Since we’re all stuck at home during this quarantine, and I want to plug my magazine!
Mental Realness Mag is a digital publication specifically for black femmes (of any gender identity) navigating mental health. We feature photography, poetry, prose, articles, etc. We’ve just recently published our fourth issue, and I would love if you guys could check it out. I’ve included some of the highlights below and a link to the magazine as well!
(We’re always looking for writers and visual media submissions as well!)
This picture represents not only our content road map but also our Patreon goals. As you guys can see we already have 3 major comic releases for the next 3 month’s alongside merch and knick knacks designed by us to be released. **December content is out, with more currently being added (54 page comic, stickers and art tutorial)**
If we reach our goals we’ll be able to completely dedicate ourselves to creating dope and diverse content that represents us and our communities without the same ole narrative that we always see in mainstream media.
Getting to 400 Patrons will allow us to pay all of our Artists for their hard work and start the production of new Pins,Stickers, and Merch.
As well as insure that we can continue to do create full-time and make even more content that’s free on here and premium content on our Patreon. It’ll also give us the opportunity to recruit more independent artist and pay them for their work as well.
We are here to fill in that demand that you guys have been waiting for in regards to more Black and POC content in art, animations, products and more. All made by actual creators from those communities, with 100% creative control with dope and unique styles; while also spotlighting new and upcoming artists, writers and creators.
So here we are to finally bring it to you on a regular basis, with your chance to directly support it .
Now that the business is set up, we can now commence the flood of dope content that we’ve stacked up for you guys!
Sometimes I don’t know where to start. I’m just a woke girl who wants to save the world. Lead, Advocate, Plan, Apply, Write, Speak. I got plans I’m scared to start. You know how many times I put my business on hold? In my mind I’m a force to be reckoned with; with my powerful poetry, gifted mind and hands. My ability to mentor and empower. I can’t seem to just START. Weight loss, Veganism, Hair Growth, White teeth, clear skin, manicure, pedicure, books, pageant crowns, business, innovation, motivation, love, marriage, acting, teaching, leading….BEING. Being myself is the hardest thing because…I want to save the world, I know how…I just..don’t know…where to…START
ONE WEEK left to apply for our Black Creatives Revisions Workshop with Penguin Random House! Black writers, here’s your chance to complete revisions on your manuscript with the help of instructors Jewell Parker Rhodes, Jason Mott, Karen Strong, Nic Stone, & Nicole Dennis-Benn!
We Need Diverse Books and Penguin Random House are excited to announce the launch of the Black Creatives Fund, an initiative with a mission of supporting emerging and established Black writers and illustrators! More about the program here.
In the wake of JK once more being a total jk, here’s a (non-exhaustive) thread of works by Black trans writers.
Don’t Call Us Dead - Danez Smith, poetry about Black masculinity, police brutality, gender and queerness. Probably the best book of poetry I’ve ever read. Smith has several collections available and you should read them all.
The Deep - Rivers Solomon, a speculative fiction novella about the descendants of murdered slave women. Themes of trauma and memory. Really beautiful writing. Their sci-fi novel An Unkindness of Ghosts is equally unmissable.
Redefining Realness - Janet Mock, the memoir of Mock’s childhood and adolescence as a trans woman before she transitioned. Mock’s second memoir, Surpassing Certainty, focuses on her life in her twenties.
Felix Ever After - Kacen Callender, a YA novel about a teenage trans boy (at the start of the book), Felix, as he further questions his identity, tries to find love, and works on his artistic future. Everything that makes YA novels great.
Reacquainted with Life - KOKUMO, a debut about Black trans womanhood and the power of her voice and body. This work is so hard to describe. Ferocious? Lively? Witty? Completely different to literally any poetry I’ve ever read? All of the above and more.
Mannish Tongues - jay dodd, a poetry collection about Black youth, queerness, religion, family, and gender. I hate how pretentious the word ‘visceral’ is, but it’s pretty accurate here. dodd’s collection The Black Condition ft. Narcissus is also phenomenal.
Pet - Akwaeke Emezi, a YA novel about a Black trans teenage girl and having to confront the existence of monsters. Emezi also has an acclaimed adult novel out, Freshwater, and I believe their new adult novel, The Death of Vivek Oji, is out in August 2020.
trigger - Venus Selenite, poetry about being Black, trans, queer, and unapologetic. This one is hard to get hold of, but worth it if you can. Selenite also co-edited and is featured in Nameless Woman, an anthology of writing by trans women of colour.
Surge - Jay Bernard, a poetry collection written in response to the 1981 fire at New Cross Road, as well as Grenfell Tower and the Windrush Scandal. Bernard is one of those poets who can use 10 words to say more than most of us can in 1,000.
Nameless Woman: An Anthology of Fiction by Trans Women of Color - ed. Venus Selenite, Ellyn Peña and Jamie Berrout, this one includes several stories by Black trans women and is, as a body of work, completely invaluable. The stories here range from semi-autobiographical and romance to sci-fi and speculative fiction.
