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Beyond Survival: Strategies and Stories from the Transformative Justice Movement

Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha (Editor),

Ejeris Dixon (Editor)

4.59 · Rating details · 909 ratings · 114 reviews

Afraid to call 911 but not sure what to do instead? Transformative justice and other community-based approaches to violence have existed for centuries, yet are often under the radar and marginalized. This is How We Survive focuses on concrete alternatives to policing and prisons. From practical tool-kits and personal essays, to supporting people in mental health crises, to ...more

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Paperback, 347 pages

Published January 21st 2020 by AK Press

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Mar 28, 2020 Always Pouting rated it really liked it · review of another edition

A book containing strategies and stories for transformative justice, this was one I wasn't sure what to do with after. I find the idea of justice seeking and conflict resolution outside of the punitive criminal justice system appealing but at the same time there were some things in there that made me extremely uncomfortable, most of it having to do with abusers who do not take responsibility for their actions and continue to harm others.

There was one chapter in there about a women whose father ...more

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Apr 11, 2020 Zaynab rated it really liked it

Shelves: demand-utopia

I started reading this book and had to put it down to adjust to life in the time of Corona virus. Deciding to pick it back up seems timely especially since inter-personal violence and harm is now happening as many of us are being ordered to shelter in place.

Overall I thought there were really useful and illuminating things that this anthology offered. I found myself bookmarking a lot of practical tools and insights for survivors (namely of sexual violence) that I hope to apply in thinking about I started reading this book and had to put it down to adjust to life in the time of Corona virus. Deciding to pick it back up seems timely especially since inter-personal violence and harm is now happening as many of us are being ordered to shelter in place.

Overall I thought there were really useful and illuminating things that this anthology offered. I found myself bookmarking a lot of practical tools and insights for survivors (namely of sexual violence) that I hope to apply in thinking about my own survivorship with dating violence.

With that being said, there were some things that left me pretty flummoxed:

- I found the lack of reflexive hubris throughout the book kind of startling. Many contributors kept repeating "we all make mistakes" but very few would actually detail what those mistakes are. I find queer failure (see Halberstam) useful for thinking about things like alternative visions to the carceral state. So I'm wondering why in a book about presenting alternatives very few felt comfortable saying "I messed this up, here's how, and here's how you can learn from my mistake." Not to say there weren't examples of this present throughout the book, but they registered as kind of glossed over in many respects.

- To this end, I find the inclusion of an essay by the Audre Lorde Project kind of curious. I remember when Olympia Perez went public about the transphobia she experienced while working at ALP. To my knowledge, ALP has yet to make true remediation that is satisfactory with Perez, as evidenced by yet another statement she released in June of 2019 (https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fb...). This is not to say that readers have nothing to learn from ALP. But I would think a HUGE part of learning from ALP is learning how they held themselves accountable for the harm they've caused Perez (or didn't), how they plan to do better in the future with respect to their treatment of Black trans women, and how this experience informs the very safety work they detail in their essay. Silence, cover ups, and denial don't strike me as alternatives to carceral systems and logic. If anything, they are hauntingly reminiscent of the treatment Black trans and gnc folk experience at the hands of the carceral system. It's one thing to say "everyone harms." But when you're a non-profit that has harmed a Black trans woman and fails to actually remedy that, maybe you're not in the place at the moment to be dishing out advice and that's okay. So the inclusion of their essay without actually addressing the harm they've caused compromises the vision and integrity of this book.

- Similarly, I think ALP owning their shit could have opened up a conversation about how to transform harms that happen outside of the framework of jurisprudence. Anti-blackness, transphobia, ableism, etc "harm people" and aren't inherently "criminal offenses" unless something physically violent happens. What would it mean to envision ways of repairing harm in communities that completely divests itself from definitions of harm rooted and subsequently informed by carceral logic.

-I would have liked to see more inclusion of how to do TJ processes around forms of harm that are not sexual violence. I am a survivor of dating violence & stalking. I've yet to see the inclusion of the spectrum of dating violence taken seriously in books trying to carve out alternatives to carceral violence. It seems odd especially given how rampant dating violence is in activist communities and how it goes unspoken of a lot of the time to not have more essays about how transformative justice can work in instances that aren't sexual violence.

