CeCe McDonald
CeCe McDonald is an artist and activist committed to dismantling the prison industrial complex (PIC) and winning the liberation of all oppressed people. As a Black trans woman, and a survivor of white supremacist and transphobic violence and the PIC, these issues are core to CeCe’s personal and political life.
The experience of criminalization and incarceration led CeCe through a brutal and violent system. During her time in prison, CeCe’s evocative and thoughtful writing inspired an international community of activists to support the #FreeCeCe and to advance the broader movements for trans liberation and prison abolition. Since her release in January 2014, she has dedicated her life to these movements through public education and organizing. A frequent speaker at colleges and universities, CeCe has also given interviews with VICE, Democracy Now!, Melissa Harris-Perry, and Huffington Post Live. She has worked with numerous organizations including Transgender Youth Support Network in Minneapolis, MN and the Gender Justice League in Seattle, WA.
As an Activist-in-Residence, CeCe will continue her critical work building abolitionist analysis with other activists and community members to dismantle the prison industrial complex; support transformative justice models and other responses to harm that do not rely on incarceration or the criminal legal system; and build up community support and power for trans women, particularly trans women of color, in cultural, activist, and community projects.
One of the projects CeCe will focus on during her residency will be a curriculum for activists and educators to incorporate into their courses. This course, More Than Cisters: Building a Trans Queer Feminist Perspective, will focus on developing skills in intersectional feminist analysis and exploring the role of solidarity between cisgender and transgender, queer and gender non-conforming people in feminist liberation. Focusing on how categories of race, class, gender, ability, sexuality, and relationships across difference impact systems of oppression, and consider strategies for implementing social justice to transform communities. The course will focus on several key areas of trans liberation and prison abolition histories, through the lives and legacies of revolutionary leaders like Sylvia Rivera, Marsha P. Johnson, and Miss Major Griffin-Gracy; organizations like the Gay Liberation Front; moments like the riots/rebellions at Stonewall in NYC and the Compton Cafeteria in San Francisco; and contemporary perspectives from leaders and activists including Angela Davis, Janet Mock, and the Movement for Black Lives.
RELATED WORK
Survived and Punished: Video Series
Survived and Punished is among a network of groups organizing defense campaigns to free criminalized survivors of violence like Paris Knox, Bresha Meadows, Marissa Alexander, Cherelle Baldwin, and Alisha Walker, and support them upon their release. These campaigns lift up people’s right to defend their lives and survive without being punished. Videos conceived by Mariame Kaba, narrated by CeCe McDonald, and directed and produced by Dean Spade and Hope Dector. To learn more visit #SurvivedAndPunished: Survivor Defense and Abolitionist Praxis. Watch the series here.
“I Use My Love to Guide Me”: Conversations with CeCe McDonald, Tourmaline Gossett, and Dean Spade
In 2014, CeCe McDonald joined prison abolition activists Tourmaline Gossett and Dean Spade in a conversation about her own experiences surviving trauma and impossible situations, and the importance of collective organizing for people facing systems of violence. This video series captures themes from that conversation. Watch the series here.
Honor the Dead, and Fight Like Hell for the Living
Micah Bazant made this image for Trans Day of Remembrance in 2013 to support CeCe McDonald’s fight for freedom, and all trans women of color fighting for their lives. Learn more about Micah Bazant’s art.
VIDEOS
CeCe McDonald, Tourmaline Gossett, and Dean Spade: I Use My Love to Guide Me
This video is part of the series No One is Disposable, which features conversations on trans activism and prison abolition with BCRW activist fellow Tourmaline Gossett.
CeCe McDonald, Tourmaline Gossett, and Dean Spade: Fighting the Isolation of Prisons
This video is part of the series No One is Disposable, which features conversations on trans activism and prison abolition with BCRW activist fellow Tourmaline Gossett.
Redefining Realness: A Salon in Honor of Janet Mock
A conversation with Janet Mock, Brittney Cooper, Che Gossett, Reina Gossett, CeCe McDonald, and Mey Valdivia Rude
This year’s salon focused on a new memoir by writer Janet Mock, Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love & So Much More, which relates the author’s experience as a young trans woman of color working in mainstream media. In this discussion, scholars, activists, and writers whose work is engaged in the history of media and literary representations of women of color in the U.S., the importance of storytelling in social movements, trans women’s activism, and the role of community and personal relationships in establishing resilience to hostile environments, offer their responses to Mock’s book. Recorded April 23, 2014 at Barnard College in New York City.