attend national gatherings within the progressive movement starting with the Allied Media Conference in Detroit this summer.

I am super super proud to be part of this project (even though I am freaked out about the recorded sound of my own voice). One of the featured poems on this CD is "Wishful Thinking" a poem that (as most of you know) I wrote for the National Day of Truthtelling in Durham, NC. I.e. it's a poem a wrote for you.

Your support for this project means everything to me.

love,
lex

p.s. To listen to an interview with Adele...the loving genius diva who first spoke and facilitated the idea that became this CD click here:
http://madamaambi.blogspot.com/2009/03/adele-nieves-speak.html

p.p.s. here is the official press release...SPREAD THE WORD!

SPEAK! WOMEN OF COLOR MEDIA COLLECTIVE RELEASING SELF-TITLED DEBUT CD
UNITED STATES — March 7, 2009– SPEAK! Women of Color Media Collective, a netroots coalition of women of color bloggers and media-makers, is debuting March 7, 2009 with a performance art CD, accompanied by a collaborative zine and classroom curriculum for educators.

handful of Speak! members at the Liquid Words studio

Compiled and arranged by Liquid Words Productions, the spoken word CD weaves together the stories, poetry, music, and writings of women of color from across the United States. The 20 tracks, ranging from the explosive “Why Do You Speak?” to the reverent “For Those of Us,” grant a unique perspective into the minds of single mothers, arrested queer and trans activists, excited children, borderland dwellers, and exploring dreamers, among many others.

“We want other women of color to know they are not alone in their experiences,” said writer and educator Alexis Pauline Gumbs of Broken Beautiful Press, one of the contributors to the CD. “We want them to know that this CD will give sound, voice and space to the often silenced struggles and dreams of women of color.”

The Speak! collective received grant assistance from the Allied Media Conference coordinators to release a zine complementing the works featured on the CD, as well as a teaching curriculum for educators to incorporate its tracks into the classroom environment.

“Speak! is a testament of struggle, hope, and love,” said blogger Lisa Factora-Borchers of A Woman’s Ecdysis. “Many of the contributors are in the Radical Women of Color blogosphere and will be familiar names… I can guarantee you will have the same reaction as to when I heard them speak, I was mesmerized.”

To promote the initiative, the Speak! collective is coordinating listening parties in communities across United States, creating short YouTube promotions illustrating the CD creation process, and collaborating with organizers and activists online and offline.

The CD is available for online ordering at http://speakmediacollective.com on a sliding scale beginning at $12. All inquiries for review copies should be directed to us at speakcd@gmail.com. Proceeds of this album will go toward funding for mothers and/or financially restricted activists attending the 11th Annual Allied Media Conference in Detroit, MI from July 16-19.

###

Please spread the word on your blogs and websites!

letter #6

2009-02-26T03:04:00.000-08:00

cross posted from my ecdysis

excerpts from Letter #6

Dear Veronica,

....Dr. Liu, in his ever strange ways, seems cheery when I call him, asking him what our next step should be, "Well, just wait until day 35 of the cycle and take a pregnancy test. If you're not pregnant, we'll just up the dosage."

In other words, as he has said it before: quit worrying.

But I am worried.

The face I put on for others is a face of hope and optimism. The words come out of my mouth as I say that I will not be devastated if I cannot have biological children, but the truth is, my darling daughter unborn, I am afraid I will slip into a darkness that will shade me for the rest of my days if that happens. The reality is that life is given to you and there are portions of it which you can exercise control. Most parts, though, are handed to you, as is, and what you do with those parts, what you choose to create or act with it, is entirely up to you. I have trouble coping with that reality.

Someday, I hope, you will sit next to me and we will go over these letters together. I'm sure I will need some prompting about what I was thinking at 29 years of age, and I hope that these words will open a door of memories that will help guide you in your path of choices.

I want to include a picture with this letter. This is a picture of me, your old Mama at twenty years young, with another little girl. Her name is Veronica and she is the little girl you are named after. Taken in 2000, Veronica, now, is around fourteen years old and probably still in barrio Nueva Vida in Managua, Nicaragua.

Back in the old college days, I decided to live in Nicaragua for three months and work in areas that would challenge my ways of thinking. Nicaragua - Veronica - succeeded....

....I want you to remember something, my child, in case you ever forget yourself: all children are created equal and therefore you will all grow into women that are equal. This world will tell you different. It will tell you that since you were born in a certain country with privileges, education, and industry, you are worth more. The world will tell you that your place in society is measured by the size of your wallet, the space of your house, the shine of your car, the interest rates of your stocks, the gleam of your hair, the smell of your breath, the shade of your skin, the mobility of your legs, the speed of your mind..........

....There is nothing greater in this world than the measure of what you will do for liberation and for how far you will go to bring a sense of peace to the places that will never know the quiet of stars because their skies are filled with the noise of bombs and bullets.

I make you sisters and gently remind you to care for one another, even if you never meet. Even if you are separated by everything and you find nothing in common, you are sisters. You are binded by my realization that I cannot sacrifice one without sacrificing the other. You need each other in every sense of the word survival.....

please read the entire incredible letter here

art speaks and quick note to self

2009-02-25T02:46:00.000-08:00

Art Speaks

Fabiola guest blogging at hermana, resist

Rad Los Angeles art piece image excavate childhood memory for many young Latinas.

See a photo of the piece here.

Last year, I attended a Mujeres de Maiz artist exhibit showcasing women of color artists, this painting took me back to when I was that child gazing at the calendar romanticizing the Aztec Warrior saving the voluptuous beautiful princess. This image decorated the new year calendar that the carniceria (butcher), local Latino market gave out during the holidays. It is a beautiful piece of art honoring indigenous history and Mexican culture. A badge of honor of sorts. It was free too, so it hung on the kitchen wall right by our table. For breakfast, lunch and/or dinner sometimes I looked up towards the image and I wanted to be that beautiful princess getting saved by the handsome strong warrior. Our home was not unique, many Latino families sported the free calendar in their walls. Consequently many young Latinas can easily identify this image, and the symbolism connoted. As an adult I’ve dissected that image of the princess saved by the Aztec, there’s a strong sexualization of their bodies, her voluptuous body, eyes closed, tender tilted face, emphasizes her looks while the Aztec warrior’s fit body accentuates his strength and conviction to save the princess. Feminism 101 ( or for me common sense 101) “female” socialization teaches that our looks are more important than our actions and that we are often times on earth to please heteronormative ideals, so when I stood in front of this image of the woman picking herself up, it brought a “hell yea” in me.

The image is called “Pick Yourself Up, Girl.”

As I dealt with a whirlwind of ups and downs the last couple of weeks, one late nigh walking the dog with an aching heart staring at the cemented sidewalk processing the day’s emotional exhaustion (heart hanging very low) with that image ingrained, I affirmed out loud, “pick yourself up girl.”

The UBUNTU philosophy, I am because we are, is resonating with me more and more lately and it cannot be truer in the journey of transformative healing. That night as I dealt with complex emotions garnering and searching for the tools at reach, that image, Alexis P. Gumbs’ “Wishful Thinking” poetry replaying over and over in my car earlier - the soothing words, the powerful image gave me the strength to reach within to not only get dragged down by the heavy load it became lighter. Their art work, infused life into the dreary terrain of pain. Their art work, helped me carry myself. Walking back home, with my head a little higher, the load lighter, and for that, I am eternally thankful.

and from noemi:

quick note to self

Noemi cross posted from hermana, resist

If love is a radical force, the work I do as an non-traditional teacher and storyteller are testimonies to this. Love is radical.

raven's eye

2009-02-22T06:08:00.001-08:00

raven’s eye

February 22, 2009

so i have been dreaming about blogs. the first dream was about a blog called: raven’s eye

and as i have been thinking deeply over the past few days about these dreams and visions, i felt compelled to say this:

we, as women of color, have been organizing ourselves for years on the internet. we have started blogs, and e-zines, social networking spaces, list serves, conferences, conversations, groups, websites, cd’s and more. we are incredibly prolific, visionary, each of us coming to this space with individual and collective visions of self-expression, survival, sexuality, business, teaching, learning, community, organizing, solidarity,art, dreams, healing, and love.

in my visions i kept seeing a women and transfolk of color blog. one that was updated daily with our news, analysis, announcements, personal reflections, conversations, and more. a location on the net where we, from our different perspectives and lives, are able to give voice to us. where we agree and disagree, and stay in conversation.

i see this blog as a part of the ongoing organizing and expression that we do both on- and off-line so well in the midst of our crazy, blessed lives.

and so i am sending this out into the ether asking what you think.

are there others who are interested in building such a space for women and transfolk of color?

i can offer a chance to see if this experiment could work. i have some free time to dedicate to the building of this site. a certain amount of knowledge of software and a willingness to learn more. a connection to some communities of color. and a desire to build with you.

please distribute this where you think appropriate.

and if you are interested please leave a comment at guerrillamamamedicine.wordpress.com

outlaw midwives

2009-02-22T02:03:00.000-08:00

the new site: outlaw midwives is up! yay! please check it out...

We envision anti-violence safer communities where mothers and children heal from reproductive violence, because it is when we are whole and confident in our own leadership, are we able to co-create healthy communities.

Communities in which loyalty to a mother’s choice is 99 percent of being a midwife and in which we define ‘motherhood’ as love by any means necessary.

Communities in which we care for ourselves developing spiritual and physical awareness so that we can hold the space, the energy, the vision for folks to make decisions that center freedom, community and revolutionary love.

We must mother ourselves. Hold ourselves the way that we hold our children. And know that our wisdom is stronger and more knowledgeable and relevant than outside expertise. We must live the lives that are given to us. And trust others to do the same. For the sake of our survival. For the sake of our ancestresses. For the sake of our communities. For the sake of love.

the invisible mother

2009-02-14T10:33:00.000-08:00

xposted from womanist musings

In feminist circles there is often commentary regarding our shared experiences as women. What is ignored is that though certain situations are similar based solely in gender, quite often we experience them differently when there is a race or class intersection. As mothers our capacity to love our children is boundless, but this is not nearly the universalizing experience as presented by most forms of media, or mainstream feminism. All mothers are not created equal. For the middle/upper class white woman, with her mini van and Prada purses there are plenty of visible representations of positive motherhood. If however you are a woman of color, the erasure in the discourse of motherhood is totalizing.

Women of color are not constructed as mothers; they are presented as irresponsible breeders who did not have the decency not to burden society with their offspring. Their right to reproduce is continually challenged because a capitalist economy does not encourage production without an obvious profit. The reality of the situation is, if a child grows in a poor household despite the pull yourself up by the boots rhetoric, they are most likely to grow into poor adults trapped by a system that has refused to give them equal opportunity from birth.

