The Nerve! Conversations with Movement Elders

Welcome back to The NERVE! Conversations With Movement Elders a podcast from the National Council of Elders featuring intergenerational conversations between elder and younger organizers about important topics in our movements today.  This episode features a conversation about moving through division and conflict to create and model the world we desire in our nation and in our social justice organizations. This episode is hosted by Aljosie Aldrich Harding (she/her) a servant-leader with NCOE, Movement Elder-in-Residence with Project South, and comrade and partner of the late Dr. Vincent Harding. Joining Aljosie in this conversation are: Loretta Ross (she/her) activist, public intellectual, professor, NCOE member and author of Calling In: How to Start Making Change With Those You'd Rather Cancel, based in Georgia. Loan Tran (they/them) national co-director of Rising Majority, based in North Carolina Kyla Hartsfield (she/her) project director at CompassPoint, based in North Carolina Resources recommended by Aljosie, Loretta, Loan and Kyla: Sister Song: Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective The Land Knows The Way: Eco-Social Insights for Liberation by Ricardo Levins Morales Fighting Shame Around How We Respond in Conflict by Kyla Hartsfield and Laura Eberly the valley of its making by Nate Marshall     CREDITS: Created and produced by the National Council of Elders podcast and oral history team: Aljosie Aldrich Harding, Frances Reid, Eddie Gonzalez, Sarayah Wright, alyzza may, and Rae Garringer.

Season 4 is here! And we're back, with a series of intergenerational conversations between elder and younger organizers about important topics in our movements today, produced by the National Council of Elders,  First up: we're digging into the work of building networks and practices of community safety, mutual aid, and transformative justice, and in resisting the construction of new prisons and cop cities.  This episode is hosted by Aljosie Aldrich Harding (she/her) a servant-leader with NCOE, Movement Elder-in-Residence with Project South, and comrade and partner of the late Dr. Vincent Harding. Joining Aljosie in this conversation are: Rahim Buford (he/him) founder of Unheard Voices Outreach, based in Nashville, TN. Bassey Etuk (he/him) movement organizer with Project South, based in Atlanta, GA. Amelia Kirby (she/her) who works with the Sycamore Project, the Yarrow Institute for Abolition and Organizing, and the coalition Building Community Not Prisons  based in eastern Kentucky. Janet Wolf (she/her) who is a member of the National Council of Elders  based in Nashville, TN. Janet's work focuses on public theology, transformative justice and nonviolent direct action organizing to disrupt and dismantle the cradle to prison pipeline through leadership by and partnership with those who are now or have been caged. Special thanks to Building Community Not Prisons - who are working to stop the construction of a federal prison in Letcher County, KY - for letting us name this episode after your coalition!  

In this episode we're exploring the role of voting in our movements through an intergenerational conversation between elder and younger organizers based in Georgia and New York. In this conversation National Council of Elders members and younger organizers dig into questions such as: Where do elections fit in our concept of real democracy? How important is our vote? How close are we to tyranny in this country, as most clearly outlined in Donald Trump's Project 2025 vision, and how much is that tyranny already here?  What are the paradoxes that we must grapple with as we face another election cycle in the U.S.?  This episode is hosted by Frances Reid (she/her) based in Oakland, California.  Frances is a member of the National Council of Elders and a veteran of 40 years of activist documentary filmmaking. Joining Frances in this conversation are: Loretta Ross (she/her) based in Northampton, Massachussetts and Atlanta, Georgia. Loretta is a long time activist and scholar who teaches at Smith College, was a Director at the first rape crisis center in the country in the 1970s, and whose latest book is Calling in the Calling Out Culture.  Barbara Smith (she/her) based in Albany, New York. Barbara is an activist and author, who played a groundbreaking role in opening up the dialogue about the intersections of race, class, sexuality and gender. She's a co-founder of the Combahee River Collective and of Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press and served two terms as a member of the Albany Common Council from 2006 to 2013. Nautica Jenkins (she/her) based in Atlanta, Georgia. Nautica is an organizer and Youth Programs MultiMedia Specialist at Project South. Her role is to assist young people in creatively communicating their stories and messages through various forms of media. Hannah Krull (she/any) based in Buffalo, New York. Hannah has been in the streets and engaging in popular education in her home region of Northern Appalachia for nearly a decade. She has worked on a number of local and national campaigns, and in recent years has organized on her university campus against sexist oppression, queerphobia, and for a Free Palestine. Hannah is a knowledge worker who grounds her work in hyperlocality and pushing back against structures of power and dominance.

