melissa gordon
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melissa gordon ~
If there is a time to be critical through art, it's now.
how do you show up in community?
I'm Melissa Gordon, Nashville Native, social worker, educator. At my core, I'm always gonna be a community organizer, even though I navigate in professional spaces where I feel as though the word "community organizer" is somewhat looked at as, especially in education, it's not as valued. I think I show up in community as a creative, I'm a poet, I write a plays. I'm always looking at even problem solving through a creative lens.
how does your identity inform and impact your work?
Well one, essential to me is, I'm a Black woman, so everywhere I show up, that's something that I don't hide. I make sure that I can show up and have my full self present. And, as a Black woman, as someone that's also gay, someone who also is, slightly masculine of center, those also inform the ways I show up in a lot of ways. So one is in education, making sure that students of color have equal access. And also main role of my job is to reduce discipline disparities. Also as someone who recognizes that we live in a world, in a state, definitely in a city to where opportunities, especially economic opportunities, are not present, I often look for creative ways to make sure that we have, when I say we, the people of color community, we have more access to resources. That looks like writing a grant, that looks like connecting people to such and such funder, then that's what I'm gonna do.
tell us about your happy place?
So I feel like I have a couple, and it depends on actually maybe what season. And also where I am in life. One, I have places in my house and it took me a while, not, it took me a while. I've always liked being at home, but this last few years I've definitely made it a space to where, that's drama free. And even, like, the top floor of my house in the last couple years, I actually made it a space to where I can sit and chill and be and get my records surrounded by plants now. But really just to kind of zone out.
Also Asheville is a happy place because it's only five hours away. There's good food, just the vibe there is carefree. I think it actually got voted friendliest city in the world for like eight years in a row or something crazy like that. Um, but also the creative community is really strong. The queer community up there is really strong and so I feel at ease.
And then my last happy place would be Belize cuz I love the food, the people, the vibe there is so cool. And I feel like I'm at home. People look like me. They just have accents a little bit, but other than that, like I just, that's another place to where I feel at home. And also there's a, even though there's definitely American influence, the disconnect from the United States is good.
what do you love about collaborating with Black women?
My favorite thing about collaborating with Black women is one, the breathing space. There's a different way of being when you're surrounded by nothing but Black women and there's this knowing, you know? Some things are just unsaid and just, just the vibe itself. But also there's this ability to lean in in a way that maybe I can't in other spaces that I navigate. And then also learning. I think for all of us, I think about times to where I've been, maybe one of two, or one in these professional settings, and to be around nothing but professional Black women who are all just trying to get tangible dreams in our own way, it feels good.
are there any missed opportunities?
Yeah. I think about even, I can name a few youth programs, for example, that are in the city, that are run by women of color, and it would be amazing if we could share our resources and have -you know, maybe it's my own dream, a shared dream, I think,- to have a Black girl center. Like that way we don't have to go and just coexist in the school system or in this community center. Instead, it would be ours that we own. And so I think about opportunities, such as community block credit funds, or using, only there are different pockets that are NSP2 eligible. Maybe like the Parkwood area to where we can get a property for a low low rate, a low cost. And so I think there's missed opportunity when it comes to shared resources because then that strengthens our power and our ability to serve. We actually own the building. And especially as Nashville, it's this "It City" in those spaces that once you look over like, "oh, that's for foreclosure and it's 130,000," the next week, it's $500,000 for the same property. So missed opportunities. We could share resources. And oftentimes we're serving the same students. And so just ways to collaborate. So this whole idea of the whole child, we could do that in a better way.
what would it look like to invest in your natural talents?
So I feel like I'm a natural networker, like bringing, connecting people together. Somebody calls, "Hey Mel, I need money for this community garden," Connect, connect people with such and such. "Hey Mel, it's a grant. You can't, you help me find a girl for such and such." Like, and so if I really sat down, like that could be something that I did on a regular basis. And then I feel like the last couple years, my own, I've been creative in different ways, so I started making films and working with young people around narrative writing, but I haven't really told my story in a while. And so, I especially think I'm going to use the last of this quarter to really finish one of two one-woman shows I've been drafting for a minute.
I don't know, especially with the winter coming, what I'm really focused on is what happens, not just women of color, but to people and what I call "the nonprofit industrial complex." And so, um, yeah. And so using creativity to be critical. If there is a time to be critical through art, it's now.