I currently work at Mozilla as Senior Firefox Release Manager – formerly the Bugmaster. Yay!
I like to speak at conferences and I love to teach. I adore hackerspaces. In 2013 I helped start Double Union, a feminist hackerspace (and a 401(c)(3) nonprofit organization) with around 150-200 members!
Recently, I translated a book by Carmen Berenguer, My Lai, published in 2018 by Cardboard House Press.
My latest book is Unruly Islands. I describe it as anarchafeminist techno-utopian poetry. It was published in 2012 by the Seattle feminist science fiction publisher Aqueduct Press. Read it – it’s completely awesome.
From 2008-2012 I was a full time web developer for BlogHer, coding in php and python. With my team there I helped to maintain and update a large complicated bleeding-edge Drupal installation. I was the 2nd tier tech support for over 2,500 bloggers who use WordPress, Blogger, and Typepad in our publishing network, BlogHerAds. Before that, I worked as the open source developer community manager for Socialtext, running their hackathons and Wiki Wednesday events, and as a software engineer on a search engine (Excite@Home/Webcrawler). I’ve worked a lot in general IT and as a programmer/analyst for universities and K-12 schools.
I am also a writer, blogger, poet, and literary translator.
I lived in a houseboat for 2 years and got into kayaking.
On and off, since 1993, I have used a wheelchair or a cane and crutches and so I think a fair amount about disability politics and the social construction of disability.
This is a blog about computer stuff, poetry, games, public transit, activism, gender, books, wheelchairs, and translation — not necessarily in relation to each other. Whatever I’m thinking about that’s very thinky. It evolved from my original web site, “Bookmania!”, where I reviewed every book I read from 1995 onwards. I have read quite a lot of world literature, as well as science fiction, fantasy, history, women’s history, and poetry.
Github: https://github.com/lizzard
I also wrote about parenting on Badgermama. Other blogs and wikis where I write (and that I helped maintain) Geek Feminism, Feminist Science Fiction, and Hack Ability. If you like poetry, and the poem “Howl” by Allen Ginsberg, you might enjoy the site I made for “Beep“, a parody of Howl by Santa Cruz poet Len Anderson. I have some fairly interesting posts that I wrote while I was the open source community developer at Socialtext, mostly about the event I ran for them, Wiki Wednesday.
My much more personal rambly blog is on Dreamwidth — a very cool open source project where I’ve also fixed a few bugs. In 2009 I was on the Systems team for the Organization for Transformative Works, another great open source project that is an especially friendly environment for women. I’m a member of the Carl Brandon Society to celebrate science fiction by people of color, and have been the jury chair for the James Tiptree, Jr. Award for speculative fiction that explores and expands concepts of gender.
If you want to know more about what I think about writing, and this blog isn’t enough, here’s some long interviews with me from Mommybloggers.com,
What Are You Working On, and Reading the World – E-Panel of Literary Translators.
Contact me through email, lizhenry@gmail.com, @lizhenry on Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn.
I’m happy to follow Composite anywhere, but I wonder if you’ll be enabling RSS?
Also, I love how your title tag fills the whole width of my browser window.
Ha, thanks Chris. I’ll turn on RSS and fix the title!
Ah, RSS is there by default – try https://bookmaniac.org/feed .
Wow. You’re about page should just read: pretty fucking awesome. I’m glad I was directed to your blog!
Love your hair in that picture! (Sorry I don’t have a more intelligent comment)
Thank you! Me too! It ends up in very random states (other than being periodically re-purpled) but I love when it is very sticky-outy like this.
Hi Liz! It was great to meet you at GGC this weekend. I look forward to reading your work.
Yay, nice to meet you too! I’m always happy to meet another nerdy poet.
Are you the Liz Henry, daughter of Ann Henry, who, as a little girl, was going to be a dancer?
No, I definitely am not! Maybe that is the Liz Henry in Philadelphia who writes the blog Six Year Itch, or the one in Europe who is also very techy, or the one in New York who has something to do with banking. Sometimes I get their email!
Beautiful translation of beautiful poetry. Have you looked into the Argentine poet MarÃa Elena Walsh? You might enjoy her work.
hi,
I’ve read your translations and research works on the Spanish-American women poets. Brilliant job!
Hi, through the wonders of Google I discovered your blog. I’m 71, mild cerebral palsy and have hit the point where something like TravelScoot looks tempting. Did you try one before you bought? Also, how important is balance?
Hi Liz!
I just want to give you a wee applause for the good translations of Nestor Perlongher’s poems. I am doing research for my MA in Comparative Literature, and one of the things I am looking into is the poetry of Perlongher – and especially “Corpses”. Officially, I am stuck with the official academic translation (by William Rowe), but I really enjoyed your translation as well! Thank you for that, it was a beautiful read.
Thank you so much Christina! I’m glad you enjoyed them! Maybe you will do some more translations of Perlongher’s lush gorgeous poems! 🙂
Dear Liz, I hope you don’t mind that I am pointing out that in the first line at the top of your great blog you have misspelled manager. If that was deliberate, ignore this.
Ha, thanks. Typo!
I just came here looking for your De Ibarbourou’s translations and ended up finding out that you are the coolest person ever! Thank you for translating Juana’s poems <3
Thanks! I really should publish them since I have a book’s worth of them!