Speakers

Lutze Segu

Social justice doula

https://www.lutzesegu.com

I am a first-generation Haitian-American who was born and raised in Miami, FL which is the ancestral and traditional lands of the Seminole, Miccosukee, and Tequesta nations. My parents are fugees who fled the island of Haiti in the 80s looking for a life that had more dignity and opportunity. I am the proud product of the Miami-Dade County Public School System and graduate of Florida Memorial University the only HBCU (Historically Black College/University) in Miami. Florida Memorial University is home of the Negro National Anthem “Lift Every Voice and Sing” and it is there that I became politicized and gained the knowledge and the tools that put me on the path to becoming a Black feminist leader.

While falling in love with Black women writers like Toni Morrison, Audre Lorde, and Ntozake Shange I decided to take my love of community and advocacy and channel that into becoming a social worker. This led me to Barry University, but I was not your average social worker. I became a social worker to work myself out of a job. I knew that as long as the world needs social workers it means that we have not achieved social justice and social justice is the goal. I have worked with survivors of intimate-partner violence, queer and transgender Black and Brown youth experiencing homelessness, and I ran a social justice camp in the summer and an in-school diversity program for high school-aged youth. My deep abiding love for community and putting Black feminism into praxis lead me to be the gender justice organizer at the Miami Workers Center. In this role, I preached the gospel of Black feminism and trained people on how to use an intersectional analysis to build power and coalitions. I was the architect of the #FemmeAgenda a feminist agenda and platform that was created to address the feminization of poverty in South Florida through a reproductive justice and intersectional lens. In the midst of all of that, I also organized youth on the issue of Comprehensive Sexual Education. I am also the founding member of the #BlackGirlsMatter Collective in Miami.

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