In this episode we're exploring the paradoxes in nonviolence and self defense through an intergenerational conversation between elder and younger organizers based in New Jersey, Florida, East Tennessee, and North Carolina. In this conversation, Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) veterans and younger organizers dig into the always present tension between nonviolence and self-defense, sharing lessons from the past, and offering possibilities for the future.  This episode is hosted by Dr. Catherine Meeks (she/her) based in Atlanta, Georgia. Dr. Meeks is a member of the National Council of Elders, Executive Director of Turquoise and Lavender Institute for Healing and Transformation, and the author of A Quilted Life: Reflections of a Sharecropper's Daughter. Joining Dr. Meeks in this conversation are: Dr. Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons (she/her) based in Gainesville, Florida. Dr. Simmons is a long time civil rights movement organizer and professor emeritus at the University of Florida. Junius Williams (he/him) based in Newark, New Jersey, who is the official historian of Newark, host of the podcast "Everything's Political," and author of the book: Unfinished Agenda: Urban Politics in the Era of Black Power. Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson (she/her) based in East Tennessee, who is an activist organizer and movement strategist born and raised in the Black liberation and southern freedom movement. Ash-Lee is the first Black woman to serve as executive director of the Highlander Research and Education Center and a leader in the Movement for Black Lives. DeMonte Alford (he/him) based in southeast North Carolina and is an organizer working with Democracy NC. 

In this episode we're exploring creative resistance and climate change, through an intergenerational conversation between elder and younger organizers based in rural New Mexico, Puerto Rico, and southwest Virginia who have been resisting the state and advocating for climate justice in a myriad of ways. We know that colonization is the single greatest contributor to climate change and injustice over the past 500 years, which is inherently interwoven with militarism, imperialism, and extractive economies the world over. We're bringing together elder and younger organizers to talk about “living through the apocalypse” many times over, fighting for our lives and communities through the land and water, and what solutions we see as necessary to thrive into the just futures we know to be possible.  This episode is hosted by alyzza may (they/them) based in Greensboro, North Carolina. alyzza is an angelic troublemaker, cultural organizer, and member of the National Council of Elders podcast team.  Joining alyzza in this conversation are: Elder Kathy 'Wan Povi' Sanchez, (she/her) based in San Ildefonso Pueblo, New Mexico who is a member of NCOE, and a founding elder with Tewa Women United. Elder Myrna Pagan, (she/her) based in Vieques, Puerto Rico who is a member of NCOE, the founder of Vidas Viequenses Valen an environmental movement working for peace and justice, and a founding member of Radio Vieques, Educational Community Radio.  Leif Hurt, (they/them) based in southwest Virginia, who is an organizer with Protect Our Water, Heritage, Rights (POWHR): an interstate coalition representing individuals and groups from Virginia and West Virginia dedicated to protecting water, land, and communities from harms caused by the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure, including the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP). 

In this episode we're exploring why the right is so scared of gender through an intergenerational conversation between elder and younger organizers across the South: Miss Major, Suzanne Pharr, Nathalie Nia Faulk, and Lorie Bryant.  We have seen a rampant increase in organized attacks on trans people across the U.S. over the past two years. At the time of this recording, in March 2024,  over 500 anti-trans bills had already been introduced in legislatures across the country.  We know that these attacks against our people, and narratives about our communities, are not new. They are cyclical. The right is using many of the same old stories and strategies to target us. This episode digs into historical and contemporary strategies of the Right, as well as our ongoing joyful strategies of resistance.  This episode is hosted by Frances Reid, (she/her) based in Oakland CA. Frances is member of the National Council of Elders and a veteran of 40 years of activist documentary film making.  Joining Frances in this conversation are: Miss Major, (she/her) is a Black, transgender activist based in Little Rock, AR who has fought for over 50 years for her trans/gender nonconforming community. Major is a veteran of the infamous Stonewall Riots, a former sex worker, and a survivor of Dannemora Prison and Bellevue Hospital's "queen tank." She continues her work to uplift transgender women of color, particularly those who have survived incarceration and police brutality. Suzanne Pharr, (she/her), is a southern queer feminist and anti-racist organizer, also based in Little Rock, AR. She founded the  Women's Project in Arkansas in 1981, was a co-founder of Southerners on New Ground in 1993, and was director of the Highlander Center from 1999 to 2004. Pharr is an organizer and political strategist who has spent her adult life working to build a broad-based, multi-racial, multi-issued movement for social and economic justice in the U.S. Nathalie Nia Faulk, (she/they) born in Lafayette, LA and currently living in New Orleans is a self described Ebony Southern Belle! Her work blends Performance, History, Healing Justice, Cultural Organizing, and leadership development in service of all people, but particularly for Trans and Queer communities. Currently, they serve as a human rights commissioner for the City of New Orleans, co-director of Southern Organizer Academy, co-director of of Last Call Oral History Project, and as the Cultural Organizing Programs Manager for Alternate ROOTS.  Lorie Bryant, (she/her) hails from Charleston, SC and is now based in Memphis, TN. Lorie is a creative arts enthusiast, natural storyteller, conversationalist, avid outdoor explorer, and indoor gardener. Lorie has worked extensively with Southerners on New Ground on campaigns and strategic projects geared towards dismantling oppressive structures and rallying for Queer liberation across lines of race, class, culture, abilities, age, gender, and sexuality.  Lorie is especially committed to pouring back into Black communities—to ensure that they have adequate resources that will allow them to create and thrive within the communities of their dreams.      

