POPULARITY
Ora Wise is a Brooklyn-based chef, community organizer, cultural producer, and educator whose current work invests in community controlled and regenerative food systems. For over a decade, Ora focused on media-based education, including co-facilitating the Palestine Education Project's high school program Slingshot Hip Hop: Culture & Resistance from Brooklyn to Palestine, serving as Youth Education Director for a progressive synagogue, and co-leading the Indigenous Youth Media Delegation to Palestine. In recent years, Ora founded The Dream Cafe, an experimental cooperative pop-up restaurant in Detroit as part of the Allied Media Conference and co-produced The Asymmetrical Table, a food sovereignty dinner series in downtown Manhattan centering the cuisine and activism of Palestinian women chefs. She currently co-directs the grassroots food justice collective FIG which operates political education and food distribution programs in partnership with frontline community organizations, farmers, and chefs.
The squad heads to our movement sister city for this episode of One Million Experiments with the Detroit Safety Team, led by Curtis Renee and John Sloan III. The organization, which was birthed out of creating anticarceral safety processes for the Detroit-based Allied Media Conference, builds a network of community-trained safety practitioners across the city, providing a pathway toward communities that are self reliant—where it is understood that we have the capacity to rely on ourselves and our community to stay safe and handle harm productively. We talk about the evolving definition of safety, learning from communal evaluation, how the pandemic disrupted movement work, and much more. SHOW NOTES Support the work of Detroit Safety Team - https://www.redefinesafety.org/donate Learn more about Detroit Safety Team - https://www.redefinesafety.org/our-vision Jimmy and Grace Lee Boggs - http://boggscenter.org/ Ron Scott - https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2015/11/30/ron-scott-detroit-activist-dies-68/76555556/ Allied Media Conference - https://amc.alliedmedia.org/ Subscribe to One Million Experiments - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/one-million-experiments/id1589966282 Explore all of the Experiments - http://millionexperiments.com/ Submit your Experiment - millionexperiments.com/Submit-a-Project Subscribe to AirGo - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091
The squad heads to our movement sister city for this episode of One Million Experiments with the Detroit Safety Team, led by Curtis Renee and John Sloan III. The organization, which was birthed out of creating anticarceral safety processes for the Detroit-based Allied Media Conference, builds a network of community-trained safety practitioners across the city, providing a pathway toward communities that are self reliant—where it is understood that we have the capacity to rely on ourselves and our community to stay safe and handle harm productively. We talk about the evolving definition of safety, learning from communal evaluation, how the pandemic disrupted movement work, and much more. SHOW NOTES Support the work of Detroit Safety Team - https://www.redefinesafety.org/donate Learn more about Detroit Safety Team - https://www.redefinesafety.org/our-vision Jimmy and Grace Lee Boggs - http://boggscenter.org/ Ron Scott - https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2015/11/30/ron-scott-detroit-activist-dies-68/76555556/ Allied Media Conference - https://amc.alliedmedia.org/ Subscribe to One Million Experiments - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/one-million-experiments/id1589966282 Explore all of the Experiments - http://millionexperiments.com/ Submit your Experiment - millionexperiments.com/Submit-a-Project Subscribe to AirGo - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091
In our fourteenth full episode of Cabana Chats, writer and cultural organizer MARS talks with Resort founder Catherine LaSota about their love for Detroit, the possibilities that can be created in moments of tension, and the importance of carving out and protecting dedicated writing time, especially when you are so committed to your other work and to your community. Bonus: Catherine conducted this entire interview while recovering from her Covid vaccination booster shot! MARS. is a writer and cultural organizer born and raised in Detroit. Their work has been published or is forthcoming in Obsidian Literature & Arts for the African Diaspora, Michigan Quarterly Review: The Mixtape, Foglifter Journal, Gertrude Press, and elsewhere. MARS is a 2021 Kresge Literary Arts Fellow