The word fan-shen means ‘to enter a new world’ and was the symbol used by a small village in China during the land reform movement of the 1940s. Fanshen Cox (president of TruJuLo) was gifted this name by her mother Trudy (Danish, Blackfeet and Cherokee) and her father Winston (Pan-African, Jamaican, Black) who wanted to raise their children to be ‘competent, self-respecting and socially-conscious citizens.’ Since Trudy and Winston’s marriage was still illegal in 16 U.S. states, they knew that having children in this country was an act of revolution – of ‘entering a new world.’
For seven years Fanshen traveled throughout the nation performing her one-woman show, One Drop of Love, which explores the complicated realities and perceptions of history, family, race, class, justice, and love.
Reared in Cambridge, Massachusetts by a Pan Africanist, Jamaican-born father and white Northwestern mother, Fanshen uses her family’s heritage to spark conversation and challenge notions around race, class and gender. She expanded her worldview as a Peace Corps volunteer in Cape Verde, West Africa, and has taught English as a Second Language to students from all over the globe.
Cox has been honored with the Peace Corps’ Franklin H. Williams Award, Peace Corps Fellows and Hollywood Foreign Press Association scholarships and distinguished alumni awards from CSULA and Teachers College, Columbia University. She holds a BA in Spanish and Education from the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor), an MA in TESOL from Teachers College, Columbia University, and an MFA in TV, Film and Theater from California State University Los Angeles.
Cox has been featured in the New York Times and on NPR, with OpEds published for Blavity, Shondaland and The Lily. She is formerly the SVP of Development and Impact at Matt Damon and Ben Affleck’s Pearl Street Films where she co-authored the Inclusion Rider. She is now the president of TruJuLo Productions, Inc, continues to speak on storytelling with an impact and consult on implementing the Inclusion Rider. She’s also the co-host of the highly rated and Webby-nominated podcast Sista Brunch – highlighting Black women and gender expansive people thriving in entertainment and media.
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