This is The Black Urbanist Monthly. I’m Kristen Jeffers and I’m making this monthly digital newsletter to share my Black, Spiritual, Diasporic North Carolinian, Working/Lower Middle-Class, Educated, Queer, CisFemme thoughts on how places and communities work. Think of this as my monthly column, the one that flaps open as you start browsing that coffee table magazine or printed alt-weekly newspaper or as so many other of your favorite newsletters do, in your inbox. This is a special edition!
Hello everyone! I wanted to drop back onto the site in the middle of the month, because this is a very special month.
I am a proud Black Queer Feminist Urbanist non-binary femme person. And I’m dedicating my work and platforms to asking if the spaces I like to inhabit are safe, affirming and secure for me and those like me.
This month in the United States, as we reflect on Black people’s past present and future, I want to take this opportunity to ask you, all of you, to reflect on a series of questions I first presented last year, strictly to other Black womxn-identified people who reside in what is known as the United States, to comment on both whether or not things I love are available ,if they’ve experienced certain land-use and development challenges, and if they are thriving in spite of all the things that challenge us.
The pandemic paused our first survey, but now I’m reopening the survey to everyone, so I can build a body of data to measure how Black Queer Feminist folx can thrive in spaces in general and as urbanists!
This data will be available for all who need it so we can have better measures around how urbanist theory and practices intersect with Black Queer Feminism.
The survey is also shorter this year and can be anonymous or you can choose to tell me who you are and contribute more ideas in a future survey.
And yes, there will be a reward! One lucky person will receive a $25 digital gift card! I’ll announce the winner in my regular newsletter at the end of the month.
Several of you did last year’s pre-pandemic survey and I’m grateful. Others of you have done this year’s survey and shared it far and wide, and I’m also grateful for you too.
I’m finding out some very interesting things with these surveys and in my usual end/beginning of the month newsletter for February/March, I’ll share a few of those findings, plus, an invite to a special conversation that you won’t want to miss and for those of you enrolled in the school pilot/online circles, two new lessons centered on Black women’s political power, will also drop on February 28th.
Starting tomorrow, we will enter our normal period of mass celebrations and acknowledgement of Black history.
However, for those of us who have started to and always live our lives inside and out around the principle that Black lives, all of them, matter, this month is a challenge and a call to us to usher in the Black future.
Time does not stand still, so it is coming anyway.
Holding back parts of that future was never acceptable, but now it is no longer tolerable or humane.
For me, my first step in this process was welcoming the future in my mind and imaging joy and abundance for myself and others.
I grew up with all the threats of violence and famine, the scary dystopian prophecies that spread far across galaxies and others that stayed close to home.
Often those fears flood back. In 2019 it was right after I read Butler’s Parable of the Sower for the first time and sat in fear of so many people knowing who I really was and failing to provide me with the income and resources I needed or stripping those resources away.
That was rooted in fears I’ve had since childhood and that showed up in my early adulthood years in North Carolina of not having control, of being a sin, of never being good enough, of being too good.
In my nomadic and diasporic years of late, the feeling that I’ve never be good enough bumps up against the cost of living and doing business in places that are further along on the measures of my humanity as it comes out of the box.
This pandemic time has been a grounding and healing force. More people have began to understand that we do not have time to waste to get things right when it comes to civil and human rights.
And yes, those of us who are place-keepers and makers are the front lines of ensuring positive futures.
I’ve elected to ensure that future is Black, Queer and Feminist, coupled with Urbanist, in its purest sense of supporting a transect of development and support of people and places.
You of course can be part of that vision! Here’s how:
Share this newsletter
Join us in one of my online circlesas we pilot becoming a full school
Fill out my survey on if your city is supportive to Black Queer Feminist Urbanists, either like me or similar to me.
Mark your calendars and watch your social feeds for several virtual conversations with me and others, as well as more opportunities to learn about the school and online circles.
Thank you for filling out existing surveys, participating and getting value out of the circles, inviting me for keynotes and to contribute articles and and for facilitating my Black Queer Feminist Urbanist Future!
This is The Black Urbanist Monthly. I’m Kristen Jeffers and I’m making this monthly digital newsletter to share my Black, Spiritual, Diasporic North Carolinian, Working/Lower Middle-Class, Educated, Queer, CisFemme thoughts on how places and communities work. Think of this as my monthly column, the one that flaps open as you start browsing that coffee table magazine or printed alt-weekly newspaper or as so many other of your favorite newsletters do, in your inbox. This is the one that will transition us from December 2020 to January 2021.
I expected this year to be special, because it was my 10th anniversary year creating this platform. I expected to have this big 10th anniversary party with a big cake and all my family and friends surrounding me and reading from the finished A Black Urbanist and preparing to go on book tour.
But the year I got was good too. How?
Coming out publicly and to family, which has allowed me to breathe in a way I’ve not been able to in years. Also, reconnecting with family in general, thanks to check-in Zooms.
Having major interviews and bylines in Sierra Magazine and Streetsblog, along with those Zoom panels and keynotes despite working on a tray table in my bed.
Collaborating with several pro-Black planners and urbanists to start building up a Black urbanist media and thought-leadership collective, plus drafting a curriculum and support network of my own, that honors Black queer feminist people and their work in the canon of urbanism and placemaking.
Helping Les start podcasting, work-from-home in defiance of her office’s declaration of essential work and taking her advocacy work to the next level with endoQueer.
Using my sadness at the loss of beloved people, stores, institutions and the ability to go out to eat and to concerts, to get better at my crochet, go on lots of harbor trail walks and drive around the metro region and get a sense of how vast the suburban areas are on both sides of the Potomac.
And, because a lot of the wishes from prior years came true.
