Pharr, Suzanne - interviewed by Rose Norman / Southern Lesbian-Feminist Activist Herstory Project / Duke Digital Repository

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I'm starting the tape then, might as well.

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Okay.

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I don't know if you checked your email

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since I sent that, since I, after I read

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that Smith College Voices of Feminism interview,

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I rewrote most of my questions.

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Because I felt like, you know,

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we oughta just reference that, since it's online,

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it's really good, and long and thorough.

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They do a good job, don't they?

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They really do.

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Yeah, the woman who did that is,

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she was just, you know, very careful, very good.

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Whoops, I just, speaking of which--

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And one thing that was kind of hilarious

0:35

about that interview is I have a, I have a couple of dogs.

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You know, I'm one of your classic lesbians.

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And one of them's this beautiful,

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kind of a mixture of a blue heeler and something,

0:47

that looks like a Blizzard ice cream.

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You know, all black and white and beautiful, big dog.

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And it had a seizure while she was here.

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We had to throw her in the car and take her to the,

1:02

take her to the vet.

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So, that I did that interview was good.

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It's actually quite remarkable.

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Truly.

1:10

When you consider that it got interrupted--

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It got interrupted like that.

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You know, I forgot to say, I need to say this

1:16

to the tape, so I can document it.

1:17

This is Rose Norman, March 28th, 2013.

1:21

I'm interviewing Suzanne Pharr by phone.

1:24

She is in Knoxville, Tennessee.

1:27

For the Southern Lesbian Feminist Herstory Project.

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I have to remember to say that every time, it's hard.

1:33

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Right, can I just say how glad

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I am that you're doing this project?

1:37

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Thank you, we just love doing it.

1:39

It's gotten to be a lot of fun.

1:41

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And Rose, where are you from?

1:44

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I'm from Alabama.

1:46

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Alabama.

Down there, Mount Seacrest country.

1:48

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Well, I live in North Alabama,

1:52

which is very different from Mab Seacrest, Alabama.

1:53

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Oh yeah.

1:56

I know that whole area pretty well, you know,

1:58

I've been such a lifelong Southerner myself.

2:03

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Yeah, I love hearing your Southern accent.

2:06

It's surprising how few of the people

2:09

I've interviewed have a Southern accent.

2:10

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Is that right?

2:13

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They're Southern, you know,

and grew up in the South.

2:15

Okay, let's see.

2:19

Let's talk a little bit about what we'll cover.

2:21

I want to focus maybe half of the interview on SONG.

2:23

And I'm thinking it'll be about an hour.

2:28

Unless we decide we need more time.

2:31

But, you know, my original set of questions

2:34

was just modeled on what I had sent Mandy.

2:36

And I mean, when I found that interview,

2:39

I thought of all these other questions.

2:41

It covers your childhood and youth,

2:43

and growing up on a farm, in a very white farming community,

2:45

and goes into a lot of detail about your work

2:48

in Arkansas with Head Start Vista,

2:50

and starting the Arkansas Women's Project,

2:52

and I think we need to mention those things,

2:54

but we don't really need to do much with them.

2:57

Except I want to try to connect

2:59

some dots that I thought needed to be connected.

3:02

And the fact that you don't talk about SONG too much

3:07

on that interview is good for us.

3:09

That way we won't be replicating much.

3:12

And get you talking about it here.

3:13

So the first question I want to change,

3:17

the original question was when in your life

3:20

did you realize that you wanted to work

3:21

on sexual orientation along with the race

3:23

and class issues that SONG addresses.

3:25

Were there specific life experiences?

3:27

And you talked in that Voices and Visions

3:30

about growing up always knowing you were different,

3:34

the family saying there were four boys,

3:37

three girls, and Suzanne.

3:38

Cutting your hair, liking boys clothes,

3:40

knowing you were attracted to girls and boys,

3:42

knowing you shouldn't let on about that,

3:44

but having a relationship with a girl in high school

3:46

while double-dating football players.

3:48

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Right.

3:50

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Not being very attuned to civil rights issues.

3:51

And then you went to a small state women's college

3:55

that your aunts had attended, and heard the word

3:57

homosexual for the first time aimed at you,

3:59

and then you got a little more aware of how various

4:03

forms of closeted lesbian culture worked,

4:05

and about civil rights.

4:07

And then the path is harder to follow.

4:09

And I'm wondering, you know, how you came

4:11

from that very sheltered, you know,

4:15

not very political upbringing

4:19

to that women's college, which, I went to a women's college

4:22

in Alabama, and it was about as apolitical as you can get.

4:26

Maybe yours was not.

4:31

How did you, how did you, you came back from New Zealand

4:34

ready to just dive into the movement.

4:39

And be a part of every single thing.

4:41

And change your whole mind about whether to be

4:44

a teacher and an academic, and do something?

4:46

How did all that happen, I don't understand.

4:49

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Okay, I don't 100% sure I do.

4:51

But let's take a go at it.

4:54

Like I just wrote a note to someone today, who's doing,

4:57

a little bit of history research too for a class of hers.

5:03

And she wanted to know how I moved from,

5:09

how the civil rights movement impacted me in the '60s.

5:12

And I, she wanted it in a few words.

5:17

And I just said that I think I was moved initially,

5:19

well first of all, I think probably the most compelling

5:26

motivator in my life growing up was the fact

5:30

that I was so rebellious.

5:33

You know, I think that was a good thing.

5:37

That I, I think I was shocked

5:39

all of my life by injustice.

5:43

You know, as little kids are.

5:45

And some of us maintain it and some of us don't.

5:47

And for me, it stuck.

5:50

I don't know if it came from having seven

5:53

older brothers and sisters, or, you know, where,

5:55

if you're the youngest kid in that family,

5:59

you're always looking to see if the pie is cut

6:01

in exactly even slices.

6:03

(women laugh)

Does that make sense?

6:07

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Yes, right.

6:09

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So that probably fed some of my sense of injustice.

6:10

And then I saw the contradictions within the church.

6:14

You know, I grew up in the rural Methodist church.

6:16

Where there was huge contradictions

6:22

between belief and behavior, as there are in,

6:26

you know, many, so many places.

6:29

And the, I can't say I had great awareness

6:32

of the civil rights movement at that time.

6:35

Except in conversation, 'cause I lived in an all-white,

6:36

you know, out in the country.

6:42

But the conversations among my family members,

6:45

and the conflict within the church over whether,

6:49

even though no one was knocking on the door,

6:53

whether or not they would let black people in.

6:55

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And the church--

6:58

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so that was one

of the enormous contradictions,

6:59

caused a huge split, you know, in the church.

