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Speaker 1: Okay, this is Sandy and Samantha and welcome to steff

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Speaker 1: WM Never told you production by Hear Radio.

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Speaker 2: So we are writing this on April tenth, although publishing

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Speaker 2: it on April fifteenth, so you know, a little bit,

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Speaker 2: little bit delayed. We got this though, so but April

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Speaker 2: tenth was in the middle of National Library Week, so

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Speaker 2: we wanted to take the time to celebrate with an

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Speaker 2: activist or an activist librarian as she is known, also

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Speaker 2: a writer, journalist, so many other things, an Alan Shockley

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Speaker 2: who is still with us, so of course we've got

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Speaker 2: to celebrate while she's still with us. Shockley has made

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Speaker 2: a profound impact in the world with her works and

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Speaker 2: advocacy since her childhood in Louisville, Kentucky, which she was

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Speaker 2: born I believed in nineteen twenty seven. Shockley has been

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Speaker 2: influenced by books and writings her entire life. Teachers and

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Speaker 2: mentors encouraged her to write and read, seeing her talents

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Speaker 2: and creativity, so in high school she would take her

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Speaker 2: talents and use them for her high school newspaper and

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Speaker 2: would continue on to get her degree in college at

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Speaker 2: Fisk University, as well as received her Masters in Library

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Speaker 2: Sciences at Case Western Reserve University in nineteen fifty nine.

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Speaker 2: So again, even back then, you were supposed to get

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Speaker 2: a master's in order to work in the library. That's

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Speaker 2: so such an invest amount of work, right, So here's

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Speaker 2: a bit about her from benhair dot Org quote in

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Speaker 2: Alan Shockley was born on June twenty first, nineteen twenty seven,

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Speaker 2: in Louisville, Kentucky. Her love of reading and writing started

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Speaker 2: at an early age. Harriet Leforest, her eighth grade teacher,

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Speaker 2: was her mentor, and Richard Writ's uncle Tom's Children was

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Speaker 2: an early influence on her writing. Shockley's introduction to writing

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Speaker 2: for the public started with her editing her high school newspaper.

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Speaker 2: She continued to write for various newspapers and graduated with

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Speaker 2: her her bachelor's degree from Fisk University in nineteen forty eight,

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Speaker 2: and in nineteen fifty nine, she received her master's degree

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Speaker 2: in library science from Case Western Reserve University. So she's

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Speaker 2: been at this for a while. During this time, she

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Speaker 2: married William Shockley in nineteen forty eight and had two children,

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Speaker 2: and she would go on to work as a librarian

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Speaker 2: at Delaware State College and at the University of Maryland

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Speaker 2: Eastern Shore and again would go on to work at

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Speaker 2: Fisk University. In fact, she would go on to serve

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Speaker 2: as Professor of Library Science at Fisk. She also was

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Speaker 2: the associate librarian for Special Collections there as well as

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Speaker 2: well as founded the Black Oral History Program. So here's

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Speaker 2: a bit more detail about her. From the book Knowledge

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Speaker 2: of Justice Disruption of Library and Information Studies through Critical

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Speaker 2: Race Theory, So contributor and writer Schandra Walker writes and

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Speaker 2: Alan Shockley a black activist librarian who wrote extensively on

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Speaker 2: the purpose and function of black special collections. Shockley, who

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Speaker 2: was a part of a continuum of black activist librarians,

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Speaker 2: was extraordinary that she raised important questions about the need

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Speaker 2: for special collections in libraries serving HBCUs, their function and

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Speaker 2: support of black studies programs on predominantly white campuses, and

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Speaker 2: the roles of librarians and publishers in developing and supporting

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Speaker 2: such collections. So a lot of amazing work. And with

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Speaker 2: her contributions to the library systems and advocating for more

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Speaker 2: African American literature and writings, she was contributing with her

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Speaker 2: own written work as well. She was a freelance columnist

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Speaker 2: from nineteen forty five to nineteen fifty four and worked

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Speaker 2: at different publishings such as The Louisville Defender, Fiske University Heralds,

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Speaker 2: and others, specifically talking about African American studies and subjects

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Speaker 2: and issues, as well as lgbt related issues. Here's a

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Speaker 2: bit more information from beinhere dot org. Again, she writes

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Speaker 2: about triple oppression, the internationality of racism, sexism, and homophobia

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Speaker 2: in the Black community, and stories and writings were inspired