Some of these things I can chalk up to the complexity of assembling an anthology, while other aspects of this book leave me wondering what could have been different about this anthology if the principles informed curation in a different direction. ...more

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Aug 14, 2020 Lucy Dacus rated it it was amazing

Incredible resource.

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Jan 24, 2020 Corvus rated it it was amazing

Shelves: anarchism-other-radicals, disability, queer-trans-lgbtqi-and-gender, prisoners-prison-abolition-law, women-and-feminism, favorites, race-anti-racism-and-immigration

Beyond Survival: Strategies and Stories from The Transformative Justice Movement is definitely one of the most important books I will read this year, if not this decade. Edited by Ejeris Dixon and Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, the text expands upon information offered by previous texts like The Revolution Starts at Home. As the editors state in the introduction, TRSAH was the "why" and Beyond Survival is the "how." This is severely needed because, while various transformative justice tactics Beyond Survival: Strategies and Stories from The Transformative Justice Movement is definitely one of the most important books I will read this year, if not this decade. Edited by Ejeris Dixon and Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, the text expands upon information offered by previous texts like The Revolution Starts at Home. As the editors state in the introduction, TRSAH was the "why" and Beyond Survival is the "how." This is severely needed because, while various transformative justice tactics and techniques have been used by communities over time, the process is almost always labor intensive, draining, and sometimes leaves everyone feeling worse off before they went in. That is not to say there have never been successes. This book includes many examples. But, many writers state that even the failures have something to teach and that rigid purity politics do not allow us to make mistakes and to grow. This book also tackles many different types of conflicts and events that may require accountability and transformative justice practices. Entries range from what many people think of when they hear TJ- sexual assault and intimate partner violence- to creating safer spaces for youth, LGBTQ parties, sex workers, and others.

Couched in between a beautiful foreword by Alexis Pauline Gumbs and poetic afterword by adrienne marie brown is a slew of information from many wise voices. What struck me the most about this book is how kind, grounded, and realistic the ideas, stories, and strategies put forth were and how everyone presented these things with great humility. These are not people living in a fantasy world where suddenly the police can be avoided in every scenario. Rather than saying "don't call the cops, period," they say things like, "here are many things you can do instead, and if all else fails, here's how to deal with the cops if they arrive."

In the first section, "Making the Road by Dreaming: Stories of Accountability," we get a little bit of the "why" of transformative justice. This and many other parts of the book make it readable regardless of if you have read "The Revolution Starts at Home." As we progress through this section, we hit an excerpt from "Black Queer Feminism as Praxis" where we are told with brute honesty that it ain't gonna be pretty. These processes can suck and they cannot erase harm as if it never existed. Also included in this section is Kai Cheng Thom's "What to do if You've Been Abusive," which explores the reality that we are all capable of causing- and have caused- harm to others. Rather than reinforce cancel/callout culture's victim/perpetrator for life binary, Thom asks that we be kinder, gentler, and more realistic. "Doesn't the feminist saying go, 'We shouldn't be teaching people how not to get raped, we should be teaching people not to rape'? And if so, doesn't it follow that we shouldn't only support people who have survived abuse, but should also support people in learning not to abuse?" I want to be clear, Thom is not claiming that everyone is a rapist and a rape victim, but more like someone who rapes someone may also have a history of violent abuse from a parent that influences their decision making. Someone who survives rape may have also been abusive or toxic towards a partner in the past and may be afraid to come forward both because they were raped and because they are afraid of their past. Someone who pushes past boundaries at a party may also be struggling with alcoholism and PTSD. Someone whose boundaries were violated may be overwhelmed by memories where they violated others' boundaries. It is almost more exhausting and shame inducing to try to be only one thing on either side of that coin. By healing everyone, even though revenge feels very good in fantasy land, we are able to create safer environments for everyone, especially when they are victimized.

How many of us have called for the abolition of prisons and police through one side of our mouth while branding someone for life as forever boiled down to the worst thing they've done out of the other? I know I've done it. Many of these writings had me repeatedly asking myself, "Do I want to be righteous or do I want to be effective?" This is not to say that we remove room for survivors' pain, anger, revenge fantasies, and so on. Multiple writers discuss how venting (and "vent diagrams" of) our frustrations and kill-your-rapist fantasies in healthy ways can be quite healing. This is also not to say that many people who have done harm don't automatically respond with defensiveness and refusal to be accountable. There are stories of this in the book. What is being said is that many of us can and want to do better. Philly Stands Up discusses in their entry how often people came to them to confess that they'd done something harmful and wanted to be accountable and prevent it from happening again. Basically, if we truly want to transform our communities with as little police and prison involvement as possible, then we have to also leave room for those doing harm to be human, to change, to heal, and to be accountable.