I want to make it clear right now, that I do not see myself as THE Black Urbanist. As in the only and the best and the most important one. I want this site and it’s companion Twitter to inspire more theses, Twitter accounts, conversations and real-life solutions. I want to see other cultures represented in building styles, businesses and on bikes. The urban fabric would not be where it is without the culture that infuses its transit-oriented bones. If you are interested to contributing to this site in some way, let me know, I’ll be glad to have you!
This one is hard. I am a mall rat. Also, if I fail to support my local mall, we will lose some of the good remaining retail near my home. However, I realize more and more that the possessions I have do not matter as much as the people I have and that I share said possessions with. I think that I can make the most of being in a suburban area, by reducing my car trips to shopping areas and taking up more DIY projects. Also, when I can, I want to carpool. My belly will love it when I stop going to Bojangles as much and I’ll begin to use the things I already have more and save for travel.
Becoming More Competitive In a Glocal Market
Yes, I used the word Glocal. I am hoping to become location-independent in the next few years. This way, I could pick areas that are walkable/bikeable, but reasonably priced. Many bastions of walkability area are too affluent and pricey for the space provided. However, a nice small town with a lot of downtown stock (Sanford, NC and many New England towns come to mind), would be perfect. I could even set up a more permanent shop such as a coffee shop or fruit stand if I wanted, because I have an income stream that allows me to contribute to an area that needs it. I am still open to being somewhere large and already vibrant, but without commuting expenses. I would like to start a family. Unfortunately, there is a great fight for urbanist and family friendly areas that are affordable. I want to set roots so that I can help ease that transition for myself and others.
It’s nice to have brand new town center neighborhoods, but let’s not forget to maintain the old ones, especially those that were already town centers.
It’s nice to have brand new transit lines, but lets not forget to maintain the old buses and trains, so they won’t fall apart and stop coming on time.
It’s nice to have new civic centers, but let’s not forget to maintain the old recreation centers that serve so many children and their parents who need a nice community place, for a reasonable cost.
It’s nice to have new markets, but let’s not forget to maintain the old ones, lest they start to sell moldy or old food, because they don’t believe they have the clientele or the money to support good food.
It’s nice to have new homes, but let’s not forget the old ones, the ones that are well made, with unique, authentic features. Also, let’s not forget those who live in these older homes, that may have paid off their homes and have lived honest lives. Let’s help them maintain their American Dream, especially if they’ve been there for 30 years, fought for this country, endured racism, sexism, classism and any other isms. Sometimes, gradual change is good enough.
More opportunities for youth to learn good citizenship
I’ve bled a lot of ink and blurred a lot of pixels about the cost of not engaging all of our youth and our citizens. The issue is near and dear to my heart, because I became engaged in placemaking and civic governance as a young child. My parents made sure I went to the library and they encouraged me to learn. So many people don’t have parents that do that, but there’s plenty of people in our community who can serve in that role for our youth. I want to find a way to do more of this myself, in a more productive and proactive way. I also think that if we don’t engage our youth, we will never be able to realize our placemaking dreams.
Remember this picture of me? I was playing on a B-cycle demonstration bike on the street that I helped paint, to have an open streets event there. Yet, from then to now, not just in Greensboro, but in many other cities, the streets haven’t been so open. In fact, many have been hostile. My wish is that we can start looking at people on our streets, not as threats, not as people to shake money out of, not as places to speculate our real estate futures and to shoot to kill, but as places where we can celebrate our achievements and what it means to be human. I might be wishing this every year, but I’m going to get us started there. If we block the streets in 2015, I pray that it’s to have a party, be at peace and be better neighbors.
Every city that has at least a major employer; homes that resemble craftsman bungalows, art deco apartments or colonial row houses; has a college or two or three; and has reasonable diversity in population is seeing some form of gentrification, proportional to the average median household income. Every city has people who can’t make ends meet and in some places, it’s worse than others, because salaries are holding steady for a lot of industries, especially at the minimum wage and entry levels. But, if the housing market could as a whole lower their costs by maybe 10% on services, rents and the like (as well as themselves start to rely less on bank loans and a bit more on cash), maybe we could fix this. This will be a continuing wish, because I know what I just proposed isn’t practical. What however is practical, is empowering people to create craft and trade guilds and turn neighborhood association funds into a means to fund labor and supplies for these maintenance and building crews. My friend John Anderson has a great argument for continuing to mentor and cultivate tradesmen, especially in underserved communities who need lots of housework done, but may not have what it takes to hire outside workers.
Understanding of How Housing Policy and some Transportation Policy Has Created A Number of Social Ills.
Again, this combines elements of the two wishes above. People need to know the history of their neighborhoods, their states and their country. If you don’t like not having public transit, find out where the stops are and why your system exists. Same with your neighborhood and why you may have seen a restrictive covenant in the deed, even though technically those are illegal. At the very least understand why your Realtor still may have suggested a certain group of neighborhoods and why certain neighborhoods command high values (It’s not just because of proximity to Trader Joe’s). I want to use this space and other forums to help people understand why so many of our urban and suburban racial battles have roots back even further than the greater civil rights movements of the 1950s and 1960s. Maybe you weren’t aware of the origins of Oregon, but this post touches on that and how in least one state, capturing the American Dream was completely banned well into the 20th Century. (I’m also aware of the irony of this link in the light of the other link from wish 1.)
That I wasn’t so afraid of the future and neither were so many other people
This is the linchpin to me of the most recent round of elections in the United States, as well as the last few election cycles. We’re afraid to die. We’re afraid of losing control. We’re afraid of never being in control. This is just a portion of the phenomenon that allows evil to raise up through our civic spaces, but it’s worth looking at by itself.
