Staff
Julie Falk, executive director
julie(at)b-word.org
Julie Falk was hired as Bitch Media’s first Executive Director in June 2009. She previously served as Executive Director of the Center for Health Justice in Los Angeles and the Prison Media Fund in Cambridge, MA.Born in Kentucky, Julie is a graduate of Swarthmore College. She is thrilled to have landed in Portland OR, where she enjoys cooking and eating the local bounty and exploring the town through the eyes of her children and dog, Copper.
Favorite TV: Perry Mason, Rockford Files, Designing Women, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Wire
Favorite Movie: Rear Window
Favorite Authors: Carson McCullers, Carolyn Keene, MFK Fisher, Georges Simenon, Lois Lowry
Turn-ons: bakeries, used bookstores, German writing instruments, clean linens
Turn-offs: industrial meat production, extreme temperatures, inconsistency
Andi Zeisler, cofounder and editorial/creative director
andi(at)b-word.org
Andi is the co-founder of Bitch: Feminist Response to Pop Culture. A longtime freelance writer and illustrator, Andi's work has appeared in numerous periodicals and newspapers, including Ms., Mother Jones, Utne, BUST, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Women's Review of Books, and Hues. She is a former pop-music columnist for the SF Weekly and the East Bay Express, and also contributed to the anthologies Young Wives' Tales, Secrets and Confidences: The Complicated Truth About Women's Friendships (both from Seal Press), and Howl: A Collection of the Best Contemporary Dog Wit (Crown). She is the coeditor of BitchFest: 10 Years of Cultural Criticism from the Pages of Bitch Magazine, and the author of Feminism and Pop Culture (Seal Press). She speaks frequently on the subject of feminism and the media at various colleges and universities.
Andi graduated from The Colorado College in 1994 with a B.A. in Fine Art that has proved to be more or less useless, though she did use it to secure a job designing rugs for Pottery Barn back in the day. She passes her non-Bitch hours watching television, hanging out with her family, and embroidering portraits of dogs. Her other interests include painting, walking, snacking, Scrabble, and the interrobang.
Fatal weakness: candy, naps
Crushes: Gram Parsons, Steve Buscemi, Hugh Laurie
Favorite TV shows: True Blood, 30 Rock, Freaks and Geeks, House, Dexter, dog shows
Turn-ons: clogs, flocked wallpaper, the Winter Olympics, rainbow cookies
Turnoffs: lip liner, improper punctuation, Gwyneth Paltrow
Secretly wishes she were a: zoo keeper
Andi's animal twin: Andi has always felt an affinity for elephants, since she too has a long nose, an excellent memory, and a deep appreciation for French pastries and department stores — which, if the Babar books are to be believed, are apparently really big with elephants. She also loves the color gray.
Kristin Rogers Brown, art director
kristin(at)b-word.org
Kristin Rogers Brown joined Bitch Media as Art Director in March, 2010. Though her first love in design is print, she loves finding the right media for the message and believes in keeping a balance of form, function, and delight in all the details of her work whether it’s brand development, packaging, identity, or web design. Born outside of Chicago, Kristin is a graduate of Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio. In addition to designing Bitch, Kristin is a freelance designer, educator, and former vice president of AIGA Portland (American Institute of Graphic Arts). She has worked with sustainable design initiatives for a variety of clients, and has been instrumental in work with AIGA Portland’s green team (established in 2008) and Worldstudio’s Urban Forest Project. When not designing, Kristin frequents waterparks, swoons for David Bowie, stalks jewelry designers and illustrators, attempts to sew, and runs or rides her bike around Portland. She is part insomniac, part narcoleptic, and quite possibly the messiest perfectionist ever.