The mother/breeder binary is readily obvious in most parenting magazines. The stories are often written by white women of the privileged class, while the lived experiences of women of color are absent from the pages. Despite the courage and strength of will that is necessary to raise a child, when you exist as a marginalized body your stories are not deemed compelling, or marketable. Women of color are meant to serve as “mothers helpers,” not exist as actual mothers.

As the elite rush off to mommy and me gatherings in between scheduling for their high intensity careers, what is ignored is that the option to pursue such a range of possibility only exists because of the ability to exploit another woman. Poor so-called third world women who are often separated from their families function as an invisible support staff, permitting women of the privileged class to announce that yes Virginia, we can have it all.

a different level of hell: family court

2009-02-12T11:07:00.001-08:00

xposted from mamita mala

I think someone said that one of the responses to grief is anger and yesterday morning, the morning abuela died, I was angry. I was not angry at death or at abuela pero I was angry porque my ex had decided to in order to pay me child support we needed to do it through court, even though the amount ordered by the magistrate, who not once looked up to see my face, was the same exact amount I had told el chileno mas o menos he would have to pay according to New York State guidelines. Add to that the fact that el chileno has opted for the money to be taken out of his check directly, instead of paid to me, I have to wait and likely won’t have enough for rent for the apartment where his daughter lives.

Next on my journey through levels of hell: Health insurance and food stamps (my case was closed).

(re)thinking walking: bfp's second walk

2009-02-12T10:50:00.001-08:00

from brownfemipower at flip flopping joy

It’s only very rarely that it’s a joy to go for a walk here. More often than not, it’s a struggle, a pain, an effort. The closest *real* park (as in, it has birds and trees and wild flowers and leaves and maybe some bunny rabbits or raccoons–as opposed to a small plot of grass with a walkway forced through it) is about a 20 minute car ride into Ann Arbor. I have not been strong enough mentally to try the bus.

To drive out to a nice park where you can’t hear the drone of the freeways is often such a hassle (and expensive–$4 gas anyone?), it’s just not worth it. But walking around the local neighborhood…well…see for yourself.

Michigan, day one

Michigan, day two

Michigan, day three

Notice anything?

Inspired to get outside and take an invigorating, life affirming, healing walk?

I sure wasn’t. And that’s why I didn’t. The fam and I got in the car instead and drove around. We documented our surroundings, became more aware of them.

Michiganders spend a lot of time trying to outrun their surroundings, to make the bleak grayness as blurry as possible so certain things just aren’t noticed anymore.

So that the miles and miles of concrete grayness doesn’t swallow you whole.

***

audre lorde

2009-01-31T17:19:00.000-08:00

"I am defined as other in every group I'm part of...The outsider, both strength and weakness. Yet without community there is certainly no liberation, no future, only the most vulnerable and temporary armistice between me and my oppression"

stuff and stuff

2009-01-31T16:19:00.000-08:00

hey there!

happy belated new year!

i am really behind already this year...obviously...and i am trying to catch up but oh well.

1. noemi created a beautiful brand spanking new site for revolutionary motherhood but i havent had time yet to figure it all out...we will be moving there soon...woohoo!

2. right now we are in cairo, egypt. after being denied entry to israel and spending a few days in israeli detention. ugh. you can read about our experiences here:

day 1
day 2
day 3

3. lex and i created this site: because we still are here

women of color globally

have written and stood

in solidarity with Palestinians for decades.

*******************************************************************

as suheir hammad chants:

if there are any people on earth who understand how new york is

feeling right now, they are in the west bank and the gaza strip…

there is life here. anyone reading this is breathing, maybe hurting

but breathing for sure. and if there is any light to come, it will

shine from the eyes of those who look for peace and justice after

rubble and rhetoric are cleared and the phoenix has risen.

affirm life.
affirm life.
we got to carry each other now.
you are either with life, or against it.
affirm life.

******************************************************************

you are invited to continue this tradition in the wake of israel’s current massacre of Gazans. to continue this tradition of transnational feminist solidarity with Palestinians. to find breaths, to find words, to co-create the phoenix in the midst of this rubble.

please leave in the comments your words, visions, rants, pictures.

affirm life

4. revolutionary motherhood has a twitter account as well! follow at: revolutionmamis

5. this is not a hotel:

when in israeli prison i try to make a joke with the you monsters. but your english just isnt that good. the american accent sounds like a lazy fold in the heart.

but did you choose this job? or was this the only job left? you yell at me for not leaving the prison but you locked the door from the inside with you still in it.

you have to be ruthless to do this job. you have to be sandpaper. you have to push your eyes into your hands and refuse to admit that you are blind.

this is not a hotel. it is a cemetary. where you the dead guard living with threats and cocked fingers, with gutturral words. the bunk beds are rickety, rusted, rattling. a posada print where the the the prison guards smiles are skeletal papier mache puppets and no one is allowed to burst the pinata. poisoned candy. urine soaked blankets. plastic wrapped food. once a day you come to threaten us. this is a dance with the beloved. spinning. spinning. to find a center. a strain of human dna in the jungle where the monsters are. my daughter stares at you wide eyed.

instead you ask questions you wont let me answer. the heart is always a lonely hunter here. and my daughter and i refuse to be mute. like the tip of the knife, tip of the pen, tip of a bomb, the heart is dangerous in prison

this is a no man’s land. no laws govern us. no heart. no grace. just following orders.

this is a broken version of hell. but you wont break me. i am a witch. back up or get burnt. like a daughter in gaza you are bombing with phosphorous clouds of light billowing into the sky like laundry on the line.

no pens, knives, bags, phone calls, questions, answers, forgiveness, order

you close down gaza. then open a cease fire.

just me and my baby girl locked in a room. bright lights always on. i drape mattress covers around the bunk bed like thick mosquito netting. i tell you we need an angel in this hell. you come back with dead food.

the screams of an eight month pregnant african woman rocking on her hips. this blackness floats around my head–like stars pulling open the center of the sky. nothing here is breathing unless it has to. this heart, my hands are heavy pulling my head to the floor. there is no place to rest the ribcage. it folds into an origami swan and lies on its right wing, cock eyed, with sharp edges.

13 israelis dead
1300 palestinians dead
and a cease fire as stable as a childs paper plane in the wind

i cross my chest and mouth the hail mary.you only let us out of the room to show us how locked in we really are. baby girl spins between the bunk beds singing the alphabet to herself: a.b.r.q.s.z…

she climbs onto the bed. shuts her eyes. takes a couple of deep breaths. and then laughs hard into the belly of her stuffed doll. drags the to doll the floor . pats the doll’s back while whispering–shhh–then tucks the doll under the blankets.

night night.

its time to go to sleep.

6. i have had the incredible privilege of getting to know you awesome mamas...thank you...it has meant so much to me. provided sustenance and helped me to feel a little less alone in this world.

Extended Call for Submissions: Don't Leave Your Friends Behind!

2009-01-27T14:48:00.000-08:00

Extended Call for Submissions:

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind: a Handbook for Radical Parenting Allies

New deadline: July 1, 2009!

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind is a book geared toward the non-parent radical community about how to be an ally to the parent(s) in their midst.

This book is going to be a collection of some of the best minds out there. We're looking for activists, allies, and radical parents to submit the most kicking stuff to make this the best book ever for getting down to business: let's make a better world WITHOUT leaving out the mamas (and papas, partners, child-care providers) and children this time!

We are extending the deadline!! We realize that each place we go, we meet more people, hear their experiences, and are referred to even more people whose actions, thoughts and stories we should include. We realize that it is better to take the time for the project to evolve and grow before putting together a book.

Thus, we are restructuring our goals and deadlines while we keep learning, teaching and networking with this exciting work. We do not have a final deadline for the book, but will continue compiling our submissions into a half-yearly zine series.

That said—we have a new and exciting zine available for three dollars (see below for more details). We plan to do another “work in progress” zine—to share more of our submissions as the project evolves-- this summer. The deadline for submissions is July 1st, 2009.

We want to know how you do support children and their caretakers in your collectives, organizations or communities. We are especially interested in experiences that also take into account factors such as race, class, gender, single parenthood, and/or mental health issues.

Word limit is from one sentence suggestions to 5.000 word essays.

Deadline for Zine #3: July. 1, 2009

About the Editors:

Vikki Law is a writer, photographer and mother who has been working on a survey of anarchist mothers for the past two years. She also put out the zine "Mama Sez No War," a compilation of mothers' experiences and activism against the U.S. war on Iraq and is the co-editor of Tenacious: Art and Writings from Women in Prison. Her first book Resistance Behind Bars: The Struggles of Incarcerated Women (resistancebehindbars.org) will be out on PM Press in February 2009.

China Martens is the editor of the long-running zine The Future Generation, started in 1990, and mother of a 21-year-old. Her first book The Future Generation: a zine-book for subculture parents, kids, friends + others is an anthology of 16 years of her zine and is put out by Atomic Book Company. It is also available from AK PRESS

Jessica Mills writes a monthly column for Maximum Rock N Roll, "My Mother Wears Combat Boots" and her book came out on AK Press in November 2007 by the same title. She's a mother of two, sometimes plays sax with Citizen Fish, and is always all about organizing cooperative childcare.

Questions? Feel free to get in touch.

Contact:
China Martens
China410@hotmail.com
P.O. Box 4803 Baltimore MD 21211

or

Vikki Law
vikkimL@yahoo.com
PO Box 20388
Tompkins Square Station
New York, NY 10009

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind--zine #2!!

2009-01-05T13:57:00.000-08:00

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind--work-in-progress zine #2

While amassing submissions for the handbook Don't Leave Your Friends Behind, co-editor China and I have made a work-in-progress zine of several contributions.

Zine #2 is 31 full-sized pages of stories, experiences and suggestions by both radical parents and their allies on building family-friendly movements, including:

*how theories on early childhood development support our arguments for anti-authoritarian parenting!

*organizing childcare at LadyFest Baltimore!

*providing childcare for children with special needs

*2 stories of parenting in collective households

*a children's crusade in Cambridge

*lessons learned from the mothers & children of the zapatista communities

Send $3 ($5 for two copies--you can give one to the ally in your life!) to:

V. Law
PO Box 20388
Tompkins Square Station
NY, NY 10009

Let's keep spreading childcare goodness to the masses!!

For those of you who missed it, our call for submissions (deadline: Feb 1, 2009) is here:
http://revolutionarymotherhood.blogspot.com/2008/09/on-heels-of-maias-posts-dont-leave-your.html

the right to marry vs. equal rights for all

2008-12-27T08:54:00.000-08:00

x-posted from my private casbah

The point. You missed it. However, Bob Ostertag hasn't. In an article on The Huffington Post he discusses "Why Gay Marriage is the Wrong Issue". It should be read by everyone who is concerned about the recent passage of Proposition 8 in California and the steps that other states are taking to keep marriage limited to one particular kind of relationship (i.e. one man and one woman). He takes a different stance from what I've seen in most discussions on gay marriage. Ostertag says that by re-framing the fight, queer families could gain more allies and have a greater chance at receiving the important legal benefits that married people now enjoy.

