POET’S ‘CHINGONA FIRE’ ILLUMINATED STUDENT UNION

Angela Aguirre, Chicana feminist poet and advocate for students with disabilities, performed at the college on behalf of the Associated Student Government (ASG) in the MHCC Student Union on Tuesday.

She didn’t shy from hard, ongoing controversies, reading from several of her poems.

In her work, “What are You?” she lists things that she defines herself by: her culture, her family, her friends.

She read aloud from its prose: “When they ask me who I am, I say I am generations of don’t fuck with me.”

Aguirre has been speaking for the last seven years, from her own and others’ experiences with rape, disability, identity, and substance abuse. She performs poetry centered around them all.

In 2006, Aguirre was diagnosed with ADHD. A counselor at her community college told her that “school just wasn’t for everybody,” she told the Mt. Hood audience. However, she eventually graduated college and became a published author. She was honored by California state Sen. Anthony Portantino as one of 10 Women of the Year he named for 2017.

“The moment I began to embrace the part of who I am that makes me different instead of rejecting it is the moment I began to live my fullest life,” stated Aguirre in her TEDx talk, posted online.

During her talk at Mt. Hood, she spoke of her own struggles with dyslexia and her experiences with a special education student with Down syndrome, Molly.

“Molly was my first teacher in disability…[she] helped me accept my own disabilities,” said Aguirre.

What consent means

As more students entered the Student Union, she brought up federal judge Brett Kavanaugh, the Supreme Court nominee that has been accused of sexual assault by psychology professor Christine Blasey Ford, and, former Stanford University swimmer Brock Turner, found guilty of sexual assault (and at the center of a controversial, light criminal sentence).

Of Kavanaugh, Aguirre said, “It’s hard to say (his) name without wanting to throw up.”

Before beginning her next poem, she dedicated the piece to Turner. 

The poem went through different situations in which she states “there is no ‘yes.’ ” Aguirre lists situations that are often said to be “muddied” when it comes to consent, painting a clear picture for her audience of just what consent means.

“There is no ‘yes’ in a blackout… There is no ‘yes’ no matter how malleable my consent feels to you,” she writes in her poem titled, “For Brock Turner and All the Men Like Him.”

Her work has been featured by The Huffington Post, Latina Magazine, and All Def Digital. She also has performed at events such as the Women for Racial Justice Breakfast and the Adelante Mujer Latina conference.

Aguirre is the co-founder of the Latina Feminist Poetry Collective, Chingona Fire, that organizes events for women of color in Los Angeles. She also has taught poetry workshops at many high schools, universities, and organizations including InsideOut Writers, Homeboy Industries, and La Pintoresca Teen Education Center.

Her book, “Confessions of a Firework”, was published in 2016 by the World Stage Press and contains poems and writing prompts.