Nikki Giovanni\u2019s \u201cEgo Tripping,\u201d<\/a> and I remember one girl challenging me. There\u2019s a line in the poem where Nikki says, \u201cI turned myself into myself and was Jesus\/ Men intone my loving name,\u201d and I wanted the class to talk about how they are powerful, how they are omnipotent, how they can be superhero-like. Not necessarily God-like, but superhero-like. This idea of writing a poem in that fashion came into conflict with someone\u2019s faith. It blew my mind, because I realized I was coming against their religion. I\u2019m thinking I\u2019m teaching a craft, a hyperbole\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\nRW: <\/strong>Yeah. [laughter]<\/p>\n\n\n\nIZ: <\/strong>\u2014I\u2019m teaching tall tales. There wasn\u2019t room in that time or space to say, \u201cLet\u2019s pause for a moment.\u201d What does that mean when your student tells you, \u201cWell, I\u2019m not God; I\u2019m not going to write about that.\u201d I didn\u2019t have a moment to say, \u201cWait, let\u2019s have a discussion.\u201d The reality is they need an anthology at the end of the year, so you can talk all you want to about other conversations and discussions, but you\u2019ve got to get some work done. I understand the very real practical things that have to happen, but this is a moment where I want you to have the opportunity to speak your truth and then say, \u201cHey, I never thought about that. What does everybody else think?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nRW:<\/strong> I think there\u2019s a way to push for that though, and make time for it, even in a more traditional teaching artist residency. In the beginning, I was much more like, \u201cOkay, this is what I\u2019m supposed to do and this is the curriculum.\u201d But the more I taught, the more confident I felt to say back to the organization or to the classroom teacher, \u201cThis is important. And your mission says\u2026 So, why don\u2019t we figure out a way to really do it?\u201d It is hard work and not easy. There\u2019s some fumbling in there too, but I feel it\u2019s worth trying. I feel process is important and not just product.<\/p>\n\n\n\nT&W: <\/strong>How has the teaching work you both have done influenced your own writing?<\/p>\n\n\n\nIZ: <\/strong>When I worked in high schools with teachers of writing, I was writing throughout, working on my novel while working in a high school near my home in Flatbush [Brooklyn]. I got to be up close and personal with those teens\u2014how they moved, what they say to each other, the jokes\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\nRW: <\/strong>And you were watching two teens who clearly were in love and dating, on the train\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\nIZ:<\/strong> I was watching them on the train\u2014<\/p>\n\n\n\nRW: <\/strong>She posted it on Facebook.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIZ: <\/strong>I took a picture of their feet. But I\u2019m always watching young people. When I was in the classroom, I got to see the teen angst, the boredom. I remember my own teen-hood. The drama\u2014or not\u2014so it just puts me right there in the subject matter that I\u2019m writing: how they respond to me, how I respond to them. At this point right now, when I write about teens their parents are my age! [laughter] I can\u2019t write this as an old person. I think that\u2019s why we have a different bird\u2019s-eye view. We\u2019re not going out to do the research and then writing the book; we\u2019re writing from our experiences over the years with young people.<\/p>\n\n\n\nRW: <\/strong>And knowing what they\u2019re capable of. I feel like so many times, the assumption is \u201cThat\u2019s too serious,\u201d or \u201cThey don\u2019t care about that,\u201d or \u201cThey\u2019re not going to want\u2026\u201d No, I know teenagers who are serious about activism, like your daughters. I want to see those characters, those people\u2014real people\u2014represented in books. In that way, I also feel like a journalist. I have been in the trenches with young people across the board\u2014wide ranges of communities and different class levels. I feel obligated to tell as many of their stories as I can. I want those young people that I have met to see their experiences in a book, too. Children\u2019s books especially are usually the extreme stories that get a lot of hype and attention. There are so many stories that might not be the perfect, all-star, super-popular, drama-kid stories, but also not down-and-out, gangs, mama-didn\u2019t-love-me, end-of-the-world stories. There are so many stories between that. Teaching taught me that, or reminded me of that.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIZ: <\/strong>It allows us to add nuance to our characters. I have to check my own propensity for stereotyping the \u201cother,\u201d because young people can still be the \u201cother\u201d even when I\u2019m a parent. So, when I\u2019m in their midst, it allows me to see them as fully realized human beings and to portray them in that way.<\/p>\n\n\n\nRW: <\/strong>When I\u2019m in deep, after a few drafts, I start to think, what if an educator wants to use this book in the classroom. I hope that some of my work can be used to help conversations that we\u2019ve talked about. So, I\u2019m mindful of that too. I know that educators are super busy. There\u2019s so much on a teacher\u2019s plate. There\u2019s testing, there\u2019s a lot of pressure. I believe most teachers really do want to have these meaningful conversations, so how can my books be a catalyst for that? Having been in the schools and knowing a little bit of how they work, I want to be an ally with teachers.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIZ: <\/strong>The key is to include enough nuance in our stories for the teachers to be able to sink their teeth into.<\/p>\n\n\n\nRW: <\/strong>Right.<\/p>\n\n\n\nIZ: <\/strong>Just because we\u2019re writing about a certain population, it can go either way. It can just be fluff and sensationalized material, or it can be something with depth. Something where there is enough context for whatever these kids are dealing with, for the teachers to say, \u201cLet\u2019s examine how this came to be.\u201d If I go to a school visit, I say, \u201cLet\u2019s talk about redlining in these communities and what happens when people are disenfranchised and marginalized and placed into a box.\u201d I want that to be in my book.<\/p>\n\n\n\nPart 2 of this interview will appear on February 20. In their continued conversation, Ren\u00e9e and Ibi speak about the creative act itself and how it affects and is affected by trauma, their recent book and teaching projects, and the impact of the 2016 Presidential election on their shared purpose as educators.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Opportunity to Speak Your Truth<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":266,"featured_media":3414,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","featured_image_focal_point":[],"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"3432,8583,1343,3179,2730,3482","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","_eb_attr":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[609,607],"tags":[91,20,88],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3411"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/266"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3411"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3411\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10126,"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3411\/revisions\/10126"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3411"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3411"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/teachersandwritersmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3411"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}