Forever celebrity crush: David Bowie, Wayne Coyne, Mike Rowe, Alan Alda, Parker Posey
Favorite music of the moment: Bowie, Neko Case, Sharon Jones, Budos Band, Jawbreaker, Mars Volta
Favorite movies: Bottle Rocket, Hoosiers, Little Miss Sunshine, Amorres Perros, Christopher Guest in every flavor
Favorite TV shows: 30 Rock, Alan Alda’s Scientific American Frontiers, Arrested Development, Adventure Time, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Trailblazers’ basketball, Discovery Channel-style reality shows, and most things related to law and/or order
Favorite books: Cruddy (Linda Barry), Dubliners (James Joyce), Spook (Mary Roach), Yehuda Amachai’s poetry, Raymond Carver in general
Turn-ons: scrabble, mix tapes (or CDs, since it’s not 1983), road trips, crabcake benedicts, Radiolab
Turn-offs: bad teeth, slam poetry, moths, using the wrong “to”, “too”, or “two” (ditto for “your/you’re”)
Secretly wishes she were a: Botanist
Jaymee Jacoby, development director
jaymee(at)b-word.org
Jaymee is a nonprofit addict, having worked and volunteered over the last fifteen years in just about every size and shape of organization. After gaining very practical undergraduate degrees in Studio Art, French and Art History, Jaymee decided that she was better suited to a career of administrative creativity, and completed her M.P.A. in Nonprofit Management and Development in 2009. Her love for the arts and humanities led to 9 years of development and administrative work in arts, humanities and educational institutions before coming to Bitch to raise money for another cause she is keen on: the feminist analysis of pop culture and the media.
When not asking others to put their money where their heart is, Jaymee enjoys spending time with her partner and their young son and pets, most all food-related activities and places, riding down snowy mountains, fiction and comedic non-fiction, late-night yoga, rapid succession TV series consumption, and planning the next trip.
Favorite authors: T.C. Boyle, Margaret Atwood, Sarah Vowell, Laura Lippman
Favorite TV shows: cooking and travel shows, Freaks and Geeks, Top Chef, Dexter, Mad Men, Project Runway, Arrested Development
Turn-ons: frankness, old buildings, accessible art, strong coffee, philanthropy, good food
Turn-offs: big egos, bad tippers, cultural insensitivity, wastefulness, disorganization
Secretly wishes she was a: baker or wildlife biologist
Jaymee's animal twin: Jaymee identifies most with the short-limbed, very active otter. Otters (like Jaymee) prefer to live near the water and are playful animals that engage in various behaviors for sheer enjoyment.
Brian Frank, finance and technology director
brian(at)b-word.org
Brian is the Finance and Technology Director at Bitch Media, keeping the administrative and financial gears turning. Brian has been active in social justice and environmental causes for the past decade, most recently working for the human rights group Global Exchange, co-founding the North American branch of the grassroots energy / climate change network Rising Tide, and doing relief work during the nine months after hurricane Katrina in New Orleans with Common Ground. When not partying with databases or spreadsheets, Brian is probably in the kitchen, gardening, or botanizing in the Cascade mountains.
Favorite TV shows: Dexter, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Six Feet Under, Twin Peaks, The Wire
Favorite directors: Emir Kusturica, Hayao Miyazaki
Best Celebrity Impersonation: Morrissey
Turn-ons: Eggplant, basil, tomatoes, and curries of all types
Turn-offs: Teflon
Secretly wishes he was a: vegetarian cooking / relationship advice tv show host
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Kjerstin Johnson, web content manager and senior editor
online(at)b-word.org
Kjerstin Johnson was born and raised in Kansas City proper (that is, Missouri) and moved to Oregon with her parents soon after she had moved to Minnesota for college, where she had the opportunity to study abroad in France and Vietnam. She later studied small publishing and writing at Portland State University, but has since continued research in her previous fields of expertise, namely old-timey comics, cartoons, and meticulously crafted mix CDs.
Kjerstin can't imagine a better place to punch her clock than Bitch (feminism and pop culture? Who'd a thunk!) and has volunteered with Rock'n'Roll Camp for Girls and at the Independent Publishing Resource Center in Portland.
Favorite Authors: Kelly Link, Dorothy Parker, the Russians, Brenda Ueland
Favorite TV shows: The Critic, Peep Show, Strangers with Candy
Turn-ons: Christian Slater circa. 1989, Vietnamese food, biking
Turn-offs: Inflammatory headlines/tweets that actually precede non-inflammatory articles
Secretly wishes she was: in an all-girl Replacements cover band.
Kjerstin's animal twin: Kjerstin imagines herself a bit of a bleating, awkward lamb because she is sometimes clumsy and likes to graze (her hair can be unruly at times as well).
Kelsey Wallace, web editor
kelsey(at)b-word.org
An honest-to-goodness Portland native, Kelsey earned her M.A. in Communication Studies/Gender Studies at the University of Oregon and her B.A. in Communication Studies/Sociology/French at Gonzaga University. When not editing the interwebs at the Bitch office, Kelsey can be found lecturing reluctant students, listening to podcasts, and hanging out with her French Bulldog, Edith. She also enjoys making things out of fabric and watching pretty much anything on television (preferably at the same time, and preferably with Edith). If you're looking for a new pal who loves both LOLcats and Linda Ronstadt records, she's your gal.
