Masthead

Isabelle Nastasia is from New York City by way of Toronto, Canada. She graduated from CUNY with a degree in critical pedagogy and intersectionality. She has almost a decade of experience in community organizing and democratic education with groups in New York and New Orleans including Our School at Blair Grocery, New York 2 New Orleans Coalition, United States Student Association, New York Students Rising and the Brooklyn College Student Union. Her writings on racial justice and student movement-building have been published in TheNation.com, Waging Nonviolence, Common Dreams, Tidal, TruthOut, New York Times, Alternet and Salon. Follow her on twitter @IzzyNastasia.

Hira Mahmood is another peon with a literature degree, now pursuing an M.A. in Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies in Atlanta, GA. Her humble writing background includes publications in Atlanta arts magazine BURNAWAY, Electronic Intifada, and the murky corners of the internet. She has lived in many places and as a product of the diaspora reluctantly recognizes her displacement via colonization. When she is not tutoring, working with Youngist, or organizing, she enjoys analyzing the crumbling of higher education, diaspora and migration, and subversive art in the age of late capitalism. For her >140 character poetics, follow her @HiraMahmood5.

Sara Chatterjee is Franco-Indian and is currently doing a Master’s degree in International Development at Sciences Po, Paris. She has previously worked with the Klevis Kola Foundation, a charity that supports refugees in South London, and Zubaan Books, a feminist, not-for-profit publishing house in New Delhi. Sarais currently a blogger for Baby Hero, a social enterprise that supports maternal and infant health. She has a soft spot for theories on ‘world Englishes’, can rarely resist bursting into song on the street, and is trying to get her head around learning Mandarin Chinese. You can follow her on Twitter @sarachatterjee.

Queen Arsem-O’Malley is a journalist and writer living in Montreal via Boston. She spent the vast majority of her time at McGill writing for The McGill Daily, focusing on labour issues and the Quebec student movement. She also has a background in organizing around climate change issues. She has worked with the New England Center for Investigative Reporting, and her work has appeared in The Boston Globe and The Jamaica Plain Gazette. Add to her Twitter followers @qaween. 

Muna Mire is a student and a journalist who graduated from the University of Toronto with an Honors degree in English, Political Science and Sociology. At U of T, she serves as Editor-in-Chief for The Strand, Victoria University’s student newspaper. She is the current antiracism coordinator for the Canadian University Press, a nonprofit student media cooperative. You can find her freelance work at Rabble.ca, The Feminist Wire, and The Huffington Post Canada. Her interests include critical theory, literature and progressive politics. You can find her on Twitter at @Muna_Mire. 

Victor Casillas Valle is a Chican@ writer, multimedia journalist, reporter, poet, musician, and music industry professional. Los Angeles native, San Francisco Bay Area transplant, he currently attends the University of San Francisco where he is studying Media Studies, Communication Studies, Journalism, and Latin American Studies. Some of Valle’s other work can be seen in the San Francisco Public Press, KQED, the Chronicle of Social Change, the Bay Bridged, and the Divisadero Publication along with many others. He’s written about labor, immigration, US/México issues, arts and culture, juvenile justice, mental health, and the child welfare system. He also currently has a radio show on KUSF.org, contributes to other publications, and has done work with Unite HERE! Local 11. Be sure to catch him on Twitter @VictorCValle.

Cayden Mak is the social media wizard for 18 Million Rising. They are finishing up a Master of Fine Arts in digital media at the University at Buffalo, New York, where they study participatory archives and games for civic engagement. Before joining 18MR, they worked as a staff organizer for SUNY’s Graduate Student Employees Union, and have been deeply involved with New York Students Rising. Though they were born and raised in southeast Michigan, they’re more likely to say they come from the internet. Nerd out about video games, cyborgs, and critical theory on Twitter with @Cayden.

Maya means illusion in Sanskrit but she has a tangible form that currently resides in Montreal, originally hailing from Venice, California. Stumbling and scraping her knees on a computer science minor while studying international development, she found herself programming, embracing open source, Github and digital storytelling. She built custom map-based websites with @Mapbox and the American Red Cross and dabbles in graphic design, video editing, and improvisational electronic music performance.

Tom Acker is an American at birth but has spent the last four years in Montreal studying at McGill. He was involved with a number of student organizations, including the McGill Daily, where he first realized his love for graphic and web design. Tom’s work can be seen over at tacky.ca, where has has worked at freelance design, branding, and digital strategy for groups and community organizations around the city.

Zachary Bell is a Boston-based multimedia freelance journalist and education consultant with C8 Sciences. Zachary studied Urban Studies and Environmental Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where he served as Executive Director of the Penn Environmental Group and Research Director for Penn’s Social Entrepreneurship Mentoring program, and worked in Philadelphia’s university-assisted community schools. As an undergrad, he also performed stand up comedy and won an intramural basketball championship. His works have been published in Salon.com, The Nation, Alternet, and Waging Nonviolence and focus on student activism and issues of gender and sexuality.