​Following the opening session of University of Maryland’s African American History, Culture and Digital Humanities’ (AADHum) “Intentionally Digital, Intentionally Black” conference on Friday, the first thing I did was run up for a hug from a young man named Nathan Dize. Nathan and I were strangers in real life; but we were also twitter friends. This process of linking up with people that I knew digitally IRL was a huge personal theme of this particular conference. Not only were we in community by virtue of our research interest, but many of us were connected virtually. While the content of this conference, which I’ll get to I promise, was incredible, a large part of the joy I derived from this experience came from the opportunity to be in physical proximity with the people that provide me with a large amount of my academic support. What does it mean to make the digital physical? Better yet, how does it feel to make the digital physical? For me, it feels like the best of me is being seen, supported and loved. Now, how many academic conferences can you say do that kind of affective labor?
 
I understand that it seems gauche to talk about love in an academic setting, but so much of my intellectual growth stems from Black women scholars at this conference who loved me simply for being a “Black girl [doing] grad school.” Black women scholars both on twitter and in the digital humanities have nurtured me; they have pushed me; they have included me. While enraptured by wonderful panels featuring Black women scholars, such as Always at Work: Black Women Online and Do It For the Culture: Black Humor and Narrative Strategies Online, I found that some of the best intellectual conversations I had with Black women scholars were by chance.

In 2017, the fact of the matter is that being a Black girl is undeniably lit.


It’s true.


Our public image today spans age, wealth, profession and interests with icons such as Black-ish’s Yara Shahidi, Chicago’s own yoga and wellness guru Lauren Ash and straight-forward and no-nonsense Senator, Maxine Waters.


Even so, many parents raising Black girls do not rely on media to make an impression on their children.


Multicultural books and literature are a common frontline approach for educators and families alike, to validate the lived experiences and cultures of non-white folks.


Think Marley Diaz—the 10-year-old Black girl, who, at the time was “tired of reading about white boys and their dogs.”


Her disinterest led her to create her now famous campaign, #1000BlackGirlBooks and now there is a surge in the scholarly interest of representations of Black girls in kid’s lit.


It’s important to note however, that just because a book a cute picture of a Black girl on the front of it, doesn’t mean it’s quality—by all means, it could be quite the opposite.


As reviewer for a national publication of children’s literature, I see absolutely outrageous and culturally inaccurate and insensitive books on a weekly basis but one book that I recently reviewed really struck a hard chord.


In hopes to keep the Black community informed, especially as we work towards educating and uplifting our young girls, I want to share this review with you all, in hopes that you get a glimpse into some of the hurtful and demeaning messages that are cleverly embedded into the colorful and fun looking books that catch our kids’ eyes.


Natalie’s Hair is Wild-Laura Freeman


Natalie’s hair is large and in charge. Paired with her bright African print clothes, she is the gleaming image of a carefree Black girl. In fact, there isn’t a comb, scrunchie, barrette or bobby clip that can “tame” or “restrain” her natural mane. So when a bird takes up residence in her hair, it’s no big deal. But soon, the pages are filled with the black cloud-like fuzz of Natalie’s growing hair as the birds are joined by a frog, owl, and a host of other creatures—even a lion. It’s not until the noisy animals keep her from sleeping that she finally decides something must be done. With the help of the fire department and local zoo, the creatures are captured and Natalie’s hair is hosed down—it was that big a job. Many garden shears and rakes later, we join Natalie back at home, happy with fresh cornrowed braids and this lesson learned: “the hair on your head, is no place for a zoo.” This title is the first authored book of Laura Freeman, illustrator of the early chapter series Nikki and Deja. A fair-skinned and loose curled African-American woman, she notes that, like Natalie, she too grew up “wild-haired.” However, Natalie is brown-skinned with a kinky hair texture—her Blackness not as palatable as Freeman’s. It is highly unlikely that should Freeman have portrayed a girl reflected in her own image, that the resolution to her problem would be cornrows and a warning to maintain personal hygiene from the local firemen turned hairdressers. While the vibrantly textured digital art is appealing, don’t be fooled—the accompanying text lacks flow and is mediocre and didactic at best. Perhaps if Natalie were depicted in the likeness of her illustrator this might have been silly and fun with no real implications, this book effectively works to undo much of self-reclamation work that Black women have done to combat the stigmatization of kinky Black hair. If you’re really looking for great hair stories featuring Black girls, skip this title and check out Crystal Swain-Bates’ Big Hair, Don’t Care! Or Natasha Anastasia Tarpley’s I Love My Hair! MK



