Dr. Eric Aoki – MODERATOR

Dr. Eric Aoki teaches courses in Interpersonal, Co-Cultural, and Intercultural Communication at the undergraduate level and Communication & Cultural Diversity at the graduate level. His courses are grounded in two guiding principles: “conversations are the most meaningful events of our lives” (learned from his mentor, Dr. John Stewart), and “it is imperative that we keep the cultural conversation going.” Eric’s advocacy includes work with CSU student diversity offices and other diversity-based causes. Eric’s research intersects the areas of identity, voice, and cultural (re)presentations in media and public spaces. Two of his publication titles include: “Mexican American Ethnicity in Biola, CA: An ethnographic account of hard work, family, and religion” in The Howard Journal of Communications, and “Spaces of remembering and forgetting: The reverent eye/I at the Plains Indian Museum” in Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies with his co-authors Brian Ott and Greg Dickinson. Eric is also published in Rhetoric and Public Affairs, Women’s Studies in Communication, Cultural Studies<=> Critical Methodologies, and the Western Journal of Communication.

Kelly Shortandqueer – PANELIST

Kelly Shortandqueer is one of the co-founders of the Denver Zine Library, a volunteer-run nonprofit organization that boasts over 15,000 zines in the lending collection. Established in December 2003, the DZL has hosted multiple Denver Zine Fests, facilitated tons of zine-making workshops, and has championed the power of self-publishing as a powerful tool for marginalized voices. For the past decade, Kelly has been publishing the zine series “shortandqueer”, each issue focusing on a different theme through the lens of being queer and transgender. His storytelling has been featured on The Narrators stage  as well as through a collaboration between the Narrators and DCPA’s Off-Center at the Jones Theater, in a show titled “Lived/Re-Lived”. Besides writing and storytelling, Kelly is also a drag artist, performing under the name Olive de Bottom. Since being crowned Honky Tonk Queen of the International Association of Gay Square Dance Clubs in 2014, he has performed at several local and national venues and is always looking for new excuses to make appearances.

Dr.  Jacob McWilliams – PANELIST

Women & Gender Center Director at University of Colorado Denver, Jacob came to CU Denver from the University of Colorado Boulder, where he worked as a postdoctoral research associate and instructor in the School of Education and in the INVST Community Leadership Program. Jacob earned his PhD in Education, with a minor in Gender, Sexuality, and Policy Studies, from Indiana University. Jacob’s research focuses on issues of gender and sexual diversity in education, and recent work involves developing queer pedagogies for supporting new media literacies practices in the elementary classroom and, most recently, drawing on queer and transgender theory for understanding the dominant discourses of engineering education and how those discourses marginalize and exclude people from traditionally vulnerable gender, sexual, and ethnic groups.

Patrice Palmer – PANELIST

Currently working in the College of Business as the coordinator of a student lead group known as Business Diversity Leadership Alliance; while being a full time academic advisor Patrice also teaches a course within the College of Business, Social Responsibility and Leadership that blends Social identity concepts and Business theory to create a more just business environment. Also guest lecturing in the College of Education teaching classism to practicum ready teaching assistants and continuously looking for opportunities to blend knowledge of Diversity, Social Justice and Inclusion with educational leadership.