The ZAMI NOBLA Podcast
by Angela Denise Davis
The ZAMI NOBLA Podcast is a sound source for Black Lesbians 40 and older. Our show topics include current events, LGBT affairs, Black Lesbian Herstory & Health and Wellness. Angela Denise Davis is the show's Creator, Producer, and Host.
Episodes
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Charlene A. Carruthers Cooks Up a More Complete Story of Black Radical Imagination
Charlene A. Carruthers, PhD (she/her) is a writer, filmmaker, community organizer, and Black Studies scholar. A practitioner of telling more complete stories, her work interrogates historical conjunctures of Black freedom-making post-emancipation and decolonial revolution, Black/Native/Indigenous...
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Frances Wood Tells All and Still Has Her Joy
Frances E. Wood is a scholar and educator; her work reflects a profound commitment to justice and the transformative power of ideas. A feminist and womanist thinker with both depth and breadth of knowledge, she brings together intellectual rigor, lived experience, and spiritual insight in ways…
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Jennifer Horn Brings Her Chair to the ZAMI NOBLA Leadership Table
Jennifer M-F Horn, LCSW, NMCFIT, is a licensed clinical social worker, researcher, educator, and U.S. Navy veteran whose scholarship and practice center Black same-gender-loving women and historically marginalized communities across aging, caregiving, and long-term services and supports. She...
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Carla Rabb DeRosa Plays with Her Food and We All are Better for It
You may register for ZAMI NOBLA's Plant Play Food Series at the following link: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/SFkOB_AvSaixs6Yr2QkrDg PLANT PLAY, a virtual feast with Carla Rabb DeRosa Turn your Kitchen into a Wellness Playground! ZAMI NOBLA invites you to join PLANT PLAY, a joyful,...
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Cara Page Revels in Movement Work as a Cartographer of Culture, Memory, Healing, and Justice
This interview was recorded in Atlanta, Georgia, on June 18, 2025. Cara Page is a Black Queer Feminist cultural memory worker & organizer. For the past 30+ years, she has organized with LGBTQI+, Black, Indigenous & People of Color liberation movements in the US & Global South at the intersections...
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Deneen Day Gives an Oral Herstory of Life in Ohio and Work as an Investigator (Part 1)
This interview was recorded on May 20, 2025 via online video conferencing. Part 1 is an oral herstory of Deneen's life in Ohio and part 2 is a detailed look at her family's journey with dementia along with Deneen's work in the area. Deneen Day retired after a distinguished 30-year career as a...
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Deneen Day Remembers her Mother, Grandmother, and the Journey of Dementia (Part 2)
This interview was recorded on May 20, 2025 via online video conferencing. Part 1 is an oral herstory of Deneen's life in Ohio and part 2 is a detailed look at her family's journey with dementia along with Deneen's work in the area. Deneen Day retired after a distinguished 30-year career as a...
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Arlene Edwards Reflects on a Life of Watching the World Through the Lens of Community Psychology
Originally from Trinidad and Tobago, Arlene is a community psychologist who recently retired from the CDC. While there she worked as a behavioral scientist focusing on capacity building as it relates to HIV prevention. She received her BA in Psychology from the University of Tampa, MA in…
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Kaila Story Knows Her Place and Creates Space at the Fenceline of Difference
Kaila Adia Story, PhD is an associate professor in the Departments of Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and Pan-African Studies, as well as the Audre Lorde Endowed Chair at the University of Louisville. She is the author of The Rainbow Ain't Never Been Enuf: On The Myth of LGBTQ+ Solidarity,...
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Alexis Pauline Gumbs Speaks on Her New Audre Lorde Biography
Alexis Pauline Gumbs is a Queer Black Troublemaker and Black Feminist Love Evangelist and an aspirational cousin to all sentient beings. Her work in this lifetime is to facilitate infinite, unstoppable ancestral love in practice. Her poetic work in response to the needs of her cherished…
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Sharon Bridgforth with bull-jean & dem/dey Book Party
This book party was hosted on May 27, 2023, at Charis Books & More in Decatur, Georgia. It featured esteemed writer Sharon Bridgforth in conversation with ZAMI NOBLA creative director Angela Denise Davis in celebration of bull-jean & dem/dey back. You can view the YouTube video of this event at:...
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Together We Heal: COVID-19's Mental Health Effects on Older Black Same Gender Loving Women
Together We Heal: COVID-19's Mental Health Effects on Older Black Same Gender Loving Women Thursday, December 14, 2023 (ZOOM webinar) Findings from a COVID-19 Community Research Study led by Dr. Tonia Poteat, and the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, and Mary Anne Adams, MSW, and...