You can also financially support Black trans people through donating to organisations such as thisandthese.
Important addendum: I tried incredibly hard to find published works by Black trans women, because trans women are the focus of JK Rowling’s tweets and indeed an overwhelming amount of violence and bigotry in general, but I’m sure it’s no surprise to anyone that Black trans women are enormously discriminated against by the publishing industry, and are routinely denied a platform for their work and their voices. Literally, when you Google ‘black trans woman author’, you just get Janet Mock’s author page. I think all of the books by Black trans women in the list above, with the exception of Janet Mock, are self/indie pub.
I have trawled through online indie and radical publishing magazines, message boards, and nearly 100 lists of ‘trans authors you must read now!’ and I would charitably say that about 1% of people featured in such lists are Black trans women. Obviously, Black trans women are writing, but the lack of available platform for their work is a huge barrier to their voices being heard. If anyone else has recommendations for work by Black trans women, whether it’s a physical book, an online chapbook, an Insta account of poetry, or anything else, pleaseadd it, because there must be so much more than I’ve managed to find.
Ima just start making black/poc readers and not specifying that the reader is black/poc… the same way yall make white readers and don’t specify that the reader is white .
“You blushed ”
“Your face turned red”
“He ran his fingers through your hair”
“Your hair fell around your face”
“your pink c*nny”
“You licked your rosy lips”
Anything regarding pale skin?
And the way yall mfs are shit at writting black readers if you arent black is laughable.
“I know how to write black readers i grew up in the hood”
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Writers, this is the opportunity to learn to write a television pilot from the queen of television, Shonda Rhimes. Shonda will be teaching an online MasterClass in 2017 and for $90, Rhimes will take students through more than five hours of lessons, teaching them how to craft a script, sell a pilot, and run a writers’ room.
Wrote about some of my first hand ordeals with systematic racism about 5 years ago inspired by the work of a young black woman who wrote on the same subject matter.
“I’m so tired of hearing about race.” “Black this. White that.” “I have black friends…” “I’m from the hood, too.” “See the problem is with you people…”
See, I’m also tired of talking about race. I’m tired of being paid 30% less than a white dude. I’m tired of being profiled because of the body I was placed in at birth. I’m tired of the “You People” statements. I’m tired of the I-have-black-friends and the my-child-is-bi-racial statements as if that meant shit. As if that meant you weren’t a culture vulture, bigoted, or still racist to infinity and beyond.
You know what else I’m tired of? Seeing my black boys and girls shot in the face, necks strangled, suffocated, beaten to a bloody pulp, and out of all that, justice still not served in their honor.
I’m tired of the systematic oppression that most of y'all don’t like to see, uncomfortable with talking about and acknowledgement of an oppressive, bloody, capitalist, slave-based system that brings us to today and other troll like comments from so-called Americans.
So, before you feel tired of People of Color talking about race relations, human equality, and/or other struggles, step into my shoes of living in fear, or better yet, step into my great-great grandmothers slave shoes and keep your mouth shut.
The waves sway like uncle at a reggae dance Side to side My uncle glides Rocking his body to the beat As everyones eyes follow his sway Uncle rockaway. His body eases to the music Then he grabs aunties waist They float across the dance floor Making everlasting memories Smiling into eachothers eyes That’s how loves meant to be He gives her a peck on her warm soft cheek Then takes her hand so they can take a seat. His loose silk shirt lightly blows in the breeze As his little plaits jump to the beat. The next day we got news he had past away Pain hit me like a truck or a train Heart burned like I was inflamed Eyes watered like I was engulfed by a tsnami This cant be! My heart got heavy as they filled his hole My mind went blank As I watched him float Like a feather on air. Uncle rock away like a boat afloat Uncle rock away to the sound of calypso. Fly uncle fly My angel in the sky Rockaby uncle on a cloud top Uncle don’t drop My love wont stop. Sway uncle sway Wave uncle wave Uncle’s so slick His memory will stay.
me: maybe I should write my fanfics with racially ambiguous reader, then anyone can enjoy it. hmm, I wonder how it’d affect my notes and following.
also me: no, write reader as a coded chubby coloured woman. describe those melanin n fat features!! don’t need notes or following, only larger range of thick poc content.
Wanna notsay reader is poc or chubby in the warnings section anymore, just let people just be jumpscared with some brutally obnoxious coded reader halfway through.
Gone are the days of “you blushed bright red”, “he grabs your small waist” and “he sucks your pink nipples” smacking you in the face.
It’s 2022 bestie, time to be hit with “your beautiful deep mahogany skin”, “he kisses your dark pussy lips” and “he kneads your soft rolls” hehe jk… unless?? (˵ ͡o ͜ʖ ͡o˵)
Photo of Keah Brown, a brown skinned young Black woman. Keah is looking directly into the camera and smiling. She has her hair straighten and parted to the side, and wearing a white, red, and denim colored sweater.
One of the reasons I wanted to do this series was to capture the diverse lives of Black disabled women. Very few spaces have given us the opportunity to discuss what it is like to be…