and a 2019 Lambda Literary Art Emerging Writers Fellow in Poetry. They work with Allied Media Projects as Director of the Allied Media Conference. Find out more about MARS here: https://blkboimars.com/ Find out more about the Allied Media Conference (AMC) here: https://amc.alliedmedia.org/ Mentioned in this episode: Room Project: https://www.roomproject.org/ InsideOut Literary Arts: https://insideoutdetroit.org/ Follow MARS on social media: Instagram & Twitter: @blkboimars Join our free Resort community, full of resources and support for writers, here: https://community.theresortlic.com/ More information about The Resort can be found here: https://www.theresortlic.com/ Cabana Chats is hosted by Resort founder Catherine LaSota. Our podcast editor is Craig Eley, and our music is by Pat Irwin. Special thanks to Resort assistant Nadine Santoro. FULL TRANSCRIPTS for Cabana Chats podcast episodes are available in the free Resort network: https://community.theresortlic.com/ Follow us on social media! @TheResortLIC
For this episode, we sit down with Ciera McKissick, to talk about everything from her being born and raised in Milwaukee, WI, her move to Chicago and all the amazing ideas she's been able to turn into her reality! Ciera McKissick is the founder of AMFM, a creative arts brand based in Chicago. She created AMFM, originally a web magazine, as an independent study project during her senior year at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where she studied Journalism and Mass Communications. Her work since then has evolved to support emerging and established artists by offering them a platform to showcase their work and passions on a larger scale through exhibitions, web content, and curated events. As a curator and producer, she seeks to combine the arts to cultivate community, access, diversity, inclusivity, intergenerational interaction and a dynamic experience. Her work often involves collaboration through many art practices and organizations, seeking to stimulate community engagement with purpose, mission, or cause. Projects for AMFM have been featured at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, the Allied Media Conference in Detroit, on Chicago's Fox 32 and ABC 7, and published in the Chicago Reader (where AMFM was named “Best New Gallery"), Chicago Tribune, Chicago SunTimes, Southside Weekly, Afropunk, Millennial Magazine, and more.
What does the future of the language justice movement hold? What visions, inspiration and encouragement will we need to get us there? Recently, organizers, educators, artists, interpreters and others who use language as their medium gathered for the 2020 Allied Media Conference for Language Justice and Beyond, a three day virtual gathering to explore the expansive and creative ways in which people are thinking about and practicing language justice. In this episode, you’ll hear the visionary voices of these future language justice elders. Transcript available at www.seveseescucha.com/episodes Follow SVSE on: Instagram.com/seveseescucha Facebook.com/svsepodcast Twitter.com/svsepodcast
In this episode, Your Host, Micheal Pope, will be joined by Chris Bravo, a documentary filmmaker based in Brooklyn, NY. His work is a blend of personal storytelling and activism. Over the past few years, Chris has been a caregiver for his mom, who has Dementia. He will share with us his most recent work: a film he made before the pandemic, and an essay he wrote after quarantine began about his experiences of separation and how COVID-19 is impacting people with dementia significantly. Read EssayWatch Film His goal is to bring audiences towards a more profound, emotionally engaged understanding of topics and themes that are often marginalized and suppressed. Bravo's films have screened internationally at venues and festivals such as Chicago Underground Film Festival, New York Underground Film Festival, Oakland International Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, Berlin Director's Lounge, Chicago Filmmakers, Allied Media Conference, The People's Film Festival. His current projects explore the intersection of aging, age-ism, caregiving, immigration, and racism. Bravo's current short film, Sum of My Parts, about dementia, loss, and disappearance, is part of that more extensive project. He is interested in the convergence of two hyper marginalized communities: the aging population, and the immigrants (mostly women) of color who take care of them. Additionally, Chris works as a documentary editor on feature films, documentary series, and podcasts. His work has appeared on Showtime, Hulu, PBS' Frontline, and Epix and has won Emmy and Peabody awards.
