Trauma, Tresses & Truth editor and contributor Lyzette Wanzer will share her work on the status of Black women's natural hair in the 21st century and facilitate a conversation with speakers from the inaugural conference of the same name.

A book at the intersection of racial justice and Black feminism, Trauma, Tresses, & Truth: Untangling Our Hair Through Personal Narratives (Chicago Review Press) collects pieces from over twenty contributors interrogating the politics, policing, and perception of African American and Afro Latina women's natural hair in schools, academia, and corporate America. Particularly relevant during this time of emboldened white supremacy, racism, and provocative othering, this work explores how writing about one of the still-remaining systemic biases in American institutions might lead to greater understanding and respect.

Lyzette Wanzer’s work appears in over thirty literary journals, books, and magazines. Library Journal named her book, Trauma, Tresses & Truth: Untangling Our Hair Through Personal Narratives, a Top 10 Best Social Sciences Book. Publishers Weekly featured the book in Fall 2022. Lyzette is a contributor to Lyric Essay as Resistance: Truth From the Margins (Wayne State University Press), Civil Liberties United: Diverse Voices from the San Francisco Bay Area (Pease Press), and the multi-award-winning The Chalk Circle: Intercultural Prizewinning Essays (Wyatt-MacKenzie Publishing). Trauma, Tresses & Truth was a 2023 Black History Month Selection of the Black Women's Studies Association. lyzettewanzermfa.com

Valerie Carpenter serves in the capacity of Deputy Manager of Family and Community Affairs with Serving Our Children. She has ten years of experience in the education system working in admissions and recruitment. Valerie is a 2020 graduate of the University of Arkansas Clinton School of Public Service and is currently enrolled as a doctoral student at Northeastern University's Law and Policy Program where she is writing a dissertation on homelessness, "Elevated Voices: The Perspectives of Homeless, Black Men with Mental Illness on Services in Washington, D.C."

Barbara Ruth Saunders is a writer, editor, and writing coach. She works as a technical writer, leads workshops on process and craft, and writes poetry and memoir. The core of her work is helping smart people write effectively and with more ease by focusing their attention on the stage of the process where thoughts become words. She's at work on Dead Dreams, an account of following the Grateful Dead. She chopped off her relaxed hair in 1994 and hasn't cut her hair since Jerry Garcia died. barbararuthsaunders.com