With grad school on the horizon.....

Searching for graduate programs is quite the endeavor. As my "work" (if I can even call the two or 3 serious research papers I have written in my lifetime such a thing)at this current juncture is primary concerned with disability, popular culture, African American fiction and performance, finding a potential home is proving to be trying beyond all expectations. I want to produce a body of scholarship that is both subversive and accessible, respected for its academic rigor and adored for its potential to reach the masses. I want both the professors and the peeps to love my stuff. I feel as if I need them to; need to know for myself that I'm making a difference across lines of educational access and class privilege with the work I put forth.

Dr. Johnson has been incredibly helpful so far, and clearly his own trajectory serves as quite the model for what one can accomplish when they relentlessly pursue their artistic passions and are able to put it in conversation with their academic interests. Seeing folks like him, Dr. Mark Anthony Neal, Dr. Salamishah Tillet, and Dr. John Jackson (to name a few among the scores of folks who have helped me get to this point) makes it undeniably clear to me that such a path is possible; I am just having trouble mapping out that road for myself.

While I go continue to search for programs, enjoy this footage of Dr. Neal speaking at the Theorizing Blackness conference which took place at the Graduate Center at CUNY over a year ago. Feel free to follow up with clips from the full speech on YouTube, it's certainly worth a listen. That reminds me, shout-out to everyone from my (Il)legible Blackness class in the Fall; our weekly discussions made all the difference. Wouldn't be on this path without ya'll.