Feminist Crush: Recent Episodes
Kitty Lindsay
Podcasting from the feminist cool kids table every #feministcrushfriday about art and activism. You know you want to sit with us. Pull up a chair.
Kayla Young is the founder of Boss Babes WV, a women's social empowerment organization; the owner of Eggs Will Roll, a non-traditional egg roll food truck; and mama to two wild toddlers. She is a freelance writer and graduate of West Virginia University.
Jan Rader became Huntington, West Virginia’s first female fire chief in 2017. Jan was featured in 2017’s Oscar-nominated documentary short Heroin(e) for her work in to confront the opioid epidemic in Huntington. She is also a board member of Fairness West Virginia, a statewide LGBTQ advocacy organization. In 2018, Jan was named one of TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world.
Amanda Estep-Burton is a working class mother of four who cares deeply about the people of West Virginia. She is committed to making a difference in her home state. She is currently running as a Democrat for the West Virginia House of Delegates 36th District.
Kayleigh Phillips works as a graphic designer and tattoo artist in Charleston, West Virginia. She is Assistant Creative Director and Design Editor of Electric Dirt, a zine created by the Queer Appalachia Project to celebrate queer voices and identities from Appalachia and the South.
Tate Thompson is the Founder and Executive Director of WV Transgender Resources (WVTR). In addition to his work at WVTR, he is also a full-time college student studying graphic design.
Diane Pendleton is a feminist wife, mom, grandmother and nurse who is horrified that her generation has not done more to protect our children. Gun violence prevention is her number one concern now.
Katie Quiñonez has served as the Development Director of the Women’s Health Center of West Virginia, the state’s last remaining abortion provider, since September 2017. With a background in journalism, social work and nonprofit fundraising, she earned her Master of Public Administration from Marshall University with a concentration in Nonprofit Management in May 2018. In her spare time, she fosters cats and kittens through local animal rescues in Cabell County.
Cathy Kunkel is a co-founder of Rise Up West Virginia, a progressive grassroots community organization based in Charleston, West Virginia. She is also a co-chair of the WV Working Families Party.
Raven Vance is a young voice in West Virginia who spends her time searching for new ways to get her message of change across to those who are not always willing to hear it. She attends Sarah Lawrence College in New York where she studies Political Science in preparation to pursue a career in Law.
Theresa "Tess" Jackson is a middle school teacher in Huntington, West Virginia. She is currently running for the West Virginia House of Delegates 15th District. She loves reading, spending time with her family, and her two cats Wally and Lillian.
Mamone is an audio engineer and artist living in the coalfields of West Virginia. Mamone engineered and produced some of the first Riot Grrrl albums and served as President of Riot Grrrl Ink (RGI), the largest queer record label in the world until 2014. Today, Mamone is the Creative Director of the Queer Appalachia Project, communicating with over 100,000 people a day who call home below the Mason-Dixon Line through the project's social media. This fall, Mamone's art will be featured in a solo show at Sheherazade Gallery in Louisville, Kentucky.
Ibtesam Barazi is the Vice President of the Islamic Association of West Virginia. Her work as a humanitarian and civil rights activist, in collaboration with the interfaith community in Charleston, spreads peace and understanding, breaks down walls, and removes barriers of misconception about Muslim Americans and their contribution to the United States. She also serves as Vice President of the West Virginia Interfaith Refugee Ministry (WVIRM), a coalition of religious and community leaders formed in 2015 to bring greater understanding of the plight of Syrian refugees to West Virginians and their leaders.
Gabrielle Chapman is the inaugural director of Call to Action for Racial Equality, a statewide racial equity leader, geared towards dismantling oppressive structures and institutional racism plaguing black and brown communities across the state of West Virginia. She carries the story and perspective of a mixed race, black woman in West Virginia and lends her skill set to open up often complex conversations around race and identity with hopes to strengthen her community, and to grow a statewide racial equity network.
Karan Ireland is a mother, writer, activist, and local elected official living in Charleston, West Virginia.
Amy Goodwin is applying to be Charleston, West Virginia's next mayor because she wants Charleston to be a place where her two boys -- and your children and grandchildren.
Katonya Hart is simply working to empower and support people. She believes we must value each other to create the progressive power needed to make change.
Tonia Thomas is one of two Team Coordinators of the West Virginia Coalition Against Domestic Violence. Tonia received both her bachelor’s degree and master’s degree from Marshall University. She is a lifelong resident of West Virginia.