7:01

And,

7:04

you know, I'm pretty much a lifelong atheist.

7:06

And so, but was very much affected by the,

7:10

you know, the kind of spiritual religious teachings.

7:14

And then when I went to college,

7:18

well, I was in the Georgia State College for Women

7:19

down in Milledgeville, which is a little school of 600,

7:21

you know, mostly for children of farmers

7:25

and store owners, you know, small town people.

7:27

There was a woman there who was head of religious affairs,

7:32

and her name was Izzy Rogers.

7:36

I think it was actually Isabelle Wood Rogers.

7:39

And she was very progressive.

7:44

You know, we didn't have a framework

7:50

to put that in, students.

7:52

But all of us who thought we were rebelling against

7:54

whatever status quo existed anywhere.

8:00

And I think many of us who were

8:02

lesbian went in her direction.

8:04

Single woman, very smart, very compassionate,

8:06

and held these great discussion groups,

8:09

where you actually got to talk in very real ways

8:12

about things that were going on.

8:16

And so she was the one who introduced us to the idea

8:18

of this great thing that was happening around civil rights.

8:21

And so she,

8:26

she helped to,

8:28

wanted to get us to have some critical

8:31

conversation and vision about it.

8:34

And then she also engaged us in some things.

8:37

Like, it was in Milledgeville where the school was,

8:39

that I first saw the Klan ride through town on horses,

8:42

you know,

8:46

carrying torches.

8:50

But, it was very kind of scary stuff.

8:51

It was an all white school, as they were

8:55

in 1957, '58, '59, '60, '61, as so many, colleges were.

8:58

But also, it was the first time I'd even worked

9:06

with black people, as I was working

9:08

as a waitress in a restaurant

9:11

across from the school.

9:14

But she involved us in the good things

9:16

going on in the state at that time,

9:18

about whether to close public schools

9:20

because of the possibility of desegregation.

9:22

And so she took, she organized with us to go

9:26

to a very large meeting, where the Grand Dragon

9:31

of the KKK spoke, you know, against desegregation

9:34

and for the closure of schools.

9:40

And we testified, you know, in the favor

9:42

of keeping schools open.

9:46

So that was--

9:49

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Wow.

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I couldn't even tell you what year,

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it was somewhere between 1957 and '61.

9:51

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That's when you were in college, '57 to '61?

9:54

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And so, I wouldn't call myself anywhere near

9:56

the center of the civil rights movement.

10:00

Very much on the edge of things.

10:01

But when I was at the University of Buffalo,

10:04

there was a raging conversation about civil rights,

10:08

I was in the presence of black students for the first time.

10:11

I was in the presence of Jewish students for the first time.

10:15

And I was really off that, way off the country to Georgia.

10:19

And,

10:25

I'd had no experience with people other than,

10:27

you know, kind of white Protestants all my life.

10:29

And so there was, it was in that debate,

10:33

Malcolm X came, spoke at Buffalo.

10:35

We were also under the whole scare around Communism.

10:40

You know,

10:45

one of our huge political moves at the university,

10:47

I was a teaching fellow there.

10:53

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This is your masters degree?

10:56

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Pardon?

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This was your masters degree?

10:58

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Yeah, I was one of those go to school,

11:00

drop out, go to school, drop out kids.

11:02

Once I got out of college.

11:05

So in that first year,

11:07

so Malcolm X was there,

11:10

and then there was this whole debate about whether

11:12

teaching fellows and faculty were gonna sign

11:17

the loyalty oath which was demanded of us.

11:19

So there was organizing around that.

11:23

There was, so there's lots of conversation going on.

11:24

And I was actually in,

11:28

I don't know what you would call it.

11:31

The discover the world part of my growth.

11:32

You know, I had not been anywhere.

11:35

I had not, you know, seen or heard

11:37

or talked about all these things.

11:39

That was happening, and then I did one of my dropouts,

11:43

went to the Young Harris College in south Georgia,

11:45

and taught as an English teacher there.

11:48

Then back to Buffalo, and then I ended up teaching

11:50

at Mary Washington College.

11:54

And at Mary Washington, it was interesting.

11:56

It was

11:59

more buffered I think from the civil rights movement.

12:01

So there was, there was activity and conversation going on.

12:03

I would say what was moving there

12:09

more than anything was feminism.

12:10

There was just that beginning of,

12:14

you know, '64 to '67, there was that beginning

12:16

of conversations about feminism.

12:20

And I was teaching 19th century literature.

12:24

You know, during the first round of the women's movement.

12:28

And so,

12:34

I and all the other faculty members

12:36

were engaged in that, in that conversation,

12:41

both outside of the class and in class.

12:44

And then I was also getting more and more engaged in,

12:48

reacting and protesting, and taking action

12:56

against the Vietnam War.

12:58

So all those things kind of worked together,

13:01

and the same time, I was trying to figure out how,

13:03

how you could be a lesbian in the world.

13:09

You know, coming to that recognition and not knowing

13:11

what and how to do with that.

13:15

And I think one of the,

13:17

one of the good things that happened to me

13:20

was going to New Zealand.

13:22

And you know, I went there out of,

13:24

great rebellion and search for freedom.

13:27

And profound ignorance.

13:30

Which is an interesting, (laughs)

13:34

sometimes volatile combination.

13:36

My, my partner and I, girlfriend,

13:39

I guess I would have called her then,

13:43

we went so that we could be lesbians, you know?

13:45

And we went also because we were sick of this country.

13:48

We just felt that,

13:52

that it was, you know, a country without a, without a soul.

13:55

But I would say that most, the thing that propelled

13:58

us the most was, we didn't know how to be

14:01

engaged with each other as lesbians and have a life,

14:06

without escaping out of the life we had here.

14:10

And so the profound ignorance is we didn't really

14:14

know anything about New Zealand,

14:16

we kind of chose it out of books, you know,

14:18

I think we thought it was an undeveloped

14:22

English-speaking country where we could help

14:26

build it rather than be,

14:30

(laughs)

14:31

being like, being in the heart of the Empire.

14:33

You know, they were one step out of the heart of the Empire.

14:36

But what was good for us there was that we,

14:39

we were in the position of having to explain the US.

14:43

Every time we moved, we were both teaching there.

14:49

I started out teaching in a high school,

14:53

and then I taught at the,

14:55

at the university.

14:58

And,

14:59

she,

15:02

she and I both, everything that we did was social.

15:04

People were really like, what is this thing about race,

15:07

what is this thing about you all and Vietnam,

15:10

what is this, what is this, what is this.

15:12

And there's nothing like that to,

15:15

to make you have to think.

15:19

You know, there's,

15:21

I'm sure neither of us had ever been asked

15:24

piercing questions before.