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Speaker 2: by the Black civil rights the LGBTQ plus aberration, and

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Speaker 2: the women's rights movements. And again from Schandra Walker, she

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Speaker 2: writes she's best known for her literary works centering the

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Speaker 2: lives of black lesbians. Her novels Loving Her, published in

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Speaker 2: nineteen seventy four, The Black and White of It published

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Speaker 2: in nineteen eighty, Say Jesus and Come to Me nineteen

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Speaker 2: eighty two, and Celebrating Hotsch Law, published in two thousand

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Speaker 2: and five, illuminate the lives of an overlooked demographic. Her

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Speaker 2: writing exemplifies the very type of work that Black special

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Speaker 2: collections endeavor to preserve and make available once they illuminate

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Speaker 2: experiences that might otherwise be unnoticed and undervalued by other collections.

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Speaker 2: In addition to her literary work, she also authored Afro

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Speaker 2: American Women Writers seventeen forty six, nineteen thirty three and

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Speaker 2: Anthology and Critical Guide nineteen eighty eight. Reportedly, the reference

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Speaker 2: work was a labor of love for her, as she

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Speaker 2: received no grant or clerical support, and she began assembling

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Speaker 2: it in nineteen seventy eight using extra time on holidays

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Speaker 2: and over summers, and describe being her inspiration for the work,

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Speaker 2: She stated quote, I shared a personal empathy with many

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Speaker 2: of these women whose problems mirrored my own and those

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Speaker 2: of women writers throughout the centuries. Yeah, and unsurprisingly, her

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Speaker 2: work and advocacy put her in a place of legacy

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Speaker 2: as an activist librarian. But honestly, we don't see a

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Speaker 2: lot of that conversation. But thanks to people like Walker,

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Speaker 2: we are able to get a better understanding of the

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Speaker 2: obvious crossovers of librarians and activism. I love that because

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Speaker 2: I will say, when I was trying to look up

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Speaker 2: specifically those who are activists, I see some historical figures,

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Speaker 2: but that was not a lot that they talk about.

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Speaker 2: I guess, you know, we don't celebrate librarians enough so

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Speaker 2: that might be part of this problem. So in her

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Speaker 2: time doing this very tedious work, she has talked about

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Speaker 2: why collections like the African American writings and works are

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Speaker 2: so important in being available to the public. And again

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Speaker 2: this is from the Walker chapter from that book. She says,

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Speaker 2: this type of special collection made available through the gathering

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Speaker 2: of books and other materials allows for more comprehensive consideration

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Speaker 2: and treatment of a certain phase of history, long neglected

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Speaker 2: and misinterpreted, which by necessity must be studied, examined, and

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Speaker 2: researched in order to provide the missing link in the

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Speaker 2: history of a people and the history of a nation.

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Speaker 2: So that was a quote from us Shocklely, and Walker

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Speaker 2: goes on to say, here we see a bold statement

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Speaker 2: that alludes to the deficiencies of cataloging and classification systems

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Speaker 2: that have historically marginalized non wide, non Western materials. Black

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Speaker 2: special collections then can be seen to have a liberating,

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Speaker 2: emancipating function. Such collections, rather than relegating materials about the

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Speaker 2: experience of Black people to a subordinate status, instead elevate

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Speaker 2: them to a level that is at least on part

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Speaker 2: with libraries, primary or main collections. Again, so important to

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Speaker 2: be represented in libraries, and her boldness in advocating for

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Speaker 2: the availability of having more black writers and books has

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Speaker 2: made a long and lasting impact as well as her

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Speaker 2: own books. As we mentioned previously, her book Loving Her

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Speaker 2: was groundbreaking. So going back to that binhere dot org article,

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Speaker 2: they write she was one of the first women to

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Speaker 2: write about lesbian, especially black lesbian experiences, and likely the

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Speaker 2: first to publish a novel centering on a black lesbian protagonist.

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Speaker 2: Her groundbreaking book Loving Her was the first to explore

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Speaker 2: a black lesbian protagonist in an interracial relationship. She wrote

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Speaker 2: about what interested her and not what was socially acceptable,

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Speaker 2: making her a pioneer in the black LGBTQ plus literature field.

