About this item
A treatise of Black women's transformative influence in media and society, placing them front and center in a new chapter of mainstream resistance and political engagementIn Reclaiming Our Space, social worker, activist, and cultural commentator Feminista Jones explores how Black women are changing culture, society, and the landscape of feminism by building digital communities and using social media as powerful platforms. As Jones reveals, some of the best-loved devices of our shared social media language are a result of Black women's innovations, from well-known movement-building hashtags (#BlackLivesMatter, #SayHerName, and #BlackGirlMagic) to the now ubiquitous use of threaded tweets as a marketing and storytelling tool. For some, these online dialogues provide an introduction to the work of Black feminist icons like Angela Davis, Barbara Smith, bell hooks, and the women of the Combahee River Collective. For others, this discourse provides a platform for continuing their feminist activism and scholarship in a new, interactive way. Complex conversations around race, class, and gender that have been happening behind the closed doors of academia for decades are now becoming part of the wider cultural vernacular--one pithy tweet at a time. With these important online conversations, not only are Black women influencing popular culture and creating sociopolitical movements; they are also galvanizing a new generation to learn and engage in Black feminist thought and theory, and inspiring change in communities around them. Hard-hitting, intelligent, incisive, yet bursting with humor and pop-culture savvy, Reclaiming Our Space is a survey of Black feminism's past, present, and future, and it explains why intersectional movement building will save us all.
About the Author
Feminista Jones is a Philadelphia-based feminist writer, public speaker, and community activist. She is an award-winning blogger and the author of the novel Push the Button, the poetry collection The Secret of Sugar Water, and Reclaiming Our Space: How Black Feminists Are Changing the World From the Tweets to the Streets. Her work centers Black American culture, critical race theory, intersectionality, women's health and well-being.Feminista's passion is writing and hers has been featured in the New York Times, Washington Post, Time, Essence, XOJane, Complex, Vox, Salon, and EBONY. In 2017, Feminista was named one of the 100 Most Influential People in Philadelphia by Philadelphia magazine and was later featured in Philadelphia Style magazine for her community work in 2018, Since 2013, Feminista has presented and lectured at various colleges and universities including Princeton, Cornell, Columbia, Boston University, UC Berkeley, and The University of Pennsylvania. She is a highly sought-after presenter for major conferences and has presented at several, including Netroots Nation, BlogHer, Woodhull Freedom Summit, Stanford University's Online Feminism Conference, Drexel's Racism in Medicine Conference, and more. In 2018, she was honored to give the Baccalaureate speech during Vassar College's Commencement weekend. In 2015, she co-founded and served as General Director of the Women's Freedom Conference, the first all-digital conference completely organized by and featuring only Women of Color. For her work, she was named one of SheKnows 2015 "Voices of the Year". In 2014, she launched a global anti-street harassment campaign (#YouOKSis) and a National Moment of Silence protesting police brutality (#NMOS14) , both of which received international media attention. That year, she was named one of the Top 100 Black Social Influencers by The Root. Feminista is also a mom, a mentor to young girls and women, and an outspoken advocate for the homeless, people living in poverty, and those living with psychiatric disabilities.
