The Maryland activist using oral history to humanize trans incarcerated people
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By Jonece Starr Dunigan, Reckon Media
For decades, hunger strikes, workers strikes, uprisings and other forms of disruption behind bars have helped incarcerated people fight for their rights. But what about the art of oral storytelling?
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[T]he experiences highlighted during Black August typically feature cisgender men. Jamie Grace Alexander is one of the leaders of the Trans Rights Advocacy Coalition, an organization lobbying for policies improving the well-being of trans and gender expansive people in Maryland. She said there is a reason – and a consequence – for the absence of LGBTQ+ voices in the Black August space. She’s coordinating an oral history project about formerly incarcerated trans people. Their stories will help end the dehumanization of trans people in jail.
“Trans people are being held in solitary confinement because they don’t fit into a cisgender binary,” Alexander said. “Because it’s centered like this, violence against trans people is happening.”
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