Black feminist culture writer Evette Dionne
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Evette Dionne is a Black feminist; she's the editor-in-chief at Bitch Media, she's renowned culture writer, editor and scholar. She refers to herself as plus size or fat despite shying away from the word fat for the better part of her life.
In terms her own move toward body liberation, Evette's thinking was molded through Black feminism and writers and thinkers such as Joan Morgan, Alice Walker, bell hooks and Patricia Hill-Collins. When she made the crucial connection between body size and liberation she found the fat blogosphere and followed the work of Lesley Kinzel, Marianne Kirby and others who were writing publicly about body size. In this episode, Jana and Evette discuss making concrete links between race and body size and Evette talks about coming into feminism in grad school and exiting her indoctrination of body shame. She articulates taking a Black Feminism Theory and Praxis seminar in grad school and the resulting a-ha moments being able to connect and apply this thinking to her life and experiences. Evette describes the importance of this unlearning and how it leads to the emotional process of coming to body positivity.
In terms her own move toward body liberation, Evette's thinking was molded through Black feminism and writers and thinkers such as Joan Morgan, Alice Walker, bell hooks and Patricia Hill-Collins. When she made the crucial connection between body size and liberation she found the fat blogosphere and followed the work of Lesley Kinzel, Marianne Kirby and others who were writing publicly about body size. In this episode, Jana and Evette discuss making concrete links between race and body size and Evette talks about coming into feminism in grad school and exiting her indoctrination of body shame. She articulates taking a Black Feminism Theory and Praxis seminar in grad school and the resulting a-ha moments being able to connect and apply this thinking to her life and experiences. Evette describes the importance of this unlearning and how it leads to the emotional process of coming to body positivity.
Evette and Jana discuss the important shift of paradigm necessary in our culture for fat bodies to be seen as equal and important. Even the shift to see fatphobia as an oppression is quite necessary. Jana brings up her Hogwarts Ride article and mining the trolling for data around different manifestations of anti-fat bias. Evette has similarly noticed that people are very resistant to evolving in their world view and that people truly believe that fat people do not deserve to experience happiness. She comes up with tactical points to combat these beliefs in her writing. She provides an example in the episode about the ways she advocates for herself and her body at the doctor. She cites the writer Abby Norman and the ways she discusses medically advocating for her female body by asking as many questions as you need to in order to walk away from a doctor empowered.
Jana asks Evette about experiencing joy and staying emotionally and mentally healthy in order to do her best work. Evette takes breaks and chooses not to engage in online discourse unless it directly relates to work. She also has created boundaries around her time to make sure that she's present for her life outside of work. Evette talks about her close relationship with water and valuing and cultivating close friendships as a means of pleasure and comfort. Her advice or tips to staying emotionally healthy in a fatphobic culture extend to simple tools such as eliminating dieting and scales in the home as these are compulsions that can dictate your emotional state around your body.
Jana asks Evette about experiencing joy and staying emotionally and mentally healthy in order to do her best work. Evette takes breaks and chooses not to engage in online discourse unless it directly relates to work. She also has created boundaries around her time to make sure that she's present for her life outside of work. Evette talks about her close relationship with water and valuing and cultivating close friendships as a means of pleasure and comfort. Her advice or tips to staying emotionally healthy in a fatphobic culture extend to simple tools such as eliminating dieting and scales in the home as these are compulsions that can dictate your emotional state around your body.
Evette is very clear in her knowing and thinking about her body in the context of enslavement. She is making meaning of her work through the lens of Black studies and she cites fiction and non-fiction works that have truly influenced her thinking. She discusses The Color Purple by Alice Walker and Their Eyes Are Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston as fictional texts that she often returns to. In terms of non-fiction, Evette discusses the Pleasure Ninjas or group of scholars who do work around enslavement and pleasure. She shouts out Two Whole Cakes by Lesley Kinzel and Jess Baker's books. The last book Evette leans on is Killer Fat by Natalie Boero about the war on obesity and how it's more about thinness and paying the diet industry than it is about health.
Evette's One Cool Thing is obsessed with Will Smith's Instagram right now because it's so joyful and creative. She also has by extension begun to watch Red Table Talk, Jada Pinkett Smith's show on facebook and she loves it! Evette talks about loving the Dear Sugars podcast and the hashtag #ResistanceGeneologies on twitter! Follow it! Jana's One Cool Thing is the book The Body Is Not An Apology by Sonya Renee Taylor. It's an another amazing book that everyone ought to read.
Follow Evette on Instagram and Twitter @freeblackgirl and read her work!! Please rate, review and subscribe to this pod in Apple Podcasts or your podcast app. Follow @womanofsizepod on Fb/Insta/Twitter and send your thoughts and experiences using voice memos or email to womanofsizepod@gmail.com.
Evette's One Cool Thing is obsessed with Will Smith's Instagram right now because it's so joyful and creative. She also has by extension begun to watch Red Table Talk, Jada Pinkett Smith's show on facebook and she loves it! Evette talks about loving the Dear Sugars podcast and the hashtag #ResistanceGeneologies on twitter! Follow it! Jana's One Cool Thing is the book The Body Is Not An Apology by Sonya Renee Taylor. It's an another amazing book that everyone ought to read.
Follow Evette on Instagram and Twitter @freeblackgirl and read her work!! Please rate, review and subscribe to this pod in Apple Podcasts or your podcast app. Follow @womanofsizepod on Fb/Insta/Twitter and send your thoughts and experiences using voice memos or email to womanofsizepod@gmail.com.
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