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Speaker 2: So this book garnered her the award of Lee Lynch

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Speaker 2: Classic Award, but also garnered some critiques. So from what

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Speaker 2: I gather, she's not actually a lesbian, but she does

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Speaker 2: find that something that needs to be spoken about. In

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Speaker 2: nineteen seventy four, what she did was truly something new

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Speaker 2: and unheard of. And here's a bit from her Wikipedia

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Speaker 2: page which he I know Wikipedia can be mistaken, but

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Speaker 2: they did a great job in trying to get her

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Speaker 2: remembered and made sure that her legacy is going to

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Speaker 2: be lasting, so they wrote this. Journalists have come out

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Speaker 2: that goes as far as to say that Shockli complicates

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Speaker 2: same gender loving as well as problematizes it through her

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Speaker 2: characterizations of African American people who also happen to be homosexual.

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Speaker 2: Along with this, some argue that Shackleli uses too many

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Speaker 2: generalizations in her text, has a poor stylistic choice, and

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Speaker 2: did not work to battle common stereotypes about black lesbianism.

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Speaker 2: In her first novel, Loving Her, the main character, Renee,

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Speaker 2: chooses to live her life as a lesbian, but still

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Speaker 2: performs stereotypically heteronormative notions on romance, which works against Shackli's

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Speaker 2: supposed intentions of exposing what a lesbian relationship really is

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Speaker 2: like in the late twentieth century. However, as the first

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Speaker 2: novel representing an interracial relationship between two women, Loving Her

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Speaker 2: does not exist within a historical framework in which it

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Speaker 2: could serve as a satirical response too, so it is

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Speaker 2: sometimes have been interpreted as a naive reinforcement of heteronormative

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Speaker 2: and racist ideas about queer relationships and black webpon rather

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Speaker 2: than a potentially self aware piece. Nonetheless, the fictional novel

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Speaker 2: is still admittingly one of the first of its kind. Again,

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Speaker 2: of course, like the author of this Wikipedia page does

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Speaker 2: point out, it could have a lot to do with

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Speaker 2: a time frame, so like it's very new, it's something new,

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Speaker 2: So maybe she was making a satirical point if she

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Speaker 2: is not actually a lesbian, which again I just saw

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Speaker 2: that in one article saying that she was not. This

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Speaker 2: could be a part of the problem as well as

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Speaker 2: how do you reinvent or have a conversation about something

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Speaker 2: that was so taboo in a time that people were

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Speaker 2: out today even today even there's problematic things in what

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Speaker 2: they think is representing in a good way, but they're

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Speaker 2: underlying whether it's misogyny or underlying misogyniir all of this

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Speaker 2: may come out without realizing it is coming maybe with

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Speaker 2: good intentions, all those things. This is deep conversation, especially

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Speaker 2: a book in nineteen seventy four. She moved to do

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Speaker 2: something really radical at that point in time, so there's

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Speaker 2: a lot of conversations that could be had. I've seen

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Speaker 2: other articles specifically written by like black queer publications that

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Speaker 2: talk about you still have to give her her flowers

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Speaker 2: like it was an amazing thing. I think they celebrated

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Speaker 2: this book last year and as being the fiftieth anniversary

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Speaker 2: of the release of this book and how it was

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Speaker 2: it was in an international level it was published on

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Speaker 2: that level. Again, a lot of things to be talked about,

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Speaker 2: but no matter what, we know that Chocolate has been

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Speaker 2: doing amazing advocacy work in order to preserve history as

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Speaker 2: well as giving recognition to those who are too often erased,

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Speaker 2: especially in this day and age. We know librarians are

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Speaker 2: being attacked, we know libraries are being attacked, we know

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Speaker 2: black writers are being attacked. We know that CRT is

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Speaker 2: being attacked. So all of this conversation that she has

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Speaker 2: fought for since her childhood is so important to remember

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Speaker 2: and we want to celebrate and thank her for her

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Speaker 2: work because this is huge in what she has done

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Speaker 2: with her life.

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Speaker 1: Yes, Yes, and very cool books to add to our list.

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Speaker 1: Always love that while listeners let us know if you

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Speaker 1: have any thoughts or suggestions for upcoming segments. You can

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Speaker 1: email us at Hello at step Whenever Told You dot com.

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Speaker 1: store and to read the book you can get wherever

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Speaker 1: you get your books, maybe your library. And thanks as

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Speaker 1: always to your super producer Christina or executive cchriuser Maya

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Speaker 1: and your contributor Joey. Thank you and thanks to you

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