Teen Girls Are Meeting for Coffee. And Changing the World

When Zoya Reebye realized there was no space in her all-girls school to talk about issues impacting Black girls, Indigenous girls and girls of colour, the then-14-year-old founded a student club called Let’s Talk Women of Colour.

“I wanted a space to actually discuss how difficult it can be sometimes to be a woman of colour in a predominantly white or male space and use community discussion as a way to empower one another,” she said.

Reebye is now 17 and graduated high school in June, leaving the club to younger students to run.

But, with the help of a team of about 10 dedicated volunteers, Reebye has grown Let’s Talk Women of Colour into a non-profit organization that runs monthly “coffee chats” for teenage girls, including trans, Two-Spirit and non-binary teens, in Vancouver.

Gathering one to two times a month at a local coffee shop, the informal events begin with a presentation led by one of Let’s Talk’s members about the history, politics, philosophy, media literacy or sociology behind a topic in the news or on social media. The topics are up to the presenter, but they must intersect in some way with race and gender.

A recent discussion about the model minority myth and its origins in anti-Black racism, was sparked by the 2023 killing of 14-year-old Cyrus Carmack-Belton in the United States. The man who shot Carmack-Belton was charged with murder and acquitted by a South Carolina jury in June.

Another conversation about the hypersexualization of Black men and its impact on Black women started with an icebreaker activity where participants analyzed the differences between comments on Instagram videos of Black men in streetwear and white men in streetwear .

After each presentation, the group of a dozen or so young people engage in a facilitated discussion about their own related experiences.

“Our goal is to use community dialogue to equip more youth with the language and confidence to challenge injustice, and feel certain about themselves,” said Reebye.

The discussions can get into university-level analysis. For example, the racism of necropolitics , a socio-political theory first described by Cameroonian historian and academic Achille Mbembe, was a recent topic.

But you don’t have to be an advanced scholar, or even interested in politics, to get something out of the conversations. “You can just be someone who is quite curious, who just wants to speak up about issues and help people feel seen,” Reebye said.

“We’ve had people who come in who just want to find a friend group or more people to be around. And they’ve left wanting to start their own coffee chats. That’s our goal.”

You also don’t have to be a person of colour, Black or Indigenous, either, to participate, she added. Though being open to uncomfortable conversations and listening to others’ experiences without interrupting is a necessity.

Let’s Talk Women of Colour is not about having debates, Reebye told the Tyee. Instead, the non-profit focuses on fostering respectful conversations where young women and teenage girls know their voice matters.