The next section of the book, "We Got This: Tool Kits and Road Maps," is full of entries by various people and groups who have learned quite a lot through their trials in transformative justice work. All of the entries in this section had a ton of useful information to offer, but a few really stood out for me personally. These were: Fireweed Collective's, "When it all comes crashing down: Navigating crisis," Oakland Power Projects', "Maybe you don't have to call 911: Know your options," Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights, Mijente, and Puente Arizona's, "Excerpt From Community Defense Zone Starter Guide," and Safe OUTside the System Collective and Audrey Lorde Project's, "Excerpts from the Safer Party Toolkit." There are so many reasonable and creative ways that these groups and communities have come up with to prevent, manage, and deescalate conflicts. But, as this book makes quite clear, activist groups are not the only ones doing or capable of doing this work. These practices have been going on particularly in marginalized communities long before the words 'transformative justice' began being applied to them.

This leads us into part three, "We didn't call it TJ, but maybe it worked anyway? Messy, real stories." I have to say, I found these messy stories to be remarkably organized. It is in this section that we get to hear from sex worker and anti-violence proponents and what they have learned from their pratices to keep themselves and their communities safe. Sex workers have a ton of interesting and creative ways of doing this in a world where there is danger at every corner from both those intent on doing harm and those who claim to help. My favorite entry in this section was "Facing shame: From saying sorry to doing sorry," by Nathan Shara. This is another entry that really opened my eyes to the ways that all of us contain a massive amount of experiences where we have harmed and been harmed. Thinking of things this way seems to really invite healing from and for all parties. Slow, slow healing. Shara states in the beginning, "Solving violence is rarely as much about the moment at hand as it is about everything else the preceded it." And, "If we cannot reveal what we have done and what has been done to us without being seen as inferior, damaged, tainted, broken, monstrous, irreparable, and so on, then out of a core human drive toward dignity, we will not do it." Now, reading this review, I know some people may bristle and these quotes out of context. It may be difficult to think about some of the people who have harmed you or your friends as being deserving of kindness. Please consider still reading the larger texts before making a judgment based on ideological purity about what accountability and healing must always look like. In another favorite in this section: adrienne maree brown's, "What is/isn't transformative justice," where she discusses callout/cancel culture and asks, "Is this what we're here for? To cultivate a fear-based adherance to reductive common values? What can this lead to in an imperfect world full of sloppy, complex humans? Is it possible we will call each other out until there's no one left beside us?"

The final section, "What did we dream then, what do we know now? Movement histories and futures," we hear from "TJ Old Heads" about what they have learned in their work over the years and decades. The interviews with Shira Hassan and Mariame Kaba really stood out for me here as exceptional. Hassan offers all kinds of advice and information, including something I have discussed many times in my own circles. Regarding what she would like to see an end to in Transformative Justice: "There's this thing of everyone thinking all forms of violence are the same. And that all the tools we have are also the same. And they're actually really different for lots of reasons... where I think it gets tricky, and I think we're afraid to have these conversations, is that it's so important that everyone is validated in their experience of survival, and that my experience of sexual harrassment can dislocate me for years, and that is still different from someone else's experience of childhood sexual abuse."When Kaba is asked why she wants to do fewer trainings, she states, "I don't think this is a work that is about experts. I want this work to be work that anyone and everyone who wants to try to do it does... I don't want people to feel that this work is something you have to get some certification in in order to be able to do." There is so much more wisdom in this section that I would have to copy the entire book to portray it. What I will say is that, once again, the common thread is humility, care, humanity, love, and an understanding that while "hurt people hurt people," it's also true that "healed people heal people.*"

*I did not invent this phrase. I saw it on a beautiful banner held by Let's Get Free.

