T243.
Publishing as Activism: Amplifying Marginalized Voices
Thursday, February 8, 2024
3:20 pm to 4:35 pm
Writers and editors of color remain underrepresented in the publishing industry despite a new wave of literature that centers the stories of marginalized peoples. These Texan publishers have created space outside mainstream avenues to reimagine what it means to uplift marginalized writers, editors, and publishers. This panel explores their experiences—impacted by criminalization, queerphobia, and racism—as they relate to self-publishing and literary community activism.
Participants
Juania Sueños a Chicanx writer. She holds an MFA from Texas State. She cofounded and is an editor at the publication and nonprofit, Infrarrealista Review. Her work can be found in: Acentos Review, Sybil Journal, The Skinkbeat Review, Porter House Review, New York Quarterly, and Nat. Brut.
Diamond Braxton is a queer, mixed-race Black-Chicana writer, editor, educator, and community organizer. She is the founder and director of Abode Press, an intersectional, anti-racist 501(c)(3) press based in Central Texas dedicated to uplifting underrepresented voices.
Murphy Anne Carter is a writer, teacher, and public programs director for the Texas After Violence Project. Since 2016, she has taught poetry and creative writing courses in Texas jails and prisons, and has worked on dynamic, thoughtful, and ethical frameworks to bring stories from the "inside" out.
Claire Bowman is the author of the chapbook Dear Creatures and a recipient of a fellowship from the Michener Center for Writers. She is the senior editor at Host Publications and produces the literary podcast The Host Dispatch. She moonlights as a tarot reader and teacher for Typewriter Tarot.
Cyrus Gray was arrested at the age of twenty-three for a capital murder charge he never committed; he is a wrongfully accused young black man, born in Liberia, who served nearly four years in Hays County jail without ever being convicted. Now he advocates for the rights of the accused.