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There was a time in history long before we reached adulthood and bonded with each other through Twitter timelines and Facebook newsfeeds. A time where what we cherish now as adults and taught our kids morally came from the same relatable fables and short stories. Lessons from stories that were taught and passed down by our parents and their parents for centuries. The same stories that help shape what many of us value today. Children’s literature is often referenced or analogized in American culture to put emphasis on or back up a point. In American culture, the popular children’s books read and promoted often give an idea of events that happen and problems that are solved “in a perfect world.” While we know this is far from true, we do know teaching them to children who are growing and developing allows them to practice critical thinking and communication skills. It’s imperative especially in the technology era, that we don’t have our children stray from the art of reading books. Children’s literature is necessary because it provides students with opportunities to respond to literature, gives students appreciation about their own cultural heritage as well as that of others, helps children to develop emotional intellect and creativity, encourages growth and development of their personality, and conveys important societal themes from one generation to the next.

One of the biggest benefits to children’s literature is teaching children HOW to think instead of WHAT to think. It provides students with the opportunity to develop their own opinions about the topic. Stories that circle around opinions or perception allow them to think critically and form their own opinion. This strengthens the cognitive development and simultaneously encourages deeper thought about the story. This is an early introduction kids can use to learn and evaluate stories, as well as summarize the topic. Picture books are the icing on top of an already developing brain. The illustrations help children develop their own dialogue for the story. Pictures and illustrations strengthen students’ cognitive functions in being able to form opinions on their own and to express themselves through language and reference to the story.

One of the best things about children’s books is that sometimes they teach children to get in the habit of having an open-mind. It provides an avenue for students to learn about their own culture as well as the traditions of others. It is crucial for children to learn these values because as society continues to grow, it will be expected that children know how to interact with others from different backgrounds. When teaching students about the cultural heritage of others, it is important parents are selective about books that pride themselves on providing these lessons, especially for young readers. They should be open minded about learning about the cultures of others and be taught about not being critical about traditions they aren’t used to. Our children should understand pride without judgment. There are many stories, folktales, and fables which contain deliberate stereotypes and inaccuracies about certain cultural groups. Many of these stories were written by authors who lived in a different time period in American history and whose point of view was based off the society’s interpretation. As society continues to move forward, there are many authors from all backgrounds who are able to diversify books on cultural heritage by writing children’s books from their perception. There is a website diversebookfinder.org that allows parents to search from authors of all backgrounds and religions who tell children's stories often reflective of their individual culture.

Children’s stories that play on emotional intelligence or help students to develop empathy are some of the most important stories in children’s literature. Stories have the power to promote emotional and moral development. It allows the parent to teach life lessons using the story’s analogy. This is an important skill for children to see modeled. When I grew up, The Boy Who Cried Wolf was always a point of reference in my house growing up when my mother wanted to prevent one of us from telling a lie. The story was about a boy who no one believed when he finally told the truth after telling a few lies beforehand. As a child, it helped me shape that lying was not only wrong, but that it had consequences too, even if back then I did not know what consequences were. The point was, it allowed me as a child to think deeper about my own feelings.

Children’s books encourage growth of a student’s personality and can teach early lessons into empathy. Children are very impressionable and gullible during the early years. Books help them develop into kind, intelligent, and welcoming people. Literature encourages kids to be polite and friendly people, and these traits may be consistent with developing students into quality adults.

Finally, children’s literature is of value because it is one form of word art that will never go out of style. Children are only young for a short time, so we must give them access to a myriad of books with bigger morals and lessons. If the book plays less into society’s trends and more into growth and development of the child, then children’s literature has the power to captivate audiences for many generations. It is valuable in providing kids an opportunity to respond to literature, learn about their own culture as well as others, promote creativity, emotional intelligence, and personality development. Early exposure to reading will continue to create responsible intelligent children who then form into critical thinking adults.  ​

Steph Ox is a unique writer of many genres. Her work is rooted in her ability to understand many perspectives and point of views. With her writing catalog including many variations of poetry, informative articles, stories, think pieces, monologues, songs and book series, it's clear she has the ability to reach and relate to many different audiences of all ages and backgrounds. Steph Ox recently published the first book in her rhyme along Children's Book series aiming to provide relate-able lessons for millennial children with values that shape our children to move in the right direction morally. Steph is passionate about changing the world through the art of writing and storytelling. Most of us live and dwell in  the life experiences we individually face. It is also why many of us accept our content point of view on the world. Steph’s mission is to continue to create and provide literature that force readers to be not only open minded but compassionate as well in a world that’s often filled with judgment.