15:26

And neither of us certainly had ever been put

15:29

in the position that we had to either,

15:31

offer a critique of our country or defend our country.

15:35

You know?

15:38

And then the thing that sent us back was the deaths of,

15:41

we thought we had, we thought we were gonna be (laughs)

15:46

the expatriates, you know, we had a lot of,

15:49

all my life I've read way too many novels.

15:54

(cellphone rings)

15:57

Sorry, let me turn

this phone off.

15:59

And so,

16:03

we just felt like we just couldn't live there anymore.

16:06

And,

16:08

and so the,

16:09

the shift from that to decide to come back

16:11

and then to do a trip that was a gift to us,

16:14

at that time you could buy tickets,

16:18

and as long you were in a forward progression,

16:20

you could stop anywhere you wanted to.

16:22

So we had saved a little bit of our teaching money,

16:24

which was not very much.

16:27

But thanks, we were able to stop in a number of countries,

16:29

and one of them was India.

16:33

And one of the places in India was Calcutta.

16:35

And it was, it was a transformative moment for us.

16:37

For me in particular.

16:41

Around thinking I had seen poverty,

16:43

and knew what poverty was.

16:45

And thought that I knew a little bit about colonialism.

16:47

And, you know, it was,

16:50

it was quite,

16:54

quite staggering for me.

16:56

And at that point I just said, you know, I'm gonna go back,

16:57

and I'm gonna figure out a way

17:00

to spend my time working.

17:03

I didn't have the language of social justice issues,

17:04

but if I'd had that language, I would have said that,

17:07

what I said was,

17:12

changing things so that we don't have the poor.

17:14

That we have of them in the US and elsewhere.

17:17

And then, Rose, I stepped off the plane

17:22

into the women's movement.

17:24

And there you have it.

17:27

And you know, worked with another woman to create the first

17:28

conscious-raising group in New Orleans.

17:34

And had that moment of recognition,

17:36

I guess I write about it in the homophobia book.

17:39

You know, that recognition that I couldn't be in this thing,

17:43

this consciousness-raising group unless I talked in a real

17:47

way about my life, 'cause that was the point of it.

17:51

You know?

17:54

And I couldn't talk about my life unless

17:55

I talked about being a lesbian.

17:57

So here was the first time.

17:58

New Orleans, Louisiana.

18:00

You know, me, age,

18:01

30 I guess, 29 or 30?

18:04

Saying those words for the first time

18:07

in a group of eight other people, seven or eight.

18:09

And, you know.

18:13

Huge changing point in my life.

18:15

That was a long answer, but I don't know,

18:17

did that give you what you needed?

18:18

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Yeah, it did, I think there's a lot that's good there.

18:20

I want to go back to one thing.

18:22

And that is, Izzy Rogers.

18:25

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Yeah.

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In a way she's your Quaker

18:28

American Friends Service person.

18:32

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That's right.

18:34

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Like Mandy had.

I wondered,

18:37

if she was Southern?

18:39

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I don't think so.

18:41

But I,

18:43

just, just in the last year,

18:44

I had enough curiosity to look her up.

18:46

You know, 50 years.

18:48

But I had the curiosity to look her up.

18:52

And some of it, she,

18:54

after,

18:57

after being at the women's college,

18:59

was,

19:02

Union Theological in New York.

19:04

And she also became like the highest

19:06

ranked woman in the Presbyterian church.

19:09

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Really, wow.

19:12

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You should Google her, there's this great picture of her,

19:14

looking for the world, like a great lesbian of that time.

19:19

(women laugh)

19:24

You know?

19:26

We had all these single teachers that,

19:27

you know, that brought such power to our lives,

19:30

who were, you know, fairly closeted.

19:34

And just gave their all to transforming

19:39

the lives of young women, in wonderful ways.

19:42

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Well, that is truly remarkable.

19:48

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Yeah.

19:49

So yes, she, so she comes out of what I would think

19:50

of as a very progressive church theology.

19:54

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Okay, all right.

20:01

Okay, I also wanted to ask you about

20:06

the term lesbian feminist activism.

20:08

Your interview, the woman who interviewed

20:10

you for Voices of Feminism,

20:13

I think it's the last tape, and you're probably

20:16

about worn out with that interview, but,

20:18

she says, well, now we're moving into the '90s,

20:21

and that's the end of your lesbian feminist activism,

20:25

and now you're doing other kinds of political activism,

20:28

and all that in Oregon and everything.

20:30

And I wondered, I would have said that was

20:32

all lesbian feminist activism, in the way we're defining it.

20:35

But I wondered how you see it.

20:39

Do you see yourself as a lesbian feminist activist?

20:40

Or some other term?

20:43

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If,

20:44

either that or lesbian feminist revolutionary.

20:46

I don't know which.

20:48

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Okay, I like that.

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I'm teasing, I wish I were a revolutionary.

20:51

But, yeah, I'd say a lesbian feminist organizer, activist.

20:54

That that's the, I would actually put another word in.

21:00

I would say,

21:04

lesbian feminist and anti-racist activist.

21:05

That has been for years my core.

21:09

And I'm like a number of people that,

21:13

in what I consider

21:17

the kind of lesbian feminist,

21:19

I don't know whether you'd call it a movement,

21:23

or wing, or whatever it is you would call us

21:25

that I love so much, I think so many of us were formed

21:27

and shaped in strong ways by the Combahee River Collective's

21:32

statement, you know, Barbara Smith

21:39

and Audrey Lord, and that group,

21:42

also by Kitchen Table Press.

21:44

And,

21:47

you know, and some of that, you know,

21:49

essential writing of Adrienne Rich.

21:51

And I still carry those things.

21:56

I've been listening to this DOMA and marriage debate,

21:57

and I keep thinking about Adrienne Rich

22:01

and Compulsory Heterosexuality.

22:04

I keep thinking about Audrey Lord,

22:06

and the uses of the erotic.

22:07

It's like, wow.

22:10

And everyday in my work, I talk about intersectionality,

22:11

and you know, where'd I get that idea?

22:15

I got it from the Combahee River.

22:17

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Way back then.

22:18

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Collective statement.

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You know, and that's another question I have.

22:21

Let me,

22:24

I want to, I have an anti-racism question here.

22:26

I want to know how you got,

22:30

okay, it was in college, it was,

22:33

Izzy Rogers that got you into civil rights,

22:36

and understanding civil rights.

22:39

But when did you start having black friends,

22:41

and how did you begin to make anti-racism

22:44

such an important part of your activism?

22:47

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I think it began in New Orleans.

22:49

And the women's movement there.