Sadly, many of the people who commented on his article didn't seem to get it. Ostertag is making the point that making sure that EVERYONE can enjoy those benefits is even more beneficial to society than simply making a slight expansion to a system that is so flawed that it isn't even working for the folks who currently use it. I'm a woman in a relationship with a man and we can't enjoy the legal benefits that married couples enjoy because we can't marry. His insurance wouldn't cover the costs of treatment for my cancer because of the pre-existing conditions clause that the government allows the insurance industry to put into place. We'd love to be able to marry but if we did, then I'd die because I'd have no way of paying for the extraordinary costs of treating my ultra-rare cancer.

I know lots of families like mine. Many of them probably think that gay marriage wouldn't benefit them but they'd sure as hell ally with anyone who would be willing to take up the cause for equal rights for all kinds of families. The majority of other queer people I know don't despise people with disabilities even though they have never fought en masse for us to have the rights that they now want for themselves. It makes more sense to get both groups to see our struggles as a fight for equal rights for all. However, judging from the vitriol I'm seeing, that's not likely to occur any time soon.

As long as we allow the government to play "divide and conquer" with this country's marginalized populations, there will be no equality.

SPEAK: CD by Radical Women of Color Coming at You!!!!

2008-12-18T06:11:00.001-08:00

Hey everyone,
Just wanted to pass on this promo for a CD that the SPEAK Women of Color Media Justice crew is releasing as a fundraiser for young mothers of color to attend and participate in the Allied Media Conference. Check it out!!!!!

love,
lex

best moment ever

2008-12-18T03:38:00.000-08:00

x-posted from hermana resist

today after dinner, J tells me, let’s talk about Cesar Chavez and the civil rights movement. My heart skipped a beat. We run down briefly on Martin Luther King Jr, Rosa Parks, voting, the underground railroad, the north/south, women and voting, wage inequality (then and current), farmworkers, Chavez & the KKK.

No, they aren’t studying the subject in school, my kid just kicks ass. He says he was looking for a book on Chavez at school and they only had spanish ones so the teacher GAVE HIM to keep forever (his words) a book on Rosa Parks and Harriet Tubman (I asked if they had other of the same books in case other kids want to read about them and he said yes). But they should really have something in English on Cesar Chavez. Also-he was going to “write a paper” (I think this means a summary in 3rd grade speak) on Ab Lincoln but after talking about thanks-giving and who really discovered who, he’s going to do it on Columbus-not discovering shit– (my words, not his). for extra credit. Not an assignment. Now if this isn’t cause for celebration I don’t know what is.

Creating Child-friendly Anarchist Space: How to Support Parents & Children's Participation at Anarchist Gatherings

2008-12-08T07:05:00.000-08:00

Suggestions and tips from various parents on the Anarchist Parenting List Serv:

from the Kidz Corner @ The Mid-Atlantic Radical Bookfair

Radical Childcare is a Radical Tactic:
By turning the system upside down, and learning how to work together to support everyone’s rights, we include the young in the change we want to see now.

1- Start planning for childcare at the beginning of the event planning and not at the last minute.
2- Children should be welcome around the event. Providing childcare doesn’t mean the children will be unwelcome other places and have to go there, it’s a resource and an option.
3- Space for childcare must be accessible and close to the main activities, the more visible the better!
4- Children and caretakers can use this space to play, chill out and meet others.
5- Prioritize the care of the young. Even if there aren’t many children this time, creating a space is a great practice for next time. No matter how many kids come, it’s important! Sometimes the room can be empty, then suddenly fill up.
6- Decorate with inspirational art, make the space attractive and friendly. We made a banner together, my daughter outlined words and kids and volunteers colored it in.
7- Don’t let people store other stuff in the kid’s space, it’s not safe. For instance free food was stored in the Kidz Corner, people coming in to get food didn’t look out for the kids underfoot and also dropped a container and glass fell near a baby's head and all over the ground.
8- ALSO, don’t have people who aren’t parents/caretakers/childcare volunteers or somehow connected to the Kids’ Space wander in and use it as a hang-out.
9- Ask local parents, groups, and those who might attend: How can you support them? Ask the children too! Get ideas from parents and kids, create dialogue with radical parents and radical community, pull in all the resources you can.
10- BUT – don’t ask the parents to do childcare (although parents' participation should still be welcome) Parents always have to do childcare, so there is nothing radical about that. This is a service to those whose children are old/comfortable enough to be left so the parents can go to a workshop, read, or participate without their attention divided and a chance for the child-free to participate with children.
11- Radical childcare also means respectful radical programming for the kids. The ideals of the larger event should be able to be used for the young on their own level.
12- Make it fun! Make it different levels of ways to be involved (for the child-free), from volunteering to just coming in and playing – the more energy the better.
13- Take care of the kids. Make sure each child is attended and the environment is safe.
14- Take care of the childcare volunteers. No one should ever be left alone or overburdened.
15- Get the word out! Super important! Every time the event is mentioned – whatever the kidz program (childcare, space, or events) should be mentioned too! Otherwise people will not know to bring their children. Knowing there is childcare can bring people who otherwise wouldn’t have attended.

Ideas in organizing

1. Interaction with the larger event is crucial. For example: volunteers were gathered, food was provided, space was found, security was aware of children and had talked about their concerns, etc. Working in coordination of the whole event makes the children’s program strong and not marginalized as only a (overburdened) parents concern.
2. Having a person to keep an eye on the room for the day creates consistency. The first year it was just me. The second year there were 2 of us, each taking a separate day. (I did a lot on my own as the person who knew the most since I was a parent but I would like to learn more the collective process.)
3. Create a scheduling volunteer sheet. Also a separate sign in sheet with name, age, parents contact, and any relevant thing you need to know. The second year we had a method of checking kid to parent by having matching key-chains. Both years it was hard, with everything going on, to keep track of checking kids in and out and I am interested in how others do it.
4. At least two childcare volunteers in room at all time – who have previously been screened, you signed up, you know who they are. Ideally both of them, but at least one of them must be experienced with childcare. I always try to pair up an experienced person with an inexperienced one.
5. Have a sign up sheet for extra volunteers. There is a lot of energy from folks that sign up the day of the event.
6. You don’t need to be experienced with kids in order to be a childcare volunteer. Having different levels of experiences provides a chance to learn skills and honestly it’s the young, and often inexperienced, that has the most energy!
7. If there are not enough childcare volunteers or if you don’t feel comfortable with providing childcare at least you can use this space for children and adults to gather, play, interact, and organize their own childcare swaps if they like.
8. Plan to have back up– people you can call for back up childcare and in case of an emergency. For Kidz Corner, I could call security if I had a problem (and who also knew CPR) plus I had numbers of back up parents and tablers who would come and help if I needed them
9. I heard that DC Radical Childcare Collective has a rule that always 2 volunteers take a child to the bathroom. That sounds like a professional good idea (for safety of child when dealing with strangers).
10. I could organize easier because my daughter was grown and this was more of a political issue to me then a personal issue of need. I think it's ideal for an organizer to be able to co-ordinate between radical parents (I called on my friends as I'd forgotten a lot of stuff about young children’s needs) where ever they are and the childfree radical community at meetings.
11. You grow as you go. The first year (that we had ever had childcare at an anarchist event in Baltimore, as far as I know, and I had ever planned such a thing) I talked to people a lot more about why and how – the second year was a fantastic experience with every community resource at my fingertips. Thank you Red Emma's!

Ideas for stuff to do

1- nap space, snacks, craft space, active space
2- comfy chair for nursing mother
3- workshops for kids and workshops by kids – yoga, radical children’s story-time, singer played songs for kids, 8 year old taught button making to older people who enjoyed it a lot.
4- A Kidz Parade can be a great way for kids and larger event to interact - really fun! Kidz of all ages dressed up and marched around outside and in the bookfair to the cheers of vendors. Our parades tended to be rather surreal and spontaneous. “More Fun” was the first theme; “Book Monster” was the second years. Originally it was a kids idea, and I usually have little to do with this, (would feel scared to plan it) just help facilitate the experience, when there is enough kids and adults ready to bust out.
5- Dress up clothes, face paints, paper table to sit around and draw on
6- Keep the spirit of the larger event, whatever the parents can get out of it, the kids should be able to enjoy and pick up similar skills and so forth. A quality rad program for rad kids!

This last year at the Anarchist Bookfair in SF:

We saw a huge response to the availability of a "family Space" where people had a comfortable zone to operate on completely kid-freindly terms for a while with their own kids, they don't want to get rid of them, just to give them a fun/calm/easy-to-handle environment, this included a lot of friends of families and passersby stopping to "play" which was awesome. The need for an actual Drop off point was actually pretty low at the bookfair. At most events like this, you are mostly dealing with people who (thankfully) are used to having there kids do what they do, and not just because they have to, but because it's healthy and fun, and I think the whole point should be to work towards making all possible events operate this way so that there isn’t such a thing as a "family space" because that is all "space" really is and our surrounding community, whether we know them or not, should be able to help in the moment if its needed ( i.e. you are participating in a discussion group and you don't want to have to stop in the middle of every sentence to talk with your child about this/that, it's ok because everyone present is comfortable being around children aka "a village"). Obviously that doesn’t realistically apply to a lot of situations right now. Also, a larger need for a full on drop off point may exist in certain situations (think non-permit protests) more than others (anarchist bookfairs, camping trips, concerts).

Potential activities: some of what we've done at the SF anarchist bookfair in years past:

• decorate a t-shirt...we provided fabric markers and various sizes of reclaimed (thrifted) t-shirts
• beads, beads, beads
• playdough, with kitchen utensils for toys with it
• big paper on the walls with paints and/or markers
• big leggos for the littler kids
• -the folks who did the kids space this year had little tote bags to
decorate with fabric markers, and I think they were also decorating
little flower pots.

Politicized activities at other gatherings/conferences:

At the USSF, the Children’s Social Forum had:
• Video making workshop for older kids interviewing folks “why did you decide to come to the social forum” and editing it into a 15 minute video. See the video at: http://www.leftturn.org/?q=node/971
• Kids contribute sentences to make the Children’s Bill of Rights
• Play with clay, make houses and learn about gentrification
• 9-11 year olds planned and presented a presentation to the adults

At the 2008 AMC, the Kids' Track had:

• block printing
• street art (learning to cut a stencil and safely spraypaint it)
• writing letters as a form of political activism

From (the zine) Moving Towards a Family Friendly Radical Movement

One thing I've seen work well is creating a log/sign in
sheet where parents can sign the kids in and write down all pertinent info
and special needs, I've seen this include the category of -good ways to calm
down a specific child- or -things that comfort them-. Very useful. If
something specific and notable happens, like a tummyache or a fall or
something, it can be documented in the log. That helps with the volunteer
change-overs and keeping new people up to speed with things that have been
going on, etc.

