Charis welcomes Ajuan Mance in conversation with Ashby Combahee for a discussion of Gender Studies: The Confessions of an Accidental Outlaw. In Gender Studies: True Confessions of an Accidental Outlaw, Ajuan Mance gives comic treatment to the challenges, complexities, and occasional absurdity of life at the crossroads of race, gender, and geekiness.
This graphic memoir answers important questions like: How many preschoolers have to mistake you for your dad before you actually start to forget your own name; if a Black girl is awful at double-dutch jump rope is it a reflection on her gender identity, racial identity, or both; and is viola player a gender or just a sexual orientation? Ajuan Mance’s comic confessions take up each of these questions and more, as it invites to share in those moments that mark the path of a gender explorer.
Ajuan Mance is a Professor of African American literature at Mills College in Oakland, California. A prolific artist and writer, Ajuan's books include LIVING WHILE BLACK (Chronicle Books) and 1001 BLACK MEN (Stacked Deck Press). Ajuan's new book, WHAT DO BROTHAS DO ALL DAY? (Chronicle Books), is her first picture book.
Ajuan’s illustrations and comics have also appeared in several anthologies, including, DRAWING POWER (Abrams Press), winner of the 2020 Eisner Award for Best Anthology. Her academic collections include INVENTING BLACK WOMEN and BEFORE HARLEM, both with the University of Tennessee Press. You can learn more about Ajuan at AjuanMance.com.
Ashby Combahee (s/he/they) is a Black queer memory worker from the South. She is a full-time librarian and archivist at the Highlander Research and Education Center. Ashby has worked on numerous community oral history projects, including Georgia Dusk: a southern liberation oral history, the New York Public Library Community Oral History Project, Black Women’s Blueprint Truth and Reconciliation Commission partnership with Threshold Collaborative, the Womanist Working Collective, and the Georgia Transgender Oral History Project. For Ashby, preserving and engaging collective memory is vital to sustaining impactful political movements. Using oral history as a catalyst for reflection and dialogue, Ashby believes that the most impactful learning opportunities develop by interrogating our lived experiences.
2 июн 2024
