A Poem By: AMANDA BUCHMAN
There is darkness-
And there is the will to see the night; to be it
A haven where creatures come to drink their tears,
For they were spilt in the morn
Guide them by the truest light
Author Archives: Zenerations
BIPOC Excellence Passed Over For White Mediocrity: Golden Globes 2021 – Op Ed
When the Golden Globe Nominees were announced this month, many took to the internet to express their outrage at the disappointing ‘snubs’ and the outrageous nominations. A common theme that most found in the nominations was that many excellent BIPOC-led movies and TV shows were ignored or not given enough attention, while mediocre white-led ones were nominated instead. Among the 40 acting nominees for TV, only two Black actors were nominated, while only two Black women were nominated across all TV and film categories. Perhaps the most shocking of the nominations was the fact that ‘I May Destroy You’, a Black-led TV show that blew up last year and explored sexual assault in a helpful and deep way, was completely ignored by the Golden Globes, while ‘Emily in Paris’, an overdone chick flick, was nominated for two awards. This is, of course, not a new phenomenon – just a few years ago, the Oscars were criticized for not having sufficiently diverse nominations, with the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite trending. But why is it so common for excellent works of art by Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) to be ignored, while mediocre projects by white artists are excessively celebrated?
WRITTEN BY: Elisabeth Hoole
Disney’s Iwájú: The Power of Afrofuturism
In 2017, Tolu Olowofoyeku, Hamid Ibrahim, and Fikayo Adeola, three friends from Nigeria and Uganda, found Kugali Media. Their vision was to create a pan-African media company aimed at telling stories of the African continent by Africans. They created a sci-fi Afrofuturistic comic-book called “Iwájú,” which roughly translates to “the future” in the West African language of Yoruba. 3 years later, in December of 2020, Disney announced a partnership with the company; it will be adapting the comic book into a science fiction animated series for Disney+ coming out in 2022. The show is to be set in Lagos, Nigeria and will explore issues like “class, innocence, and challenging the status quo”–themes all too relevant today.
WRITTEN BY: Lucy
Why is Racism Towards Asians so… Normal?
Why are derogatory phrases like ‘ching chong’ so ingrained and embedded into people’s vocabulary, and are often dismissed as harmless jokes? How does the Model Minority Myth and East Asians’ perceived proximity to whiteness act as an underlying factor?
Metamorphosis
How small we were at first
Perhaps blissfully ignorant
and in matters of the world, unversed
Little eggs, unbeknownst to the reckoning-
The growth the not so distant future would bring
The COVID-19 Vaccine
As we move forward in this pandemic, more and more people are becoming sick with COVID-19, with many dying as well. Thankfully, scientists from around the world have come together to collaborate on vaccines, 2 of which are already being rolled out in the United States.
Dear Gen Z, AAVE is not “Internet Slang.”
“It’s the AAVE for me,” “Chile, anyways,” “We been knew,” “Finna,” “Periodt, “No cap,” Well, aside from being ingrained in “Internet culture” and often incorrectly referred to as “Gen Z slang,” “internet lingo” or “stan language,” they’re all rooted in AAVE – African American Ventricular English. AAVE is an established, recognized system of linguistics and a dialect of English natively spoken by Black communities, notably in the United States and Canada.
WRITTEN BY: Cil
Register for the Women of Color Conference!
2021 is finally here and #ItsOurYear! The Women of Color Conference is giving girls the tools to live up to this claim. Through career panels, grants, and mentorship programs, we aim to inspire young women to never limit themselves, but instead to reach for the stars and land among them. Through our conference community, we’ll remind them that no matter what they’ve gone through in 2020, they can use their voice to illuminate a brighter future. 2021 is the year of the black and brown girl; it’s the year for us all to be loud, make change, and thrive.
A Simple Guide to Sexual and Gender identity
We are now living in a world that is transcending beyond the former understanding that Sexuality and Gender identity are purely binary. Now, we live in a world where Sex and Gender lie on a far more complex spectrum than in the past. To many, their Sexual and Gender identity holds a pivotal role in shaping who they are. However, many struggle with their Sexual and Gender Identity at some point in their lives, including those we love. Contrary to what many of us may understand, Sex and Gender is not binary. Our biological sex is what chromosomes, hormones, genes, sex organs, and secondary sex characteristics we have, whereas our gender refers to how we think of our identity in the context of how norms function in our culture. Yet just like how gender falls within a more complex spectrum, our biology isn’t binary either. Students are often inaccurately taught that all babies inherit either XX or XY sex chromosomes and that having XX chromosomes makes you female, while XY makes you male. In reality, people can have XXY, XYY, X, XXX, or other combinations of chromosomes — all of which can result in a variety of sex characteristics. People with intersex traits can usually identify themselves as either Male, Female, or Intersex.
WRITTEN BY: Jia Xuan
Diversity in Disney: A Tale as Old as Time
Beauty and the Beast, Cinderella, and The Little Mermaid. These are all classic stories that were brought to life by the Walt Disney Studios. For almost a century, they have dazzled audiences old and young with these tales of fantasy. But what do they all have in common? Their stories are centered on thin white beauties. This is not to claim there is an issue with that, but when you look at the expanseous vault of Disney movies, you can easily deduce that characters of color are painfully absent.
WRITTEN BY: Evie Fitzpatrick