On a more personal level, I’ve been more afraid since the election. Mostly because I was afraid long before the election. I feel safe to say that I left both my hometown and the one I adopted from June 2015-September 2016 because I was afraid of being myself in the spaces I conducted myself in. I feared that I wasn’t square enough to be in elected and appointed politics. I felt super black, and not in a good, fists up, I matter kind of way. I felt smaller and smaller. I felt like I had to be involved in small town nitpicky things. I felt like I was running out of people. And energy. And time. So I’m in the D.C. Metro finally. I can’t say that it’s for good, only because life happens and life happens outside of me.
For our greater populace, we may not like each other. We may feel like people are invading our personal space and messing with our ego, but the world needs some of that. We need all kinds of spaces, safe, and unsafe. We need dense and open spaces. May we continue headfirst to the transect and may we look at everyone first and foremost as worthy of love and worthy of the best. Then stop building bad things, taking away good social programs that work and condemning folks to judgment places that probably don’t look like what you think they do in your head.
A lot has changed, but the forward motion of being myself, partnering with someone who loves me and supports me and raising money has come true. Still working on the marginalized peoples part.
Everything I said last year is still true and in the wish column. Media, North Carolina, mask it up and get it together.
And now, going from 2020 into 2021, here’s what I can add:
Kristpattern and the Black Queer Feminist Urbanist School create the passive income I need for me to be comfortably location-independent and that allows me to do the work I want to do, when I want to do it and take care of my family, my friends and my partner.
The industry continues to do the work it promised to do to increase racial equity. This means being pro-Black, pro-gender non-conformity, pro-all class levels, paying equitably and retroactively, understanding when it’s time to pass the baton and restoring the legacies and work of those it stole or suppressed in route to catering to a white supremacist, whiteness first ideal. Oh and those of us who are Black — never stop using our radical imaginations, claim our space and heal on the inside and heal our communities.
I can finally release A Black Urbanist Journey, with audiobook, e-book and in print and on tour.
I continue to love, nourish and cherish my Black Queer Feminist Urbanist Southern self and know that I have everything I need, if only on the inside.
After all, I’ve learned over the last decade that the best wishes capture feelings, not so much specific items. If anything, those feelings create the action items and goals.
And in this time, where I can’t guarantee I’ll be alive next year, let alone next week, my biggest wish for 2021, is to be sitting in front of a computer, writing out 2022’s wishes, in good health and at peace.
As I’ve said throughout this pandemic, I hope you’ll be there with me too. Thank you for being here with me today and be sure to keep in touch via @blackurbanist or @kristpattern. And if you can, support this venture financially for the cost of a trip to the coffee house, via Patreon.
This is The Black Urbanist Monthly. I’m Kristen Jeffers and I’m making this monthly digital newsletter to share my Black, Spiritual, Diasporic North Carolinian, Working/Lower Middle-Class, Educated, Queer, CisFemme thoughts on how places and communities work. Think of this as my monthly column, the one that flaps open as you start browsing that coffee table magazine or printed alt-weekly newspaper or as so many other of your favorite newsletters do, in your inbox. This is the one that will transition us from November to December of 2020.
When I originally sat down to write this letter, I couldn’t think of a single thing to be thankful for. After all, this year continues to be this year.
But, when I look back over this year, I can honestly say I achieved exactly the intention I set for this year — to amplify the voices, work and and witness of Black women-identified & queer folks in the greater urbanism world.
Did it happen exactly as I spelled out in my goals newsletter back in early January? No, but 2020 didn’t go as planned, period.
Yet, I’ve heard from so many of you that despite the calamities of this year, there was a lot of awesome and extraordinary. Same with me!
You’ve invited me to keynote and share thought leadership on several wonderful industry panels, podcasts and at virtual design days and class meetings across the world.
You’ve allowed me to mentor you as you create planning and urbanism platforms of your own and helped me curate one of many safe spaces for us as non-white urbanists on and off the internet.
Black women specifically — you gave such excellent feedback in my survey on your experiences in various metro areas and work various elements of place and urbanism (and it’s not too late to share or amend your thoughts!)
And I’m in the early stages of creating the educational media platform of my dreams, thanks to those of you on Patreon who donate at any level, and especially those of you who are receiving the Book Club/School videos directly.
All those other goals are coming, but need a little more time to incubate. This year could be its own chapter in my book. However I’m so happy I got done what I got done and thus far have been relatively healthy.
And of course, I’m still here period. We’ve lost so many folks to COVID-19 complications and other sicknesses and sudden deaths.
I can’t end this without thinking about how Octavia Butler, who many of us have drawn wisdom from this year and I see as one of our great Black woman urbanists, set a goal to be a bestseller.
She wasn’t a New York Times bestseller until recently, but she sold enough in her lifetime to attract the attention of the MacArthur Foundation, who gave her one of their “genius” grants. The grants vary in amount, but their purpose is to make sure you don’t have to worry about expenses.
To me, that counts and I believe she believed it counted too. You can see the words straight out of her journal and check out the bus route and library where she wrote several of those bestsellers in this wonderful interactive map the Los Angeles Timesput together of her writing world in the Los Angeles Metro region.
Let’s let her intuition and grit and flexibility around her intention, my gratitude towards you and the fact you survived to this point of the year, ignite your radical imagination as placemakers, policy builders, mentors, makers and designers to continue to improve our world.
After all, we had an election miracle. And a Black woman vice-president elect. Don’t tell me what’s impossible.
See you back here on New Year’s Eve with my annual dose of urbanist wishes and goals!