Favorite albums: Girls in the Garage vol. 9 Oriental Special, Paper Television by The Blow, Live at the Harlem Square Club by Sam Cooke, Ready to Die by Notorious B.I.G.
Favorite movies: The Royal Tenenbaums, The Station Agent, Videodrome
Favorite books: Pastoralia (George Saunders), Slouching Towards Bethlehem (Joan Didion), An Invisible Sign of My Own (Aimee Bender)
Turn-ons: '70s country music, an encyclopedic knowledge of Arrested Development, boats
Turnoffs: baby talk, poor grammar, aggressive quirkiness
Celebrity crush: James Spader, especially during his '80s asshole phase
Secretly wishes she were a: hip hop MC
Kelsey's animal twin: The elusive red panda enjoys Asian cuisine and afternoon naps, and hates hot weather—Kelsey can relate.
Emily McNulty Scripter, development systems coordinator
emily(at)b-word.org
Bringing over fifteen years of nonprofit administration experience to Bitch Media, Emily McNulty Scripter is left and right-brained, being both an info-tamer and an artist. On the left-brain side she likes to organize, alphabetize and systemize (budgeting or preparing for an audit, anyone? Oh yes, and warm fuzzy thank you letters to our wonderful donors!). On the right-brain side she likes to create – sewing, painting, gardening, printmaking, bookbinding, beading, crocheting...The only person she knows with more hobbies is her husband, who is a mad scientist. Sometimes it feels like her primary role in life is maintaining order, be it donor files or craft supplies.
Favorite movies: Brazil, Fight Club and anything by Michel Gondry or Wes Anderson
Favorite artists: historically - Frida Kahlo, Georgia O’Keefe, and Judy Chicago, and locally - Sharon Bronzan, Gabriel Manca, Kristin Shiga, John and Robin Gumaelius and many, many more
Turn-ons: cats, unpainted cedar siding, natural fibers, and creativity
Turn-offs: greed, people without empathy, and the corporate mentality (is this the previous 2 rolled up in 1?)
Emily's animal twin: Emily chose a cat as her animal twin as they can be very affectionate, but are particular with whom they establish a close relationship. When taken by surprise, their claws come out, but later they are embarrassed about this childish behaviour. They are quick learners (at things they consider worth learning), obsessively clean, and know the value of a good nap.
Ashley McAllister, library director
library(at)b-word.org
Ashley was born on a futon mattress in SE Portland. She grew up in the Portland area and then moved away to get her degree in Literature and Women’s Studies at Western Washington University. Given her love for feminism and books, when she came back to Portland it only made sense for her to become a feminist library coordinator.
Ashley has spent a lot of time working with women who have been affected by domestic violence as well as educating teenagers on the effects of sexual assault. She likes to take on elaborate craft projects, bake cookies, attempt to choreograph outrageous dance routines with her BFFs, and talk to her plants.
Favorite books: Fun Home (Alison Bechdel), Kindred (Octavia Butler), The History of Love (Nicole Krauss)
Favorite movies: Fire, Me and You and Everyone We Know, Volver, rom coms
Favorite TV: Parks and Recreation, Party Down, Freaks and Geeks
Turn-ons: scones, knit graffiti, beekeeping, ecofeminism, mason jars, snail mail
Turn-offs: factory farming, snagging her tights
Secretly wishes she were an: erotic baker
Ashley's animal twin: Ashley identifies with the honey bee, because she is busy, likes sweet things, and is community-minded.
Jyoti Roy, publishing intern
publishing(at)b-word.org
Born in Sydney, Australia, Jyoti is currently a full-time grad student at Portland State University in their writing and publishing program. She holds a degree in creative writing from the University of Wollongong, Australia, where her honors thesis Pussy Pirates Utopia: 21st Century Radical Literature, Lessons from Kathy Acker, formed the basis for her first published article in Bitch.
Jyoti co-founded Beating Hearts Press, a zine and book publishing project that distributed feminist, anarchist, and other radical works throughout Australia and Southeast Asia. Her first feminist publishing venture was a collaborative zine project called No Apologies, a response to a very macho straight edge punk scene in Sydney in the late '90s. Bitch has been an huge inspiration to Jyoti over the years, and she is honored to be a part of it.
In summer you can find her reading in one of Portland’s many fabulous public parks, and the rest of the year huddled in the small press section of Powell’s books.