Also, sometimes there is a need for a one on one person for really small
children or special needs so it helps if that is a possibility for parents
to be able to set up on the front end.

And the last thing is, if this is a conference or something where workshops
are offered, always ask presenters if they want to do something for the kids
as well, like a mini workshop. It rarely occurs to people and lots of times
people that like children are happy to do a thing for kids as an extra.

And--please don't make childcare an afterthought. It's better not to offer
it if the childcare is going to fall through, be unsafe, or suck.

from the Allied Media conference - Revolutionary Parenting Caucus.

Here are two of the suggestions we came up with about making an event be child-friendly:

1.At the start of an event, let the audience know that kids and kid noise is both okay and welcome.

2. Think about how the conference/event is helping parents/kids/families get to them. Remember that if we're flying, bussing, taking the train, etc., we're often paying for more than one seat (in addition to taking time off work, having to pay for TWO-(or more than two) meals instead of one at each mealtime, etc). How are the organizers working to make the event accessible for lower-income parents/families? (two mothers realized that they couldn't come to the AMC because they just couldn't afford the cost of travel. Both lived in places where it wasn't really feasible to get a ride from someone already going or hop on a group bus

And some more ideas (from individual parents):

1. Organize games for kids to play together (non-competitive) or art supplies and a space specifically for the kids. We want children of radical parents to become friends with each other and parents to be able to talk to other adults. For actions, have all the kids write "Baby Bloc" or "Kid Bloc" on their signs.
2. It is really helpful for organizers to direct parents with strollers to a safe space before a planned arrest situation. We experienced this once- we had marched through Kent with the Portage Peace group and as we approached the bridge, an awesome organizer pointed all the parents with strollers off the road and onto the sidewalk because they were going to block the bridge and risk arrest to do it.
3. Tell smokers if they have to smoke around kids to at least point their firesticks toward themselves instead of sticking them out at kids' eye level.
4. Honor kids somewhere in your readings if it is at possible to do so. Show kids some positive attention, by introducing them, hugging them, playing with them, giving parents a break now and then.
5. Keep toddler-chasers company... If you see a parent doing nothing at an event but chasing a toddler around, it probably means the parent planned on participating more in the event but cannot. Parenting can be pretty lonely especially when you're around people you can't talk to.

THINGS TO THINK ABOUT:
How do we integrate kids and adults & what are our expectations in how to interact with each other as a community?

**As someone whose kid is not often without a parent, I find great comfort in
knowing that when I leave him in a childcare zone the people there will call
me at the drop of a hat. That makes me more free to get involved - not
worrying about whether my kid is wanting me. I think that it would be great
if, in situations where kids are dropped off, there are a couple of extra
cell phones or 2-way radios for parents who don't have cell phones as well
as a very bold policy about calling parents upon first request or other
expressed need of the child.

I also really like spaces where kids and adults are integrated rather than
just having drop-off, but sometimes that doesn't work or isn't appropriate
(whatever that means!).

* * *
Personally, what i would love to see more than babysitting or anything
else is a discussion or hand-out, some kind of statement on community
standards relating to children. i realize that could be complicated to
get consensus on depending on process, but it would be cool.

the thing that stresses me out the most about taking my baby places is
having to worry about whether other people (adults) are willing to deal
with their own comfort issues. i am always responsible for my kid's
safety and needs, unless someone else agrees to take care of them for a
while, but i wish i could let him roam free and explore without having to
stop him from touching other people or their stuff. i am fine with other
people not wanting to be touched by him, but i wish i could assume that if
it wasn't fine they would deal with it themselves or at least ask me to
deal with it without treating me like i had done something wrong. i would
like this in all public settings, but at least in radical settings that
are not exclusively adult it would be really nice.

i would also like to know what people's expectations are in regard to
noise. i take my little one out of lectures and meetings if he is being
so loud that it's really disrupting what is happening, but it's hard not
to be concerned if he just shrieks loudly occasionally -- i would like to
know whether organizers or people in attendance are concerned about that
sort of thing or not.

i had another idea, too...providing something like activity packages,
snacks or a toy library that people could pick things up from to to help
support kids who would be going around to different activities with their
parents could be cool.

* * *

I wish adults could handle themselves around kids. I don't mean play with or hang out with my
son, but hold their own boundaries, communicate what's going on for
them, and let me know. It seems one of the places where I have to
hold other people's boundaries. And that feels gross to me. If I
touched someone and it wasn't ok, I'd expect them to speak up and be
direct or stop me before it happened - if I were giving a hug for
example. And I want people to do that with kids, even if it's more
challenging for them - it's their boundary.

Now my son's 10, he's a pretty good judge of who's going to be ok,
but adults behave in unexpected ways and that is confusing and
upsetting.

Part of that is because we are a very inclusive community and so we
get a really wide variety of people.

My opinion is that what's really needed is networks of people we
trust banding together and consistency around that. For example,
people willing to step up: it would be great if folks would step up
for kid care regularly so that they can form bonds with the kids and
the kids can feel safe with them. That way we open the circles of
trust and support in real, grounded ways.

It would be great if parent-allies who are not parents formed bonds
with children to help us hold space at events. For example there are
adults that I know that will step up and work with my son if
something happens to/with him when he's out of my sight. I can trust
them to help him and speak up if he's been confronted or done
something where other adults or kids are around as well as to step in
if he, say, nearly steps in poison oak.

I'd love to have a term stronger than "ally" for people who don't
just care, but are willing to step up - allies are people who
identify, I want people who are willing to act. Maybe making buttons
for them to wear at events so that kids know who to go to if
something's up, but their Adult on Duty (parents, guardians,
overseers) are not in immediate eye sight. And that would build
trust. It would be even more awesome if the kids could give out the
buttons so that it was clear that they trusted the adults in question.

What I hear myself asking for is acknowledged commitment from my
peers to support me and my family in ways that I can hear.
Reasonable, yes. Do-able? I don't know.

End Note: Mutual Aid/Mutual Respect

Parents: Parents and Children can be a high needs group of folks, be careful not to burn out your allies. Be responsible and on time with picking up your children when you say you will or call.

Allies: Be aware that radical parents often make progressive alternative parenting choices outside the mainstream which make them more vulnerable to criticism from society, family members, as well as the predominately child-free radical movement.

THANK YOU Steph and Britt /CrimethInc! (They asked for advice on how to support & include parents and children at the CrimethInc convergence) AND thank you to everyone else who wants to know as well!

mamihood and work

2008-12-05T10:15:00.000-08:00

written by fabi!

My daughter is with her papa..so what do I do? Write about her. I'm such a mama, I know.

Warning a little long and mama'ish.

I sat on a panel at USC early this week for a responsible development and USC expansion talk. Munchk was with me; the panel started in the evening. A traditional style panel where the "experts" sit facing the listeners. We faced the 40+ students and thankfully Tafarai sat right by me (I asked him to). Beside him sat a USC professor, planner and an architect (USC alumni). During the two hour panel discussion a fruitful dialogue unfolds, Amaya who's on my lap scribbles on her homework, she wrote her name, draws a flower on my right hand, tells me about five times that she wants to go home, asks for water, gets up a couple of times, and when the other three men speak she starts to talk to me - in her regular tone. I whisper to her, to please lower her voice, "like this" emphasizing the low hush tone. She then responds, louder than normal "but I want to go with Grandma."

Bored she began to unbutton my shirt, a buttoned black long sleeve collared top; good thing I wore a black tank top under it. For the next 10 minutes she would unbutton the top slowly, then button it back up, once buttoned up, rapidly unbuttons playfully, with one hand on one side of the top shirt and the other hand on the other side...ripping it open like she was acting out a scene of undressing dramatically. Since the buttons were clip-like it was noisy. Just a little outrageous to see a child doing a I'm taking my mama's shirt off in front of many people over and over again act. Finally I noticed how distracting it became, I asked her to please stop unbuttoning my shirt, "it's my shirt and it needs to stay buttoned." She smirks, and gives me this look, like who do I think I am.

In essence she amused a couple of students with her rambunctious demeanor. At the end of the panel the comments that I received were about how well behaved she was.

Last month, she did something similar when I interviewed voters (with Jessica Hoffmann), towards the end she started to cover my mouth as I spoke to people, while I had her on my hip. "Stop talking mami" covering my mouth with her little hands.
Lastly, that little person took off her overall dress in the Sisterfire art festival, wearing her gray thick tights and blouse. I asked her if she was sure about taking off her dress and walking around with tights and only a blouse that tights are supposed to be worn with a dress/skirt/long blouse and she responds non chalantly, yes mami I'm fine. Do it while you can baby.

She's something else. Though at times nerve wrecking and hard, for the most part, she adds quirky excitement during what would normally be pretty serious work.

New Stories

2008-11-29T15:12:00.000-08:00

by China Martens

first published in The Fertile Source

I hesitate to write the story of my daughter’s birth.

When I tell the tale I usually espouse many of the positive themes you expect to hear in pro-home birth essays, along with some young radical single-mother embellishes. I tell my listeners about how strong it made me feel to do it on my own and the belief it gave me in myself, which translated to a confidence in my child as well as my ability to be her mother. It was a departure from the way I was born, the way I was often told it had to be, on a path that was rare to find. It’s something I am very proud of, a story I like to tell to travelers by the sea or expectant mothers sitting under a lemon tree. But the fact is, there are other kinds of stories, including home-to-hospital births.

When Sprout, pregnant with her first child, came to town, she wanted to create a radical parents support group; she asked on the anarchist-parenting list serv if there were any other anarchist parents in Baltimore. I was a full 20 years older than she was (and probably a foot taller), but I answered her call to be in that group. Never in a million years did I expect the news that came next: Paikea died in the hospital a few days after her birth. Though I went to her as soon as I heard, to tell her I was sorry, this was something I didn’t even know how to respond to. I was the more experienced mama and yet how little I knew!

The following year, Magenta, another mother who sought my advice for midwife choices and resources, wound up having a tumultuous and long labor that resulted in a c-section and posttraumatic stress.

These women had gone on the same adventure as me, with the same intentions as I had. They had read the same books, held the same expectations (to have a home-birth with a midwife), but wound up in the hospital with questions about how and why things happened the way they did. Their birth stories contain great love and strength, great pain and loss.