This is The Black Urbanist Monthly. I’m Kristen Jeffers and I’m making this monthly digital newsletter to share my Black, Spiritual, Diasporic North Carolinian, Working/Lower Middle-Class, Educated, Queer, CisFemme thoughts on how places and communities work. Think of this as my monthly column, the one that flaps open as you start browsing that coffee table magazine or printed alt-weekly newspaper or as so many other of your favorite newsletters do, in your inbox. This is the one that will transition us from October to November of 2020.
This time of year has always been full of spookiness. This year is overdelivering.
But, I still have that hope I talked about as we started this month because as I stare down my own fears, I’ve been able to pull up many at the root and replace them with fulfilling fibers and fruit.
I could have been afraid to address industry and academic disparities ten years ago this month, and not launched this platform.
I could have stayed afraid to address many of the things I talked about on National Coming Out Day, but I’m glad I did because spiritual bondage and failure to be intersectional in how we make policy will create goblins we’ll never be able to settle.
I could be mourning at the feet of my beloved, but now dead online-only suburban clothier New York and Company, but instead, I picked up my crochet hooks and I’ve gotten re-acquainted with both my local yarnshops and the still remaining big-box craft suppliers and the wonderful community of folks I’ve encountered as I’ve breathed new life and fiber into Kristpattern.
Where fear tries to live, I replace it with clear analysis, action, and hope.
As we go into this month where we express gratitude, let us not forget the folks who originally claimed the lands many of us sit on. Let us not be afraid of continuing to dismantle the terrors of anti-Blackness, queer and transphobia, sexism and misogyny/misogynoir, xenophobia, classism, colonialism, ableism and ageism and so many others that are felt but in-descriable.
Now, to the candy and enjoying my Lovecraft Country/Josephine Baker/Roaring 20s but make it 2020 Pandemic inspired costume, which you’ll see on all of my socials later today.
Keep up with my socials so you’ll know when I drop things and consider supporting me at any level via Patreon.
And yes, the book is still coming.
Take care of yourselves and I look forward to seeing you all soon!
P.S. In my most recent chapter breakdown of Chocolate Cities: A Black Map of American Life, live today in both my Patreon and Mighty Networks book clubs, I break down how many cis-masculine Black men create villages, and I promise, I recorded these videos before the recent news around certain Black male celebrities endorsing our sitting president).
Many of you have noticed changes in my Twitter and Instagram bio, that I’ve been “interested” in more queer events on Facebook, and others have had the pleasure to meet Les, my partner, in person or you’ve known her from her own work in faith-based LGBTQ and transportation advocacy (and you should get to know her videos and life coaching and endometriosis advocacy and our merch line we colaborated on together!). She’s been with me on all my speaking visits over the past two years and we’ve both been helping each other with our various business and community ventures.
Plus, two years ago today, on National Coming Out Day 2018, after a wonderful date night at Midlands after years of knowing each other casually, we decided to start a life journey together, as lovers and friends.
However, in the past and directly, I’ve been hesitant to talk about this part of my life and it has affected how I do this work and how much I pride myself on being transparent. Yet, I believe that this is the time to address this. I wrote a draft of this about 18 months ago, but I believe today is the day to bring this draft into the light.
For My Family and A Note on My Theology
Before I get started, a warning to both family who are reading this and finding out for the first time and family who may have spoken to my mom or who are concerned about my mom.
First of all, I still love you all and if that love doesn’t extend back to me, I understand. Secondly , I told mom privately when I was last home in Greensboro in the spring of 2019 and I ask that you allow her the space to process this and that you refrain from asking her any questions or making judgements on her and how she’s raised me and treated me over the years.
If you are tempted to make these and other similar judgements, please remember that this is not about you. This is not an attack on my mom (or on you, mom), our family, our reputation and as church people. This is not an attack on my family raising me in the best way they knew how. This is not me wasting my beauty or my brain or giving up.
I identify as a pansexual polyamorous non-binary femme (pronouns she/her/they), who is willing and able and has fallen into a committed, loving, monogamous relationship no matter who or how that person presents/is. This also does not mean I’m turning into a male person or will start presenting more masculine as a rule. I still like all the same things I like. I’m happy with my body and how it’s proportioned. Also, I support all other sexual and gender expressions that are loving and consensual.
I know this is an agree-to-disagree notion some of you. I believe we were born holy, are always holy, but sometimes fall astray and need reminders from God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit and folks sanctioned under their power to share this truth. I also know everything under the banner of gender and sexual uniqueness is under the purview of the perfect creation of God. The verses that explciitly condem same-sex or gender-noncomformity I believe have a context for which they were written, that doesn’t necessarily affect our situations. I also believe that we can support civil rights for everyone, without necessarily understanding each individual. We were not all created queer and not every queer expression, just like not every hetero expression of love is holy. But some of us were created queer, our queerness is holy and we need to acknowledge this in our faith communities.
One way I illustrate this is that many of us, especially in the black church, have no issue with allowing women to participate in the full body of worship, namely being or speaking in the pulpit. Yet, the Apostle Paul found that to be a distraction in one of the churches he was writing to and he told those specific women to not speak. However, women spoke and were active in church work in other places, plus, there were lots of women doing work for Jesus and all through the Old Testament. I believe that the scripture we have was God’s word for those specific people and much like God spoke directly to them, they (and yes they, I’ll save that for another post), still speak to us and work with us with the situations they gave us to live out.
And yes, I made a choice, but it’s only a choice to no longer live a lie.
Why Am I Talking About this Now
I’m suffering through purple rage and I need to let it go to keep my business and creativity alive.