22:52

As we were, you know, building it.

22:54

And that was, that was fairly limited, you know,

22:58

but I,

23:02

part of it came through reading.

23:04

But it came through feminism.

23:08

It didn't come as much through,

23:10

civil rights, there was a lot of reading involving that.

23:14

But it was where these two kept coming together,

23:19

and being able to see them linked through particularly

23:22

black women's thinking and bodies.

23:26

And,

23:30

it was a gradual increased awareness,

23:31

understanding, analysis, probably the writings,

23:38

the books of Kitchen Table Press more than anything.

23:42

In terms of the real, real bringing everything together.

23:46

I think,

23:50

you know, the,

23:54

the people who were going back and forth across country,

23:57

in the '70s, what I call the Great Lesbian Migration,

24:01

where,

24:05

you know,

24:06

it was not only the Olivia music folks,

24:07

and all the other music folks that were going back and forth

24:10

to little towns, and you know, we would,

24:13

we would have somebody great, like Linda Tillory.

24:17

In Fayetteville, Arkansas.

24:21

You know, and it'd be in a little

24:23

tiny auditorium, or, maybe a big room.

24:26

You would have 50 women in and get to hear

24:31

someone like that, and be in relationship in some way.

24:34

And then I think my work in Head Start

24:41

for a couple of years,

24:43

it was a place where I was really able

24:47

to put it on the ground, and the work in,

24:48

helping to develop the first shelter there,

24:51

in northwest Arkansas.

24:55

-

Were you getting--

25:00

-

We were already working to,

you know, to be engaged with black women.

25:02

You know, we weren't seeing multiracial.

25:06

You know, we weren't seeing people of color.

25:09

It was black and white, seeing life in that way.

25:12

And you know, that had the,

25:17

there were a lot of folks beginning to,

25:20

a lot of white people beginning to catch on to anti-racism.

25:23

In Arkansas, I mean, all during the '70s,

25:26

even if people weren't living in racially mixed situations,

25:31

in what I would think of as kind of the left,

25:36

or the women's movement there was that constant

25:39

conversation of analysis, and,

25:41

trying to figure things out.

25:45

-

But you do mention on that other interview

25:49

that all the CR groups in New Orleans were white.

25:51

-

Yes.

25:55

-

So there's something Mandy talked about,

25:55

the importance of making it interracial from the beginning.

25:59

And not just something that you look around and say,

26:02

oops, where are the white people, we better find one.

26:04

-

I totally agree with that.

26:07

But that was not where we were in 1969.

26:08

-

Right.

26:12

-

In New Orleans, you know.

-

You were finding your way then.

26:15

-

Oh, very much so.

26:17

I mean, I feel like that's been the story of my life.

26:19

You know, it's not like,

26:23

I'm so interested in hearing some people

26:26

talk about their lives,

26:27

who either imply or virtually say

26:30

that they had their political,

26:33

their politics all their lives.

26:36

That would not be true of me.

26:38

You know, my life has been evolving.

26:40

And political analysis evolving.

26:44

Political awareness evolving.

26:49

You know, all of that.

26:51

That's why I believe in social change.

26:53

I think if a person such as myself

26:54

can change in my view of life and my commitments,

26:57

into, you know, my relationships.

27:02

Then there's a little bit of hope for everybody.

27:05

-

(laughs) Right.

27:07

-

You know?

-

I do know.

27:08

-

Lucky those of you who were just born with this awareness.

27:13

I don't know how it happens.

27:16

-

I don't know

how it happens either.

27:18

-

Yeah.

-

When you go back,

27:20

when you look at some of the--

27:22

-

And that what it's been, is that growth.

27:23

But I remember, when we had the first

27:26

meeting in Fayetteville, probably 1975 or '76

27:27

to talk about battered women, it was a racially mixed group.

27:32

-

So what do you think, when I talked

27:38

to the Gainesville Women's Health Center people,

27:39

which, one of the three founders

27:42

of the Gainesville Women's Health Center

27:44

was Byllye Avery, an African-American.

27:45

And,

27:49

they mentioned that about half

27:51

of their abortion patients were black.

27:54

But they offered many other services, including CR groups.

27:59

And almost no black, African-American women went to those.

28:02

They had a hard time reaching across

28:06

that racial divide in Gainesville.

28:08

And I asked Byllye--

28:12

-

I can understand that,

can't you?

28:13

-

Well, yeah, in 1969,

'70, yeah, for sure.

28:16

-

Yeah, who would,

who would trust that, you know?

28:19

Or actually feel that it was gonna actually speak,

28:22

even maybe your life?

28:25

I think that was also true of a lot

28:30

of low-income women as well.

28:34

White women.

28:37

It's like a CR group, I don't know.

28:39

-

Like your father not wanting to sign those loan papers,

28:43

because he didn't want to tell you how much he made, 'cause.

28:46

-

That's right.

28:48

-

Yeah, I can see where that would be true across the board.

28:49

-

Yeah.

28:53

-

Oh gosh, when you think back to that period,

28:56

and,

28:59

you know, it's such a long time ago in a way,

29:00

but like when you look at movies,

29:02

or go in the Civil Rights Museum,

29:04

and you see the TV from that day, and you remember,

29:07

you wonder how we ever got out of it.

29:11

-

Isn't it true

29:14

that we've, I mean, I think in some ways,

29:15

it feels as though we've inched ahead,

29:18

because it's not as great and as thorough,

29:21

and desegregation but not necessarily equality.

29:24

And there's a great income

29:31

and equity and injustice, that gap,

29:35

is still based so much on race.

29:39

But at that same time it's been with the speed of light

29:43

that some things have changed.

29:46

-

Yeah, marriage equality seems

29:48

almost like the speed of light to me.

29:49

-

Yeah, yeah.

29:51

And it's really interesting.

29:54

-

Okay, I have another question here,

29:58

and this was one I was about to ask a minute ago,

29:59

about models of organizing, is that?

30:01

I think one of the most important things about SONG

30:04

is how that organizational model works,

30:05

with codirectors and 50-50 black and white,

30:07

reaching out to non-gay groups about non-gay issues.

30:10

And that seems to be model that you were

30:13

working on when you started The Women's Project.

30:15

-

That's right.

30:17

-

So your interviewer asked if you had a model for that,

30:18

and you said you don't think so, and that you think.

30:21

So can you talk about if you brought that model to SONG,

30:23

or others were working with that model,

30:27

how did that come together?

30:29

-

Well, I brought a lot of the Women's Project to it.

30:34

There's no doubt about that.

30:37

We had already been going for,

30:39

about 11, 11 or 12 years then.