In this episode, Your Host, Micheal Pope, will be joined by Chris Bravo, a documentary filmmaker based in Brooklyn, NY. His work is a blend of personal storytelling and activism. Over the past few years, Chris has been a caregiver for his mom, who has Dementia. He will share with us his most recent work: a film he made before the pandemic, and an essay he wrote after quarantine began about his experiences of separation and how COVID-19 is impacting people with dementia significantly. Read EssayWatch Film His goal is to bring audiences towards a more profound, emotionally engaged understanding of topics and themes that are often marginalized and suppressed. Bravo's films have screened internationally at venues and festivals such as Chicago Underground Film Festival, New York Underground Film Festival, Oakland International Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, Berlin Director's Lounge, Chicago Filmmakers, Allied Media Conference, The People's Film Festival. His current projects explore the intersection of aging, age-ism, caregiving, immigration, and racism. Bravo's current short film, Sum of My Parts, about dementia, loss, and disappearance, is part of that more extensive project. He is interested in the convergence of two hyper marginalized communities: the aging population, and the immigrants (mostly women) of color who take care of them. Additionally, Chris works as a documentary editor on feature films, documentary series, and podcasts. His work has appeared on Showtime, Hulu, PBS' Frontline, and Epix and has won Emmy and Peabody awards.
In this episode, Your Host, Micheal Pope, will be joined by Chris Bravo, a documentary filmmaker based in Brooklyn, NY. His work is a blend of personal storytelling and activism. Over the past few years, Chris has been a caregiver for his mom, who has Dementia. He will share with us his most recent work: a film he made before the pandemic, and an essay he wrote after quarantine began about his experiences of separation and how COVID-19 is impacting people with dementia significantly. Read EssayWatch FilmHis goal is to bring audiences towards a more profound, emotionally engaged understanding of topics and themes that are often marginalized and suppressed.Bravo's films have screened internationally at venues and festivals such as Chicago Underground Film Festival, New York Underground Film Festival, Oakland International Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, Berlin Director's Lounge, Chicago Filmmakers, Allied Media Conference, The People's Film Festival. His current projects explore the intersection of aging, age-ism, caregiving, immigration, and racism.Bravo's current short film, Sum of My Parts, about dementia, loss, and disappearance, is part of that more extensive project. He is interested in the convergence of two hyper marginalized communities: the aging population, and the immigrants (mostly women) of color who take care of them.Additionally, Chris works as a documentary editor on feature films, documentary series, and podcasts. His work has appeared on Showtime, Hulu, PBS' Frontline, and Epix and has won Emmy and Peabody awards.
Andrea Perez holds degrees in both library sciences and social work, and she was a co-organizer of the Radical Librarianship track at the Allied Media Conference. She has worked here at Ferndale for a few years, but she's been working in libraries for most of her life, including Southfield and Plymouth, but also Westland, the latter of which resulted in controversy when five librarians were abruptly cut from their positions. But, that anecdote actually has a happy ending, if you listen to the end of the podcast. Meanwhile, when she's not working weekends here at Ferndale, Andrea's a therapist at the Radical Well-Being Center. In this episode, we discuss the collection she develops for circulation: the 300's--the social sciences. And she has three recommendations discussed in this podcast.
