As a young person who finds herself straddling many worlds, Miriam Zoila Pérez is constantly pushing boundaries and making connections between her multiple identities and passions. Coming out in a Cuban family and grappling with gender non-conformity have provided plenty of fodder for her activism and writing.

Pérez has worked in the reproductive justice movement, both online and in person, for the past several years. She has been with the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health (NLIRH) for over four years and has served on the Board of Directors of the Sistersong Women of Color Reproductive Health Collective and the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice.

She is an editor at Feministing.com, the widely read and popular Feminist blog with over 500,000 unique visitors a month, and the founder of Radical Doula, a blog that covers the intersections of birth activism and social justice from a doula’s perspective. Her writing has been featured online and off in publications such as RH Reality Check, Bitch Magazine, The Nation, Alternet and The American Prospect, among others. Her work has also appeared in a number of anthologies, including Click: When We Knew We Were Feminists and Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and a World Without Rape. In 2009, she was named one of the Women’s Information Network’s (WIN) Young Women of Achievement.

From the perspective of a young queer Latina activist, with an informal, refreshing speaking style, Pérez’s most requested lectures and workshops are:
• Feminism’s Gender Identity Crisis: Genderqueer Perspectives from the Feminist Movement A personal narrative about being a genderqueer feminist and what it’s like to try to be gender non-conforming in a women’s movement. Includes the ways in which feminism needs to update to be relevant to new ideas of gender identity.
• Connecting Birth Activism and Reproductive Rights Some think childbirth and abortion are two issues that have nothing in common. They are wrong, and a new movement of doulas working to support women during abortions is proving it.
• Organizing for Reproductive Justice in Immigrant Communities This interactive workshop breaks down the myths about Latino immigrants and highlights how to achieve reproductive justice. Topics include the intersection between reproductive justice and immigrants, how to work on these issues in Spanish speaking communities, what challenges are faced such as Catholicism, and what can be done to address them.
• Queering Reproductive Justice Why should the queer community care about reproductive justice? This interactive workshop elucidates what these two communities have in common and why we have to work together.

Pérez also is available to perform the following non-fiction personal essays:
• Coming back around to butch to be published in Persistence: Still Butch and Femme by Arsenal Pulp Press, forthcoming in 2011
• Pillow dancing and other failed hetero-adventures published in Click: When We Knew We Were Feminists, May 2010
• When sexual autonomy isn’t enough: Sexual violence against immigrant women in the United States published in Yes Means Yes: Visions of Female Sexual Power and a World Without Rape, January 2009

In addition to numerous speaking engagements about LGBTQ issues, the barriers facing Latina immigrants and reproductive justice activism at national conferences such as the Facing Race Conference, the National Council of Abortion Providers Conference, and the Civil Liberties and Public Policy Abortion Rights to Social Justice, Pérez has lectured at colleges and universities across the country. Recently, she appeared at New York University, Georgetown University, Tufts University, Boston College, and Old Dominion University. Pérez also enjoys speaking to local organizations such as Planned Parenthood NYC, and national groups like NARAL Pro-Choice America and the Asian American Justice Center.

Drawing on her experience as an online communications consultant for a number of social justice non-profits, Pérez regularly speaks about blogging and social media at industry conferences, and has conducted trainings for the United States Student Association, NLIRH, and the American Forum on topics related to writing for the web, launching a blog and developing an online communications strategy. Her television and radio credits include appearances on GRITtv, Radio Bilingue, and NPR’s Here and Now.