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Sangodare Wallace Expands the Technology of Sermon and Song
This interview was recorded in February 2024. Sangodare (Julia Roxanne Wallace) is a sweet space for transformation. Sangodare comes from a thick legacy of Black Baptist preachers and church leaders and currently activates Black Feminist sermonics at a weekly Sunday Service held by Mobile...
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Kendra Bryant Aya and Cyndi Ixchele Aya Share Stories About "US"
In February 2024, The ZAMI NOBLA Podcast sat down to talk with Kendra Bryant Aya and Cyndi Ixchele Aya about their internet creation, "This is US: Unscripted Sundays with Kindy." The couple shared the joys and challenges of maintaining a digital presence and the sacredness of storytelling. Kendra...
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Lana Williams Puts Her Money Where Her Mind Is
Lana Williams is the Board Chair of ZAMI NOBLA (National Organization of Black Lesbians on Aging). She is a Financial Coach, with over 25 years of experience in the financial services industry. Her experience includes banking, mergers and acquisitions, investment advising, and bank industry...
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Sabrina Francis-White and Lynnette White Speak on 34 Years of Love and One Unbreakable Bond
Lynnette White and Sabrina Francis-White sat down with Angela to share how a Blind date turned into a Fairy Tale Come True. And to discuss what it takes to sustain 32 years of love, understanding and marriage. As they continue to plan their next adventure in life.
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Mary Hooks Keeps Her Eyes on the Prize
Mary Hooks is a 42yr old, Black, lesbian, feminist, abolitionist, pan-Africanist, mother, wife and a member of Southerners On New Ground and part of the leadership of the Movement 4 Black Lives. Mary joined SONG as a member in 2009 and began organizing with SONG in 2010. Mary's commitment to…
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Marilyn McClain in North Carolina Reflects on Her Enduring Legacy of Love
The ZAMI NOBLA North Carolina State Chapter holds a monthly potluck. I took a road trip to Charlotte, North Carolina, to experience one of these gatherings and had the pleasure of interviewing one of their members, Marilyn McClain. Marilyn McClain's Bio: I Am a body Alchemist. One who is patient,...
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Stephanie Anne Johnson Shines Her Light on Life, Work, and the Ancestors
Stephanie Anne Johnson is a second-generation theater practitioner. Her mother Virginia Johnson (Green) worked with The American Negro Theatre In N.Y. Johnson has been a lighting designer for over forty years. Nationally she has done designs for La Mama Theatre (N.Y.), Telluride Repertory…
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M Shelly Conner: A Queer, Renaissance Woman Creating Connections in Literature and on Land
M Shelly Conner, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Central Arkansas. Her multi-genre writings examine culture through a dapperqueer womanist lens and include publications in Crisis Magazine, the A.V. Club, NBC News, and the Grio. Her debut novel "everyman",...
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The ZNP Celebrates 4 Years of Black Lesbian Herstory
The ZAMI NOBLA Podcast celebrated four years of serving as a sound source for Black lesbian herstory in August 2022. This episodes celebrates that achievement with excerpts from various episodes. Links to each episode can be found below. Kamilah Aisha Moon Talks about the Human Business of Poetry...
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Dr. Moya Bailey Talks on Misogynoir, The Combahee River Collective Statement, and Brittney Griner
Dr. Moya Bailey is an Associate Professor in the School of Communication at Northwestern University. Her work focuses on marginalized groups' use of digital media to promote social justice and she is interested in how race, gender, and sexuality are represented in media and medicine. She is the...
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Gaye Adegbalola Centers Blues Herstory and Music as a Griot and Activist
This interview was recorded via video conference on October 29, 2021 by Angela Denise Davis. Gaye Adegbalola talked about her early years in Virginia, college life in Boston, and her career as a Blues musician, griot, and activist. Gaye Adegbalola's website: https://adegbalola.com/ Facebook page:...
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Dr. Emilie M. Townes Champions a Robust Hope in the Midst of a Matrix
Angela interviewed Dr. Emilie M. Townes on October 12, 2021, via video conference. Townes talked about growing up in Durham, North Carolina, her formative years in theological education and parachurch work, and the necessity of having a robust hope. Emilie M. Townes, an American Baptist...
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Sharon Bridgforth Creates Spaces for Healing and Remembrance on Stage and in Life
Angela sat down with Sharon Bridgforth on October 8, 2021, to record this interview via video conference. Bridgforth talked about her formative years, her pathway to healing, intergenerational mentoring, and her life as a touring artist in the time of the COVID-19 pandemic. Sharon Bridgforth's...