Concha, a third rad mama, cried to me, for just a moment, in the sunshine. As she stood like a queen of everything free and triumphant, maternal and happy, with the most beautiful baby in the entire world, she told me that she felt like a “failure” for having to go to the hospital, for needing western medicine, for not being able to do it all on her own.

And that is unacceptable to me. If my strong, beautiful, resourceful, and clever sisters feel like some kind of failure because of this, then it must be addressed. Something in the natural birth movement, meant to empower us, is creating a mythology that can work to sabotage individual truths.

Listening to these stories has changed my thoughts on how I interpret my own experiences, just as my own mother’s story of my birth made me know I never wanted to have my baby in a hospital and watching my cat have kittens showed me the kind of birth I did want. I see that I have made some assumptions from my life because things happened as I expected them to. These are not fair assumptions to make. I could have had a tumultuous birth as well. I certainly have had tumultuous experiences in other areas where my natural, alternative, and radical peers did not—so I know what that feels like. A friend told me she had some trouble nursing at first, with her third child. Who would have thought such a thing? The first two had no such problems. All mothers know, and the more experienced then the better, not everyone has the same troubles. Your own struggles may benefit you with the wisdom to be more compassionate to another’s.

I didn’t go to the class at my midwife’s house the week we discussed what to do if we needed medical intervention during labor––because I believed, with the great golden strength of the young, that nothing would go wrong. (Yes, the midwife and her assistant were mad at me about that. But I read about that stuff in a book already; and I wanted to join my friends in a big outing to Denver. I chose adventure over dour responsibility and fear.) I just knew that everything was going to be all right. This attitude, many believe, was what made everything turn out as well as it did. But after talking to Magenta, I see how silly that thought is. She told me that people tell her that it’s not her fault, that her body couldn’t labor on her own and have a vaginal birth. How can that be, when those of us who do have successful natural births take the credit for our bodies’ capabilities? Things could have happened differently and then I would have felt differently.

Now I see there are many places within one’s life to gain or lose confidence and faith with yourself, as well as to lose what you have gained and regain what is lost, multiple chances across the expanse of your life. We need to utilize all that will help us; to challenge all that will harm us; and come up with combinations, variations, and adaptations over time. Pregnancy and birth are heavy. I’m sure every mother has thought about the dangers but, if you are like me, you may hate the hospital so much that you can not imagine yourself needing its care. We need to be prepared for different outcomes and paths, and recognize that taking other routes is not a failure, but is seeking the help we need.

I see now that there are some mothers who feel ambivalence and difficulty when thinking back to their labor, whose stories contain more struggles within them.

When I first heard my friend Magenta’s story, I didn’t know how to handle this kind of power in a woman, a truth telling woman, when the truth was not pretty. I sat in the grass, with my friend in pain before me, a pain I could not fix, holding her wonderful little son, and listened to her story. We discussed our issues with our bodies over the course of our lives so far. We tell our stories, after all, to create changes as well as to understand, and to try to make sense of, the things that have happened to us. I want to learn how to tell a story that will honor all women, all births, all that birth is; to hand something down into the future as well as to change it.

It is only with this understanding that I will now tell the story of my daughter’s birth.

I loved being big and pregnant: my hair was long and alpine green and I lived with my two best friends by the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Boulder. They had migrated here when there were political actions going on, lived in a house of activists, and stayed. I had come to settle and to give birth. Amy walked around town with me everyday. Unemployed, we would make a mission searching for “curly fries” or I would sit on the steps outside our apartment and she would read to me from a book she was exploring (usually some woman-centric, sexuality or magical type thing). Her hair was alpine green, too; she was to be one of my daughter’s fairy godmothers. (I hoped that everyone I knew and met would all become her extended radical family). Olga, my other best friend, had drifted away. She was very interested in mothering topics but we weren’t feeling as close as we used to. She was busy with her job, her band-mates, and a big festival that her band was going to play soon.

I was surprised when contractions arrived while walking in the grocery store with my mother––it was such an ordinary day! Surely this could not be the beginning. They felt like menstrual cramps, nothing like the Braxton Hicks I had earlier that had made me feel more insecure about miscarriages and vulnerable. This small discomfort was the beginning of the birth process?

Getting back to the house, the pinges continued and I decided to time them. I interrupted band practice in the kitchen: “Does anyone have a watch? I think I might be having contractions.” Everyone was surprised, and wanted to know if they should stop band practice but no, no, I assured them it was fine, I didn’t want to be any bother.

Contractions went on into the night. I remember breathing through them and looking at the clock, with mama kitty to keep me company. She had been a roommate’s cat until she found another home for her. But that evening, she ran away from her new home blocks away and returned to sit up all night with me––the best doula ever!

In the morning, Olga had to go to one last band practice before the show. She asked me if it was all right, if she had time, she didn’t want to miss the birth. I told her it was fine, there was time. Amy, however, who hadn’t been interested in being present at the birth, stayed and paced around like a nervous father––afraid and excited.

I had painted a large mural on the wall to welcome the baby––a tree with flowers and birds. I had an antique crib I had dumpstered. My mother slept on a guest mattress and read a Tom Robbins book I lent her, Jitterbug Perfume. All our plain things had been painted on, even the lampshade. I had planned on having my daughter at home the way cats do, the way witches do, the way anarchists do—and here in this progressive town, even though home-birth was illegal, it had been easy to find a midwife. I attended a class with her each week.

When we called the midwife, her husband answered and said to get lots of rest while I could, to drink miso, and call back when I was further along, that he would wake her then since she was resting from another birth. I didn’t want to call until the time was really coming close. I know some people like to have lots of people around them but I feel more comfortable being by myself. This was my birth. It was good to have the midwife’s support but I just wanted to birth in peace.

I had a book that told me how long each stage would take and I believed in it as a guide, as solid as a map. Birth takes time. It’s not like on TV, how there is a scream and panic and off to the hospital.

How surprised I was then, by the intensity! I roared like a lion. (Later I wondered what the college boys who lived upstairs thought.) I have never known sound like that, sound from within, strong powerful deep—the roaring was part of the pushing, one and the same. It was an inner body experience, I like to say, kind of like tripping—a veil came down as I felt my hips shift and the baby moved down. I wasn’t as composed as I thought I would be. I had gone to take a shower and wound up delivering a baby on the floor by the toilet, with one of my socks half on and half off, not wanting to move. My mother came behind me and cradled my head, held my upper body, as my feet pushed up on tip toe. My midwife’s assistant arrived and said I was crowning. It was going to be the first baby she ever delivered.

I yelled, “I am dying, I am dying, I am dying,” for birth is like lovemaking where you try to say something once and find yourself repeating it over and over.

“You are not dying,” she told me and I was glad she was there. When my daughter came out, it was suddenly very calm and silent––from this whirlwind, my newborn arrived. The midwife’s assistant placed her on my chest.

“My baby,” I said, and looked at her, wide-eyed, looking back at me––us seeing each other for the first time. I just knew, from that moment, that it would always be right. I loved her very much. To take a shower felt incredibly lonely; I wasn’t used to being alone without her in my body and I was so glad to get back to her, in my arms, back on my bed. “She’s beautiful,” said the midwife. Yes, she was.

I have a photo of my best girlfriends grinning on both side of me, holding my baby, in my bed. We looked so young. At the time, 21 years old didn’t feel so very young to me. We had done a lot of things; we knew what we wanted. Natural childbirth, like anarchism, gave me a belief in my own powers outside of the establishment, the possibilities of humanity to live without exploitation but each to their own, in cooperation.

Days later, I took my daughter to a doctor to look at an eye infection she had developed that wasn’t responding to a breast milk remedy. The doctor tripped out on the fact that I had a home birth and hadn’t had the baby tested with the “prick the foot and bleed” test (given the information, it seemed like a bad test anyway). He sent Child Protective Services to my house. Unlike so many others’ experiences with Child Protective Services, mine turned out well. The social worker looked around at the crucified clown on a cross, the artwork, drum set in the kitchen, two roommates, mattresses on floors. Then, she looked at me, my child, and my mother and said, “Clearly this child is loved,” and left.

Years later, I would have other battles of doubt and struggle, other initiations and changes in my life, contractions and tears, and I would grow and learn even more. Birth is not always about just trusting in nature and learning to let go. I have always advised my friends to fall down the steps like a drunk––they get hurt less that way––and don’t be afraid. Or I have said that, pardon the crass comparison, it’s like taking a shit. And going to the hospital makes you get scared and constipated and then they all start working on you and the trouble begins.

I’ve learned about how things can go wrong. Sometimes we will have trouble but that doesn’t mean we are weak or inferior. Human beings are more complicated than that. We are body and spirit; we are good times and hard times. All of this makes us what we are––exactly who we are, experienced, marked, marred and born of it.

As beautiful as the natural birthing movement helped me feel, and as empowering and revolutionary to define my own path while joining in an older heritage, there are always other stories, other ways. It’s kind of dumb to take credit for the fact that everything went well because life can dish out many things. Why take the credit for the good when they say not to take the blame for the bad? Is it some kind of female machismo to brag about how you can handle the pain of childbirth? For me, it was the one time I could join in with that, never being very good as a girl before, not being able to do flips off the swing, or cartwheels, or show off agility on the monkey bars. My body has never felt like a close companion of mine. To become friends with it through having a child was an amazing experience.

My birth story is one of my happiest stories. A punk rock mom fleeing from LA once confided to me, “When I feel down, I watch the tape of my birth and then I feel so strong that I can do anything!” There are many different stories. We share things in common as women, but we also claim so many variations. Birth experiences, like sex experiences, can encompass so much diversity: pleasure, joy, liberation as well as enslavement, disappointment, and devastation. Not every woman experiences things the way some others say that she “should.” Our experiences have to be turned around to emphasize that we’re normal, rather than used to demonstrate that we’re a failure in someone else’s system. Prepare for everything, not just for something going “wrong.” Preparing a hospital back up plan might help with that outcome; if you need western medicine, honor that path. Focus your positive energy, make the decisions for yourself, gather support around you. And then what comes next? That’s your story.

There is never really an end to that tale.

call for submissions

2008-11-03T23:05:00.000-08:00

Call for Submissions for Borderlands Zine #3

I am currently seeking personal stories and visual art on the theme of
RELATIONSHIPS and PARENTING for the upcoming issue of a compilation zine
about people of color's mixed-race, bicultural and transracial adoptee
identities. Stories should be non-fiction and no more than 1,000 words.
Prose only, please. Visual art should be black and white and replicate
well in a copy machine (minimal grey tones). Submissions for issue 3 are
due JANUARY 1st, 2009. Please email them in Rich Text Format to
oxette [at] riseup[dot]net and help forward this call widely.

