Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
FIRST NATIONS ACTIVIST
2010's people to watch in the GTA: Jessica Yee, activist
Who will be the movers, shakers and shapers of the new year?
Jessica Yee is a young woman on a mission. And at 23, she is wowing social justice activists twice her age with her passion and persistence. The eldest daughter of a Mohawk mother and a Chinese father, Yee was volunteering for a local women's shelter when she was 12.
At 15, she was spearheading a letter-writing campaign in support of a gay student who was barred from bringing his boyfriend to the prom.
When she was 19, she was in South Dakota fighting against the recriminalization of abortion and meeting with the powerful Native American Women's Health Education Resource Center.
By age 20, Yee pulled those experiences together to form the Native Youth Sexual Health Network, the first agency of its kind run by and for youth that isn't focused solely on disease prevention.
Today the network is a North American force for healthy sexuality and reproductive rights, among other things. And as its founder and executive director, Yee has become a respected international youth leader who organizes UN conference forums on indigenous youth and writes, edits and produces books, videos and theatre about youth sexuality.
"We try to incorporate everything, from environmental justice to violence prevention, that you wouldn't typically see within a sexual reproductive health mandate," says Yee. One of Yee's strengths is her ability to connect the dots, says Judy Rebick, who nominated Yee for the Toronto YWCA's 2009 Young Woman of Distinction Award (she won).
"She's got everything: She's a great organizer, a great speaker. She's very courageous and determined."
Yee says her activism is rooted in her parents' history as sex trade workers. Although they were also caught up in substance abuse and minor brushes with the law, they raised Yee and her younger sister, Jennifer, in a safe, loving environment, teaching them to be open-minded, pro-choice and socially responsible.
"My past is empowering," Yee says. "It's not belittling in any way. It shaped who I am."
Yee has home offices in Toronto's Kensington Market and on the Oneida Indian Reserve in Wisconsin, where her partner, "a self-identified male feminist," is a teacher and consultant. But she spends most of her time speaking at conferences and overseeing the network's 14 projects across the continent.
Last year Yee edited a book on the sexual education experiences of young aboriginals and racial minorities. In 2010 she is working on a second book on young women and feminism.
And she is the subject of an upcoming National Film Board documentary on the future of feminism, due next year. Filmmaker Karen Cho sums up the international buzz on Yee. "When I said I was doing this documentary, everyone said I had to interview Jessica."
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