In this episode, Dr. Jessica Lopez Lyman recalls her earliest memories of learning and the resulting availability of new worlds and possibilities. She centralizes this question for our deep consideration in order to imagine ideal conditions for a better tomorrow: “What do you want?” She directly connects the act of manifesting, something as simple as writing and keeping our dreams and visions in order to make them a reality. She offers guidance for today’s higher education inclusion innovators that includes a practice of discipline as a form of liberation, of having agency in our lives and outcomes.
About Dr. Lopez Lyman:
Jessica Lopez Lyman, Ph.D. is an interdisciplinary performance artist and Xicana feminist scholar interested in how People of Color create alternative spaces to heal and imagine new worlds. She received her PhD in Chicana and Chicano Studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Her manuscript, tentatively titled Midwest Mujeres: Chicana/Latina Performance explores racialized and gendered geographies of urban Minnesota. Jessica is a member of Electric Machete Studios, a Chicanx/Latinx/Indigenous art collective on St. Paul’s West Side. She is a Postdoctoral Associate at the University of Minnesota in the Department of Chicano and Latino Studies where she will join the faculty as an Assistant Professor in 2019.
Show Highlights:
- Find out what’s causing Jessica amidst her other important identities to feel like a writer a lot more nowadays 04:46
- Hear more about her experience in the first Chicano & Latino Studies department in the Midwest engaging her local community at the University of Minnesota 08:32
- Jessica tells us more about her unique path towards using her voice for helping others and how she always loved education, reading, and writing 16:47
- Shares some resources for other college professionals 24:48
- Hear more about why the best advice Jessica ever got was the importance of being disciplined and why it is a truly liberating mindset 33:13
- Jessica shares amazing tips of advice surrounding vulnerability, finding your community, and naming truth to injustice 46:23
Notable Quotes:
- “I was so passionate about learning how to read. I remember when I was starting to read the whole world came alive…I used writing as an outlet for my emotional healing…I found a lot of passion in the arts.” 17:07
- “[Regarding discipline] It’s about people that are living their passions and they’re thriving. And that was success…I started seeing this common denominator; it was discipline.” 34:02
- “Why I see [discipline] as a form of liberation, is that in the world we live in now…discipline allows us to set our intention and choose our path.” 36:41
- “I really believe in the energies we put out there…the intentions end up manifesting” 45:36
- Inspirational quote from Cherrie Moraga:
“Sometimes a breakdown can be the beginning of a kind of breakthrough, a way of living in advance through a trauma that prepares you for a future of radical transformation.”
Links Mentioned:
- Latina Theory Podcast with Maria Isa and Arianna Genis
- “Borderlands/ La Frontera: The New Mestiza” by Gloria Anzaldua
- “Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds” by adrienne maree brown
- “My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies” by Resmaa Menakem
- “Year of Yes: How to Dance, Stand in the Sun and Be Your Own Person” by Shonda Rhimes
- “Difficult Women” by Roxane Gay
- Connect with Jessica:
- Email: lyma0025[at]umn.edu
Click here to start your free trial of Audible and download your copy of Jessica’s recommended book, “Year of Yes” by Shonda Rhimes
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