30:42

And it was,

30:45

The Women's Project in the '80s,

30:48

you know, from '81, and SONG started in '92.

30:52

It was,

30:56

that was for many of us who worked in it in Arkansas,

31:00

and almost for all of us, I would say, it was just

31:04

so amazing and so life-changing for us.

31:06

And I had

31:10

not only brought my politics to it,

31:13

but it built,

31:14

all those, my politics there.

31:16

But I think the,

31:19

the big thing that,

31:21

that I probably brought to it,

31:24

that was a sense of political integrity.

31:26

That your organization and what you do in your organization,

31:30

and how you treat each other should mirror

31:34

what you're demanding of society.

31:37

So, don't demand racial justice, if you're going to insist

31:40

that white people be in the majority.

31:46

Don't demand economic justice, if you're gonna pay people,

31:49

have huge differences in salaries.

31:54

You don't demand equality if,

31:57

people don't have the full share of decision making,

32:00

and control over resources, you know, all of those things.

32:06

So, I think that's,

32:10

that's what I brought, and then that's what people built on,

32:13

and built it far more than I had envisioned or dreamed.

32:18

But we, we knew that.

32:24

And I think I came in with this,

32:27

that we have such a history of racial injustice,

32:29

and it's so ingrained in every fiber of the,

32:36

of our society, that you can't change

32:40

that just by fighting it, that you have to actually create

32:43

models of living where, I used to call it,

32:46

where you would tilt the balance

32:50

toward the equality and the,

32:53

the full self-determination

32:57

and wholeness of people of color.

33:00

And so that was why it was always,

33:03

not that we have, 50-50 could never work.

33:06

50% white people and 50% people of color

33:08

because white people carry--

33:12

-

more than their weight.

-

Yeah, so much greater share of privilege,

33:15

and greater share of power.

33:18

That to even begin to making that tilt,

33:20

you've got to have a majority

33:22

on your staff, on your board, you know.

33:24

And it can't be just,

33:27

what my friend used to call color me up.

33:29

You know, like I have a board and make sure

33:32

we get some people of color on it,

33:33

so that we'll look great, as opposed to,

33:35

let's have something where people have

33:38

full decision making and power and authority.

33:39

So yeah, and then the people who came

33:45

into The Women's Project were just,

33:49

just great, great folks.

33:53

And we were just so committed to,

33:54

and it was, you know, it was lesbians and straight women.

33:57

And it was black and white.

34:01

And then it became multiracial.

34:02

And then in the,

34:04

in the '80s, we begin to have trans women come in,

34:07

and volunteer with us or work with us,

34:09

and we always had sex workers engaged with us.

34:13

And, you know, so it was a very rich place.

34:17

You know, kind of following this idea that,

34:19

we can, we can keep racism and sexism linked together.

34:22

Because they are linked together.

34:28

And we can always work on the two simultaneously.

34:30

So that was.

34:35

-

Well, you'd already written the homophobia book,

34:38

linking racism and sexism.

34:40

-

Yeah, I didn't do that, though, until the late '80s.

34:43

-

But you'd written that before SONG, so.

34:46

-

Yes, yes.

34:48

-

So that would be a big.

Yeah.

34:50

-

And that's why I had the, you know,

34:51

we're friends, and Mab had,

34:54

an outstanding history of working against racism.

34:59

And so that was just our agreement.

35:04

Well, first of all, when we came together,

35:09

it was at the Creating Change conference in North Carolina.

35:13

It's a big national queer conference.

35:17

And,

35:19

it was a time of, you know,

35:21

all of the conversation about NAFTA.

35:22

And so what we did there,

35:25

and Mab had a huge leadership in this,

35:27

was to insist that there be, that they're in the South,

35:30

and we were gonna talk about NAFTA.

35:35

And so we did this huge workshop,

35:36

and also got Mab as the preliminary speaker.

35:38

And it caused a great upset there,

35:42

because, you know, all these folks,

35:44

particularly guys, but women as well,

35:47

were walking around and saying, well,

35:49

what the hell does this have to do with,

35:50

you know, my gay freedom?

35:53

And so we,

35:58

we knew it before we went in,

36:01

but we really recognized it then.

36:02

There was so much controversy,

36:04

but we badly needed to get people off this single

36:05

identity politics and to get, at least in the South,

36:10

LGBTQ people to take on race, class and gender,

36:15

in addition to, because gender then

36:20

wasn't the way we think of gender now.

36:22

In addition to their, you know,

36:27

homosexual identity, or LGBTQ identity.

36:31

And then we said, but you know that's not all that's needed.

36:35

We also need to get the historic

36:39

civil rights organizations to take on homophobia.

36:42

And so that was basically our approach.

36:48

And then, in terms of who was gonna be part of SONG,

36:52

we were all women, we were all lesbian feminists.

36:57

Three black women, three white women.

37:00

And it took us a long time to let men be in leadership.

37:03

Because our standard was that you can't be part of this

37:07

unless you are feminist, and you're an anti-racist worker.

37:14

If you're a white person you have

37:18

to come in not with talking anti-racism,

37:19

you have to have a track record.

37:21

And so that's how Pam and Mab and I, you know,

37:24

we came in with that track record, and we insisted on it.

37:27

And,

37:30

so it was, and that's what made us reluctant about

37:33

bringing in men, because they had to have

37:39

a track record around feminism.

37:40

And to us, the track record wasn't talk.

37:43

You know, it was something active that you had done,

37:47

and were doing, and you know, permeated your work.

37:50

So I think that, that kickoff, you know,

37:54

and with us all having strong inclination to,

37:58

carrying an economic analysis along with this,

38:05

and an analysis around violence.

38:08

I think that set the,

38:13

set the political part of it.

38:15

And also really, really believing

38:18

in the power of our relationships,

38:21

the power of our Southern histories and lives.

38:23

You know, recognition that the South is this extraordinary

38:28

combination of having this

38:33

horrible racist history, horrible labor history.

38:38

The history of slavery, the history of worker,

38:46

worker oppression, and women's oppression.

38:50

And at the same time, carries the most

38:55

outstanding movement of the 20th century.

39:01

And the civil rights movement carries

39:06

extraordinary work by women, carries on the one hand,

39:09

and strictly since the '70s, such negative politics

39:16

out of churches, once politics was moved into churches,

39:21

at the same time such liberation.

39:24

You know.

39:26

So, and that throughout all of that,

39:28

people who grew up in the South love the smells,

39:32

and sounds and tastes of the South.

39:35

And so to carry all of that and sort of believe

39:38

in our cultural lives as well as our political lives,

39:42

and how those intertwined, that has been SONG.

39:48

That continues to be.

