Category: writing
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“Checking In” is not enough
TW: Suicide I learned about the death by suicide of DJ and dancer Stephen “tWitch” Boss at the same time I was preparing my plans to attend a weekend fan memorial for Jonghyun of SHINee, a k-pop musician who died by suicide five years ago this week. I talk about Jonghyun all the time, he…
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Bad Bitches with Anxiety
“I’m a bad bitch, and I got bad anxiety” – Megan Thee StallionLast weekend I had a panic attack. It was triggered after reading about the crowd crush tragedy in South Korea and going to visit friends shortly afterwards (along with my own lingering feelings of anxiety around socializing in potentially maskless crowds). It took me…
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Notes from the Twitterpocalypse
For as long as I can remember I’ve been terrified of zombies. (Yes, I know they are not real.) Just the concept of zombies terrifies me, though, to the point that I can’t even watch ads for shows like The Walking Dead. The reason for my fear has always been the idea of someone you…
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Law and Order – Theme Song Analysis Unit (DUN-DUN)
Back in the early days of The Learned Fangirl, when it was just a personal co-blog and we weren’t serious about it, Raizel and I had a recurring feature we called “TLF has Bad Taste” where we would riff on the weird pop culture issues we obsessed over for no reason in an essay that held…
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An open letter to the NKCF
A letter that I sent to the National Keratoconus Foundation about something that’s been on my mind lately. My name is Keidra Chaney, I am a Keratoconus patient and proud donor to the National Keratoconus Foundation. I’d like to thank NKCF for your continuing work in raising greater awareness and understanding of Keratoconus for doctors,…
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Sister Outsider Headbanger
On Being a Black Feminist Metalhead originally published in Bitch: Feminist Response to Pop Culture on November 30, 2000. I’m not sure exactly when or how it happened, but at some point in my childhood I began to think I was a white guy trapped in the body of a black girl. And not just…
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A garden walk between love and hate
Originally performed at Tuesday Funk, September 1, 2020 This is a story about the power of love and nurturing during hard times. It’s also a story about hate, and how sometimes hate is transformative, sometimes liberating. I know that in these divisive times. talking about embracing hate doesn’t feel constructive, but please bear with me,…
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Producing Shows And Healing Trauma
originally performed at Miss Spoken, on March 25 2020 Back in January, I got together with a friend for the first time in about a year and a half. We caught up on a lot of the shit going in our lives, and we talked about our plans and dreams and goals and self-betterment for…
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A Love Letter to Hair Love
Originally performed at the 1st Annual Naw-scars show in Chicago on Feb 7, 2020 I first heard about Hair Love, the Oscar-Nominated animated short, in 2017, when it was a Kickstarter campaign from director Matthew Cherry. I saw the pitch for it on Twitter, thought the idea was cute, threw some money at it, and kept…
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Writing to Get My Life
It’s the first week of 2020, so of course I am feeling at once overwhelmed and refreshed. Thinking about possibilities while also trying to catch up (at least with work). It’s been a good opportunity for me to think about what I want to do and what I don’t want to do, this year, and…
Keidra Chaney 