I built this site nearly a decade ago (and my work on blogs over the last 15 years) to be real, raw and honest about what we can do for the community. Over these years, I’ve been exposed to so much outside of my childhood bubble and I’ve grown so much. Yet, not addressing this directly and firmly has been eating away at me and making me publicly rageful, jealous and resentful. If you’ve been at a happy hour (or even on a few Zoom calls) with me recently, you’ve witnessed some of this. I apologize for anyone I hurt with this behavior, but know I’ve been trying to sort through things a lot of us do as teenagers. Writing this post is helping me heal and start the process of healing relationships–both with people as well as with my work and visibility. I also forgive you, but understand if you can’t forgive me.
We need to stop being prejudiced, racist, and genderphobic in our own community of queer people and in how we apply our urbanism.
I’m sick of the white gay men purporting to speak for (or in some cases use their power to tear down) neighborhoods and spaces that have rich culture and life without them getting into the mix and meddling with what makes those communities special or even better, using their priviledge as white bodies to help us be heard or raise money. This is the root of a lot of the protesting around prides over the last few years, that in their corporatization, they’ve started to mirror non-queer society in how they margialize non-cis, non-white bodies. I’ve felt compelled to always live in cities and move to larger ones, because I’m committed to building community in the black queer community. Because of what I shared above, we struggle a little more at times. Love is defintely love, but it’s really sweet when I can wake up next to my black lesbian partner and have her understand what we need and the struggles. I also hope that as more folks feel comfort in being out and proud, that we get more diversity in expressions and more people feel comfortable dating each other. However, we do not need to favor whiteness or cisness or even wealth. We all have worth and value.
The Death of a Inspiration
The person that helped me to start unpack my harmful theology, not just around queerness, but around patriarchy and white supremacy in our churches and our faith, Rachel Held Evans, died on Saturday May 4, 2019 from complications of the flu, a UTI and an antibiotic she took to heal those other two. She was only 37 (just four years older than me!) and left behind a husband, a three-year-old and a barely one-year old. She was white, grew up in the Evangelical bubble (church, college and also early writings on faith and action), straight and cis and she had her own blind spots around race and even with our affirmation as queer. But she got up daily for over a decade and through her blog and books confronted the notion that only straight cis white men get messages from God that hold weight and authority. Her breakdown of Proverbs 31, her attempt to follow all the rules in the Bible for women, her making peace with needing a different worship experience and now, all the people across the Christian world who have something positive to say about how she challenged them, and challenged them in the way those of us who are current or past evangelicals know and appreciate, with lots of well-stated scripture and a heart for love. She truly had a prophetic voice and it’s this voice that continues to inspire me to speak truth to power, over myself and over our communities.
Final Thoughts
I’m in love and she’s my best friend and she makes me a better urbanist, a better Christian and a better citizen, friend, daughter, etc. Our urbanism needs to make room for queerness that isn’t just white and cis male. Our faith communities really need to examine how we look at the words that God has given us and the internal words that the Spirit speaks to us. Also, for those of you who don’t practice or hold different beliefs outside of the Christian fold, know that I love and respect you too and just like I’m Black, I’m also queer and Christian and that’s the spirit of where this comes from.
Finally, this is something I’ve known about myself since puberty and something that I take one day at a time. However, I do believe it is time for me to speak about this so that I can know where I stand with everyone in my life and so we can continue the greater work of restoration in our communities.
This is The Black Urbanist Monthly. I’m Kristen Jeffers and I’m making this monthly digital newsletter to share my Black, Spiritual, Diasporic North Carolinian, Working/Lower Middle-Class, Educated, Queer, CisFemme thoughts on how places and communities work. Think of this as my monthly column, the one that flaps open as you start browsing that coffee table magazine or printed alt-weekly newspaper or as so many other of your favorite newsletters do, in your inbox. This is the one that will transition us from September to October of 2020.
We’ve made it to the end of another month. Not much has changed on my end. Other than garnering a little more hope through the depressions and anxieties.
Hope because many of us work on issues at the local level and so much of what is broken is local.
Police violence is local.
Lack of medical capacity is local.
Voting is local
Discrimination and prejudice of all kinds is local.
Eviction laws are local.
Pre-K-12 education is local
Higher Education is local
Zoning and development is local
Your home is local
Your family is local
You are local.
If you’ve been spinning your wheels trying to find the solution, it’s right in front of you. And since we’ve been in this pandemic world for the last six months, right in front of you is your family, your roommates, your own health and in some cases your job security, and ability to pay bills and keep a roof over your head.
When you do venture out your front door, the solutions come around to who gets to stay in business. Who got and who gets the toilet paper. Who can vote safely. Who gets covered properly in the press.
And depending on what kind of municipal government and state government you have (or work for), you have the power to feed, clothe, protect, insure and so many other things that are only enhanced or fully funded by the federal government.
It’s why in several of the talks I’ve had this year, in this post, in my full ten-year body of work and counting, I encourage and encouraged us to remember and know what kind of government is at our front door. And what kind of front doors do we and the people we claim to serve, even get to have.
Les and I recently binged the show Greenleaf, which just ended after five seasons. It addresses a lot of issues around the Black church, namely how it’s a resource and a refuge for so many, but for many others, there are issues around morality and respectability and even danger. The show doesn’t shy away from any of those things and doesn’t leave very many stones unturned.
It challenges you to think about ways that we do and don’t protect institutions that celebrate culture, without that celebration being at the expense of others. It also challenges you to think about how secrecy and respectability can ruin or slow down progress on the local level. When one is getting life decisions from their Higher Power or faith connections (or lack thereof), no matter what you do as a builder or designer or government official, you may not break through.
However, there are ways. Those of you who are still joining me for the book club, the latest chapter of Chocolate Cities: A Black Map of American Life, also goes into how churches and other civic institutions deem people as unrespectable, even while claiming to be beacons of light for marginalized people. In both sections, I delve into how we can examine ourselves for internalized prejudices and we can do better about creating better environments. Join us in the section that’s right for you.
