Content Warning: The guide and source text reference rape and sexual abuse, physical abuse, child abuse, anti-gay bias, anti-trans bias, racism, ableism, classism, and medical abuse/neglect. The author also reclaims and utilizes a number of slurs and derogatory terms, which are referenced and quoted in context throughout this guide. These terms include: “cripple/crip,” “dyke,” “gimp,” “freak,” and “queer.”

“But what sends me scrambling for a pen, what interrupts my reading over and over with the urge to write, is neither the familiarity of what we share nor my curiosity about what we don’t. It’s not just the what. It’s the how.

Morales examines why Eli Clare’s writing inspires her. She argues that is not just the content of his writing—namely, a life similar to her own. It is the craft that appeals to her, which points to The Role of Personal Narrative in Social Justice Work: The literary nature of Clare’s personal essays functions differently than a more purely research-based appeal might.

“How do we construct and reconstruct self-love in the face of the corrosive dehumanization and abusiveness oppression inflicts?”

Morales poses a question that her own work and Clare’s work seek to answer. The ideas of pride and witness are important to answering this question, and Clare will dive into them with depth.

“Skin of our bodies and skin of the world. This is how to understand the land as well as the flesh. To be unsingular, fractured and whole, grieving and proud, in universal solidarity and difficult alliance, never to allow urgency or burning injury to keep us from demanding the whole, intricate, inclusive story.”

The image of skin and reaching beneath the skin is crucial to Exile and Pride and especially to the final essay. In associating skin with both the human body and the Earth itself, Morales positions humanity as continuous with its environment (paradoxically, as skin itself would seem to constitute a barrier). This lays the groundwork for the collection’s exploration of The Impact of Environmental Degradation on Marginalized Communities. Morales also mentions the importance of crafting an “inclusive” story, which speaks to the theme of The Intersections of Disability, Gender, and Sexuality, as all of those identities are essential to forming an inclusive world.