Chad Seader

Chad Seader is an assistant professor of English at William Penn University. His research seeks to understand how institutional failures shape identity, and he uses this knowledge to build community spaces for healing. Chad has been working with communities and individuals impacted by incarceration for the past ten years. He led writing workshops with men transitioning home from prison with the Neighborhood Writing Alliance in Chicago and developed a drama program for formerly incarcerated teens with the Redhouse Arts Center in Syracuse, and will be participating in the summer story gathering part of the project to use memoir to create space for people—particularly LGBTQ people—who are returning home to no one. Halfway houses and homeless shelters are meant to serve as liminal spaces; they don't provide people with the stability needed to grow and thrive in community. Rather, spaces like these often perpetuate the stigma of incarceration. Chad hopes that “Doing Our Time on the Outside” might grow to support numerous community sites where anyone can go to feel welcomed, feel heard, be a mentor, or receive support depending on what they might need a given day, creating the kind of community where beautiful stories, provocative art, and powerful activism could take shape.