Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals
For this week we are reading selections from Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals by Alexis Pauline Gumbs.
In Undrowned, Alexis is presenting considerations of marine mammals in a new way focused on growth and exploration of what they can teach us.
As you are considering this work please try to reflect on marine mammals in and of themselves, what we can learn, and also to extend these thoughts to how you interact with nonhuman animals in general. For instance:
- What might we learn from land mammals like cows, pigs, squirrels, etc?
- How do we think about and interact with them now?
As optional (but highly encouraged!) readings, we’ve also included the following on Perusall:
- A chapter that Alexis Pauline Gumbs wrote for Octavia’s Brood, entitled “Evidence”.
- Aph and Syl Ko’s book Aphro-sm: Essays on Pop Culture, Feminism, and Black Veganism from Two Sisters, which we read last semester (see the blog post here). Their work is very informative for considering animal issues and we will draw on their scholarship in considering the writings of Alexis Pauline Gumbs.
We encourage you to think critically about how we interact with all types of nonhuman animals, and how human systems of oppression entangle humans and nonhumans alike.