Momma bear, lotus flower, lifelong public servant, lover of squirrels. Her career used to be her life. Now her family gives her life. Her work and volunteerism fill her soul.
Chris Gosses is the President of Rainbow Pride of WV. For two years, Chris served as Vice President of Rainbow Pride of WV and worked to promote the organization's mission of creating change through social engagement and visibility, educational programming, community involvement and events. In 2015, Rainbow Pride of WV awarded Chris the Power of One Award which recognizes individuals who make a positive contribution to the lives of LGBTQ West Virginians.
Artist, advocate, and entrepreneur Crystal Good uses poetry and performance to explore the landscape of Appalachia as a lens into the universe. She is a member of the Affrilachian Poets, an Irene McKinney scholar, and performs with Heroes Are Gang Leaders, a New York-based Free/Avant-Garde experimental improvisation ensemble. She is the author of “Valley Girl” and is working on her second collection of poetry.
Ellen Allen is a mother, wife, daughter, and lifelong activist who seeks justice for all through her work as Executive Director of West Virginia’s Covenant House.
Margaret Chapman Pomponio is Executive Director of WV FREE, a reproductive health, rights, and justice organization that works every day to for West Virginia women and families to improve education on reproductive options, increase access to affordable birth control, reduce teen pregnancy, improve adolescent health and protect personal decision-making, including the decision of whether or when to have a child.
Shayla Leftridge was born and raised in Oakland, California. She was raised by three loving parents: a stepfather who is a retired teacher, a mother who is also a retired teacher and vice principal, and a father who is a retired Oakland motorcycle police officer. Her family has deep roots in activism and social justice. Today, she lives in West Virginia where she is heavily involved in social activism and a professional vocalist in the vibrant local music scene.
Rev. Kayla was the Contract Minister at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Charleston, West Virginia. Today, she’s the Minister of Congregational Life at All Souls Unitarian in Indianapolis, Indiana. She believes we are all connected, and that our task here is to repair the breaks that keep us from ourselves, one another, Spirit, and a just world.
Valerie Woody is a space nerd, humanist, atheist, feminist, queer transgender lesbian, polamorous, writer, activist, and professional troublemaker.
Kaleidoscope WV, a consulting firm founded by four young, queer women (Chela Barajas, Caitlin Gaffin, Ciera Pennington, and Amanda Schwartz) offers support and training to progressive small businesses, nonprofits, candidates, and individuals to build power, create change, and be more effective leaders in their communities. Kaleidoscope WV focuses on approaching work in an intersectional manner that lifts up marginalized voices and people, specifically women, people of color, those with low income, and LGBTQIA+ folks.
Jennifer Wells is currently the Director of Youth Leadership and Development with West Virginia Healthy Kids and Families as part of the organization’s Our Children Our Future initiative. A transplant from New Orleans, Jennifer is working to make her new home in West Virginia the best place to live and thrive for women and people of color.
Jacqueline Venus is an artist, feminist, abuse warrior, freethinker, and intellect who embodies each of those "labels" about herself with an exuberant amount of passion. She doesn't really abide by society's standards on how many are conditioned to live their lives; whether that's in relation to friends, family, romance, jobs, or the way society is taught to consume.
A Los Angeles-based writer, theater-artist, and teacher, Olivia Buntaine's passion is creating productions of Shakespeare and other classical works with the purpose of starting conversations about violence against women and other marginalized populations.
Pamela J. Peters is an Indigenous multimedia documentarian from the Navajo Reservation. Her multimedia work, which she call "Indigenous Realism", explores the lives and diversities of real American Indians and pushes viewers to critically analyze the psychological and historical structures of Native Americans in mass media.
Best known for award-winning LGBTQ-inspired web series Anyone But Me and Producing Juliet, writer and director Tina Cesa Ward’s latest feminist offering, comic book series Delegates, puts women of color in power and pops with political relevance.
Robin Cloud is a Los Angeles-based comedian, writer, and director. Her first narrative short, Out Again, premiered in March 2017 as part of Refinery29's Shatterbox Anthology. In 2016, Robin launched Cloud Creative Media, a production company focused on creating independent narrative and documentary films and series.
An artist raised on an Owens Valley Paiute reservation in California’s Sierra Nevada, Native American poet and performer Tazbah Rose Chavez draws inspiration from her Nüümü, Diné, and Apache heritage to create powerful, consciousness-raising poetry, film, and music.
Stephanie Hallett is a Toronto-born, Los Angeles-based lifestyle writer and the senior lifestyle editor at HelloGiggles. She was previously an editor at HuffPost and Ms. magazine, and moonlights as a hip-hop dancer and instructor.
