Censorship Destroys

There is a transphobic activist group called Collective Shout that has convinced Visa and Mastercard to retract independent creators' ability to make a living from their work on websites such as itch.io! This can and has already impacted small-press, indie authors/artists, and small business creators! Black, brown, LGBTQIA+, women/other diverse genders, and Disabled creators have already been negatively affected by this ready-made compliance. Collective Shout claims it forced Visa's and Mastercard's compliance in the name of "decency" and to "protect women and girls" from "pornographic material", but, we know who it will truly hurt: Black/brown people, POC, women/diverse genders, QUILTBAG+ communities, and disabled communities. 

Reclaim One's Heritage

Been struggling with a science fiction story. And then a friend from MFA program volunteered to beta-read it. Now I did most of the grammatical edits.

What's bothering me is one of the scenes I've decided to change from the alien's POV to the Jamaican-American's POV. I'm Jamaican-American or Jamerican and realized that though I can say a few words in Jamaican Patois/Patwah/Patwa, I'm illiterate when it comes to writing, reading, and can only spell certain words.

Was about to post on my Caribbean/Diaspora writers group page about me having to rewrite what a texting social media language but realized this is the difficult tasks and decisions a writer will come up against. So, I'm currently researching, remembering, and will read more on my culture's poet laureates. And while I'm remembering, will be reclaiming.

Best of 2017 - Part Three

NOTE: Here, there be hyperlinks!

In honor of Banned Books Week, which will conclude tomorrow, I am posting my Best of 2017 books that have simply blown my mind (and that's not an easy thing to do, though I feel my tastes are wide-spread enough that I'm often more satisfied than disappointed) and wish to share my findings with my readers and visitors...

Next is The Secret Loves of Geek Girls anthology and The Secret Loves of Geeks a sequel that will be out in 2018!

I was entranced with this anthology from the get-go. I hugged myself while reading this. For all the other books I'm showcasing, I don't really want to name any favorites as I would want ANY of these books I'm speaking about on a deserted island with me. However, this particular anthology not only showcases four pages of an autobiographical comic by Margaret Atwood but the essays and comic-essays by some of the most notable geek/nerd women in multiple industries. 

The Secret Loves of Geek Girls deals with crushes/infatuations, first love, last love, broken hearts, burgeoning sexuality, puberty, college days, divorces, remarriages, first and only marriages, cohabitation, and romance in all its multilayered beauty and ugliness. 

An eye-opening, page-turner that discusses a margin of what romance and the love life of females who identify as geek and nerd. 

The Secret Loves of Geek Girls is edited by Hope Nicholson and foreword by Kelly Sue DeConnick and front cover illustrator Noelle Stevenson artist for the comic series LumberJanes - Please give this anthology a try!

Info on Banned Books Week here: Banned and Challenged Books

What Heian Means To Me

NHK World TV - old illustration of Sei Shonagon

[This post has hyperlinks. Please feel free to click away!]

As a fan of Japanese culture, I go all out, going beyond the constraints of Anime and Manga --and this makes me a Geek, for those who still can't tell the difference with the term Nerd. 

I also tend to read, when time allows me, a lot of English-translated Japanese literature. I try to gravitate towards the contemporary but keep returning to the classics. 

When others claim to have read Shakespeare, I can say I have read "The Pillow Book of Sei Shonagon". I blame publisher Grove Press for this. [The parent company is Grove Atlantic. Please check them out]

Grove Press is heavily reference and history title but do not let that daunt you. Their books are amazing, you will learn so many things in such enjoyable competent writing and they are quite friendly on Twitter too! :)  

"The Story of Lady Li" a Tang Dynasty short story, from my Grove Press collection of ancient Chinese literature -- during this dynasty, short stories had grown in popularity at this time, as well as some kick-butt jade sculpturing, I might add -- and this tale inspired me to write "Su Ling", which after some rejections, became my first published short story. 

But all roads lead... As the saying goes. Chinese culture was my gateway to other Asian cultures and their medias. Japanese animation, called anime (pronounced an-nee-may) by its fans both casual, intermediate, and hardcore, soon got me researching Japanese lit. 

Let me remind you that it's because animation from Japan is so thorough and steep in its cultural background, that it maddened me to watch these cartoons and struggle to understand what the meaning of this was versus the meaning of something else. 

Fast-forward to community college, and not only did I discover someone's discarded The Pillow-Book of Sei Shonagon, but reading this Heian Dynasty diary by an actual court lady was one of the most exciting books I had ever come across. Reading historical letters, diary entries, and somebody else's thoughts from a given time period has been the one thing that has kept history alive for me. To understand that history is not just a boring class of memorization of dates, tidbits, and figures. 

There were many references to the pillow book. The more I dug into the diary, I began to search for more information. Especially when Lady Murasaki came up and I learned she was the author of The Tale of Genji, the world's first novel. Yes, that's right. A Japanese noble woman invented the novel! 

And because it was a time that even women of high status could not learn the written language that the men could, many women invented their own lettering system and used this 'female alphabet' to write down in their diaries, write to one another, and write stories, as Lady Murasaki did.

This particular blog post was a long time in the making. It also explains why it is so hyperlink-heavy. I will speak more on this in another post. Please bear with me. 

To Inspire Girls!

It hurts when I am teaching young women, and a few times, older women, and I see that often, the sense of curiosity has been lost or damaged.
What I mean is that girls often show they want to DO something but family, peers, and society tells them to leave things to the boys and men. 

What was I doing as a little girl? I was playing with my brothers' toys that they outgrew. My sister is an extrovert and appeared to know what she wanted to do.
As a child in the Bronx, I played with a magician's kit, my Xmas gift one year. Another gift years later when I was in Florida, and from big sis, was a chemistry set. I was performing experiments before and after receiving it, which is probably what may have inspired my sister to buy it for me. 

I believe these childhood experiences fostered a hunger in me to learn, to question, to seek out the truth...
Many of the young women I now encounter often yearn for knowledge, or don't appear to understand that they must ask questions. Their excuses range from 'I don't want to be a bother' to 'I didn't THINK to ask'. 

What is going on? Where is the female potential to question and to understand? As a functional human being, it is each individual's responsibility to seek and to learn! Especially us women! As the majority of the world's population, we can contribute so many things to our distinct societies, and yet, many things in those very societies, whether overt or subtle, bar us from doing so.

Why not take the challenge to challenge yourself? Don't just leave it to some, do the world a favor and participate in the human story.... We need ALL the chapters to tell it.