North Memphis native, Shahidah Jones is my guest for Ep 221 of the Verbally Effective Podcast. Shay comes from a huge family consisting of Smokey City, Hurt Village, New Chicago and more. Half of her family is of the Islam faith which is the cornerstone of her organizing efforts. She tells us of her time at Austin Peay University where she encountered much adversity while earning her degree. Upon graduation, Shay shares her journey which encompasses working as a waitress at Ebony and Lace which deeply humanized her. She later worked her way through call centers and entered the corporate world working in Marketing at FedEx. Shay felt that the titles and money was not fulfilling her purpose. When she entered her 40’s life changed and she started paying attention to some of the grass roots organizations and started doing work in the community. However, it was the death of Darrius Stewart that totally changed the trajectory of her organizing and activist work. Take a listen as Shay breaks down the predatory criminal justice system in Memphis and her thoughts on the recent District Attorney race. She’s currently active in the Black Lives Matter Memphis Chapter working towards improvement on bail bonds, transformative justice trainings, voter registration programs, end money bail campaign and the Freedom Singers Fellowship. You can also catch Shay managing Tyke T’s career and promoting his new album, “Written by Tyke T” in addition to planning DreamFest 2023.