Actor, writer, and self-taught filmmaker Mary Neely makes movie-making look easy, directing, editing, and producing her latest short PINK TRAILER, which premiered in North America at 2018's SXSW Festival.
With a focus on gender, third-culture identity, and family, visual artist Yasmine Diaz works with mixed media on paper, drawing, and collage to question and assert her unique experiences as a Yemeni-American artist and feminist.
Jade Phoenix is a fierce story and truth teller, a vulnerable yet dynamic performance poet and actress, aspiring comedian, an informative and engaging cultural producer, and activist that uses her platform and art to shift and change the conversations and dialogue, specifically for trans women/femme and gender non conforming people of color in the arts, academia, and film.
Best known for her fun, funny, and feminist takes on gender, race, and sexuality, stand up comic Janine Brito is currently crushing it as a writer on the third season of Netflix's socially-conscious sitcom One Day at a Time.
An award-winning film director, editor, and producer, Ambika Leigh joined the #MeToo movement in October 2017 when she, along with dozens of women, came forward to accuse Hollywood writer-director James Toback of sexual assault.
Together with four other funny women, Kelly Lohman, Amanda Troop, and Jessica Lynn Verdi make up Ripley Improv, an LA-based improvisation troupe that specializes in devising artful, long-form narratives about women who save the day, save the world, and save each other.
Cameron Airen is a coach who works with clients of all genders to help them better manage their mind and emotions, and get in their bodies so they can experience deeper intimacy, show up more powerfully, and live a more fulfilling life. In addition, she w
Following her 14-year battle with disordered eating, fitness expert Robbie Ann Darby founded RAD Experience, a radical fitness and wellness movement devoted to transforming not only bodies, but lives.
An award-winning choreographer and seasoned dancer from Brazil, Marina Magalhães's choreography draws from her unique background in Afro-Latin and Contemporary dance practices to create a dance theater grounded in subversive politics and deeply personal.
Musicians Emma McCall, Arden and Eva Baldinger make sweet music together as Moonrise Nation, a young, fresh pop-folk ensemble currently touring the U.S.
Best known for her “Courage Has No Gender” campaign, LA-based street artist Meg Zany transforms global cityscapes into fiercely feminist works of public art that draw attention to issues of gender inequality in the hopes of inspiring the world to crea
Inclusive, multicultural stories take centerstage at Bag O' Bones, an art collective dedicated to creating socially-conscious, multimedia visual and performance art content in Los Angeles. Founder Tinks Lovelace and creative partner Francesca Gámez, the
In 2008, author and activist Winnie M. Li was working as a film producer in London when she was violently attacked and raped by a teenage boy while traveling in Northern Ireland. Today, Winnie dedicates her life and career to addressing the issue of sexual assault through the media, the arts, and academia.
Romance novels and feminism? The two may seem like strange bedfellows, but for Bea and Leah Koch, the book lovers behind America’s sole romance-only bookstore The Ripped Bodice, the connection is real.
Best known for her laugh-out-loud performances including her hilarious portrayal of Mitzi Fitzsimmons in the web series Rods and Cones (which she co-created with longtime collaborator Beth Lisick), writer, comedian, and actor Tara Jepsen flips the feminist script with rad projects like Pave The Way, a skateboard design company that celebrates queerness, and her forthcoming debut novel, Like A Dog, a Sister Spit imprint of San Francisco's famed City Lights Publications.
After years of studying and performing theatre in the United States and South Africa, actor, playwright, and activist Brittanie Richardson founded Art and Abolition, a freedom movement and nonprofit organization that uses art as a vehicle to free, heal, and empower young survivors of sexual slavery in Kenya.
Raised in Tijuana, Mexico and educated in the United States, visual artist and designer Tanya Aguiñiga's unique, cross-cultural craft work combines activist and community-based art practices, connecting marginalized communities through creative collaboration and inspiring audiences across the country and beyond its borders to engage in critical conversations about identity, gender, and culture.
A staple of the Los Angeles alt-comedy scene, transgender comedian Riley Silverman brings the house down by raising consciousness, delivering sharp, silly, and darkly humorous takes (inspired by her own experience) on topics like transitioning, harassment, and #TravelingWhileTrans.
Inspired by the fashion needs of both its founder and the larger LGBTQ community, designer Nik Kacy formed Nik Kacy Gender Equal Footwear, a groundbreaking shoe company specializing in the creation of stylish, uniquely unisex footwear for individuals of all gender expressions, paving the way for all people to rock what's in their hearts and souls on their feet without being (shoe)boxed in a gender binary.