Favorite books: Written on the Body (Jeanette Winterson), Pussy, King of the Pirates (Kathy Acker), Perfume (Patrick Suskind), Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, (Deleuze and Guattari), Fugitive Pieces (Anne Michaels), The God of Small Things (Arundhati Roy).
Favorite movies: Winged Migration, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Goonies, Karate Kid
Turn-ons: independent bookstores, road trips, tea
Turn-offs: dust, bigotry
Secretly wishes she were: an elite gymnast, or an opera singer.
Animal twin: Like the hummingbird Jyoti is small, but strong, and loves flowers.
Yana Tallon-Hicks, editorial intern
bitch(at)b-word.org
Yana got her super-useful Bachelor's Degree in Liberal Arts from Hampshire College where all of the hipster students design their own “concentrations”. Her very own self-made major focused on GLBT, gender and sexuality studies which she finished in 2008 with a thesis on San Franciscan lesbian bars. Shortly afterwards, Yana received over 40 hours of training on sex toys and sexual health as a Good Vibrations sex educator/sales associate and has had sex on the brain ever since. Because sharing is obviously caring, Yana snarks her way through a weekly sex column in the Valley Advocate, regularly contributes her sexpertise to Curve magazine and is pumped to get all feminist about sex-related pop culture during her internship at Bitch. When she's not happily glued to her tiny pink laptop, she can be found selling sex-positive goods at Portland's female-friendly sex toy shop She Bop.
Turn-ons: sharp written wit, dark chocolate, counseling strangers on their lube purchases
Turn-off: her own overlooked typos, inconsiderate neighbors, yogurt, the word “sphere”
Yana's animal twin: The Chihuahua! A tiny loud-mouth, Yana is forever linked to the Chihuahua as she too likes to ignore her pint-sized pup status to act like a big dog. A forever fan of the color pink, hoodies and optional devilishness, this particular Chihuahua flaunts a striking resemblance.
Jasmine Silver, design intern
jasmine(at)oohsilver.com, design(at)b-word.org
Jasmine was born and raised in the Portland-Metro area. Her parents moved out to the country where she attended Banks High School and hated it as only a teenager could. Jasmine studied 'virtual technology and design' for four months at the University of Idaho before running back to Portland and the tangibility of graphic design. Over the last three years living in the city, Jasmine has gained a new found appreciation for the Banks countryside, a love of brewing, and a BS in graphic design from Portland State.
Daily affirmation: Messy as it is, people keep tirelessly trying to communicate. We use written, verbal, and visual voices.
Fatal weakness: bad smells
Favorite authors: Douglas Copeland (especially for J-Pod and Life Without God), Starhawk, bell hooks
Favorite movies: Pan's Labyrinth, Little Miss Sunshine, The Science of Sleep, Synecdoche, New York, Man on Wire, The Wackness
Favorite TV: Firefly, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, X-Files, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, Queer as Folk, Star Trek Deep Space 9, Lost, Farscape, The Magic School Bus, Arthur
Turn-ons: ink & paper, typography, body positivity , herbs
Turn-offs: mold, competition, transit police
Secretly wishes she were: a clean person
Mac Pogue, new media intern
newmedia(at)b-word.org
Mac is a serial intern, birthed in the Northeastern suburbs of New Canaan, reared in New Mexico, high-schooled in the Bay Area and shipped off to Portland for an undergraduate degree at the fine institution of Lewis & Clark College. When not Facebooking, Twittering or blogging for Bitch he can be found Facebooking, Twittering or blogging for himself. In the non-internet world ("real," if you will) Mac can be found dining on any local or international sandwich varieties, digging himself into a financial ditch at any number of record stores or searching for the perfect biscuit recipe. Mac is unbelievably excited to work for/with/at Bitch and reportedly called his mom while jumping on his bed when he found out he got the job.
Favorite TV: Breaking Bad, Delocated, My So Called Life, Seinfeld
Favorite Movies: Dazed and Confused, The White Ribbon, Texas Chainsaw Massacre
Favorite Books: The Quarterly Journal of Speech, Twitter, The Savage Detectives
Favorite Albums: The Power Out by Electrelane, Fabulous Muscles by Xiu Xiu, Life... the Best Game in Town by Harvey Milk
Turn-ons: appropriately big words, replicating fast food in my kitchen, distortion pedals
Turn-offs: people that don't like hot sauce
Secretly wishes he were a: guitar solo
Animal twin: If Mac were an animal he would be an orangutan with an iPad, because sometimes that's just how he feels.