This was also posted to my blog. ...more

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Feb 10, 2020 andy rated it it was amazing

on transformative justice...and how it isn’t an “alternative” to the police; and how it is direct practice of a world without police; and how messy it is; and how it can’t be turned into a quick concept for academia or the non-profit industrial complex; and how there are no “experts” because to have “experts” is to be moving towards institutionalization; and how it can work; and how it doesn’t always work; and how it’s different from restorative justice, mediation, and more; and how it depends o ...more

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Jan 31, 2020 Leila rated it it was amazing

Shelves: transformative-justice, abolition-feminism

this book is a GIFT and a must-read for anyone exploring community-based strategies for responding to harm and violence without prisons or policing.

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Apr 17, 2020 Allison rated it it was amazing

Shelves: non-fic, antiracism, essays

[trigger warning: review mentions rape/suicide/child sex abuse] BEYOND SURVIVAL is absolutely essential. I learned SO MUCH reading this anthology. Transformative Justice is the practice of addressing violence, harm and abuse at the grassroots level without involving police, incarceration or punishment.

We all (hopefully by now) know that police & prisons disproportionately target BIPOC, disabled, LGBTQ people, poor people and sex workers and don't *actually* make our communities safer from violen ...more

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Aug 31, 2020 Lianna Bessette rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I learned a lot about transformative justice from this book (considering that I knew very little before reading), and the stories of people's experiences provided clear examples of how this process has worked. The second section and some of the later readings on how to implement the process in an organization were less relevant to me, but I still recommend reading the important and diverse collection of TJ stories in this book. ...more

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Jul 04, 2020 alaya rated it really liked it

4.5 stars.

this book is truly a beautiful tool. I had to stop reading it momentarily (started reading on a library ebook) because after a couple of essays, I knew that I needed my own copy. to hold. to share. to underline. the only reason it does not get five stars is a matter of my own personal preference, as I think that some essays were not as strong as others. regardless, it's a gift of a text that I know that I will re-visit again and again. ...more

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Aug 10, 2020 Madeleine rated it really liked it

so grateful for the history, wisdom, vision, and spadework that led to this beautiful collection. i appreciated the explicit reckoning with how hard TJ can be: the way it sits with the messiness or process and opens the reader into its learnings. the examples and activities, the pod maps, venn diagrams, and focused questions are critical tools for all of us. i left with many more questions, and i’m sure many other readers did too since this invites the reader into deeper practice of emergent wor ...more

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Jun 13, 2020 Jacob Wren rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favourites

This book really floored me. I learned so much from reading it.

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Dec 12, 2020 Nora rated it it was amazing

This was a hard read (because it aches to read and think about harm for 320 pages) but also hopeful and practical, but extremely well worth it. Everyone should read.

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Mar 24, 2020 Acqua rated it really liked it

Shelves: adult, db, aoc, qf, nonfiction, q

Really interesting read; focuses on the how of something I had so far only seen as theory, when there are people out there that are doing this and pretty much have been for decades.

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Feb 03, 2021 Ganny rated it it was amazing

Shelves: trauma-work, 2021-want-to-read

This book is not pretending to be a road map. Instead it relays messy lessons, low points, failures, and moments of real transformation that come from a dedication to trial and error. It makes the reader feel that they could enact transformative justice themselves because there are no experts and no hard and fast rules. This book encourages creativity, perseverance, boundaries, compassion and an imagination vast enough to dream of a world outside of the Prison Industrial Complex. I will be retur ...more

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Oct 09, 2020 honeybean rated it it was amazing

Shelves: lgbtqia, anarchy

Spent a lot of time going over this book, and will still be discussing some chapters with a book club, and overall this book is really helpful and a good introduction/gateway for transformative justice. Love the practical advice and techniques

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Apr 16, 2021 emma rated it it was amazing

Shelves: politics, nonfic, essay, anthology, favorites, home-to-be, 2021

Required reading.

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Jan 13, 2021 Romy Chu rated it it was amazing

I feel like I should say something because this is a life changing book and just giving it a rating isn’t enough. I learned so much from this and will be re-reading parts of it because of how helpful it was. It in so many ways answers the question of how do you heal (as both the perpetrator and the victim, and how everyone is both of these) from harm in all forms - where do you start and how do you progress, and how do you navigate relationships such that healing and trust is centered. Also I lo ...more

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Apr 27, 2021 Cass rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites, abolition, feminism

this book is like a big hug. i really needed to read this when i did.