39:52

And so we expand, we expand as our awareness expands.

39:53

Of now, now we are multiracial, now we are multigendered.

40:00

Now we are engaged in work around immigration.

40:07

You know, we,

40:11

so as the, not just the moment expands,

40:14

but that our awareness of the moment expands.

40:18

Our awareness of the conditions, and awareness of,

40:21

when we talk about we want a place

40:25

at the center of our work,

40:26

poor people,

40:31

people who are so,

40:34

inviolate gender so much that they are persecuted.

40:38

For people who are trans, for people, you know,

40:42

there's a whole list of the people that we place

40:46

at the center of our work.

40:50

But our awareness of those people

40:51

at the center grows all the time.

40:52

It's not just, oh, we want these people.

40:55

The people who are experiencing so much

40:58

of the marginalization of society to be at the center.

41:01

You have to have, you have to build eyesight, you know.

41:06

In order to recognize that,

41:10

and work side by side with people.

41:14

So.

41:18

You know, I work on the staff of SONG now, as of last May.

41:20

-

All right, well that's good to have you back

41:25

in the saddle there.

41:26

-

Yeah, 20 years

of working closely with it in all sorts of ways.

41:29

And now that I'm getting more than a footstep away from it,

41:32

now, I'm 73, and I'm back working half time with it.

41:37

-

That's great, I'm sure they're glad to have you.

41:43

-

It's mutual, definitely mutual,

41:46

it's a great group of people.

41:49

-

It looks like a pretty young group, too.

41:51

-

Very young group.

41:52

We have me and one staff member over 40.

41:55

And the rest are under 31 I believe.

41:58

I believe our youngest is about 22.

42:02

And it's a really, really strong, strong group of people.

42:04

And it's grown, it's grown from a very small group

42:10

to now it has, you know, 10 staff members,

42:15

half are full time.

42:21

And has a decent budget.

42:23

And working in five states.

42:27

Your state's one of them, Alabama.

42:31

-

Is that right?

42:33

Who in Alabama is?

42:35

-

We don't have a person

actually living there, yet all the others,

42:38

we have a staff person in the state,

42:40

but Mary Hooks from Atlanta and Kate Shapiro

42:42

have been working back and forth in Alabama.

42:46

And I believe they're, they just had a meeting,

42:48

and I think most of the people

42:51

were from Tuscaloosa and Huntsville.

42:53

So they're just beginning organizing there.

42:58

-

You know,

43:02

I've been doing this project for three years.

43:03

And I haven't interviewed one person from Alabama.

43:07

-

Is that right?

43:10

-

Well, actually,

Donna Burnell now lives near me.

43:11

She's actually somebody who was one of the directors

43:14

of the Gainesville Women's Health Center.

43:16

And I did interview her.

43:18

And I did set up an interview

43:19

with somebody who had to back out.

43:21

But I've,

43:23

I just haven't hooked into the,

43:26

I mean, I keep, we're kind of doing,

43:28

we call it a snowball method.

43:31

You're just following where people lead you.

43:33

And it hasn't led me to Alabama yet.

43:36

-

I guess, you're gonna do a map, right?

43:39

-

Yes, probably.

43:43

To show where we're.

43:44

This special issue can't possibly cover.

43:46

-

Yeah, well Mab, you know, she grew up in Alabama.

43:48

So,

43:52

she could talk at length about that.

43:53

-

Yeah.

43:57

Actually, I'm not sure we are gonna interview Mab.

44:01

-

I just, you gotta. (laughs)

44:05

Gotta interview Mab.

44:09

Mab and--

44:12

-

And Minnie Boise.

I know, but you know, they're sort of like

44:15

the figureheads in a way.

44:17

I mean of course they did wonderful things,

44:20

but they've written about it already.

44:21

-

Yeah, that's true.

44:23

-

They've written

about it widely, and a lot of what we're trying to do,

44:25

I mean, you're one of the more famous people

44:29

that we're interviewing, you and Byllye Avery

44:30

are the most famous people we've interviewed.

44:33

-

Well, Mandy Carter.

44:36

-

And Mandy, you're right.

And Patty Zang.

44:38

-

Yeah, she's,

she's a much-loved character.

44:40

-

Although you are way more on the internet than Mandy is.

44:44

Although she is on there, she is on there.

44:47

-

Yeah, that's because I've written and made,

44:49

you know, I think,

44:50

once you write a couple books, people are.

44:53

-

All over you, yeah.

44:57

-

Yeah, you get a level of attention

44:58

that is often more than you deserve.

45:02

-

Not necessarily, I think you're in every

45:07

women's studies textbook I ever taught.

45:08

-

Yeah, you know, that's, it's really been interesting,

45:12

Rose, I remember when I first wrote

45:16

the homophobia book in particular,

45:19

Barbara Smith said to me, you know,

45:21

what you need to, you know,

45:25

being that it's Kitchen Table,

45:27

she said, Suzanne, what you need to know

45:29

is that books have a shelf life of five years.

45:31

And,

45:36

so, she said, you know, just be prepared for that.

45:39

And I was.

45:41

And now it's excerpt for publication.

45:42

But for years, probably 15 years,

45:46

it was still being taught as a book.

45:49

-

Yeah.

45:51

Because nobody else had done it.

45:53

I mean, really, you want to go get that subject dealt with,

45:54

that's where you're gonna find it.

45:57

-

This is what interested me, and there's been plenty

46:00

of opportunities for people to do it.

46:02

It's like, well, what's up with that?

46:04

-

Yeah, and you know, I think it's part of this whole

46:07

business of intersecting oppressions,

46:10

bigger picture, seeing the connections,

46:13

which people have been talking about.

46:16

Like you cited Barbara Smith

46:18

and Audrey Lord talking about it.

46:20

You have been talking about it forever, but doing it.

46:22

You know, that next step, there seems to be more energy

46:25

around single focus, single focus issues.

46:30

And not--

46:34

-

I think that's true.

-

Not as much big picture.

46:37

But SONG does that.

46:40

-

Yeah, yeah.

SONG really holds that, holds that close.

46:44

-

Now, did you know all of the SONG co-founders?

46:48

I know you knew Mab.

46:52

-

I didn't actually know Pat very well.

46:56

The people I knew the most were Mandy and Mab.

47:00

And I knew Pam a little and Joan a little.

47:06

And then Pat.

47:11

I think I had met her but didn't really,

47:15

I couldn't say that I knew her.

47:17

-

So, was Mandy the?

47:21

I'm wondering, who was the person who knew

47:24

all the other people, really?

47:26

Was that Mandy?

47:28

-

Probably.

Mandy. (laughs)

47:30

Mandy is one of the.