In Seasons 1 and 2 we brought you excerpts from oral history interviews with members of The National Council of Elders (NCOE). In our 3rd season we're bringing you a series of intergenerational conversations between elder and younger organizers about important topics in our movements today. First up: we're digging into the transformative power of radical love! At a time of chaos and uncertainty, relationships rooted in love, of ourselves and one another, can move us forward in ways that call upon values that make life meaningful and joyful. In caring for ourselves, for each other, and for the earth that sustains us, by encouraging actions that enable us to heal what has been broken, we restore life and create visions of the worlds we all long to bring to life. This episode is hosted by Aljosie Aldrich Harding, (she/her) a servant-leader with NCOE, Movement Elder-in-Residence with Project South, and comrade and partner of the late Dr. Vincent Harding. Joining Aljosie in this conversation are: Elder Kathy “Wan Povi” Sanchez, (she/her) who is a member of NCOE and a founding elder with Tewa Women United, based in northern New Mexico. Autumn Gomez, (they/she) with Tewa Women United and Three Sisters Collective, based in northern New Mexico. Shea Howell, (she/her) with the James and Grace Lee Boggs Center and an NCOE member based in Detroit, Michigan. Ru Colvin, (they/them) with The Solutionairies Collective based in Detroit, Michigan. La'Die Mansfield, (she/her) with Project South based in Atlanta, Georgia. rakaya nasir-phillips, (they/he) with the Young Voices Action Collective (YVAC) and a member of The NERVE! podcast team, based in Greensboro, North Carolina.    

Candie Carawan is a folk singer, educator, and cultural worker who has been based at the Highlander Research and Education Center in east Tennessee for many years. Candie and her late husband Guy Carawan (1927-2015) worked together as cultural organizers and educators for 50 years. Their workshops and documentary projects took them throughout the South, including the South Carolina Sea Islands, and the southern Appalachian mountains. Their particular interest was how cultural traditions and expression can strengthen and support movements for justice and progressive change. Their website provides a brief overview of this work. They also traveled widely offering music in support of many movements for peace, labor, the environment, immigration rights and gender issues.  In this episode Candie talks with FJ Johnson about how she found her way to Nashville from California in the spring of 1960 and quickly became involved in the sit-in movement that was underway. She describes learning from Jim Lawson and C.T. Vivian and meeting her future husband Guy at Highlander that same spring. FJ and Candie talk about the importance of reaching into our deep cultural histories in organizing work, the role of white people in multiracial movement work, the importance of being flexible and knowing when it's time to change course, and how music, food, storytelling, and humor help remind us of our power.    

Elder Kathy ‘Wan Povi' Sanchez is an Indigenous community activist from San Ildefonso Pueblo, New Mexico. Kathy has worked on women's issues related to culture, the environment, and social change for most of her life. She was among the co-founding mothers of Tewa Women United, a group that raises awareness about issues relating to colonization. In this episode Kathy talks with Heather Bryan about growing up in close proximity to the Los Alamos National Laboratory which was built in her community's sacred mountains and where nuclear waste was stored in traditional ceremonial kivas. Kathy tells stories about growing up in close community with her Indigenous elders and in deep connection with traditional practices and wisdom, while also navigating colonial Euro-American systems and frameworks during the "Age of the Atomic Bomb."  Kathy describes her ongoing work supporting younger leaders as "a grandmother's role" where she and other elders and ancestors are watching, supporting, guarding, and protecting younger Indigenous organizers in their work.  And Kathy 'Wan Povi' Sanchez teaches us that: "There's such a disconnect within a culture of violence that doesn't give space for a language of love to to help mend the world or to help grow a soul."        