Fanta Freeman is a native of Sierra Leone, West Africa. She was born of her wonderful parents, Horatio and Isa Freeman, on June 11th, 1991. Fanta attended grade school in Nairobi, Kenya at the International School of Kenya (ISK). After graduating from ISK, Fanta attended Boston College in Chestnut Hill, MA. She double-majored in Communications and Studio Art, with a focus in photography and painting. She entered the Teach for America (TFA) corps in 2013 and finished her commitment to TFA in 2015. She decided to stay a third year to teach English to her wonderful students at Weldon Middle School. Currently, Fanta is attending law school at the Kline School of Law and will be working at Ballard Spahr, a corporate firm, after she graduates in May 2019. 

Ministry is much like academia.  Nothing ends. Nothing ends and chaos is swirling about.  Nothing ends, chaos is swirling about, tasks must be completed, and deadlines met.  This is the life of ministry. This is the life of a pastor. There is rarely a beginning or end to the tasks and projects in the life of a church.  I have found that my starting point, as the incoming pastor, may have been the end or middle of the previous pastor’s task or project. Then, there are relationships to be managed with church members, other ongoing tasks and projects to be completed, and seeds of new ministry ideas that have yet to come to fruition.  And I must, somehow, hold and manage it all. So, I have learned to appreciate the process in arriving at the “end” of any task or project. I have learned to appreciate the process – the steps, the liminal spaces, the meantime moments – on the way to achieving the goal. This appreciation is essential for ministry praxis because everything is in process all the time – sitting in the presence of dying people, listening to church members, praying with and for church members, and facilitating conflict resolution.  Over the course of my ministry years, I have realized that I not only pastor people, I pastor processes too.
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Academia, at all levels, is much like ministry too.  I may not have pastored people in my classes, or prayed with professors, but learning to appreciate the process is half the battle in managing the rigors of academia.  While pursuing my degree in social responsibility and sustainable communities, I took a class called “Community Based Research Methods.” I learned to engage in community-based research realizing how vital the processes and tools were that the researcher used.  In fact, the processes and tools used to mine the research were more important than the findings themselves. Randy Stoecker, author of Research Methods for Community Change: A Project-Based Approach, wrote a chapter in the book titled “Implementing: When Research Is the Project.”  As I read that whole chapter – even the chapter title itself – I could not help but remember the praxis of ministry.  Like academia (and community-based research), having the proper processes and tools in ministry directly affects the results, and the proper processes and tools are directly related to the gifts and skills of the individual.  David, in his battle against the Philistine, Goliath, almost used the wrong tools in the fight. At the time, King Saul gave David his tools with which to fight – a sword, a shield, and armor. But, when David put them on and tried to walk into battle, he could not do it.  David took them off, then used the tools related to his gifts and skills – a sling, five smooth stones, and a shepherd’s staff. Likewise, in academia I learned that I could not write like someone else. I could not conduct research like someone else. I could not understand like someone else because the processes and tools with which I engaged my learning were particular to me – Enger – a young adult, educated, middle class, black woman from Prince George’s County, Maryland.  The practice of ministry cultivated a deeper resilience and tenacity in me for academia. Sure, there is most definitely an end to academic pursuits – the degree. But, no one tells you how to take care of you in the meantime. No one tells you how to stay in academia when it gets hard. No one tells you that academic failures are not a waste, but much needed seeds for success and self-discovery. Here are a few ministry lessons I’ve learned to navigate academia well – at any level:

1. Take care of you.  Do not neglect the basics of drinking water, exercising, eating well, resting.
2. No person is an island.  Seek out a village of love, laughter, accountability, and support.
3. Ask for help.  You do not know everything, nor can you do everything.  Be kind to yourself.
4. No is a complete answer.  This short yet powerful word reminds you that everyone has limits - even you - and that is okay.
5. Risk failing boldly.  Then, examine the failures with your village and learn from them.
6. Learn to laugh at yourself.  Laughter is good for the soul, and laughing at your mistakes reminds you that you are human.
7. The work will always be there, but you may not be.  So, bring the best and healthiest you to the work.

​Last summer, my father passed away suddenly. I and other people have written elsewhere about the mourning and grief while in graduate school. It’s a long and exhausting process that makes the demands of graduate school much more difficult. It was also a reminder of the strength of my community and the different resources that are (and aren’t) available to me as I move forward into a new reality. Last Fall, I got engaged. Our proposal was a complete surprise – I truly had no idea – and I was over the moon excited to come back from Thanksgiving break and tackle what was sure to be a really challenging end of the semester. I shared the news with my friends from school and from other chapters of my life. Once again, I was reminded of how dope my community is. I was lucky to be able to share my joy with the many wonderful people I’d grown close to over the years. However, during both of these hugely life-changing moments, I found myself asking the same question: who should I tell at school?

