On Sunday, Feb. 9, the College of Social Work will be hosting a workshop for those within the LGBTQIA community. The workshop is called Food, Bodies & Liberation: An Intersectional Approach to Healing Toxic Relationships with Food for All Bodies. Author Syd Yang will facilitate the workshop.
The workshop is from 1 to 3 p.m. A second workshop, geared toward mental health practitioners, will be held from 4 to 6 p.m. on Sunday as well. This event is a one time thing here on campus.
Yang is a non-binary, queer, mixed-race author and most recently, they have published a memoir called “Release: A Bulimia Story.” It focuses on looking at eating disorders through a new lens, and Yang uses their work as a source of support for others.
Yang has been working with the community for twenty years now and speaks not only on eating disorders but also the experiences of women of color, queer people and transgender people, as well as racism and sexism. Yang has worked at the Women’s Foundation of California as a Senior Program Officer and was also involved with the activism groups Changemakers and the Resource Generation board.
Yang wants to help others heal and gain their energies back to provide individuals with liberation.
“I began to understand my purpose and my calling — to weave wholeness back into bodies that have been disconnected through oppression and violence, through energy healing, intuitive coaching and spiritual practice,” Yang said.
The reasoning behind this workshop is to provide students, as well as those within the broader Knoxville community, who identify as LGBTQIA with a safe space to discuss eating disorders as well as sexism, racism and intersectionality.
The LGBTQIA community has some of the highest rates of eating disorders, so these workshops will help raise awareness within the community, as well as work toward healing and discuss topics that have been ongoing issues, such as oppression.
The event is also a part of the College of Social Work Social Justice Innovation Initiative grant program. Students can apply for grants to complete projects that focus on sexism, intersectionality and racism.
Mary Hansen is a graduate student in the College of Social Work, and she said that she hopes that those who get involved in the workshop will leave feeling more in tune with their minds and bodies, as well as with a greater understanding of the connection between oppression and mental health.
“I hope the participants of the workshop will leave feeling empowered, grounded and in touch with their body and wisdom. I also hope that participants will gain greater understanding of how oppression and violence impact their wellness and tools to question, name and heal from the oppression faced daily in society and how this impacts our relationship to our body and body image,” Hansen said.
Both of the workshops are free, but online registration, accessible here, is required. The workshops have limited seating, but several spots are still available.
On Monday, Feb. 10, from 6:30 to 8 p.m., Yang will follow the workshop events with a book reading and discussion of “Release: A Bulimia Story” in the Mary Greer Room of Hodges Library.
The reading does not require registration and is open to the public.
