The way you speak should not determine your intelligence. I should be able to say 'lit,' and you still know I'm intelligent. I should be able to say 'turn up,' and that doesn't take away from my intelligence. I wanted to break down that stereotype a little bit.

At the time when I was in college, Oscar Grant had just lost his life in Oakland, Calif. He was an unarmed young black male who had a record. And at the time when his death was making headlines, more people were talking about what he had done in his past than the fact that he unjustly lost his life.

I think, as a writer, sometimes you do worry, 'Am I just writing, or am I putting the burden of African-Americans on my shoulder and carrying it?' But if we just write the stories that we're supposed to write, that's when we have the biggest impact.

Especially for young POC, when we enter majority-white spaces, we feel the need to assimilate, to blend in, to prove ourselves. I don't think we discuss it enough.