April 13, 2022
Dear Friends,
I write with a heart full of gratitude to members of the CCCC trans community and allies who reached out about the 2023 CFP and Adrienne Rich’s endorsement and amplification of transphobia. I should have known her history and the truth is that I could have known without laying on you the added emotional labor of instructing me. I recognize my culpability and rededicate myself to educating myself and holding myself accountable so you don’t have to. I have now removed the reference from the CFP.
You deserve a field and a CCCC organization unfettered from transphobia and that, as Latinx trans writer and performance artist Heath V. Salazar urges, neither forgets nor denies but rather contends with its past in service of creating and sustaining a more equitable, more just, more fulsome future. And you deserve a conference like that as well. I commit to you that I will do everything I can to make that conference a reality.
With Love,
Frankie
P.S. You can read about Heath V. Salazar here:
https://www.alunatheatre.ca/be-a-part-of-it/residencies/heath-salazar/
You can see an interview/performance:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvdE9W0E8ms
And another performance here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ey7uZpQMNPM
