HBO star Issa Rae talks black women, feminism and finding confidence

The Maneater: Latest Stories Issa Rae, the first black woman to have her own show on HBO, spoke to an audience of about 200 students on Saturday night in Jesse Auditorium. When looking back at her climb to fame, Rae said she came from a very funny family. Her brother introduced her to the British version of “The Office,” which she liked but also wondered, “Where are the black people at?”
Her HBO series “Insecure” is a show “about black women, by black women,” Rae said. She has been featured on both Glamour’s “35 under 35” and Forbes’s “30 under 30” lists.
Rae walked on stage to speak with assistant journalism professor Cristina Mislán. Rae thanked the audience, saying that it was already a good night because Drake had just come out with a new album.
She started a YouTube channel in college at Stanford University. Her videos soon started getting views, and she eventually grew an audience at Stanford and other colleges such as Duke University.
“I didn’t want to have to depend on other people, and that’s what networking typically is,” Rae said. “I wanted to grow my audience myself.”
Rae said using YouTube as a platform provided her with freedom that wasn’t offered in traditional platforms such as TV writing contests, which she entered but never won. Rae said she didn’t feel like her work was translating to television and film, so she started a series on her YouTube channel called “Dorm Diaries” about being black at Stanford, in an effort to convey nonstereotypical black humor.
The YouTube series “Awkward Black Girl” came next.
“Fresh Prince, Living Single, Family Matters [feature] different worlds with different archetypes of black people,” Rae said. “[There were] many different types of awkward black girls but no black leads.”
“Insecure,” featuring an almost entirely female team of writers, has been referred to as “our post-election ...


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