My idea of zines was that only white punks could make them.

I am zine-crushing on Joyce Hatton so hard right now. She just send me issues 8, 9, and 10 of her zine Think About the Bubbles and they are SO good that it wasnt enough just to reviews her zine(s). I wanted to know how it all began. Nia: How long have you been doing zines? Joyce: I made my first zine about 12 years ago. I didnt copy it, but it was un-copyable anyway because I made it on construction paper and the contrast was low. I thought of it more as an art book, because my idea of zines was that only white punks could make them, and they had to have that certain distressed look of being recopied to them. I made a second issue, but I didnt like it so I ended up throwing them both away, which is a shame, because the first one was really beautiful. It was about loneliness, which I didnt realize at the time. My friend Becca made a zine called Past Due, and I contributed to that, and played around with making zines that I never copied. I started Think About the Bubbles #1 in December of 2012. I dont remember how I decided to make a zine. I was in the psych hospital and just feeling so awful and alienated so I asked for some paper. Somehow I knew making a zine was the only way I could really express myself. So that zine was made while I was in the hospital with just a pencil, so I think thats how my style was kind of born. Nia: What made you want to get started/how did you become introduced to the medium? Joyce: I dont know how I was introduced to zines. I know Ive seen them at different stores. I used to work at a place that had a tiny zine library. Nia: Have you always had such a unique style (hand-writing zines, using text as illustration) or is that something you developed along the way? Joyce: I think my style has definitely developed, but my zines have always been handwritten and self-illustrated. I think the using text as illustration came about because I thought I couldnt draw, so I figured Id make it more interesting to look at by making the text interesting? Nia: How long have you been in and out of psychiatric treatment? Joyce: I first went into a psych ward in my early twenties. Soon after I ended up being committed, mostly for insurance reasons, which was a really horrible experience. I thought that I somehow marked for life as crazy and my life was over and I ended up getting a lot more depressed while I was in there.

I never stayed on meds or followed any kind of treatment plan, so the hospitalizations didnt work anyway ha. But I would end up back there when I was depressed enough. In 2011 when I went after my suicide attempt and got sober thats when it finally took. In the year before I made the first issue of Think About the Bubbles I was hospitalized like five times? Maybe more. Id been sober long enough that I was gaining awareness of what the heck had been happening in my life, and how unhealthy most of my relationships were, and I didnt have booze and drugs as my coping skill anymore. I was a wreck. Once I started making zines my mental health improved immediately. It was incredibly empowering for me to have a box of zines Id made from start to finish that was my thoughts about mental health, uncensored by anyone. Also, zines have really helped my mental health because theyre a great way for me to process things Ive been through. I really am working on being authentic and showing my true self, so I make these zines. I make them because I have to work toward growth and showing myself and some sort of fearlessness. It was really validating to get connected to other POC zine makers/readers, because that started me on a journey from liberation regarding mental health to acknowledging that I am a black woman and that my mental health problems are in part due to being a black woman who has lived mostly in North and South Dakota. Nia: Ive heard you refer to yourself as crazy and mentally ill. What do these words or identities mean to you? Joyce: I primarily identify as mentally ill. Sometimes I call myself crazy with other mentally ill people. I dont think crazy is necessarily an offensive word, but I do generally hear people using it meaning to being hurtful, when referring to people. I dont know what the identity means to me! Hmm. I dont really think of it as an identity, which I know is problematic at times. My mental health issues are disabling, but I have really ableist ideas of what disability is sometimes. I need to do a lot more thinking and reading about that. Nia: In the last part of this interview you said, My mental health problems are in part due to being a black woman who has lived mostly in North and South Dakota. Could you elaborate on this a little bit? Joyce: Its hard to separate whats what, because I dont want to blame all of my mental health problems on oppression, but I think it definitely plays a role in it. I finally really realized when I was on the Race Riot Tour that all of those little microaggressions were in fact other peoples issue, not mine. I realized that I was living in a community of mostly white people who constantly were gaslighting me, even/especially some of the

radicals. Once I realized that I saw that some part of my anxiety came from never really being on solid ground. Last year Wing Young Huie was the artist-in-residence at the Plains Art Museum, and I went to his opening and he talked briefly about growing up in Duluth, MN where there was only one other Asian student in his school He said he avoided that student because they reminded Wing of his own otherness, and that was the first time I heard someone talk about their internalized racism. Until then I knew I had those thoughts but I had so much shame about it I didnt think I could ever talk about it. Sometimes black people that I met would tease me about not being a real black person, and now I can see that some of it was just honest teasing (if you can get past the idea of what a real black person is). But at the time is was really wounding and confusingespecially conversations about code-switching. I would get really confused and now I understand its because I only have the one code, as far as how I speak. Sometimes I use black slang in my head but it feels so weird coming out of my mouth. It feels very appropriative when I use it, because that isnt my culture- I didnt grow up in it. So as far as my mental health problems stemming from living here: I just dont feel like I fit in anywhere. As I grew up many people made it really clear I was an other, and everyone around me let me know my acceptance was conditional based on one factor or another. I was called racial slurs very rarely, but white people would say really racist things and then say but not you, youre one of the good ones. And I realize now that being one of the good ones means not saying, Hey, what you said was racist as hell and thats not ok, but I was young, so I couldnt even express that if I wanted to. As I got older I fit in well enough when I was drunk all the time and an unhealthy miserable ineffective wretch, not great, but well enough. But now that Im getting healthier, love myself, have self-esteem, and am assertive, people really dont like me because less and less am I one of the good ones. Im increasingly uppity and dont know my place anymore. To just express my feelings is letting all hell loose. Nia: Is there anything NOT crazy-making about being a black woman in North and/or South Dakota? Joyce: The things that arent crazy making about living here I think there are more than I realize. Lately, Ive been really depressed and angry because Im just realizing how living here has affected me. But, for one thing, its SO easy to live here. I never had a hard time finding a job, and the rent is so cheap its ridiculous. Resources and opportunities can be easy to come by. Last year when I was starting Fargo Moorhead Zine Fest I didnt know what I was doing, but I thought that having zine workshops would be a good start, and the Rourke Art Museum let me use space in the museum for free even though they had no idea who I was. Ultimately, one of the reasons I stay is that I really want to make a difference in the lives of youth of color, especially black girls, that are experiencing the same problems I faced when I was young. Nia: Tell me a little bit about the Fargo-Moorhead Zine Fest.

Joyce: I started the Fargo Moorhead Zine Fest because I LOVE zines. They feel so safe to me. Its a safe way for me to communicate, and theres so many zines that validate my experiences and that has helped me a lot. My goal with FMZF was/is to create ongoing community where safe space skills could be practiced. Id just come from an experience where a really awesome set of safe space values were thrown out the window as soon as it was clear that it takes work and some discomfort to uphold those values. I really wanted to take what Id learned from that experience and create a safe space to practice skills so that we could all have more courage to go out and use them in the larger community. It ended up being really awesome. Maggie Eighteen wrote up this recap. I realized it was really just a party I threw for myself, to celebrate being alive and growing. Im really bad at working with people, so Im hoping that this year I can relax and work with others as long as I remember: 1) its a celebration, and 2) we have to work and be willing to communicate to have a safe space. It felt really affirming that there was a large focus on independent media made by people of color. It felt really good to claim physical space and time to talk about work that people of color were doing, and why that work was important. FMZF 2014 will have that same focus, which is exciting. Buy her zines here.