Bianca Butler, development intern
development(at)b-word.org
Bianca was born in Oklahoma, briefly raised in Indiana, and finally settled in southeast Michigan for most of her formative years, during which time she managed to contract a subtle accent which never quite matches that of the people around her. At Michigan State University, Bianca earned her B.A. in English, French, and the Residential College in the Arts and Humanities, a program that takes even longer to explain that it does to say. In some circles, Bianca is probably best known for her extensive shoe collection; her other interests include running, baking, and watching series of horror movies in reverse-chronological order. Since moving to Portland she has also developed some rather unexpected pastimes, including rock climbing, doing small-scale construction projects, and eating hot sauce.
Favorite TV: Bones, Gossip Girl, Curb Your Enthusiasm, 30 Rock, Gilmore Girls
Favorite sing-a-longs: "Flavor of the Weak" by American Hi-Fi), "Common People" by William Shatner, "What’s Up?" by 4 Non Blondes, "I Believe in a Thing Called Love" The Darkness
Favorite Books: Sexing the Cherry (Jeannette Winterson), American Gods (Neil Gaiman), Half of a Yellow Sun (Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie), Ella Enchanted (Gail Carson Levine)
Turn-ons: Kitchen gadgets, theme parties, animal-shaped rings
Turn-offs: Running shoes worn for non-athletic pursuits, “lose” spelled with two O’s
Secretly wishes she were a: a one-woman band
Animal twin: Bianca shares a special affinity with the rose-breasted cockatoo, a friendly bird that enjoys the occasional dance party. She’s also jealous of its pink plumage because of a youthful conviction that her eyes were pink (they weren’t).
Rachel Toback, library intern
libraryintern(at)b-word.org
Rachel is the Library Intern at Bitch. When she's not getting lost in the book she's supposed to be shelving, she keeps busy by organizing, categorizing and re-organizing the 50+ sections of books we have. Rachel likes to be surrounded by books and feminists and luckily most of her volunteer experiences in Portland have included one or the other or both! Not wanting to have to commit to any one major, Rachel is finishing up her Bachelors degree in Liberal Studies at Portland State University, where she basically gets to take whichever classes she wants, the future be damned. Rachel moved up to Oregon is 2008 from Santa Cruz, CA, where she grew up thinking that everywhere was sunny 300 days out of the year.
Favorite TV: Golden Girls, Murder She Wrote, True Blood, Twin Peaks, Arrested Development, X Files
Favorite Movies: Priscilla Queen of the Desert, Suspiria
Favorite Albums: Charm of the Highway Strip by The Magnetic Fields, Last Splash by The Breeders, Kind of Blue by Miles Davis, Live Through This by Hole, TV, Death and The Devil by Nü Sensae, The Very Best of Hall and Oates
Favorite Books: Everything That Rises Must Converge by Flannery O'Connor, East of Eden by John Steinbeck, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love by Raymond Carver, All About Love by bell hooks, The Essential Dykes to Watch Out For by Alison Bechdel. All Young Adult Fiction. All of it.
Turn Ons: Having bike lights, Greatest Hits albums, free coffee, puns
Turn offs: Willful ignorance, accidentally putting too much Sriracha in Pho, rendering it inedible
Animal Twin: The raccoon is a scavenging night-dweller with a great color scheme going on, who appears to be wearing glasses at all times. Rachel can relate.
Julie Sabatier, podcast producer
julie(at)destinationdiy.org
Julie has been reading Bitch since her days as an Oberlin College student and was honored to come on board to help out with the podcast. In addition to assisting the Bitch folks with their quarterly audio project, Julie Sabatier hosts and produces a monthly radio show/podcast of her own called Destination DIY. She has produced quality radio for outlets such as Pacifica and American Public Media. She is also the associate producer of Oregon Public Broadcasting's daily talk show Think Out Loud. Julie spent her formative years in Baltimore and now lives happily in Portland, Oregon in a house full of men and cats.
Fatal weakness: spell check
Favorite books: Good Bones and Simple Murders (Margaret Atwood), To The Lighthouse (Virginia Woolf), The Importance of Being Earnest (Oscar Wilde)
Favorite movie: His Girl Friday
Turn-ons: nectarines, throw pillows, microphones, men in skirts
Turn-offs: grammatical errors, television
Secretly wishes she were a: lazy person
