There is a on-air piece today on NPR about life as a black nerd. The NPR social commentary is narrated by Eric Deggans who is a TV/Media critic for the Tampa Bay Times. Any opportunity for media exposure about black nerds I'm on top of it like Gen. Petraeus overseeing a hot bodied biographer.
Too soon?
Okay, well anyway what I took away from the commentary was music to my ears. Yes! NPR is highlighting the emergence of the Black Nerd in society. The only problem is...what about Black Girl Nerds?
Deggans mentioned briefly Melissa Harris-Perry's aptly titled #Nerdland hashtag that she references quite frequently on her program. However, during the on-air piece he talks about blerds such as Kanye West, Donald Glover, W. Kamau Bell, Levar Burton, and even mentions the former blerd archetype Steve Urkel.
I commend Deggans on his piece and I hope this conversation facilitates further in other media outlets outside of the NPR community, but the questions remains--what about nerdy black women?
In the three minute and forty-five second soundbite, 5 black male nerds were mentioned and only 1 lonely black girl nerd. Not sure if Melissa-Harris Perry defines herself as a BGN, she simply has a segment of a program on her MSNBC show called #Nerdland. I can only assume she calls herself a BGN, but that's for her to say and it's not in my place to brand her with that title.
Here's what I'm trying to say. I hope that the Blerd Conversation will permeate more into social circles, but more importantly my goal is to see more Black Female Nerds represented in the Blerd Conversation. As Katy discussed in the previous post, we are a subculture within a subculture. Therefore, our voices are muted more than our blerd counterparts.
Let's keep this conversation going folks. Just don't forget that there are tons of nerdy black girls out there.
Here is the soundbite below if you'd like to take a listen:
