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Ep 6: Labor, Care Work, and Disabled Queer Femmes

 

Today’s episode is on labor, care work, and disabled queer femmes. Writer and cultural worker Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha and social justice activist Stacey Milbern join Alice in a conversation about emotional and other forms of labor performed by disabled people and the crip wealth we generate as a community for one another.

Transcript

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Related Links

Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha. (July 13, 2017). A Modest Proposal For A Fair Trade Emotional Labor Economy (Centered By Disabled, Femme of Color, Working Class/Poor Genius). Bitch Media.

Stacey Milbern. (July 13, 2017). A Life of My Own Terms, Thanks to Medicaid. ACLU blog.

About

Image description: Leah, a light brown skinned femme in her early 40s, faces the camera with her hand on her right hip. She wears big oversigned vintage sunglasses with rhinestones, a blue t shirt that says "Get Ready, Stay Ready" in yellow lettering, and a black leather skirt. She has hot magenta lipstick, brown and green curly hair that is shaved on one side, and one large round earring with an image of Frida Kahlo is visible on her right side.
Image description: Leah, a light brown skinned femme in her early 40s, faces the camera with her hand on her right hip. She wears big oversigned vintage sunglasses with rhinestones, a blue t shirt that says “Get Ready, Stay Ready” in yellow lettering, and a black leather skirt. She has hot magenta lipstick, brown and green curly hair that is shaved on one side, and one large round earring with an image of Frida Kahlo is visible on her right side.

Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha is a queer disabled nonbinary femme writer and cultural worker of Burger/ Tamil Sri Lankan and Irish/ Roma ascent. The author of Dirty River: A Queer Femme of Color Dreaming Her Way Home, Bodymap, Love Cake  and Consensual Genocide, she is also, with Ching-In Chen and Jai Dulani, co-editor of The Revolution Starts At Home: Confronting Intimate Violence in Activist Communities. Her work has been widely published, most recently in The Deaf Poets Society, Glitter and Grit and Octavia’s Brood.  Currently a lead artist with the disability justice performance collective Sins Invalid, she teaches, performs and lectures across North America. Leah co-founded and co-directed Mangos With Chili, North America’s longest running queer and trans people of color performance art tour, from 2005-1015, and co founded Toronto’ Asian Arts Freedom School.

Website: http://www.brownstargirl.org/

Twitter: @brownstargirl

Image description: photo of Stacey in her garden. She has short hair, is mixed race Asian American, and uses a power wheelchair. She is wearing a bright orange scarf and is surrounded by succulents.
Image description: photo of Stacey in her garden. She has short hair, is mixed race Asian American, and uses a power wheelchair. She is wearing a bright orange scarf and is surrounded by succulents.

Stacey Milbern is a social justice activist with 12 years experience organizing at the intersections of ability, queerness, and race. She currently works in the private sector doing HR/accommodations work, and also is on staff at Sins Invalid, a performance project led by disabled queer folks of color. She likes to roll deep with people she trusts, ferment beverages, and read YA.

Twitter: @CripChick

 

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Credits

Geraldine Ah-Sue, Audio Producer

Alice Wong, Writer, Producer, Interviewer

Cheryl Green, Text Transcript

Lateef McLeod, Introduction

Mike Mort, Artwork

Theme Music (used with permission of artist)

Song: “Dance Off”

Artist: Wheelchair Sports Camp

Music

Lightfeet” by Podington Bear (Source: freemusicarchive.org. Licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License)

Jetsam” by Podington Bear (Source: freemusicarchive.org. Licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License)

Depeche Mold” by Podington Bear (Source: freemusicarchive.org. Licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License)

Fits” by Podington Bear (Source: freemusicarchive.org. Licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License)

“Bit Rio” by Podington Bear (Source: freemusicarchive.org. Licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 International License)

Sounds

Crickets This work is licensed under the Creative Commons 0 License.

“VOCODER countdown” by Jack_Master. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons 0 License.

8 Bit Beeping Computer Sounds” by sheepfilms. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons 0 License.

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