Teach the Babies w/ Dr. David J. Johns

ICYMI: A Back-to-School Special Rerun

Stephanie Allen does God’s work.  A career educator for more than two decades, Ms. Allen currently teaches high school in Guilford County Schools in Greensboro, North Carolina, the third largest school district in North Carolina. She was recognized as a Teacher of the Year in 2019 and 2024–a recognition she’s earned. This episode features the front-line experiences of a classroom teacher, centers stories about under-supported students, and describes necessary steps to dismantle the social hierarchy that relegates Black students to the lowest rungs of every quality of life indicator ladder.

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ICYMI!

Andrea Foggy-Paxton brings a unique perspective to leading change across sectors, drawing from leadership roles in start-up organizations, established organizations, and philanthropic organizations supporting systems transformation.  This episode answers the questions: What is civics, and why should it be taught to all students? Andrea shares lessons from her experience as an industry titan and appointed school board member.  She also talks about philanthropy and corporations' responsibility for ensuring educational equity.

edloc.org
@afoggypaxton

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Summer Rewind Episode

In this deeply personal and politically urgent conversation, Dr. David Johns welcomes his White House family—Deesha Dyer, former Social Secretary to President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama—for a raw discussion about what we lose when power demolishes history, and what endures when community builds with intention.

Deesha takes us inside the moment she saw excavators tearing down the East Wing of the White House in October 2025—the space where she orchestrated state dinners, opened doors for people who never thought they'd walk through them, and made the People's House truly belong to the people.

This conversation moves from the rubble of demolished institutions to the unshakeable foundation of community organizing. Deesha shares lessons learned from Michelle Obama about grace under pressure, why she wrote Undiplomatic for Black girls who "risk it all," and what defending democracy actually looks like in practice: investing in local organizations, letting leaders lead in their expertise, documenting our work, and showing up for each other with intention.

Deesha's story is a masterclass in refusing to let imposter syndrome—or anyone else—define your worth. As she reminds us: buildings can be demolished in 72 hours, but they can't demolish the memories, the legacy, or the collective power we build together.

This is required listening for anyone who believes that mutual aid isn't charity—it's how we survive, build, and love each other into liberation.

Website: DeeshaDyer.com
Instagram: @deedyer267
Email: deesha@deeshadyer.com (She answers every email!)
Book: Undiplomatic: How My Attitude Created the Best Kind of Trouble
(Available at libraries and independent bookstores)

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I'm from Los Angeles. So when I picked up Dr. Terrell Winder's Shameless: The Making of Black Gay Identities in LA, it read like a love letter to a home I'm watching change—and a map of how young Black gay men build family, selfhood, and joy inside all that change anyway.

This week, Dr. Winder—sociologist and urban ethnographer at UC Santa Barbara—pulls up to the classroom to teach us unspoiling: his framework for refusing shame and rejecting the burden of stigma outright, no matter what it costs. We get into the affirming spaces that keep our babies alive and why they're under attack right now; why intersectionality can't keep being told to wait its turn; and what Noah's Arc's first-ever Emmy nomination means in a season when Black and Black gay stories are being pulled off shelves.

Because when you take these spaces away, Dr. Winder is clear about what we lose: lives.

Go get the book, sit with it, and then go build a room where somebody can put their burden down.

About the guest
Dr. Terrell J. A. Winder is Associate Professor of Sociology at UC Santa Barbara. A Baltimore native, he earned his B.A. in Comparative Ethnic Studies from Columbia and his Ph.D. in Sociology from UCLA (2017). His research spans race and ethnicity, sexuality and sexual health, qualitative methods, and education.

Key ideas & theory
Unspoiling — Dr. Winder's framework: a stigma response that centers the stigmatized person rather than the comfort of the stigmatizer; refusing shame instead of managing it.
Spoiled identity / stigma — Erving Goffman's foundational concept, and the classic responses of passing and covering that Dr. Winder argues break down for people carrying more than one stigma at once.
Intersectional stigma & "intersectional recovery" — holding race, sexuality, and gender together rather than deferring one for later; recovering the full selves of figures history flattened.
"Visibility is survival" — his argument that ethnography documents threatened histories and everyday Black LGBTQ life.
People mentioned
Erving Goffman — sociologist, Stigma and the "spoiled identity."
Dr. Marcus Anthony Hunter — sociologist and chair of African American Studies at UCLA; credited with first posting the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter (August 2012); the BLM movement/network was later co-founded by Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi. Co-author with Dr. Winder of "Space, Place, and Urban Future."
Bayard Rustin — Black gay civil rights strategist, chief organizer of the 1963 March on Washington.
George Washington Carver — scientist cited as an example of a flattened, partially-told legacy.
Patrik-Ian Polk — creator of Noah's Arc.
Organizations & spaces
Better Brothers Los Angeles / The Truth Awards. 
Native Son.
Hilltop Coffee + Kitchen (Issa Rae's LA spot) and Bricks & Scones (Larchmont). 
Media & culture
Noah's ARC — Patrik-Ian Polk's groundbreaking series, the first scripted show centering Black gay men; Noah's ARC: The Movie (the 20th-anniversary reunion) earned a 2026 Emmy nomination for Outstanding Choreography, the franchise's first-ever Television Academy recognition.
Pose, Insecure — referenced in conversation and This or That.
My Best Friend Rodney — Rodney Chester's interview podcast.
Anita Baker & Luther Vandross — the This or That showdown.
Further reading — Dr. Winder's scholarship
Shameless: The Making of Black Gay Identities in LA (NYU Press, 2026).
"Unspoiling Identity: An Intersectional Expansion of Stigma Response Strategies" (Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, 2023).
"Visibility Is Survival: The Chocolate Maps of Black Gay Life in Urban Ethnography."
Marcus Anthony Hunter & Terrell J. A. Winder, "Space, Place, and Urban Future," in Research Handbook on Intersectionality (ed. Mary Romero, Edward Elgar, 2023).
"The Discursive Work of 'Bottom-Shaming'" — 2024 SSSP Outstanding Article co-winner.
Connect with Dr. Winder
Social: @BmoreTerrell · Web: terrellwinder.com

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In case you missed it... In this rewind episode, I'm in conversation with the brilliant Professor Kimberlé Crenshaw—legal scholar, civil rights advocate, chief architect of Critical Race Theory. 

From her parents' kitchen table discussions that shaped her critical consciousness, to her groundbreaking work challenging legal institutions, to founding the African American Policy Forum, Professor Crenshaw has spent decades translating academic theory into tools for resistance. 

In this powerful conversation, we explore what it means to be "a born back talker," why pivoting away from our truth won't save us, and how we can resist critically—and in community—during these challenging times. Enjoy!

Resources
Backtalker: An Amercian Memoir 

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