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Feb 18, 2020 Bee rated it it was amazing

An unbelievably useful and excellent collection of work on transformative justice, including what it is, what it can (and can't!) do, how its practice has evolved through success and failure and culture, and just a whole bunch of other useful stuff. Can't recommend highly enough either for people who want to learn about TJ or for people who think they know it all. ...more

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Nov 17, 2020 Kody rated it it was amazing

This book gave me extremely useful tools, frameworks, and inspiration for work I am currently doing, and also encouraged me to dream big about how communities I'm part of could transform our handling of conflict and abuse longer-term. ...more

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Dec 16, 2020 P Choezom rated it really liked it

Took me a long, long time to work thru this book. I found myself understanding transformative justice, in fundamental concept, as having deep roots in buddhist principles of living. Will be returning to my scribbles often to consider & reconsider TJ's guidance on the everyday of world-building. ...more

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Jan 04, 2021 Loveeeeee rated it it was amazing

My first book of 2021!!!!!! Hopefully this means we are off to a great start lolz

Anyway, I bought this book after asking my prof for recommendations regarding accountability processes/TJ for a book club that was reading "Are Prisons Obsolete," by Angela Davis. This prof was actually the first person to really ever teach/discuss TJ in any of my classes so basically they were a large influence in my learning anyway. All around really cool prof. Anyway wasn't sure exactly what I would get from this My first book of 2021!!!!!! Hopefully this means we are off to a great start lolz

Anyway, I bought this book after asking my prof for recommendations regarding accountability processes/TJ for a book club that was reading "Are Prisons Obsolete," by Angela Davis. This prof was actually the first person to really ever teach/discuss TJ in any of my classes so basically they were a large influence in my learning anyway. All around really cool prof. Anyway wasn't sure exactly what I would get from this book but I am really grateful for the recommendation as I wouldn't have actually purchased it.

I've decided for 2021, any book I'm reading to learn from, I'm going to write a summary/thoughts after every chapter. It's both great and annoying but in the long-run it's going to be really helpful. Because of it, it took me a little longer to finish but it definitely helped with my understanding of the realities of TJ and the people who are on the ground working in their communities. So here are my thoughts that are definitely bound to change as I grow:

As someone who has a really bad attention span, when I'm reading more theory-based works, I find it hard to really connect the concepts with actual work and people. Because of it, I really appreciated from start to end, the way that this book was written for everyone by everyone. Not saying that theory/really conceptual works aren't always accessible to people but it's definitely a different process, at least for me. I think the book even talks a little about this that a lot of the times, many people will learn about TJ and think that because they're able to understand it in writing and academia, they begin to think that they're "experts" in the field, when it's not always like that. It takes practice and work and reading this book, is only the beginning of my understanding.

I really loved the fact that this book was an anthology as it gave so many different perspectives and the very intertwined experiences of organizers/scholars. In some ways, the work of one org would kind of contradict another, not in a way of being right of wrong, but the process of understanding that TJ is so much more than what one might prescribe it to be. I think that as someone that hasn't had experience with Community Accountability Processes or a TJ circle (not sure of the name), the way I take in this information feels kind of premature or not as deep. Not saying that creating communities of care don't exist in my life, but I think that I would really connect with the book on a different level with more experience and maybe maturity? I'm only beginning to grasp these concepts and apply them in my own life.

I think one story that left me questioning a bit about TJ was one of the earlier ones, and if you read other reviews, many others speak about it. It was of a daughter who was sexually abused by their father and then he went on to sexually abuse his new family's kids and how they used TJ to help bring healing and hold their dad accountable to what they and their half-sibling wanted as survivors. It was very raw and personal and all I can do is listen and learn from them. So, it feels a bit wrong to feel confused about the role TJ plays in this story. The perpetrator never changed his actions or learned from his mistakes. Obviously, it was never the survivor's responsibility to change someone and the institutions of punishment in America are obsolete and would only cause more harm, but how do we stop him from doing it again and help him learn and heal? It was a good preface to the rest of the book as I had to read more of the hard and rough aspects of TJ that show that it isn't and never will be perfect. I want to so badly believe in this process and think that these stories were a testament to everything in between, not only the good parts.