With Call Your Girlfriend, a biweekly, unapologetically feminist podcast discussing the latest in pop culture and politics, journalist Ann Friedman and real-life bestie Amina Sow invite listeners to eavesdrop on their phone calls to each other about everything from menstrual cycles to workplace dramas, shattering the tired stereotype of catty and competitive female friendship and shining a bright, powerful light on the bond of sisterhood.
Blending bright colors, playful humor, and fierce feminism, illustrator Mary Purdie's gal-powered gallery of pop culture's most iconic feminist sheroes has drawn thousands of Instagram followers, inspiring meaningful activism and healing laughter through her artwork, while waving a middle finger (or two!) in the patriarchy's face.
Slam poetry superstar and teaching artist Alyesha Wise puts into powerful words her experiences as a black woman, calling out white supremacist patriarchy with her poetry and inspiring the next generation of poet-activists.
Using hair as a form of social justice, queer hairstylist Madin Ray Lopez's non-profit organization, Project Q, transforms LGBTQIA and homeless youth by helping those struggling to accept who they are become the people they were born to be - one haircut at a time!
Drawing from her coming-of-age as the child of an Italian immigrant, the othering she encountered as a city kid residing in the rural South, and her experience as an immigrant living and working abroad, LA-based visual artist Debra Scacco creates multimedia artwork that charts a course towards understanding cultural identity (including her own), exploring "placelessness" and pinpointing personal history as a port of entry for continual investigation of geography and environment.
Whether she's writing about queer politics, racial justice, or rape culture, writer, activist, and social media maven Carmen Rios reigns queen supreme of the feminist blogosphere, overseeing the development of safe spaces centering the feminine narrative as Managing Editor at Argot Magazine; reporting, rebelling, and truth-telling as Digital Editor at Ms.; and activating young women by melding fandom and social culture with current political issues as Co-Host of THE BOSSY SHOW podcast.
Indie-folk goddesses Elana Stone and Katie Wighton, together with their "sisters" Hannah Crofts and Georgia Mooney, cast a potent spell as All Our Exes Live In Texas, a fierce, musical foursome mixing masterful musicianship, heavenly harmonies, and a little feminism for good measure.
Embodying different Bettys colliding at the intersections of anger, sex, and "thea-tah", actors Anna Lamadrid, Tracey A. Leigh, and Elyse Mirto deliver a knockout blow to a thousand boring tropes about female identity in The Theatre @ Boston Court's production of Jen Silverman's brash, uncompromising, queer comedy Collective Rage: A Play in 5 Boops.
In That'swhatshesaid, a one-person performance using only female dialogue from the most-produced plays in America, performance artist Erin Pike acts out a brutal theatrical exercise in isolation, inviting audiences to observe the chaos and clarity that emerges when female characters are left alone with no male protagonists to support.
Tired of waiting for permission to screen her own films and desiring a safe space for feminist filmmakers and their movies to shine, indie auteur and actor Premstar Santana founded the Moonfaze Feminist Film Festival, an annual celebration of films that foreground a feminist viewpoint and showcase critical, political, cinematic takes on the many levels of oppression women, queer people, and people of color navigate every day.
In her new, semi-autobiographical television pilot Binge, actor and series creator Angela Gulner stars as Angela, a bulimic woman who drunkenly enrolls in eating disorder rehab where she must juggle her failing pastry shop, an affair with her therapist, and a cast of bizarre food-abusers, all while trying not to do what she does best: vomit.
Inspired by Susan J. Brison's book Aftermath about violent trauma and the body, visual artist and feminist Nancy Baker Cahill's current body of work SURDS features small and large-scale drawings that merge her interpretation of the human body as a complicated abstraction engaged in perpetual struggle with a mathematical concept in order to explore the human "rational" desire for understanding through order and logic, even when faced with a nonsensical act like sexual assault.
Fiercely intelligent and wildly funny feminist performance artist Kristina Wong takes on Tila Tequila's viral appeal, the highs and lows of trolling Donald Trump and his alt-right acolytes on Twitter, and the challenges of creating political theatre in a world where performance art and "real life" are increasingly becoming one and the same.
Co-editor of The Feminist Utopia Project and playwright Rachel Kauder Nalebuff's radical work-in-progress play production, The Bumps, probes how we make meaning as we wait, casting pregnant performers at various stages of pregnancy and combining narrative and movement to chart how our understanding of motherhood has evolved.