Finally, you’ll be hearing a bit more from me during this anniversary month. Some dates and projects have changed, but what hasn’t changed for all of us this year? I’m reaching in the air, tapping into that hope and I look forward to continuing to deliver it through my work and projects.
Take care of yourselves and I look forward to seeing you all soon!
(Watch me share a version of these words above or you can skim and read the script I started with below, which has links to several of the things I talked about in the video).
Hey folks. Kristen here and as I come to the end of another month and the end of another calendar season, I wanted to check in and reflect a bit over the last month.
First of all, I think I do best with doing these newsletters monthly and then giving more time and energy to my virtual classrooms and offline design and art projects. So, if you want to hear more from me, you’ll want to join me in one of my online circles/schools. I’ll talk more about updates to those in a moment.
If you’re reading (or watching) this and you’re already in a circle, I’ll be sending special versions of this message for you on September 1. If you’re reading or watching this on September 1, then go there first! It’s in your email! Share this one with folks who need and want to join a circle!
—
The actions taken this summer in regards to the racism and other marginalization in the design world were long overdue.
I have to admit that I didn’t realize that despite all the work I’ve had online for over a decade, along with the speeches and some of the online activism, there were still a lot of places that weren’t listening, weren’t changing and were sadly oblivious to all that’s been going on.
But then again, I didn’t realize, because I’ve known. I’ve known for a long time and I thought more people knew too.
I realized in the Spring of 2010, when I saw how one bad manic mental health episode of my Dad’s could shatter his mobility and that of so many other people thanks to one run red light. Even though he shouldn’t have crashed his car, he shouldn’t have had to be punished by one-hour bus headways, lack of public bathrooms to help him as he walked around town and so few sidewalks and so many six lane thoroughfares in our hometown of Greensboro, NC.
And as I mentioned earlier this summer, upon hearing the news of George Floyd’s death, my dad’s death wasn’t from police violence, but it was violent and without knowing exactly who did it, I didn’t want to speculate and nail a suspect on a rumor. I’d learned that lesson back in August of 2008 when I was robbed at gunpoint in the parking lot of a “luxury” apartment complex in South Durham and I could only see his masked face after he turned and tapped me on the head with the barrel of his gun. The person was prosecuted two years later, but not from me naming him in the line up they wanted me to do that night.
So in October of 2010, when I saw a lack of care and diversity and inclusion in how Black people were portrayed in academic materials in my public administration and policy graduate program in a public university, I went back to those moments and decided that it wasn’t enough to write a blog about urban planning, education, media and other miscellaneous topics under a name that could have been anyone.
Hence, the name The Black Urbanist.
I saw a stat earlier today that said that less than 5% of all owned media outlets are Black-owned. It was on an Instagram post about one of the handful of design-focused Black-owned media outlets, AprhoChic, which I hadn’t even realized was still publishing, but I’m glad they are. One of the founders shared in another Instagram post that before they were able to focus on design and media full-time, they were a policy attorney.
That’s the story of a lot of us, working one job during the day and doing design and art at night, suffering through working in offices or on committees or somewhere else without adequate pay or support. as the funding and support for Black media, Black art and design and building and sustaining Black neighborhoods and resources for Black folks is miniscule.
The Black-owned, operated and underfunded equivalents of Planetizen, Next City, Streetsblog and others that may have Black board members, donors, and columnists but not ownership, creative and editorial control,— which is key in this moment of asserting Black power and liberation.
If you’ve seen my byline in a publication or if you’ve read my expert commentary, I can tell you right now only a quarter, if not half of those opportunities have been paid.
I’ve been getting honoraria for most of my speeches and appearances over the past two years, but that wasn’t always the case and I didn’t always have a guarantee.
Yet, I’ve watched many urbanist and non-urbanist media outlets, sprout up, expand and grow. I’ve been part of some media projects that I have absolutely no creative control over and have not seen a penny for my labors and my words.
And with a similar dearth of Queer-led media outlets, being able to uplift my partner Les’s vision on her recent podcast to bring the design world and everyone else in the LGBTQIA+ world together, specifically other Black masculine of center lesbian and queer women was vital.
Like I said last month, the recent spate of media attention on Black designers and planners and urbanists and community activists has been great, but what happens when the cameras and the pens and clicks go away from these White-led and profit and image driven publications, that think that doing the one story or takeover or painting is enough? What happens when you can’t be on social media 24/7 pumping up your community, your cause and your work?
I know many of ushave been wrestling with the word urbanist this summer. However I’ve been worried for years that in a world that thinks it’s ok to call Black music and black culture and even Black neighborhoods no matter their typology urban, would take the the words Black urbanist together and run roughshod, shutting out Black voices and creating further misinformation.
I had that fear again when googling the word urbanist recently yielded one of my posts on page four, after sifting through lots of white cis male urbanist blogs, articles and academic papers. Only one focused on queer issues and only one other focused on feminism of any kind.
All of this is why, once again, I am in full solidarity with the Design as Protest, BlackSpace and the full Movement for Black Lives platform along with all grassroots and mutual aid efforts.
I’ve also been complicit and I’ve held isms, attitudes and performed actions that I’m not proud of and that didn’t help the cause of Black liberation, Queer and Trans liberation and ensuring access across all economic classes. This note only exists in writing and audio, but without American Sign Language, which is ableist by default.
That has to change.
That’s why I’m creating and teaching a curriculum that centers the stories and scholarship of Black Queer Feminist Urbanist womxn and non-binary people, with the kinds of affinity group and identity caucuses that allow people to learn, process, transform and come together in a way that’s aligned with justice.
