News & Events
Care & Joy in Precarious Times Conference
Care and Joy in Precarious Times: The 3rd Annual WGSS Interdisciplinary Conference
The USF Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies invites the USF community to attend the Care and Joy in Precarious Times Conference on February 21, 2025, at the USF Tampa campus. This conference is sponsored by USF ResearchOne, USF College of Arts and Sciences, and the USF Department of Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.
As Audre Lorde once wrote, “Caring for myself is not a self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” Lorde was writing about living with breast and liver cancers and about her life and work as a queer Black woman. Honoring Lorde’s legacy in the contemporary moment asks us to rethink the possibilities of care and joy that emerge from authenticity, community, accountability, resistance, and resilience.
Care & Joy in Precarious Times asks us to rethink questions such as: What does it mean to care for the self? How can we care for ourselves and one another responsibly? In what ways does joy show up in times of precarity? What kinds of self-reflection and responsibility do these uncertain times call for? In what ways are care and joy acts of resistance or preservation? In what ways are acts of care and joy mutually constituted? In what ways can acts/outcomes of care and joy transcend embodied labor? In what ways might care and joy be politicized?
Sponsors
Important Dates
- Notifications of submission acceptance: January 21, 2025
- Conference registration deadline: February 13, 2025 (registration is free)
- Conference: February 21, 2025
Keynote Event: Refuse & Reclaim with Sheree Greer and Slam Anderson
12:30-1:30pm
TECO Hall
An interactive poetry reading that invites you to refuse participation in oppressive systems and reclaim your sense of self, your identity, and your livelihood through self-care, play, and rest.
Sheree L. Greer is a writer, teacher, and arts administrator living in Tampa, Florida. She is the author of two novels, Let the Lover Be and A Return to Arms (both Bold Stroke Books). Her work has been published online and in print at the Bellevue Literary Review, Obsidian: Literature & Arts in the African Diaspora, Burrow Press Review, LezTalk Anthology, VerySmartBrothas, Autostraddle, The Windy City Times, Bleed Literary Journal, Current: An Anthology for Jackson, Mississippi, Windy City Queer Anthology: Dispatches from the Third Coast, and others. In 2014, she founded Kitchen Table Literary Arts to showcase and support the work of BIPOC women and femme-identified nonbinary writers and poets. Sheree holds an MFA at Columbia College Chicago and is a VONA/VOICES alum, Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice grantee, Yaddo fellow, and Ragdale Artist House Rubin Fellow. Her essay, "Bars" published in Fourth Genre Magazine, was nominated for a Pushcart Prize and notably named in Best American Essays 2019, and her essay, "None of this is Bullshit" was published at The Rumpus and featured in "Memoir Mondays.” A frequent collaborator with the 2nd Story Theatre Collective, Sheree teaches for several literary arts centers and organizations, namely The Porch in Nashville, TN, and Story Studio Chicago, where she serves as core faculty in memoir and was voted “Instructor of the Year” for 2023.
Slam Anderson is the Outreach Director for The Kitchen Table Literary Arts, a workshop facilitator, spoken word artist, slam poet and writer. Slam has competed in national and regional poetry slams in Charlotte, NC, Oakland, CA, Greensboro, NC, and others. She has presented at several child welfare conferences around the country including, the 2021 National CASA Conference in Seattle, WA, 2021 Office of Respondent Parents’ Counsel Annual conference in Colorado, Springs, the 2022 Texas CASA Lived Experience Conference in Denton, TX; the 2024 National American Academy of Pediatrics Conference in Orlando, Fl, and others. Slam is a graduate of the University of South Florida (Tampa, FL) with a B.A in Creative Writing; and a current Graduate student in the Master of Social Work program. She is a native of Alachua/Gainesville, FL.
Conference Location & Time
Locations of TECO Hall (in DAC) and FAO 296.
The main hall for registration and the keynote event for the Care & Joy in Precarious Times Conference will be TECO Hall, located in the David C. Anchin Center on the USF Tampa campus. Conference panels will be hosted in TECO Hall and FAO 296.
The conference day will be from 9:00am-5:00pm.
| Time | Session |
|---|---|
| 9:00am | Registration opens in TECO Hall |
| 9:25-9:30am | Welcoming remarks by Dr. Kim Golombisky (TECO Hall) and Dr. Milton Wendland (FAO 296). |
| 9:30am-10:30am |
Session I: Care & Joy / An Introduction Panel A: What Care & Joy Might Mean
Panel B: Reclaiming Care & Joy: Your Inner Child in Adulthood
Our roundtable continues the tradition of Black women exploring what it means to remain joyful and whole, and considers how to reclaim connections that are severed in a capitalist society -- those of self, community, love, and joy. The vital seedling of that reclamation is what has now become an act of defiance in a world that centers individualism, isolation, and survival: joy through reclamation of the inner child. We will explore these topics and provide real-world, actionable examples of this reclamation. |
| 10:45am-11:45am |
Session II: Care & Joy Around the University Panel A: Camp Consent: Centering Joy, Connection, and Nuance in Violence Prevention
Program Design
Camp Consent, a novel primary prevention program developed by USF’s Center for Victim Advocacy and Violence Prevention, uses “camp” (both noun and adjective) as a vehicle for engaging students in a multimodal, skill-building experience that infuses joy into the topic of sexual violence prevention. Our panel will provide an overview of Camp Consent’s framework, materials, and activities, as well as implementation observations. Panel B: Teaching, Learning, & Cultures of Care
|
| 11:45am-12:30pm |
Brown Bag Lunch Stretch your legs and grab some food on campus, or bring a lunch to eat in the conference main hall. Light refreshments will be available. |
| 12:30pm-1:30pm |
Keynote Event: Refuse & Reclaim with Sheree Greer and Slam Anderson An interactive poetry reading that invites you to refuse participation in oppressive systems and reclaim your sense of self, your identity, and your livelihood through self-care, play, and rest. Click here to learn more. |
| 1:45pm-2:45pm |
Session III: Bodies of Care & Joy Panel A: Precarities of Care & Joy
Panel B: Creating Space for Joy in Sex Education: Facilitating the Choosing Myself
Program to Foster Hope & Resilience
Choosing Myself is a mindful, inclusive, and collaborative health education program facilitated for marginalized youth in Tampa Bay for ages 13-18, aiming to reduce violence and unintended teen pregnancies. This presentation outlines the Choosing Myself program as a source for empowerment and joy for youth who have experienced violence, incarceration, or other traumatic events. |
| 3:00pm-4:00pm |
Session IV: Care & Joy Beyond the Obvious Panel A: Expressions of Care & Joy
Panel B: Care & Joy in Unexpected Places, in Unexpected Ways
Panel C: Care, Joy, & the Visual
|
| 4:15pm-5:00pm |
Session V: Care & Joy: Taking it Forward Panel A: Coming Together in Care & Joy
Panel B: Creating Joy
|
The conference schedule can also be downloaded as a PDF.
Registration
Registration is now open for the conference. The Care & Joy Conference is free to attend.
Disability Accommodations
If you require a reasonable accommodation to participate in a WGSS event, please contact us at 813-974-5520 at least five (5) working days prior to the event.