**I know you are looking at the deadline and thinking "January 1st? That's
like light-years away!" but people seem to get hella busy during the
holidays, so please start writing now and submit early. This helps me get
the zine out in a timely manner. <3**>

You can get Borderlands #1 & #2 for free @ QZAP.org
and both are also available for purchase at StrangerDangerDistro.com and
ShortandQueer.com.)

Call for Submissions for Borderlands Zine #4

I am currently seeking personal stories and visual art on the themes of
WORK and SCHOOL for the upcoming issue of a compilation zine
about people of color's mixed-race, bicultural and transracial adoptee
identities. Stories should be non-fiction and no more than 1,000 words.
Prose only, please. Visual art should be black and white and replicate
well in a copy machine (minimal grey tones). Submissions for issue 4 are
due JUNE 1st, 2009. Please email them in Rich Text Format to
oxette [at] riseup[dot]net and help forward this call widely.

[Your stories are valuable, and it's time to bring our often neglected
cross-cultural and multi-racial experiences from margin to center by
telling our own stories! -Nia]

Is My Revolution in My Womb?

2008-11-03T22:54:00.000-08:00

Over at Quirky Black Girls, Iresha explores the connections between Black revolutionary practice and motherhood. She describes:

I recently had one of my Black Nationalist female friends state that Black Women need to procreate for the race at a higher speed than the speed that they were doing now….when I questioned her on the implications of child birth and the issues that we have with some Black men taking care of their children, she simply shrugged and said that it was not as important as out numbering White folks!?

Later in the post she gives a bit of historical perspective on the question saying:

In 1966, Frances Beale, a member of SNCC, which was a nonviolent student organization that was founded in 1960 for the purpose of coordinating the sit-in movement in an attempt to integrate bus stations, lunch counters, created a segment of SNCC called the Black Women’s Liberation Committee. Frances Beale wrote that Black women had the right and the responsibility to determine when it is in the interest of the struggle to have children or not to have them and this right must not be relinquished to any other than the Black woman to determine when it is in her own best interests to have children.” She makes this clear in her famous article “Double Jeopardy: To Be Female and Black”:

We are not saying that Black women should not practice birth control. It is her right and responsibility to determine when it is in her own best interests to have children, how many she will have and how far apart. The lack of the availability of safe birth control methods, the forced sterilization practices, and the inability to obtain legal abortions are all symptoms of a decadent society that jeopardizes the health of Black women (and thereby the entire Black race) in its attempts to control the very life process of human beings

mama/papa zinesters - want to raise some hell?!

2008-10-30T13:12:00.000-07:00

grabbed from China (The Future Generation)'s livejournal. (I've been involved in Mamaphiles from the beginning):

hello!

I wanted to tell you about a project called Mamaphiles. Its started on the mamaphonic website, a site for writer and artist mamas, on the zine thread where mamas were listing there zines.

"What if we all did a zine together, kinda like a mama zine reader?" posted one zinester - stacey of Fertile Ground - way back whenever (I don't remember, I think in 2000) and about 32 other zinesters jumped in excited. The purpose of this project is also to be collaborative. In that, we are stronger, together - and all who participate (mothers or fathers, now with the last issue we are opened to papa zinesters) in writing an essay can participate as much or as little as they can/want. Jumping in with ideas, taking n a task: such as promotion, lay out, printing, editing, etc...

which is great! I love to lay out zines but am bad at promotion so my job was to lay it out. another mama used to zerox on the sly at her office, now we have a new contributor whose collective owns a zeroxing machine, and she is going to do it and is interested in lay out. I said I would write and do outreach, looking towards newer mama zine writers I have met this year - to see if they would like to participate!

Another beauty of this project, is that we pick a theme - a very loose open theme - and see how each one of us interperates that theme. It comes out pretty cool! and no one is turned away, you want to be in, your in - but we have learned also, to have a word limit.

so we work together on this - and it becomes whatever those who make it, make it!

Interest, as well as general activity levels over at mamaphonic, is down - but some of the contributors that joined last year, are already ready to make another! Enthuisiasm is re-emerging. . .

Brainstorming on a theme - has began. WHAT DO YOU THINK? Would you like to join in? I hope so! Like I say, as little or as much as you can. I know many parents are busy. If you would like to only contribute an essay that too, would be so wonderful! I think there are more parent zinesters to ask and reach out too. The more the better!

creating this kind of "reader" with bios in the back, also is a good networking tool and a good way a new parent or interested person can see many diverse and various publications at once.

The new theme idea that has the most interest level, so far, is "Raising Hell" I kind of like it. Might be just the ticket! We need something more spicy, the last issue "coming home" was very nesty.

and please, if you may, spread the word to all parent zinesters you know - that they are invited (+ greatly happily welcome!) to participate

organization takes place on mamaphonic.com and here is the thread about planning theme - the first step - next will come formulating the call for submissions. this is a good time to jump in, at the beggining! (but things are rolling along, so I am not sure where we will be if this has been forwarded to you and took a week or so ...so check in and see)

http://www.mamaphonic.com/node/1873

and for more info on this project: mamaphiles.com

thanx and best wishes,
china

p.s. - also all ideas on place to put the call for submissions up are welcome too. like I say, my (self apointed) job this go around, is more outreach for newer members who may not have heard of this project before.

please feel free to forward this!

mules and mamas

2008-10-21T00:27:00.001-07:00

when i found out i was pregnant i was a bit surprised. my friends were flabbergasted (i love anglosaxon language for words like flabbergasted). most of them seemed surprised that i would 1) let myself get pregnant 2) be happy about it 3) not be considering abortion....
now i am a pro-choice girl. being pregnant solidified my pro-choice, reproductive justice dedication, but i wanted to be a mother so bad, the rest of that was like background noise.

i was a journalist/activist in the west bank. i hung out with the 'cool kids'. we would get together in the evening with beers and wine and green and tell jokes about stupid soldiers at checkpoints and the best beer in palestine and geo-politics and such. our lives were so cool and exciting and glamorous and dangerous (sic). or at least that is what i was told. so my increasingly cynical-laced joy at the wonders of pregnancy, birth, and motherhood, seemed a bit out of place in that crowd.

i was kinda thrown off kilter by their response. i had images of a woman with a baby on her back and a rifle in her hand striding across the desert. okay, i wasnt planning to carry a rifle. replace the rifle with a black power fist, or a video camera. i imagined sitting on hills doing look-out, while my kid played in the scraggy bushes, me sending messages down to the main group via cell phone.
i imagined sitting in rooms with women, their headscarves now resting on their shoulders like a shawl, their babies falling to sleep on blankets curled up to the walls, while we giggled and told stories and figured out strategy for the next day.

or we could hire a babysitter. something.

2 1/2 years later i will be returning to the west bank. a lot has happened since the last time i was there. and not much for the better. but a couple of my friends have babies of their own.
sometimes people ask if i am scared for her well-being living in such a dangerous place. no, not really. well, there were two shootings last weekend in our neighborhood here in chicago. the west bank was not really more dangerous.

if i ever get to live out my imaginings of west bank mother journalist/activist, it will probably not feel so exuberiant (sp?) or glamorous or clear. it will probably feel a bit inconvenient and murky and silly. a bit like a mule. the best i am hoping for is--fun. that is the aim everyday. i guess it will feel like any other flabbergasting motherhood day.

wherever you go there you are.

REALLY alarmed

2008-10-18T16:30:00.000-07:00

from stinky kinky mama

I am REALLY alarmed at the pervasiveness of vaccine propaganda. Marc and I have buried ourselves in vaccine research that leaves our brains sputtering and hissing. I’m collecting “legal proof” of my research and notarizing copies of our birth plan and exemptions so I don’t get slapped with some child neglect charge.

We also stole our neighbors’ dog. They had him in a dark shed with no food or water and he was crying for two days straight. He stopped crying as soon as I stepped in front of the shed and I couldn’t leave him there. When I stuck my hand into the shed, he was so beside himself that there was company that he kept toppling over his own feet. Turns out he has roundworm and ringworm. We got him some dewormer at the vet and some antifungal soap and ointment at HEB. Stache is sleeping at my parents’ house for a few nights until we disinfect our house and treat the puppy. He’s only 8wks old! He looks like a pit bull, but kind of like a bulldog too. He’s just too young to know. But he is definitely a puppy. He chews on everything and his pee puddles are the size of a silver dollar. Hahaha just what we need at this high-stress time! Seriously, we’re trying to buy all the baby’s stuff and get the vaccination research done in time for the baby’s arrival. A puppy is not on the agenda. But he has encouraged us to take it easy and laugh.

So, free puppy who will be at tallest 21inches (according to the vet) and may be at least half pit bull. Still too young to have been too traumatized by his alone time and very, very alert. We’ve been feeding him garlic and unfluoridated water to help his immune system recover fully.

no poem today

2008-10-17T16:57:00.000-07:00

originally posted here

no, no poem today
because I slept
in the back of the car
with cool breeze coming in
and Winter playing with sticks
next to me.
no poem because
i sat outside
and watched her
build houses with
twigs, as we moved
from shade to shade
under the trees
instead of a poem,
i left coffee water
in my plants
rearranged the dollar store
pots River and Winter
bought me for my birthday
in lieu of a poem,
i divided the cactus
succulent,
moving the babies into
pots of their own.

a tale of two events

2008-10-08T13:34:00.000-07:00

A few years ago, my 3-year-old daughter Siu Loong and I were hanging out with another three-year-old and her mother. My friend was planning to attend an event at the local radical bookstore later that evening. Sure that Siu Loong wouldn’t sit quietly through a slideshow about political movements in Argentina, I had not been planning to go.

My friend kept trying to convince me to go. She pointed out that the girls were having a great time together and that, between the two of us, we could tagteam dealing with them.

I finally agreed.

When the slideshow started, my friend pulled Siu Loong on her lap and absent-mindedly starting bouncing her. “Bouncy, bouncy, bouncy, bouncy!” my daughter chanted happily.

The presenter stopped, looked at us and said, “I can’t concentrate. That’s really distracting.” I started to take Siu Loong outside; she began wailing because she wanted to stay with her friend; her friend didn’t want to leave and, to top it off, the girls had scattered their belongings throughout the store, making it impossible to grab our stuff to make a quick exit.

I ended up sitting outside the bookstore feeling humiliated, ostracized and stupid for letting myself get talked into the situation. I felt unsupported by the other mama, who, despite her earlier arguments, had said nothing.

I didn’t attend an event there for the next three years.

This past month, I organized a panel about incarcerated women at that same bookstore. Even though my daughter, now 7 ½, can read a book through any event I drag her to, I’ve never forgotten that feeling and so decided to arrange childcare, a first for that particular venue. Two volunteers with Regeneracion, the local radical childcare collective, agreed to hang out with the kids during the event.