By organizing women-led music festivals, devising educational programming in music, and amplifying the voices of women and girls who rock, musicians Anna Bulbrook (GIRLSCHOOL) and Mona Tavakoli (Rock n' Roll Camp for Girls LA) turn up the volume on feminist activism, fostering an empowering and supportive community of women-identified rockers.
Through her exploratory workshop Feminist Acting Class, presented as part of The Hammer Museum's Bureau of Feminism initiative, queer feminist playwright, director, musician, and performer Gina Young hopes to expand the roles for women and non binary people in the theatre by providing a space free from restrictive gender expectations for performers to experiment with roles that would otherwise be off-limits.
With Instagram account Bye Felipe, feminist journalist-cum-Tinder vigilante Alexandra Tweten calls out dudes online who turn hostile when rejected or ignored by inviting women to screenshot the harassing messages they receive when they tell men they're not interested.
As artistic director of Chicago's The Viola Project, professional actor and teaching artist Skyler Schrempp cultivates confidence among middle school-aged girls by creating "a brave space" for young women to stand up, advocate for themselves, and demand inclusion through creative exploration of William Shakespeare's classic plays.
Chicago-based storyteller, educator, and sex positivity activist Alicia Swiz takes on takes on rape culture, slut shaming, and media's role in influencing our attitudes about women and sexuality.
Writer, producer, and co-creator of Amazon Prime's new animated series Danger and Eggs Shadi Petosky talks internalized transphobia, intersectional feminism, and the importance of recognizing our biases (and f***ing destroying them!).
For playwright Ellen Fairey and director Kimberly Senior, aging and ageism, the evolution of gender roles, and the need for safe spaces to express our anxieties about an ever-changing world take center stage in the Goodman Theatre's New Stages Festival production ofSupport Group for Men.
Actors Bri Sudia and Lauren Molina, in collaboration with Tony Award-winning director Mary Zimmerman, set the scene for sisterhood both on and off stage in the Goodman Theatre's production of Leonard Bernstein's classic musical Wonderful Town.
Through comedy, feminist improviser and creator of goodgirlsarentfunny.com Holly Mandel empowers funny women to say HELL yes, and... "f*ck it!", to bust their inner good girls, and to "build their own sandboxes" in which to play (No boys necessary!).
Chicana punk rock pioneer Alice Bag sounds off on making art out of rage, finding her feminist voice, and reveals "the greatest hurt" she could do to herself: to not live by her own convictions.
Writer and comic book creator Christy Marx chronicles the origin story of her "soul obsession" with super heroes, considers why Jem and The Holograms strikes such a chord with feminist fans, and offers her advice for breaking into the comic book industry's boys club (hint: Let nothing stop you!).
Transgender actor, writer, and comedian D'Lo raps about how hip hop inspired his feminism, storytelling as a tool for self-discovery, and his gratitude for directors who challenge him to face his stinky "shit."
The political is poetic as feminist writer and climate change activist Rebecca Solnit opens up about mansplaining, the change-making nature of "naming things", and why we all need an education in hope.
Five Nights in Maine filmmaker Maris Curran sounds off on empathetic cinema, the critical role of "champions" in taking a story from script to screen, and exposing the behind-the-scenes barriers keeping women from calling the shots in Hollywood.
LA-based artist and feminist fashionista Whitney Bell chats about reclaiming 'cunt', combating harassment one dick pic at a time, and how her art's signature spoonful of sugar helps the feminism go down.
Transgender actor and activist Scott Turner Schofield shares his personal "trans moment," his thoughts on transforming Hollywood into a more inclusive space, and the greatest challenges facing trans people today and what we can all do promote wider trans acceptance.
Exhibit creators Emma Thorne-Christy and Krista Ulman share the inspiration behind their newest Los Angeles installation, Laughing Matters: The Experiences of Women in Stand-Up Comedy, and reveal how the uniquely unfunny challenges faced by women, queer people, and people of color in comedy are no joke.
Queercore queen Michelle Tea opens up about her new book, Black Wave, her lesbian feminist separatist nervous breakdown, and why Aquarians rule!
Brooklyn-based hip hop trio Hand Job Academy raps about street harassment, body positivity, the challenges of growing up girl.
Transgender performance artist Justin Vivian Bond talks gender nonconformity, creative inspiration, and the art of becoming the person one has always dreamed of being.
Host Kitty Lindsay talks Gloria Steinem, reproductive rights, and The BETTY Effect with rock goddesses Alyson Palmer and Amy and Elizabeth Ziff of the badass feminist band BETTY!