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Deidre McCalla is no 9 to 5 Singer Songwriter
This interview was recorded by Angela Denise Davis on October 14, 2021, via video conference. Deidre McCalla sat down with Angela to talk about McCalla's early life in New York, her start in music, the herstory of her place in the women's music movement, and the way the COVID-19 pandemic changed...
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Sherri Jackson Tells Her COVID-19 Pandemic Story as a Healthcare Professional
On August 19, 2021, Angela sat down with Sherri Jackson to record her story about living in the era of the COVID-19 pandemic as a healthcare professional. Jackson is a healthcare provider,minister and activist. She has a wide range of LBGTQ.and AIDS organizational involvement. She has been a...
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Melodie J Rodgers Celebrates Southern Literature and our 3rd Anniversary
Melodie J. Rodgers is the Founding Editor of SOREN LIT. Her creative writing and photography has appeared in Johns Hopkins University's Doctor T. J. Eckleburg Review, G.R.I.T.S. - Girls Raised In the South: An Anthology of Southern Queer Womyns' Voices and Their Allies, Future is Fiction,...
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Cheryl Clarke Takes us to School
Our guest today is the Black lesbian feminist writer, Cheryl Clarke. She is the author of Narratives: Poems in the Tradition of Black Women (1982), Living as a Lesbian (1986, reprinted in 2015), Humid Pitch (1989), Experimental Love (1993), and By My Precise Haircut (2016). Since 1979, she has...
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Joyce Penalver Captures East and West in Recounting a Life of Intersections
Joyce Penalver is a retired therapist in Vallejo, California. She was instrumental in forming social clubs and newsletters serving Black lesbians in the Greater Bay Area. We recorded this interview with her in February 2020 before the nationwide lockdowns prompted by COVID-19.
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The Art and Spirit of Verlena L. Johnson
In August 2020, Verlena L. Johnson was featured in ZAMI NOBLA's virtual art show, Cocktails, Tea, and Art. This interview was recorded remotely a few days before the show. Verlena L. Johnson was born and raised in the Midwest (Wisconsin and Illinois), but also briefly lived in New York City…
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Janyce Jackson Jones on the Fluid Nature of Art and Life
Reverend Elder Janyce Jackson Jones was one of the artists showcased in August 2020 at ZAMI NOBLA's visual art exhibit, Cocktails, Tea, and Art. She discovered her passion for art upon retiring to coastal North Carolina after 21 years of dedicated service to her church and social justice causes…
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Lorraine Lane Gets in the Spirit about Cocktails and Operating a Restaurant in the Time of COVID-19
Lorraine Lane was a guest artist for our virtual art show, "Cocktails, Tea, & Art," in August 2020. In this episode, she talks about how to make a great cocktail, how she came to love bourbon, and the challenges of operating a restaurant during the COVID-19 pandemic. Lorraine came into the Food...
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Black LGBTQ Health Forum 2019
This is a file from our archives. On August 31, 2020, ZAMI NOBLA in Partnership with the Southern Unity Movement sponsored Working Cross Differences: The Black LGBTQIA Health/Wellness Public Forum as part of Atlanta Black Gay Pride. This audio clip is from a conversation with Dr. Lourdes Dolores...
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Mary Watkins Composes and Arranges a Life of Music and Movement
In February 2020, Angela Denise Davis interviewed Mary D. Watkins at her home in Oakland, California. Watkins was gracious in her recounting of major life events and her work as a composer and musician. Trained in classical music at Howard University, Watkins has composed three operas and has...
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Dr. Wilhelmina Perry Reflects on Lesbian Love, Radical Activism, and COVID-19
Dr. Wilhelmina Perry (85) was interviewed by Angela Denise Davis from her home in June 2020. She talked about growing up in Harlem, her 30-year partnership with Antonia Pantoja, radical activism, and life during the COVID-19 pandemic. She is a community activist, social work educator, spiritual...
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Brenda Joyce Crawford Talks About Cannabis, Community Organizing, and Change
Brenda Joyce Crawford has been in the thick of social justice work for over five decades. She's an unapologetic butch woman who comes from a blue collar working class background in the U.S. South. A great deal of her career has been spent promoting values-based leadership in order to create safe...