Two other girls showed up with their mothers. The childcare providers took them to the playground, then stayed with them outside where the girls held an imaginary dinner party while the grown-ups inside talked about abuse in women’s prisons, the companies that profit from the soaring rates of incarceration, and work being done—both inside and out—to challenge and change these realities.

Although we didn’t manage to challenge or change any aspect of women’s incarceration that night, by providing childcare we did manage to change the reality that, for many mothers, attending a social justice event is still not possible.

11 years and over an hour ago

2008-09-20T01:57:00.000-07:00

cross posted from mamita mala

Sunday, September 7, 2008

It was after Abner Louima. I was 20 years old, single and very pregnant. After spending the entire summer supervising a city wide voter registration drive that employed members of street organizations (aka gangs) and running security at various anti-police brutaity rallies, one of the most gratuitous incidents of police violence occurred and I was forbidden by my mentor from marching across the brooklyn bridge. I was due to give birth to Alejendro Lautaro, half Rican, half Mapuche baby that moved heavy in my belly. Richie did not want me giving birth on the brooklyn bridge during a protest against the police that could turn ugly. I thought the whole notion romantic. What better place to give birth to the child of two warriors. but my mother and Richie planned and instead I was limited that Staurday to walking around the block in my hood. The hood where I was percieved as the “different” kind of Rican because I could speak so well and didn’t play my music so loud. And now I was, in the eyes of many , a stereotype.

When the marches were over and everyone was safe in their homes, my contractions began. I was calm. I may have stood outside an abortion clinic months earlier, but this moment felt like the most natural thing in the world. I asked my mother to call the cab. Asked my sister to grab my bag and soon I was on my way to Long Island Jewish Hospital.

Once inside the hospital, everything happened so fast. I was wheeled in for a sonogram, where I hoped finally to see if my Alejandro Lautaro was really a boy (I never really knew as the baby was a modest one). Instead clearly the baby raised a middle finger to me as I intruded into it’s space. My mother and sister can confirm this.

I hadn’t taken lamaze or bithing classes. Who had time for that when I was working and organizing? So I faithfully took the epidural when it was offered. My crooked spine was bearing the weight of this birthing process. I slept while my mother watched tv and before I knew it I was pushing out the most perfect brown baby from inside of me, into a world that welcomed her and rejected her, into a world I would teach her about but will never be able to fully protect her from.

Yes she, Alejandro Lautaro was born a girl to remind me that mujeres are warriors to and thanks to a collaboration between my sister and I, she was named for two cities in two separate countries that carry her bloodline.

That was 11 years ago to the day.

Since then I have been transformed by mami’hood. Something about carrying and bringing life and caring for life radicalized me. She was barely a month old when she attended her first rally and got into a physical confrontation. Her first word may have been mami, but her first sentence was no justice, no peace. She perfected her raised fist by age three. Learned chants for Vieques before her abc’s. She was fed as my comrades and I disected texts on race, power and resistance. She colored as we planned protests and waited for me when I took my first arrest. She hates writing , but can spot injustice in half a second. She’s quiet but it’s because she’s thinking and plotting. She was raised by a single mother and by a community of women in the family who made sure she never lacked what she needed but also that she was never overwhelmed with a false sense of abundance or privilege.

I am proud to watch her grow into her own mujer, with me as a guide , with victories and failures as examples.

Te abre el camino mi’jita mia, ahora tu tienes que caminarlo.

impending motherhood

2008-09-08T18:48:00.000-07:00

from stinky kinky mama

I have been chewing off the skin on my fingers to the point that it is painful to type these words. My teeth ache from chewing ice all day long and my bloodshot eyes are a gross reminder of my sleeplessness. I’m just a little nervous about impending motherhood. I do comfort myself with the fact that no matter what I do or how I prepare or what I read, I will never, ever know exactly what I’m doing… and no one has ever mastered motherhood. I mean, right? So all I have to do is my best. Right?

Something that has been irking the shit out of me is how lucky I am, just to have been born to a mother whose teaching job has us in the middle class. I don’t know the exact figures of income for middle class for our region, lower or upper, but I know we’re definitely in the lower middle class, having experienced many instances growing up that as a family we were near broke by the end of the month. But since I was 4, we’ve always lived in houses, always had a car, always had health insurance, always had new school supplies and clothes and my mom always had free time to spend with my two sisters and I. Now the income and charitable spirit of both Marc’s and my parents is helping us out immeasurably. I was able to choose not to work (now I realize I may have been happier working) while pregnant. I have learned so much these past months though, from sheer reading time; I have absorbed more information in these past months than I did in that year I was in college.

But from all this learning a feeling of panic has set in. I’ve always been a bookworm, always excelled at academia and loved to write. I also love to talk and share information I’ve gathered. This has led to me having a hidden dream to be a professor someday. And now that I’ve been slowly unlearning all my history classes and realizing that what made me hate the idea of furthuring my formal education was its irrelevancy to my life (read: high school history books had nothing to do with being a brown person on the US side of the Mexico-US border). Okay, the history of Texas has plenty to do with my life as a confused, border-town, brown girl– but not the way it was presented to me. As for that panicked feeling, I’m fretting about how I let my four-year full-paid scholarship (that I worked hard for) go down the drain, how I succumbed to drugs and partying and how I never believed that I could be ’smart’ or articulate enough to get up there and do it, be a professor of, well, I didn’t know WHAT I wanted to profess back then. But now Chicano studies would sweep/has swept me off my feet. Border studies. Womens studies. Other stuff I don’t even know exists as part of the UT Pan American programs because I am too melancholy to look. I was extended this great opportunity and some flimsy ideology I possessed a year ago allowed me to think I’d be happy leaving the great resources at the local university. A friend named Hector was ranting about the ICC infiltrating the university, sputtering about how “this University is ours, these resources are ours, this place is for our people!” And now I realize how important it is to my mental health to have time to be a little, oh, scholarly.

I explained all this to Marc near tears today. The beautiful person of my dreams was genuinely concerned, and asked me very specific time-span questions. In his mind, it’s not a question of can Sofia do it, it’s how long will it take? And he said he’d work to put me through school, no questions asked (Marc passionately wants to be a stay-at-home daddy).

All that said, back to impending motherhood. Or parenthood, for that matter, since me going back to school would affect all three of us so intensely. I am going to continue to research positions in the Valley where I could help people in my community without going to college, or going to college for a shorter period of time. I know I could feel fulfilled doing something else related to radical change or the providing of information here in the Valley. Hell, I would even go to vocational school to do something meaningful on the side. It’s just that I’m so damn good at academic stuff, it’s that natural talent I have. Oh well- there is no conclusion to be had today, in this post. This post has already changed so drastically from what I thought I was gonna write about when I started typing.

I’m gonna try to sleep now. Marc’s been asleep for a couple of hours already, but I had to let my damn food go down so as to avoid heartburn. And as usual, I got to thinking and chewing my fingers and whatnot. And yeah, I’m off.

PS My stomach itches.

McCain’s VP Pick : Palin and the Politica and Privilege of White Woman’hood/ Mommy’Hood

2008-09-06T00:35:00.000-07:00

cross posted from mamita mala!

Cross posted with VivirLatino

Last night, Alaska Governor Sarah Palin accepted the nomination to the vice-presidency at the Republican National Convention.

Originally the buzz about Palin, focused on her having a vagina. Her presence was analyzed as a calculated McCain strategy to lure disgruntled, hard core Hillary Clinton supporters.

Then the shift went internal, to her uterus, her identity as a mother to five, the youngest with some form of developmental delay, and a 17 year old daughter, unmarried and pregnant.

So what does this Palin parranda of information and analysis mean to mamis of color, Latina mamis like me? Not surprisingly, nada.

Sarah Palin wants to put herself out there as “every woman”. She wants to be seen as “just your average hockey mom”, and other mommies see themselves and their reality reflected through Palin, except, mamis of color, that is.

The talk returns to mommy wars, not mami wars, because the entire conversation excludes Latinas and other moms of color. We are not even soldiers. Even for so called progressive white feminist, the war is fought by them and maybe, if mamis like me are lucky, we’ll reap some benefit. When I was a pregnant teenager, in a Latin American country where abortion was and still is illegal(Chile), there was no opting out of pregnancy or working. Which is why the debate of how Palin could go back to work after having a baby with special needs or how a pregnant unmarried teenage daughter is being used, feels like a sideshow with little significance in reality. The politics of choice is being raised, with the emergence of a woman who is anti-choice, even in cases of rape or incest and with no talk of how for women of color, choice goes beyond an abortion and means the very right to have children (forget 5!) Imaginate if Michelle Obama had five children? Imaginate if one of the Obama children were older and pregnant? Imagine the hate and stereotypes that would be unleashed? Oh wait, I don’t have to imagine, as a single mami of color, I live it. Palin’s large brood isn’t seen as a strain on the system. They are a beautiful portrait of an “American” family making every other family, families like mine, ugly.

And let’s talk about the perceived double standard, that if a man had five children no one would be making a big deal of it, that men are held to a different standard, as stated in the video above. Claro if you take race out of the picture, it’s easy to follow along, pero if Obama was the father to five instead of two children, you don’t think the media and politicos would be making all sorts of references to black men and their hyper-sexuality? Or black men and responsibility? I hear no one telling Palin’s husband to put on a damn condom.

Just as many of women of color couldn’t get behind Clinton and her campaign because of racist attacks on Barack Obama, attacks that asked women of color to choose a candidate based not on a complex and painful history and reality, but rather because of perceived shared genitalia. Palin positions herself as continuing Clinton’s struggle, as continuing the struggle set forth by Geraldine Ferraro, the first woman to run as a vice-presidential candidate. Let’s not forget that Ferraro called Obama “lucky” for being black. Is Palin then lucky for having five children, like my abuela did before being forcibly sterilized? You wanna talk about Palin’s uterus or the uterus of her daughter? I want to talk about my abuela’s uterus, how it’s power was deemed dangerous because of it’s power to bear brown Spanish speaking babies, my uterus and it’s abortions, miscarriages, and pregnancies, violations upon it, the uterus of an immigrant woman being viewed as a weapon in a culture war and the need to put those immigrant women in chains as they push babies from them and the need the U.S. government has to separate mamis and babies and deport and dispose.

My uterus and my head is tired.

Sources of info and Ire/ The NYT, The Kitchen Table, Jack and Jill Politics, Culture Kitchen

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind (a call for submissions for radical parents & their allies!)