And why I don’t believe in making Black, Indigenous and other marginalized/colonized people pay for opportunity and their healing spaces if they can’t do so reasonably. But I also believe in brave spaces. Hence why the Mighty Networks space is invitation only, because at the moment, that’s the only way I can ensure that. And if you as a fellow BIPOC design or media (or both) world individual are able to pitch in financially to help me hold this space, you can absolutely do so via Patreon or my Cash App or my Venmo.
And I believe our White colleagues can step up and pay the price for this work, both individually and at the corporate and institutional level, to practice direct reparations for this work. Hence the Patreon campaign and my new Teachable school, which will launch next month.
Existing Patreons at the $40 level will get first access to this school, along with everyone in the BIPOC space.
I want to give a special shout-out to everyone whose been stepping up in your workplaces, professional organizations, schools, families and out in the streets to make it known that Black Lives Matter all across the board.
Not Black Lives Matter, as long as you don’t ask for equal power and pay. Black Lives Matter, as long as buildings aren’t destroyed even though they represent slavery, segregation and classism. Black Lives Matter, until it’s time to abolish the police, reorganize both secular and faith-based charity and governmental systems in favor of grassroots action and mutual aid and include all genders, sexualities, economic classes and abilities.
I am making The Black Urbanist to be synonymous with Black Queer Feminist liberation that’s not intentionally ableist, classist, fatphobic and every other marginalization that is against all people being their full and healthy selves.
And while I can’t guarantee that 100% of the time because I’m an imperfect human, I can at least hold the trademarks and the online handles and the website addresses and keep Heteropatriarical, capitalistic, imperialistic thought away from family, village, community and pod creation.
Those villages, communities, pods and families that form the foundation of human urbanization. That anyone can create. And has created.
Finally, You can comment below, reply back to this email, @blackurbanist and if you have the phone number, text or call me.
Also, I am in the hunt for volunteer advisory board members, social media ambassadors and research assistants. I want to pay every last one of these people, especially if they are Black.
I am on the shoulders of my elders and ancestors and indwelled by Spirit and I hold all of them in great reverence and gratitude.
This is The Black Urbanist Weekly. I’m Kristen Jeffers and I’m making this ideally weekly but realistically monthlyish digital newsletter to share my Black, Spiritual, Diasporic North Carolinian, Working/Lower Middle-Class, Educated, Queer, CisFemme thoughts on how places and communities work. Think of this as my weekly column, sitting on your proverbial print paper’s editorial page or as so many other of your favorite newsletters do, in your inbox. This is the 34th regular edition.
Your timeline is probably full of black and white images just like the one I decided to lead this newsletter with, that uplift women and continue to keep our eyes on how women and non-binary folks, as well as trans folk, are still not heard, seen and even erased from these movements.
However, I’m highly doubtful that you’re witnessing an eviction of a neighbor right outside the doors and windows of your apartment building.
In fact, its the unit above us and the last I saw of that neighbor, they were working an “essential” job at the drugstore. However, like so many people, it was already barely enough to live on and now that we are back to “normal”, so many other things are too.
I’m grateful for a partner who still has a job, but her hours were cut back, just because she decided that her safety and well-being were more important during this once in a lifetime medical pandemic, that compounds all other pandemics and chronic illnesses, including the one she’s raising money for, to advocate for queer-centric care in, full-time.
We went to IKEA over the weekend, and we did a distanced porch visit, via the car we can still pay for and that can get us out and around, without transit and having to incur that risk. We’ve both done grocery shopping and haircuts, fully masked and shielded on all fronts.
But we we rarely both go inside a building. I still prefer grocery and other curbside pickups and deliveries.
And of course, when it comes to white supremacy, racism, all the other isms and issues and their role in general society and specifically how the greater urbanism world have shaped and produced them.
I’ve already known.
In 2012. In 2013. In 2013 again, reflecting back on 2004-2012 when I was doing my undergrad and graduate studies.
I’m in deep solidarity with this recent piece and I hope this isn’t the last time this magazine is this Black and I can’t wait to share an all Black Queer Womxn conversation we did last night that touches on all these things and more.
If you want to get in on these experiences, it’s not too late and everything is recorded so you can go back and watch as much as you want and at your leisure. You can get signed up over here.
(And keep working on my book, which is still forthcoming, because I still do have a lot to say).
Until next time,
Kristen
Thanks for reading! You can get these messages in your email, Or you can use that link to update your information we have on file or unsubscribe) support the platform financially on Patreon and get special bonuses; follow the platform on Twitter, LinkedIN and Instagram and if you missed some of the previous weeklies, check out the archives.
This is The Black Urbanist Weekly. I’m Kristen Jeffers and I’m making this weekly digital newsletter to share my Black, Spiritual, Diasporic North Carolinian, Working/Lower Middle-Class, Educated, Queer, CisFemme thoughts on how places and communities work. Think of this as my weekly column, sitting on your proverbial print paper’s editorial page or as so many other of your favorite newsletters do, in your inbox.
This is edition #33 and I want to welcome all the new people who have come onto the list over the past few weeks and I want to thank those who have been here on the list with me since 2013 and those who I’ve picked up along the way. Thank you all for wanting to join me on this (mostly) weekly journey.
That question depends on who you are.
To my fellow Black queer feminist urbanists ( and all Black and brown souls under the weight of oppression)
REST.
Seriously.
Do something that invites joy.
Mourn and grieve for our lost people, and express the gratitude that you are still breathing and not dead or so gravely ill from The Rona that you can’t read this letter.
That your neck is clear of all feet, off the street and you are breathing on your own, outside of a jail cell or lifeless in a morgue awaiting autopsy.