I think also having these stories written by so many different people across America and even Canada gives such a humanlike glimpse into the work that is being done, especially in Toronto, as I don't really know much being done outside of America. If anything, I know that throughout all my reading and work, the message that needs to be and is being pressed upon me is the rejection of a binary between good and bad and to make sure that every person has the space and opportunity to be listened to.

Especially reading of the story of Zahra, I felt that being able to read and understand other people in a light different than statistics and such and instead through emotion and pain, made it so much easier to take lessons from. I found that chapter so relatable to me in my own life as I navigate the ways I have taken in harm and also reciprocate that to others. I think if anything, I'm thankful for this book because it helps me see the ways in which I view myself, my relationships, and in life and how I can also change. TJ isn't just this broad base way of viewing things. It isn't just abolishing the police or prisons, it's caring for others and realizing the depth of our human experiences. It's hard and it doesn't come all at once but it's an incredible collective of love and care that starts with every single person. I loved starting my year off with this book:) let this be a sign lol ...more

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Feb 02, 2020 J rated it it was amazing

So good. Made me cry. This is the type of world I want to live in; the world that is imagined in this book.

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Jul 26, 2020 samantha rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

this book is a great start for me to learn about transformative justice and how community accountability is enough to handle harm. it is very eye-opening, and i remember crying while reading some parts of it. as a psychology student, i feel like transformative justice has a lot of things related to psychology. it is true that we cannot fight violence with violence, especially if we wish to stop the cycle. trauma is intergenerational and a person who had been harmed would by chance inflict harm o ...more

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May 09, 2020 Luca Suede rated it it was amazing

Shelves: abolition-curriculum

A delicious, challenging, and ground breaking volume with contributions by some of my personal heroes in Transformative Justice work. Leah Lakshmi, adrienne marie brown, Mariame Kaba, Kai Cheng Thom, Mia Mingus, Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Shira Hassan, Janae E Bonsu, and so many collectives and brilliant folks I’m just getting to know because of this text. My favorite collective piece was from the Audre Lorde Project, but i love that this text included group pieces contributed by crews of folks doing ...more

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May 18, 2020 Leslie rated it really liked it

As someone who was not very familiar with transformative justice, this book laid down the foundation for it and provided me resources to practice some of the elements. This took me a bit longer to read because there is stories and personal accounts of sexual assault and child abuse so do be aware. I do wish there was a piece dedicated to breaking down the differences between punitive, restorative, and transformative justice as to make sure folks knew the differences but I also understand that th ...more

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Jan 01, 2021 Jaime added it

favorites:

- What to Do When You've Been Abusive, by Kai Cheng Thom, p 67
- Pods and Pod-Mapping Worksheet, by Mia Mingus for the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective, p 119
- Vent Diagrams as Healing Practice, by Elisabeth Long, p 209

p 80 for a write-up on everything wrong with mandated reporting

p 120 (in the Pods write-up) on how the word community means different things to different people and is often too loose to be of tangible utility in real-life crisis situations

"...we are not, as our ...more

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Jun 21, 2020 dhruts rated it really liked it

Shelves: academic

life changing. all about decolonizing what we know about punishment/accountability in favor of community based solutions and transformative justice. it is fundamentally possible in my imagination now. wish however, that lot of the evidence based community work wasn't predicated and dependent on sexual assault survivors. class issues touched upon briefly. overall, a gift to readers -- and written by a south asian woman!!! ...more

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Jan 10, 2021 Becky Schwartz rated it it was amazing

This is a pretty intense book- filled to the brim with essays and interviews that address different aspects of transformative justice. I thought a lot about the different ways a person can move toward making up for harm they caused. The idea that a person can make up for violence they’ve caused and maintain their space in community was interesting and made me think harder about the ways I think about healing and justice.

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Mar 23, 2021 Haja rated it really liked it

Shelves: radical-movements, rj-tj

really nice volume on transformative justice, what it is (and isn’t). would’ve been intrigued to read a story of how TJ didn’t work or gotten a story perhaps from someone who was a perpetrator and talked about how TJ worked for them . There is some jargon in the book that may make parts confusing for readers who aren’t as familiar with TJ, but it’s a great starting point

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About Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha

Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha

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Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha is a Toronto and Oakland-based poet, writer, educator and social activist. Her writing and performance art focuses on documenting the stories of queer and trans people of color, abuse survivors, mixed-race people and diasporic South Asians and Sri Lankans.