Episode 39 - Ashley Farmer
Ashley has spent her career researching and considering the Black revolutionary women of the last century. Her most recent tome is Queen Mother about Audley Moore. With Chloe, she goes in depth about not only who these women were and how they navigated the times during which they existed, but at what cost was their activism and how their lives inform our present world. Moving through the challenges of motherhood, the tools of white control, and possibilities of Black sovereignty, Ashley broadens our understanding of historical context and explains her style of writing usable history.
Highlights
How to understand possibility of America being a failed experiment for Black people
How to create meaningful, painstakingly accurate biographies of marginalized leaders
What it means to think in the longue durée
Dr. Ashley D. Farmer is an Associate Professor in the Department of History and African and African Diaspora Studies at the University of Texas at Austin. Numerous schools and foundations, including the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Whiting Foundation, have supported her research. Farmer is also a co-editor of the Black Power Series published with NYU Press and the Black Women’s History Series, published with UNC Press. Dr. Farmer earned a BA from Spelman College, an MA in History, and a PhD in African American Studies from Harvard University.
Chloe Aftel has spent her career working in commercial photography, photojournalism, and film. She’s an established name in modern photography with work featured in The New York Times, Mother Jones, Playboy, Dazed & Confused, Vogue Germany, The Hollywood Reporter, The Wall Street Journal, Vogue Italia, Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, Teen Vogue, and more. Aftel has photographed victims of sexual violence, reported on COVID 19’s impact on the trans community, and gained access as the first reporter in COVID wards of the West Coast’s hardest-hit hospitals. She has covered underground abortion providers, the impact of gender pronouns on daily life, and clergy abuse. Aftel’s first book, Outside & In Between, is an award-winning anthology covering gender non-conforming people across the United States.
