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 newsletter is both lamb and lion as we go from the second March of the pandemic and the second pandemic April rains on us.
Every week, I shampoo, condition and style my hair. One week out of the month, I go, fully masked, to a person in a salon suite and they do all that for me, plus, cut my hair and color it, when it needs it.
(You can thank her for my galaxy hair I debuted during my birthday month).
She, like me, is a young Black woman with colorful hair in its natural state, that owns the means of her production.
She and folks like us in collective beauty studios and art and design studios and kitchens and vehicles of all sizes all over the world and in individual homes are examples of how marginalized people can and do create their own economies that are fair and equitable.
I can’t completely celebrate our resilience because access and control of resources isn’t true for far too many people in the world, especially non-white people who are enslaved, underpaid, undermined and flat out colonized and stolen from, as well as maimed or killed by state-sanctioned forces, some that have no desire to even reform, much less abolish themselves and repatriate back to the natives and exploited of the land.
Sometimes those of us who have been gifted titles and authority in and over communities struggle with what would happen if our current roles become obsolete. You’ll read that paragraph above and you’ll feel guilty or angry or some other kind of in-between space that comes from having had to play the game too long.
I wanted to focus my monthly letter on this to help use center our post-pandemic shift and challenge us to take this remaining moment of pause to reflect on what’s worked and what we can do to work better and connect better.
Are we ready to help others repatriate, divest, grow? Are we ready and able to heal?
In the spirit of showing up and being there for each other, I’m going to be doing something different for April. I’m bringing back live webinars! This is my way of easing into being outside and seeing more folks.
For those of you who are active in the Black Queer Feminist Urbanist School Pilot Groups, check your emails and the platforms for special messages and Doodle polls for events on either April 5th or April 7th. It’s not too late to join one of those pilot groups, you can learn more and join at www.theblackurbanist.com/school.
Many of you are curious about the survey and the initial results. Join me on April 6th to check out the results and what I hope to do with them. I’m also doing a webinar to talk about the progress of my survey on Black Queer Feminist Urbanism on April 6th. The time will be announced later this week in a separate email/social announcements/updated blog post. This webinar is free and open to all Patreon supporters, and $10 for all those who are not already Patreons.
If you haven’t had a chance to contribute to the survey, but want to, please do! This survey is open to everyone, even though it’s collecting data for a specific group of people. I’ll also be sharing some of the things I’m learning about various self-identified groups and general information I’ve collected around affordability and land-use.
Finally, be sure to follow me on Instagram @blackurbanist and @kristpattern, where I’ll be going live every once in a while documenting my various trips as I head back outside distanced and post-vaccination, as well as opportunities on the latter to connect with my journey to environmentally sustainable and fair-trade fashion.
If you’re reading this right now, this means you’re still here and I’m grateful. Hang in there and we’ll be in touch soon, on Zoom or somewhere else safe.
Kristen
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