2008-09-05T06:08:00.000-07:00

on the heels of mai'a's post:

Call for Submissions: Don't Leave Your Friends Behind: a Radical Parents Allies Handbook -
CONCRETE WAYS YOU CAN SUPPORT PARENTS AND CHILDREN IN YOUR SCENE

Don't Leave Your Friends Behind is a book geared toward the non-parent radical community about how to be an ally to the parent(s) in their midst.

This book is going to be a collection of some of the best minds out there. We're looking for activists, allies, and radical parents to submit the most kicking stuff to make this the best book ever for getting down to business: let's make a better world WITHOUT Leaving out the mamas (and papas, partners, child-care providers) and children this time!

We are interested in submissions that focus on practical concrete ways you can (and have!) supported parents and children in your scene! We want stories of including children and parents in the anarchist and anti-capitalist activist movement such as: organizing Kidz Corners at radical bookfairs, providing childcare at specific events or as a political action, creating Baby blocs, and being part of collectives who include childcare so their members can participate, etc.

Word limit is from one sentence suggestions to 5.000 word essays.

Deadline: Feb. 1, 2009

About the Editors:

Vikki Law (that's me!) is a writer, photographer and mother who has been working on a survey of anarchist mothers for the past two years. She also put out the zine "Mama Sez No War," a compilation of mothers' experiences and activism against the U.S. war on Iraq and is the co-editor of "Tenacious: Art and Writings from Women in Prison." Her first book Resistance Behind Bars: The Struggles of Incarcerated Women (women.prisonersresistance.org) is coming out on PM Press.

China Martens is the editor of the long-running zine "The Future Generation ", Slug & Lettuce columnist, and mother of a 20 year old. Her first book The Future Generation: a zine-book for subculture parents, kids, friends + others is an anthology of 16 years of her zine and is put out by Atomic Book Company – also available from AK PRESS

Jessica Mills writes a monthly column for Maximum Rock N Roll, "My Mother Wears Combat Boots" and her book came out on AK Press in November 2007 by the same title. She's a mother of two, sometimes plays sax with Citizen Fish, and is always all about organizing cooperative childcare.

Questions? Feel free to get in touch.

Contact:
China Martens
China410@hotmail.com
P.O. Box 4803 Baltimore MD 21211

or

Vikki Law
vikkimL@yahoo.com
PO Box 20388
Tompkins Square Station
New York, NY 10009

i dont hate kids, but...

2008-09-05T01:08:00.000-07:00

okay--i am late on this post...over a week late, but i still wanted to mention it.

over at vegans of color there is a post about young folks and intersectionality...the post itself (based off of joshivore's post...the link is below) is cool, but some of the comments blow my mind...

what amazes me is how many people just plan and envision their entire lives as being child-free. i had a friend who said that she wasnt really used to being around babies so i couldnt blame her if she was horrible at it. she just didnt have any friends who had kids. well actually what that means is that she chose to swim in circles that are childfree. and parentfree. and that is a pretty exclusive circle.

and as the comments at this blog make clear: that is a choice. people really do assume that their workplaces and their social places will not include young ones. not only do they assume it, but they also demand it. and lets name exclusivity as exclusivity and not just a nonpolitical personal choice...like the difference between paper or plastic (which is also a political choice...but wev)

at joshivore's original post, there are plenty of folks who say things like: i dont have to like your kids.
and:
'Although a lot of people *say* they "hate kids", I realise what they usually actually *mean* is that they dislike being in their company."

which is such a problematic construction: 1. no, you dont have to like my kid but you do have to treat her with respect. 2. you have no right to discriminate against her based on her age alone 3. i dont 'own' her in the sense that she is not a piece of property. she is a person. and 4. well actually you do have to like my kid. she is awesome. and she is not going to apologize for being alive. if she is not acting in a way that pleases you then probably she does not like you. and she does not have to like you. cause she doesnt like assholes. (hell, there are plenty of times when she does not like me. obviously. you should have seen her yell today when i wouldnt let her play with the cell phone. and just as i was about to cringe, i realized that the guys outside of our window were even louder than she was and they were talking about nothing that i could decipher as important--- so some people are loud...oh well...)

kids are not a 'product of their upbringing'. they are not a product. they are human beings. and it is horrible that we are still characterizing human beings as products. my experience in this black female perception makes me very wary of the ways that we articulate people as products.

i get your point but we all have our own reasons for not being into breeding.

did i mention how racist the word: breeding is? god, i hate that word coming from the wrong mouth...calling a woman a breeder is disgusting...yeah, i know sexism sucks and it sucks to have people ask you why you arent a mother, but when you actually look at the socioeconomic statistics for childfree women vs mothers, there is no mistaking that childfree women are socially and economically privileged...so...yeah...sexism sucks.

the number one indicator of women sliding into poverty is motherhood.

im not sure what i am trying to say in this post...i guess something about how hating kids (or not hating kids) is really about creating this little exclusive club that says: no mothers allowed. and by creating those little clubs you are perpetuating the system of oppression that alot of radical folks claim to be opposing and deconstructing. and part of creating radical communities is working and living with people that your privilege promised you wouldnt have to deal with. like blacks, or women, or queers, or disabled, or kids, or mothers.
and so ppl need to either deconstruct their privilege and get over it and start learning how to like kids and all kinds of folks that you arent 'used to' because that is the world we live in. or you can crawl into a gated community where you only see kids when the brown and black nannies are taking them out for a walk in the afternoon.

Speaking of child friendly, nothing is ever black and white

2008-08-25T17:18:00.000-07:00

xposted from fabulosa mujer

Most pick up lines suck, this one especially:

1. You are very beautiful (directed towards my child), just like your mama. And repeat that line, then over step my boundaries by reaching out to grab and kiss my hand in front of my child.

Speak of boundaries

2. Yes, paying attention to children is important, but please don’t disappear with my child for 30 minutes straight, and take her away from my arms abruptly like I don’t deserve a heads up and some respect to my holding her.

My journey in practicing revolutionary mamahood without comprimising my own boundaries (and I am one who is happiest when my boundaries are set early healthily) the letting go to share the responsibility outside of what was once my nuclear family, has been a interesting journey…

There are what appears to be contradictions as the beginning of this series unfolds, but when are things black and white? When I volunteered to be part of the planning of the revolutionary parenting caucus at the AMC I was a little nervous about not being revolutionary enough. Admitting to imperfection in my desires to be revolutionary in my mamahood, reconciling with the need for boundaries, insecurities and sharing of responsibility of my first child, inexperienced, and without any concrete live examples of that has been a difficult and very humbling process.

3. When my child was under 2.5 years I was a pretty absorbant mama, careful of who held her, wary of not seeming like I imposed my child on people, and hesitated “handing off” my child to folks, even those that volunteered, because of my own inhibitions, insecurities (thinking I’m taking advantage of people’s good intentions) and first mamahood attachments/protections. My own environment fueled this, when I involved myself in projects when my little one was an infant to early toddler-hood most people didn’t held her when I went to work. My mom hasn’t been around for a while, thus extended family support was distant for the first 15 months of my child’s life, so when I did the stay at home motherhood thing, it was just the munchk and I for hours straight day in and day out. She was an attached baby, crying with other people, so placate her wails, I kept her with me. Letting go, as good as that process was for us, was not easy and it was at times painful. It began around the time I started working (full-time outside the home) and stopped breastfeeding; she was 1 year and 7 months. Now my daughter will be turning four, and through separated parenthood, she’s been around way more people, that love and caretake for her, and I’m sure that’s only going to expand; and it has been though tought at first, an embracing experience. Late last year, the munchk went from having one house to two, thus I’m with her half of the time now. Talk about letting go.

Capitalism does fuel individualism, nuclear family-ism, and one sometimes treats ones children like possessions (as in being possessive of them) without even thinking that’s what we’re doing. Boundaries and personal space are affected by all of this, I will not deny that. Yet, there is a thing called personal space and healthy boundaries in all of this. Boundaries are very important to me, though I do fervently believe in intergenerationl gatherings, movement, projects, in work and social gatherings, which means many people, there still is space in this intergenerational organizing for personal boundaries and personal space, difference of expression, and moments to want to spend alone, with family, with friends, with one’s child, and a time for everyone to be around.

Mamita Mala, does a good job at pointing at this — in this entry. On limits and boundaries…

I have a lot to say about that lately, limits, boundaries, retrieving, needing space, and folks being respectful of that, without wanting to knock your wall off because they can, and they will try. Our social justice involves difference in communication, space, boundaries, processes and if folks are needing of space for whatever reason, that’s okay.

out of babyland

2008-08-25T17:14:00.000-07:00

cross posted from quirky black girls

in the past couple of months, i have begun to make some major changes in my life. i started to really think about who i am and who i am becoming deeply as i weaned my 1 year old daughter. for the past two years i have spent my life in baby-land: pregnancy, birth, and breastfeeding. babyland in many ways is like an altered state of consciousness. my body housed and fed another living being. it is a beautiful exhausting heartbreaking space to live in.

weaning my daughter, re-viewing and re-formulating life is happening in conjunction with my first saturn return. when the old and unnecessary structures of my life fall away and i determine what is useful to who i am. it is a bit scary.

i have been thinking about the rebecca/alice walker sadness. it paralyzes me. i have loved both of their writings. and i am an unconventional black mom raising a biracial kid. her father's family have so much more resources than i do. and i struggle for time to write to read to think. i would love to drive a 100 miles away for a few days and write. *sigh* i also struggled with a mother who seemed to put her work and her reputation before my best interests. i would have loved to have a mother who could be involved in my life without making it 'about her'.

i wonder what my daughter will say about me? will she rail against the way i raised her? ahhh...i can hear her now: you took me to dangerous war zones, locked yourself away so you could 'create', never let me develop traditional bonds with my extended family, wrote openly about how you resented being a mother, referred to me as a 'parasite' when i was still in utero, refused to take me to a medical doctor even when i had a high fever for 2 days, fed me unhealthy food, never had a stable home and bribed me with a lollipop so that you could write an insignificant blogpost (that was 10 minutes ago). all of that before she was 2 years old...

so part of these changes i have decided to make are more writing time, healthier eating, studying more, more long walks, more bodywork, being a practicing member of an online spiritual practice community (still looking), and a more concerted effort to get my work 'out there'...which in another sense means i am committed to being an even worse mom.

right now my daughter has abandoned the lollipop and is throwing books into a box. no, now she is trying to crawl into the box. the lollipop is stuck to my leg.

i hope that when she is older she will not feel that i abandoned her to travel and write and love. but i am sure that she will...sometimes...because i refuse to be a martyr for my child. if i were then she would learn to be a martyr and i owe her more than that...

right now she is standing on the box, yelling no over and over again. when i smile at her she stops for a moment and then starts proclaiming no again.

the beginning

2008-08-25T17:13:00.000-07:00

revolutionary motherhood: every mother is revolutionary