47:32

She really does great relational work.

47:34

She remembers people and she meets people easily,

47:38

she chats with people easily.

47:41

She keeps really good records.

47:45

-

Yeah, yeah, she can cite dates too.

47:47

-

She can, she can!

47:51

I'm like, damn, where do you get that?

47:53

Wish I could.

47:56

-

Do you remember

that speech on August 4th, 1960, you know?

47:57

-

Me, I'm doing well at remembering my birthday.

48:02

(laughs)

48:03

-

So, one of the questions was your story of SONG.

48:07

Do you think that's what you've just told?

48:11

-

I think so.

48:14

-

Mandy tells it from the point of view

48:16

of organizing the Creating Change, and then,

48:18

this coming out of it.

48:23

-

And that's true, that's what I would say too.

48:25

Is that, you know, that's how we came together,

48:27

was in that, in that, you know, that moment

48:30

of really recognizing how much

48:34

something like this was needed.

48:38

-

And she also connects it to the sort of anti-Southern bias

48:42

she was getting from the phone calls

48:46

about having it in the South.

48:49

-

Yeah, that wasn't in my head.

48:52

But she had gotten, she had gotten those.

48:55

-

You weren't seeing, and SONG's mission

49:01

is not to make people love the South.

49:05

-

No. (laughs)

49:07

No, no, no.

49:08

I don't think so.

49:10

Our mission is work in the South

49:12

and change the world by doing it.

49:15

I mean, I'm making that up.

49:19

But I mean truly, it's.

49:21

It's sort of like The Women's Project.

49:23

We thought,

49:25

what we did do is really great work on the ground,

49:26

and then what we learned

49:29

from that is to use that nationally.

49:30

So like for years, we documented acts of violence,

49:35

the killing of women, and the violence and oppression

49:43

of black people and LGBTQ people.

49:47

And religious minorities.

49:51

And we put out quite a long report every year,

49:53

showing all that documentation.

49:57

It was from that that we were able to have

50:00

to do national speeches and national writing

50:03

about how women should be included in the Hate Crimes Act.

50:05

You know, how could it not be a hate crime against women,

50:10

when men were picking women up and taking them out

50:12

and raping them and leaving them on the side of the highway.

50:16

That's not a hate crime?

50:19

-

I interviewed Cal and LaRose Felicity

50:22

about some work they did in Kentucky,

50:26

and that's one of the things they did,

50:28

was gather data on how many, on all the domestic violence

50:29

cases and what happened with them.

50:32

Which, you know, at that time in the '80s,

50:34

ended up being acted on.

50:37

And they got a lot of things done with that data.

50:39

-

I'll bet.

50:42

-

Okay, SONG and the historical moment.

50:46

This comes at the end of our study period.

50:50

1994, which is when the Atlanta Lesbian Feminist Alliance

50:53

closed its doors, it's the end of what we're studying.

50:57

Although we talked about things that happened after that.

51:00

But it seemed like, that much of the energy

51:03

and enthusiasm of the women's liberation movement

51:07

was dissipating by the early '90s, when SONG was founded.

51:10

Probably because of all those years of Ronald Reagan.

51:15

And that we had Backlash.

51:18

And I'm wondering if you've thought about how SONG

51:20

responded to that, or I mean,

51:25

how it fits into Backlash, the end of Reagan.

51:28

I mean, of course we also had the election of Bill Clinton,

51:32

about the time that SONG was.

51:36

-

I think we were probably,

51:38

I don't know if we were talking about Backlash,

51:42

using that particular language as much as we were examining

51:46

the policies that came out of Reagan.

51:51

That, you know, all of that anti-taxation,

51:56

anti-worker, you know, the racialization of issues.

51:59

You know, all of those, those kinds of things.

52:04

And then the fact that globalization and privatization,

52:06

all of that was having on the economy and on poor people.

52:12

And then we also were doing a lot of analysis

52:18

of the effect of the rising right wing.

52:24

That it of course had been rising since 1964.

52:27

Around '92, '94, '95, we were beginning to feel that impact

52:32

in a way that people hadn't recognized it so much before,

52:37

as such an enormous political force.

52:42

-

And that's, you eventually wrote the book about that.

52:44

-

Right, I wrote that in, I guess, '96.

52:48

-

So this is part of SONG, then.

52:52

What SONG is interested in?

52:55

-

It's still interested in that, yes, yes.

52:57

You know, 'cause it's had a huge impact,

53:01

every step of the way in SONG.

53:05

The policies of Reagan and the organizing of the right.

53:08

When you think of the taking in,

53:11

when it's on our own turf down here

53:15

that we have Jerry Falwell.

53:18

And that whole initiative to grab up the new evangelicals,

53:21

and to introduce into faith arenas

53:28

political, electoral organizing.

53:35

And moving messages of oppression.

53:38

That has had an enormous impact in the South, as you know.

53:42

And in some ways, I know for me,

53:47

beginning more and more to work on the right wing

53:51

in the late '80s and in the early '90s,

53:54

and all the way through now, it took me awhile to,

53:57

to kind of get myself clear on it.

54:02

Because,

54:05

the South has been so much a bastion of the right.

54:11

Of politics, historically over time, you know, forever.

54:16

-

You've got something to say about that.

54:23

-

And we're beginning to see some difference

54:25

between this particular incarnation of the right

54:26

from that of the far right and of just the conservative,

54:30

conservative states rights, and you know.

54:36

To be able to begin to parse those out was not,

54:40

kind of an immediate place that one would go.

54:45

-

That, that is so relevant to right now.

54:52

And the,

54:56

the dialogue, it's not really a dialogue.

55:00

It's more of a sparring match

55:03

that goes on between, and I'm thinking here about,

55:08

just friends and relatives of mine,

55:12

from other parts of Alabama.

55:15

It's like we've created an alternate universe.

55:19

For me it's like they've created an alternate universe

55:26

in which Obama isn't a citizen, he's a communist.

55:28

-

Right, right. (laughs)

55:32

It is an alternate universe.

55:34

-

Yeah, and yet, you know,

55:36

I know these people, and they're good people,

55:39

I mean, they're like my parents, you know, my brother.

55:42

They're really,

55:45

they mean well and et cetera.

55:49

But they're Southern.

55:51

And whatever happened to me,

55:52

maybe it was because, you know, being a lesbian,

55:57

didn't happen to them, and they can't see it.

56:01

They cannot see, we cannot talk about any of this.

56:04

None of it.

56:07

-

And not only, they can't see it because of what

56:08

didn't happen to them, but they also can't see it

56:12

because of what has been fed them.

