Interview with Essence Thompson

An interview with Essence Thompson, a Black trans woman, performer, community advocate, and union meatpacker based in Richmond, Virginia. In this oral history interview, Thompson discusses her upbringing, transition, and relationship with her family, including with her late transgender sister, her experiences as an employee of Tyson's Foods, including discussions of workplace harassment, union representation, and the need for better education and understanding of trans issues in workplaces, her experiences as an advocate, speaker, and community member with both Equality Virginia and Nationz Foundation, and her thoughts on the unrest of spring and summer 2020 following the murder of George Floyd, trans politics in the world as a whole, and visions of a better future for Black trans people. She additionally discusses her career as a performer in pageants around Richmond, her thoughts on violence against Black trans women, and the need for representation and education around trans issues.

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View At: https://umedia.lib.umn.edu/item/p16022coll97:219
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Item Information:

Identifier: wd375w61z
Collection: Oral Histories with People of Color
Institution: Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection, University of Minnesota
Creator(s): Thompson, Essence
Contributor(s): Beam, Myrl
Billund-Phibbs, Myra
Publisher: University of Minnesota Minneapolis Libraries
Date Created: Aug. 7, 2020
Genre: Oral Histories
Transcriptions
Subject(s): Equality Virginia
Nationz Foundation
Places: Georgia > Fulton County > Atlanta
Virginia > City of Richmond > Richmond
Topic(s): Anti-transgender violence
BIPOC
Black transgender people
Family members
Harassment
Murders of LGBTQ+ people
Trans women
Transgender activism
Transgender people in the workplace
Transgender people of color
Transitioning (Gender)
Resource Type: Moving image
Text
Language: English
Rights: Copyright undetermined
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