Activist Spotlight: Maya González
Maya in conversation with Ellen Cassedy, a fellow activist, in Selma
Photo Credit: Jay Mallin
Hello! My name is Maya “Zuni” González and I'm a third-year PhD student in History at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. I’m broadly interested in Yiddish and American Holocaust memory. My current research project looks at what Yiddish-language zines tell us about twenty-first century secular Yiddish culture.
The stories and historic materials of the radical Yiddish Left inspire my political organizing. As a zine-maker, I am especially interested in underground publishing as a tool of political movements. My first English/Yiddish zine was a collection of 30+ words sourced from historic dictionaries and medical books to talk about reproductive health and justice. I'm currently co-editing a zine with JVPWM with stories from Jewish community members who have made the choice to join the struggle for Palestinian liberation. I organize zine-making workshops to bring this skill into my community. Whether it's through teaching people how to fold a zine that they will fill with their own ideas, or introducing a new set of Yiddish words for them to describe their lived experiences, my organizing is about empowering the Jewish Left to plug in and speak out.
Visiting Selma with the Workers Circle affirmed the power of bringing Yiddish language and culture into social justice spaces. We thought deeply about how language can uphold or destabilize structures of oppression, especially during times of rapid change when language itself is transforming. We heard from community members fighting to strengthen Selma schools with necessary resources, organizing against statewide book bans, and making voting accessible for everyone. Marching alongside Alabama residents — much like our Workers Circle ancestors sixty years ago — moved me to organize in support of Alabama residents today.
I invite you to download my new zine about Eve Adams, a Jewish lesbian targeted for her underground publishing in the 1920s. All profits from downloads of this zine will go to Read Freely Alabama, a group of library advocates working to oppose anti-library extremism in Alabama. Suggested donations of $2 or more. A sheynem dank—thank you.