Reverend John Fife is the co-founder of the Sanctuary Movement which protected Central American refugees from deportation in the 1980's. He is a founding volunteer with No More Deaths, which provides humanitarian aid to migrants in the Sonoran Desert borderlands. In 1992 Fife was elected Moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (USA). He lives in Tuscon, Arizona and is a member of the National Council of Elders. In this episode John Fife talks with Yezmin Villarreal about growing up in southwestern Pennsylvania, moving to Arizona as a young newly ordained minister for an internship on the O'odham Reservation, and falling in love with the border and the rich legacies of organizing and resistance there. John tells Yezmin how learning from African American Churches and Pastors during the Civil Rights Movement fundamentally changed everything he believed about the role and responsibility of the church in movements for social change. And he describes his role in the accidental creation of the Santcuary Movement. John also reminds us that the struggle for liberation is long haul work: "You get a lifetime, but that's never the end of the struggle and you don't change the whole world in five years. You just get a chance and opportunity to do a part of what is a long and endless struggle. And you take each day and year as a gift, and you try to do your best with the time you got."

Dr. Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons , Ph.D. is Professor Emerita from the University of Florida. She is a Veteran of the Black Freedom, Peace, and Social Justice Movements from the 1960s until today. She was a student activist in the 1960s Sit-In Movement, a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and she worked for the National Council of Negro Women and the American Friends Service Committee. In this episode, Dr. Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons talks with younger organizer DeMonte Alford about the importance of organizing from a position of love, care, and compassion - and with an understanding that communities know what they need. Raised by her grandmother in segregated Memphis, TN - Zoharah tells DeMonte about her path into organizing work. From refusing to move to the back of the bus for white passengers as a teenager in Memphis, to learning about the Student Nonviolent Coordiating Committee while a student at Spellman College in Atlanta. She shares stories of the years she spent working with SNCC in rural Mississippi, the constant threat of violence while doing this work, and how SNCC workers sang and danced in their free time to cope with the intense stress of the work. She also shares wisdom on how to enter into organizing with communities from a place of humility, collaboration, and respect. 

Aljosie Aldrich Harding talks with young organizer Destiny Hemphill about the importance of inner heart work and healing justice, the power of great teachers, and how community is essential to organizing. Reared in segregated North Carolina, Aljosie Aldrich Harding began learning, teaching, and building social justice skills along with organizing in the 1960s as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Lome, Togo, West Africa.  She has been a servant-leader at the Institute of the Black World (Atlanta), a think tank and advocacy organization, and the Learning House (Atlanta) an independent Afrocentric freedom school.  She has worked in community organizing in several southern and northern cities and in empowerment building with women's circles, organizations, and colleges.  With her co-worker, partner, and late husband, Vincent Harding she built intergenerational relationships with social justice and peace organizations across the United States and abroad. As a spiritual guide (director) she shares healing justice practices in all her organizational work.

Tune-in as we share highlights from a recorded intergenerational zoom chat with 4 young organizers and 4 elders from the Council.

Mandy Carter is co-founder of Southerners on New Ground and a proud Black southern lesbian. She traces the activist influences through her movement work with Chasyn, a dynamic youth organizer in North Carolina.

Catherine Meeks chats with young organizer Nautica Jenkins about her incessent desire for freedom and the inner work necessary to get there. Catherine is Executive Director of the Absalom Jones Center for Racial Healing. She is the retired Clara Carter Acree Distinguished Professor of Socio-Cultural Studies from Wesleyan College and Founding Executive Director of the Lane Center for Community Engagement and Service

 Suzanne Pharr is a queer feminist and anti-racist organizer who founded the Women's Project in Arkansas, co-founded Southerners on New Ground and was a director of the Highlander Center. Rae Garringer, host of the podcast Country Queers, asks Suzanne about the history of mutual aid in the South and the tension between rural organizers and the Left. Pharr shares stories of political organizing experience offering practical tips for young organizers.

How do you pull, tease, nurture people to bring out the better part of their potential?Joyce Hobson Johnson and Nelson Johnson have been married and active organizers for social change in Greensboro, North Carolina for over 50 years. Alyzza May interviewed the two at the Beloved Community Center.