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Lisbet Tellefsen Recounts Her Life as a Memory Keeper
Lisbet Tellefsen is an activist, publisher, producer and archivist that has served the Bay Area's LGBT community for over 3 decades. In 1989 she co-founded Aché: a Black Lesbian Journal —which served as an cultural, political and social nexus for LGBT communities of color both nationally and...
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Dr. Lourdes Dolores Follins On Black LGBT Health, Yoruba Spirituality, and Therapy
Lourdes Dolores Follins's Biography Dr. Lourdes Dolores Follins is a Black, queer femme psychotherapist and writer. As a therapist, researcher, and organizational consultant, she has worked with adolescents and adults of color who are marginalized because of their ethnoracial background and…
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Ericka Huggins on Mothers, Mindfulness, and Meditation
Angela interviewed Ericka Huggins at her home in Oakland, California in February 2020. Huggins, an educator, Black Panther Party member, former political prisoner, human rights advocate and poet, generously shared poignant parts of her life. For 40 years Ericka has lectured in the United States,...
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Michelle Elizabeth Brown Talks about Podcasting, Poetry, and Pride
This episode is a conversation with sister podcaster, Michelle Elizabeth Brown, who lives in Detroit, Michigan. In addition to being a podcaster, Michelle is a public speaker, poet, author, and activist. She is a force for change! She was born and raised in Detroit graduating from Cass Technical...
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Nikki Young and Benae Beamon Talk about Love, Work, and Ethics
Benae Beamon is from North Carolina, where she started dancing and joined the acclaimed North Carolina Youth Tap Ensemble under the direction of Gene Medler. She went on to earn a BA from Colgate University and an MA from Yale University and is currently completing her PhD at Boston University in...
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Dr. Tonia Poteat Addresses COVID-19 Questions
During these uncertain times, it is important to have accurate information regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. Our guest, Dr. Tonia Poteat, fielded questions for a webinar sponsored by ZAMI NOBLA on March 22, 2020. This is a recording of that event. Tonia Poteat, PhD, PA-C, MPH, is Assistant…
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Jowanna Tillman and Edonna Koon Talk about Living the RV Life
We interviewed Jowanna Tillman and Edonna Koon in the summer of 2019. They shared how they came to the RV life and what sustains them as they travel and work across the United States. This travel loving couple started full time RVing in early 2018. They are always up for an adventure. Edonna is a...
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Joi and Jane Mitchell Talk about Work and Residency Abroad
What is it like to live and work outside the United States? In this episode, Joi and Jane Mitchell tell us about their experiences living abroad in Korea and the UK. We also talk about shifts in careers, national identity, and culture. Dr. Joi Mitchell is Originally from Detroit, Michigan. She...
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Sheila Alexander-Reid Shares Herstory of "Women in the Life" and Talks about Black Lesbian Herstory Preservation
In August 2019, we interviewed Sheila Alexander-Reid at her home in Washington, D.C. Reid is the Director, Mayor's Office of LGBTQ Affairs, and Founding Member, Women in the Life Association. She talks about the origins of Women in the Life, her work in the Mayor's Office, and the preservation of...
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Angela Denise Davis Reflects on One Year of Podcasting
We are back with our latest, a reflection from our host and producer, Angela Denise Davis. This episode is a recording of a talk she gave at The First Existentialist Congregation of Atlanta this past summer. We also share a meaningful out-take from a previous interview with one of our guests.
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Deepali Gokhale and Tishana Trainor Reflect on Creating a Loving Space as Lesbians from Different Ethnic and Social Backgrounds
This is the third in a four episode series on lesbian couples. Today, we talk about the process of creating physical emotional, and familial space in our lives. Creating space in a lesbian relationship can be especially challenging when a couple has different ethnic backgrounds as do our guests...
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Grace Queen Tribling Talks About Mothering, Becoming a Lesbian, and Living in Rural Georgia
Grace Queen Tribling, a native of DC, talks candidly about her becoming a lesbian in her late 30s. She also share some highlights on her relationship with her mother and life in rural Georgia.
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Kamilah Aisha Moon Talks about the Human Business of Poetry
The author of Starshine & Clay (2017), featured on NPR's "All Things Considered" as a collection that captures America in poetry, and She Has a Name (2013), a finalist for both the Audre Lorde and Lambda Literary Awards, Kamilah Aisha Moon's work has been published widely, including in Best...
About this show
The ZAMI NOBLA Podcast is a sound source for Black Lesbians 40 and older. Our show topics include current events, LGBT affairs, Black Lesbian Herstory & Health and Wellness. Angela Denise Davis is the show's Creator, Producer, and Host.
Hosted by
Angela Denise Davis