Before I started my Ph.D. program, I worked at a non-profit for five years. While there, I developed great relationships with my colleagues and tried to stay professionally collegial with my supervisors. As casual as my workplace was, the boundaries were clear. I knew who to grab a drink with, who I could gossip with, and who I absolutely could not talk to about my personal life. And then I started grad school and everything turned on its head. Although I was eager to get to know fellow graduate students, I wasn’t sure what to do about the professors. I was now in a world where people had casual drinks with faculty and the teacher-student relationship was heightened by genuine friendship as well. Mentors were also friends; former students became colleagues. While there was a tangible hierarchy that people acknowledged, the fact that we were training to also be academics entering our advisors’ fields makes our interactions with professors different from those with teachers and professors in our younger years.

When faced with an opportunity to divulge personal information, I try to ask myself one question:  how does sharing this information help? When my father passed away, I told one professor because I owed her a paper. Throughout my classes this year, I talked about my father with my professors to give them a heads up that I might be out of it. Grief is unpredictable and requires me to constantly check in with myself. I happen to be in the same field as my father, so I run into his work quite often. While I would normally soldier on and save the personal anecdotes for my therapist, I felt in this case it was important for some of my professors to know what I was going through. I was still in course work this year, and how I showed up in class was still very important. But in making that decision, I had to also be ok knowing this information would spread. In my first year, a professor of mine shared his “grad school survival pointers.” Several of them stuck with me, including his point-blank assertion that faculty gossip about students as much as students gossip about faculty. Since that first week of classes, I have found myself in many situations that confirmed this. People gossip at every level. My goal is to give them  very little fodder about myself to pass around at the water cooler.

Recently, I was talking to two friends of mine about this question. All three of us have jobs as research assistants and we were trying to quantify how to balance our supervising professors' demands, our personal lives, department requirements, and prep for our coursework. Teaching, working for our professors, writing comprehensive exams and dissertation proposals, and doing coursework at the same time meant that time was precious. On top of that, it was important for us, as people who came back to school from the workforce, to have time to decompress and spend with our partners, families, and friends. We debated whether telling our supervisors about our personal lives would push them to be more reasonable about the hours they required from us. But, academic culture still normalizes working all day, every day, and while there are some academic advocates for thinking about life outside of work, those people are a noticeable minority.  In the end, we decided that rather than talk to these professors about our lives outside of school (which exist, believe it or not), we should meticulously record the hours we work for the professors so our compensation actually reflects the time we’ve spent on each task.
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As a woman of color, I’m decidedly guarded in graduate school. Unlike some of my cohort-mates, I’ve avoided adding faculty on social media. I don’t tell them about my personal life and I rarely ask about theirs. With other graduate students, I’m slightly less guarded. Of course, there are many people I consider friends; I’m very lucky to be on great terms with my cohort- and department-mates. Thankfully, my departments aren’t tensely competitive, and graduate students generally get along with one another. But, given the now common knowledge that academia remains a hostile environment for women, I’m choosing to be very selective about how much of myself I share. In talking about my personal life, I’ve chosen to operate with a need-to-know policy.  I’m learning that there’s no absolute right or wrong way to do graduate school. Different people adopt different approaches. Mine is to think of graduate school like I would a job, a very demanding, extremely exhausting one. In the spirit of self-preservation and drawing clear limits, I’m resisting allowing academia to take over my whole life. For me, that means keeping my personal and academic life separate – at least for the time being. 

Cierra Kaler-Jones is a PhD student whose research focuses on using storytelling and artistic expression as effective strategies to teach students about social justice issues. When she isn’t researching trends in education or speaking to students about the power of sharing their stories, she dances professionally and leads arts, movement, and mindfulness workshops. She has a strong case of wanderlust, loves chasing sunsets, and is in constant pursuit of the perfect cup of coffee. Check her out at cierrakalerjones.com or find her on Twitter @_cierrajade_. ​

​Ebony Taylor is a PhD student at Northwestern University studying African-American history. She occasionally blogs on her website ebonyptaylor.com. She is also in the process of developing a digital history project. While her research focuses on business and economic history, her dream is to write fantasy fiction. Follow her on Twitter @ebonyptaylor.