UK Happenings

UK College of Education Social Justice Series to Feature J Mase III

LEXINGTON, Ky. (Feb. 21, 2017) — The University of Kentucky College of Education Department of Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology’s Social Justice Scholarship Series will bring J Mase III, a black/trans/queer poet, to campus to give a talk on, “How I Survived the Gay Rights Movement as a Trans Person of Color.” It will be held at 2 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 28, in the Taylor Education Building Auditorium.

The event is free and open to the public.

The series is hosted by the UK College of Education Department of Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology, with support from the UK Violence Intervention and Prevention Center and the student-led Social Justice Advocacy Group. The lecture series was designed for students and faculty in the College of Education to actively engage in learning to better advocate as professionals and as citizens on issues of inequality for historically oppressed and marginalized groups. The series recently received funding from a 2017 UK Inclusive Excellence Grant.

The Department of Educational, School and Counseling Psychology has hosted the lecture series in the spring semester during the past two years, meeting once a month with assigned readings. The series was started by Kenneth Tyler, director of graduate studies and associate professor of educational psychology. This year’s focus is on sexuality, gender, and race.

About J Mase III:

J Mase III is a black/trans/queer poet based in Seattle, by way of NYC. He is the author of “If I Should Die Under the Knife, Tell my Kidney I was the Fiercest Poet Around,” as well as “And Then I Got Fired: One Transqueer’s Reflections on Grief, Unemployment, and Inappropriate Jokes about Death.” As an educator, J Mase has worked with thousands of community members in the U.S., the United Kingdom and Canada on the needs of LGBTQIA youth and adults in spaces such as K-12 schools, universities, faith communities, and restricted care facilities among others.

He is the founder of the international performance tour Cupid Ain’t @#$%!: An Anti-Valentine’s Day Poetry Movement, and founder of awQward, the first ever trans and queer people of color specific talent agency. His work and musings have been featured in Believe Out Loud, Everyday Feminism, Black Girl Dangerous, Upworthy, the New York Times, Buzzfeed, the Root, the Huffington Post, and more.