56:14

You know, and the right bought up

56:17

all the little radio stations in the '80s under Reagan.

56:19

And you know, the great right wing thinktanks in the '70s.

56:25

It began all of that messaging.

56:31

And then you've got your Limbaughs,

56:33

and you've got your Fox News,

56:35

and you've got it through your churches.

56:36

If you can create this sort of nonstop messaging,

56:40

and then link it to, you know,

56:45

church, hearth, and, you know.

56:49

So-called values,

56:53

then it really builds that barrier

56:56

that keeps people from being able to see.

57:01

It becomes a sea change in their own thinking.

57:04

But you know, I have family all over the South.

57:08

Not all over, that's not quite true.

57:10

But I have a lot in Georgia and a lot in Florida.

57:13

And a few other places.

57:16

And I've seen them make remarkable change.

57:19

And they're country folks that now live

57:23

in these little towns and cities.

57:25

But they've changed not just on LGBTQ issues,

57:28

they've changed enormously on that.

57:33

They, some of them, not all of them, but some of them

57:36

have really changed on their ways of thinking politically.

57:39

So that,

57:45

now I can sit down with most of the Republicans

57:47

in my family and have a conversation.

57:50

That's a step forward.

57:52

-

Yeah, that is a huge step.

-

Yeah.

57:56

Because, and then a couple, I'm like,

57:58

there's no need for me to bother.

58:01

I mean, they got the,

58:04

they're Tea Party, you know?

58:06

They don't want conversation.

58:09

I'm like, okay.

58:12

I don't want it either.

58:13

And this kind of conversation, you know.

58:15

-

So, is SONG, from what I've been reading

58:20

and talking with Mandy about SONG is working

58:25

with other organizations, or is SONG working

58:28

on trying to reach those, across those barriers,

58:32

and deal with the messaging?

58:36

-

We're trying to do some of the messaging.

58:39

But what we're about to do is more on the ground

58:43

solid organizing than we've done before.

58:46

So we're beginning to initiate a campaign

58:49

to work on transforming education.

58:52

And so that's gonna have,

58:58

it'll have a lot of local organizing in it as well as,

59:02

we're gonna do it under the overall framing

59:10

of building beloved community.

59:12

And you know, we take that right out of the last two years

59:16

of thinking of Martin Luther King.

59:19

And,

59:23

so we're working both at cultural change,

59:25

and trying to move the way people frame and see and think

59:30

of things as well as trying to figure out some concrete

59:34

things to do in terms of education and what's happening

59:38

to our children across the board in that.

59:42

-

That makes me--

59:48

-

Go ahead.

-

That makes me think of a line from the other interview.

59:51

Toward the end, you said the center

59:53

of your political thought now is,

59:55

how do we resist and how do we create vision and action

59:57

that is connected both to resistance and vision.

1:00:00

-

Yeah, yeah.

1:00:04

You know, so it's kind of how do you hold one

1:00:07

in one hand and one in the other.

1:00:11

You've got to resist,

1:00:14

but you've gotta create at the same time.

1:00:15

And what are we resisting?

1:00:18

Are we resisting the messaging?

1:00:19

Are we resisting?

1:00:20

-

We're resisting

the oppression, resisting the violence.

1:00:22

Resisting the conditions that we live under.

1:00:25

You know, so, in some ways it's kind of slammed at people.

1:00:31

You know, that's, this is the level of violence,

1:00:36

remains high in this country.

1:00:39

In every aspect of people's lives.

1:00:42

And it does, and so it does.

1:00:45

And then there's homophobic violence mixed in that.

1:00:47

So that's resistance.

1:00:51

It's like stopping the bad laws,

1:00:53

the don't say gay law in Tennessee.

1:00:57

All these, we have these now, super majority

1:01:00

legislatures in the South that are just wildly passing

1:01:04

such repressive laws, so that's resistance.

1:01:09

But the creation is creating

1:01:13

ways of living or ways of schooling,

1:01:18

or ways of, you know, ways of worshiping,

1:01:21

or ways of whatever it is that hold within them

1:01:25

a whole different set of values.

1:01:31

-

Our hour, we have used our hour.

1:01:40

I kind of feel like at least we got

1:01:44

to the end of my questions.

1:01:45

-

Well good.

1:01:48

-

And I will, as fast as I can, type up excerpts.

1:01:49

What I do is not transcribe, because it takes

1:01:54

way too long, and it's boring.

1:01:57

I pull out pieces from the tape, I listen to the tape.

1:01:59

And I edit it as I go along.

1:02:04

And then I send it to you.

1:02:06

-

Okay.

-

And you can do anything you want to it.

1:02:09

Including, you know, just create another document.

1:02:12

-

All right.

1:02:17

-

Add anything we didn't say.

1:02:18

We can have another interview if you wanted to.

1:02:20

But I want to warn you, I will edit it,

1:02:24

I will move things around, so that they come together.

1:02:25

I could ask you to do that, but you probably

1:02:30

wouldn't feel like it. (laughs)

1:02:31

-

No, I don't think I would quite have time to do any of it.

1:02:34

-

Right, okay.

1:02:37

So that's what I'm gonna start doing right now.

1:02:39

And it went really fast with Mandy,

1:02:42

so maybe I'll get that turned around quickly.

1:02:43

-

Okay, well I look forward to seeing it,

1:02:46

whenever it does come.

1:02:47

-

Okay, and we are working

on trying to have a draft ready for Sister Wisdom in May.

1:02:51

So we're trying to get these things turned around in April.

1:02:55

But our final deadline is later than that.

1:02:59

But they're gonna tell us whether we have

1:03:01

a single issue or a double issue,

1:03:03

after what we send them in May.

1:03:05

So we want to get everything we can by then.

1:03:06

-

Great.

1:03:09

-

Okay.

-

Sounds terrific, I'm so glad you're doing it.

1:03:12

-

Thank you very much, I'm enjoying doing it.

1:03:14

And I enjoyed talking with you.

1:03:16

-

And where are you living now?

1:03:18

-

I live in Huntsville.

1:03:20

-

In Huntsville.

-

That's where I'm living.

1:03:22

-

So, it might be good

for some of our folks to get in touch with you.

1:03:25

-

Sure, sure.

1:03:27

-

When they're working

over that way.

1:03:28

-

I would love to be

in touch with some of them.

1:03:30

-

I'll give them your email.

-

Good, that would be great.

1:03:32

-

Great, well, thank you so much.

1:03:34

-

Okay, thank you.

1:03:36

-

You bet, bye now.

-

Bye-bye.

1:03:38

Pharr, Suzanne - interviewed by Rose Norman

Transcript

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Sallie Bingham Center for Women's History & Culture

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