That for this moment, you aren’t scanning groceries and hoping the next person scrolling by isn’t careless and coughing in their unmasked face.
That you have a few moments yourself in the midst of all the ventilators you have to keep running just so folks can think to see their families again.
That you can hug those children you’re trying to teach the best way you can, and finally, have gotten to the point they can declare summertime and give you a break.
That if you’ve managed to hold onto a paying job that you can do in your home, you can take extra naps and send extra donations to mutual aid.
And that mutual aid is here for you if it seems as if unemployment or even just a little extra help never comes through.
My Black siblings. Rest and rest well. Hug yourself and bask in the gratitude that the world that seeks to kill and exploit us didn’t win today.
Never apologize for your feelings and your tone when it comes to the sanctity of your life, health, and safety.
Write out the vision, heal internally, and radiate outward in spaces and systems we created and which work well for us.
Hand the swords to those we trust to fight the battle for us and aid in dismantling the systems that their ancestors started and they have refined, that they realize no longer work for us and that they benefit from at our expense. Let them stand up.
To all of our abolitionists and accomplices.
Keep educating yourself on how to dismantle the systems of your ancestors and peers that kill and maim Black and Indigenous people.
Decolonize your own mind and lift up the legacy and the witness of your non-White presenting or “model” siblings and elders.
Don’t erase the legacy culture of or force the assimilation of the children you adopt from other cultures who you think you’re saving.
Continue to step up on yours and our social media pages and educate and explain to your family, friends, and colleagues why we are fed up and ready to burn it all down and rebuild.
How we didn’t have that much to lose and the companies we are so afraid of losing property either have (1) Corporate insurance that covers all losses or (2) A community of people that love them and want them to build back more sustainably, both their building and their business practices so that they are able to contribute and provide for a more just society and community. They might have both.
Explain and emphasize that you only get one life and once it’s snuffed out, it’s not coming back. And that Black and Indigenous Lives Matter.
Explain that assimilation and gentrification and colonization erases personalities and places that were already great.
Sponsor and mentor us in your workplaces, with an equitable inclusion of our ideas in their fabric.
Fund our work and dreams and our schools and homes and businesses without restrictions and assumptions as to how well we will do it.
Fund mutual aid efforts, legal defense and bail funds, survivor, and friends GoFundMes.
Fund organizations, efforts, and collective work activities that seek to create the goods and services we need, without causing us all physical, emotional, and financial harm.
Defund as much as you can, corporate entities that still lack care and concern and once again, have insurance policies that can deem property replaceable, but see their employees as interchangeable and not worthy of safe working conditions, living wages, and necessary health care.
Allow and encourage our full cultural and bodily expression without question.
Folks, this is what we should be doing right now.
Other Things To Do
Mel Mitchell’s book, which I’ve been helping to promote, African American Architects: Embracing Culture and Building Urban Communities, is now available on Bookshop.org and IndieBound. Also, call your favorite BIPOC or independently owned allied bookstore and ask them to stock it.
SAVE THE DATE for the launch webinars of my new course, The Black Queer Feminist Urbanist Ideas Salon is centered on my growing list of books in my Black Queer Feminist Urbanist Cannon and will be taught on a weekly basis, in two sections, a Black Indigenous People of Color (BIPOC) Healing Space and an Allies Educational Space, to allow us to have the freedom and comfort in discussing these issues in the ways best suited to those who are in need of instruction or who want to build connections of people who understand what it’s like to work, practice and live under a Black Queer Feminist Urbanist framework. Join the launch webinar for the BIPOC healing space on Tuesday, June 2nd at 1 p.m. Easternand the Allies Educational Space on Thursday, June 4th at 1 p.m. Eastern.
SAVE THE DATE for my free lecture series How to Communicate in the Modern World, in support of my course for design professionals, community institutions and concerned citizens and residents to master relevant communication tools and skills to aid in their work with and for communities How to Communicate in the Modern World with Mastery. Join the free lecture series on Fridays, starting June 5th at 1 pm Eastern leading up to the course launch of How to Communicate in the Modern World with Mastery on July 10th.
I have revamped my survey on Black Queer Feminist Urbanist women so that it’s more mobile-friendly and so anyone else who feels they can comment on what my experience would be like in your city and what your own experiences have been with land and land-related issues are. Find it here. Black women-identified folks, you’re still encouraged to fill out the other survey using a laptop or desktop, but you can fill out the mobile one as well and mark off that you are a Black woman.
You can book me— on your media platform, as a keynote/lecturer, or as a panel participant. I can do a virtual delivery. We can go ahead and start booking programming for late 2020 and 2021. Also, If you are a member of the press and you would love to get my expert commentary on deadline, you can reach me at (301) 578-6278.
Les, that wonderful life partner and sales advisor of mine, is great at hyping you up, making you laugh, and helping you or your organization make radical changes in your life and health. Join the email list for her company Les’s Lighthouse for periodic motivational updates. Also, if you need some laughter and motivation right now, check out some of her prior performances and motivational talks on YouTube. (Heads up, there’s saucy language, but hearty messages). She’s relaunched her podcast with some great interviews, including a familiar face to those who are active in the NUMTOT group on Facebook.
As always, I hope to hear that you’re still here the next time we talk via email or social media. And that you’re at peace and at rest. Thanks to all of you for continuing to open this email and likewise, hope to still be here doing the same.
Love,
Kristen
Thanks for reading! You can get these messages in your email, Or you can use that link to update your information we have on file or unsubscribe) support the platform financially on Patreon and get special bonuses; follow the platform on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIN and Instagram and if you missed some of the previous weeklies, check out the archives.
