Sometimes, the first person we need to tell that we were sexually assaulted is ourselves. Too often, we can convince ourselves that it wasn’t “so bad,” that we can “handle it” or that it was somehow our fault. All of these are not true. In this Healing Comes in Waves episode, we are talking to Chenthoori Malankov-Milton, Jaye Garcia and Eternity Martis about understanding what it means to be a survivor and how that is different for everybody.
Sometimes, the first person we need to tell that we were sexually assaulted is ourselves. Too often, we can convince ourselves that it wasn’t “so bad,” that we can “handle it” or that it was somehow our fault. All of these are not true. In this Healing Comes in Waves episode, we are talking to Chenthoori Malankov-Milton, Jaye Garcia and Eternity Martis about understanding what it means to be a survivor and how that is different for everybody.
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CONTENT NOTE:
Although there are no descriptions of sexual violence in this podcast series, any conversation about the topic can bring up big feelings and be hard to hear. Listen in a way that feels safer for you. You get to choose.
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NEED SUPPORT?
If you have been affected by sexual violence or other forms of gender-based violence, you are not alone. There are resources like sexual assault support centres in your community that you can reach out to. Check out our resources page to learn more: https://healingcomesinwaves.ca/resources
If you are a Toronto Metropolitan University community member, please connect with Consent Comes First, the Office of Sexual Violence Support and Education: https://www.torontomu.ca/sexual-violence/
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KEEP CONNECTED TO HEALING COMES IN WAVES
Check out our website for transcripts, resources, and episode guides that include articles, supports and activities to explore attending to the impacts of trauma: www.healingcomesinwaves.ca
Follow us on Instagram: @healingcomesinwavespodcast
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MORE ABOUT OUR GUESTS
Chenthoori Malankov-Milton (she/her) is a daughter of the Thamil Diaspora. She is a grassroots gender justice advocate. She lives, works, and plays as a guest on the traditional territory of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee, and the Huron-Wendat Peoples. Chenthoori is a Social Worker who incorporates a transformative healing justice framework and is committed to cultivating a better world for all marginalized communities. She enjoys spending time with her two pups in her spare time, practising yoga and smashing the patriarchy.
Jaye Garcia (they/them) is a fat, queer, gender non-binary, racialized person of colour with hidden disabilities, born and raised by Latinx refugee immigrants in Amiskwaciywaskahikan ("Beaver Hill House" in Cree; AKA Edmonton, AB). Jaye is eager to continue their journey as a settler-guest, living, (un)learning, and growing in Tkaronto. Presently, Jaye works at ACT, an AIDS Service Organization (ASO) in Toronto, coordinating programming for People Living with HIV/AIDS (PHA), those 'at-risk' and those in solidarity whose livelihoods persist despite ongoing neglect by the state. The year is 2022, and Jaye remains unapologetically fat, femme and fierce.
Eternity Martis is an associate professor at the School of Journalism and Toronto Metropolitan University. She is also an award-winning journalist and editor whose work on race and gender has been featured in VICE, Chatelaine, Maclean’s, Flare, Salon, CBC, Hazlitt, The Walrus and many more. Her bestselling, award-winning memoir They Said This Would Be Fun: Race, Campus Life, and Growing Up, about being a woman of colour at a predominantly white university, won the Kobo Emerging Writer Prize for Non-Fiction and was named a “Best Book of 2020” by the Globe and Mail, Chapters/Indigo, Audible and Apple. Her writing has helped newsrooms, including The Review of Journalism, Xtra, the Toronto Star, and tvo.org change their style guides to capitalize “Black” and “Indigenous,” and her writing has been taught on academic syllabuses at North American and Caribbean universities. Following a petition by journalism graduates at X University for more diverse courses in light of the murder of George Floyd, Eternity developed and teaches “Reporting On Race: Black Communities and the Media” at Toronto Metropolitan University’s School of Journalism, the first course of its kind in Canada.
Keneisha Charles (they/them) is an organizer and artist who strives to dream and co-create liberation through all they do. As a fat, Black, queer, nonbinary, autistic, second-generation Caribbean, intersectionality is at the heart of their praxis. Their community work centres around Black liberation, collective care, environmental justice, disability justice, queer-trans liberation, and gender equity. As a poet, storyteller, and musician, they’re also passionate about the role of art in revolution. Their present work with the Consent Action Team helped launch #HighSchoolToo, a national student-led network that works to end sexual violence in secondary schools. They’re completing a Bachelor of Social Work degree with a double minor in Caribbean Studies and Disability Studies at Toronto Metropolitan University.
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CREDITS:
Created by Consent Comes First, the Office of Sexual Violence Support Education at Toronto Metropolitan University in Collaboration with the Consent Action Team. Podcast produced by Vocal Fry Studios. Graphic Design by Isabel Jordan.