Dug Song and Sally Carson, discuss the role of design in tech. Doug is a general manager and cofounder of Duo Security, now a part of Cisco. And Sally is their head of product design and user research.Duo Security makes it safe to log into anything from anywhere, from any device, at any time. Duo combines security expertise with a user-centered philosophy to provide simple and effective security solutions for all users today, we will explore why design matters in tech and why we need to build more inclusive environments across the tech community.Links for Reference: Duo Security, Cisco, Elayna Spratley, w00w00, Allied Media Conference, Brian Stevenson at the Equal Justice Initiative, Digital Defense Playbook, Project Greenlight, Detroit Community Technology Project, Chamath Palihapitiya, Ben Adida, VotingWorks, Ban the Box, Org Design for Design Orgs
adrienne and Autumn are joined once again by the incomparable queer astrologer, Chani Nicholas (@chaninicholas), author of You Were Born For This, in the opening plenary of the 2020 Allied Media Conference. Their giddy, love-filled conversation spans the gamut from how we sit with hard astrology, to how we work with and shape our collective purpose using the queer feminist technology of the stars. TRANSCRIPT - https://www.dropbox.com/s/9wtc6ko0ol5y3xg/HTS_AMC2020.pdf?dl=0 HTS ESSENTIALS SUPPORT Our Show on Patreon https://www.patreon.com/Endoftheworldshow PEEP us on IG https://www.instagram.com/endoftheworldpc/ TWEET @ us https://twitter.com/endoftheworldPC --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/how-to-survive-the-end-of-the-world/message
AirGo hosts the second volume of Unelectable, our live podcast series with Black Youth Project exploring electoral politics and radical imagination, as part of Allied Media Conference 2020! The live virtual event's focus is Feminism, and features Unelectable cohost Asha Ransby-Sporn, environmental justice organizer Siwatu-Salama Ra, and Detroit movement legend Tawana Petty. Check out the illustration of the event by Emily Simons on our IG, and learn more about Emily's work here: https://www.pittsburghposterproject.org/emily-simons SHOW NOTES: http://Freesiwatu.org https://www.honeycombthepoet.org Check out video of many of the conference's amazing sessions and learn more about this remarkable gathering: https://amc.alliedmedia.org/ Recorded 7/26/20
Hey, magical folx! In this episode we discuss Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, which is *NOT* YA. We gotta say this at the top because its some sexist bs that women/femme adult fantasy writers get miscategorized as YA (read about how sexism impacts genre categorization). *Call to action* This fortnight, we're urging our magical community to learn more about abolishing borders, abolishing ICE and migrant justice as well as to support organizations doing this work. Watch/listen to the final plenary from this year's Allied Media Conference, “From Dreams to Practice: Abolition in Our Lifetimes”. The panel features a TON of rad ppl doing abolitionist work, including Miski Noor, Tawana “Honeycomb” Petty, Andrea Ritchie, Toni-Michelle Williams, Mariame Kaba and Rachel Herzing. Check out their work and learn learn learn and act act act [Note: I (K) attended the AMC virtually and I was BLOWN AWAY by the wisdom shared. Cannot recommend enough] Check out Harsha Walia's Ted Talk “A World Without State Borders”. Her book Undoing Border Imperialism is definitely on my TBR! Abolish ICE Denver is just one of the groups doing the work. They have an encampment outside of the Aurora ICE detention facility run by the for-profit prison company GEO Group. Check out their instagram for updates and action items. And donate if you can! **This isn't an exhaustive list! Please do research for your local area and share with us any resources you find in your journey. We will share those on Instagram and Twitter. We are often posting resources on social media as well, so check that out, too! Additionally, if you get a chance and are able, please consider becoming a patron on Patreon to get episodes early, access to our discord, and more. Or you can make a one time donation on ko-fi. Support feminist media, ppl!
This is a conversation with Crystal Middlestadt (She/Her, They/Them). This episode includes topics such as domestic violence, code switching, finding our professional voice and how to begin the process of healing trauma. Crystal is the Executive Director of the Chinook Fund. The Chinook Fund supports grassroots organizations working on issues of social and economic justice; by pooling our collective resources, we seed groups making a positive, systemic impact to improve the quality of life for all Coloradans. Crystal previously worked for the Grassroots Institute for Fundraising Training (GIFT), Survivors Organizing for Liberation, a former Chinook Fund grantee, and is proud to have helped kickstart resource mobilization gatherings at the Allied Media Conference. During their tenure at GIFT, Crystal was proud to bring the 2016 Money for Our Movements: A Social Justice Fundraising Conference to Denver. Crystal is a board member of Resource Generation, serves on the steering committee for the national Giving Project learning community, and participated in the Transformative Leadership for Change fellowship for Colorado leaders of color. Crystal was raised in a small, working class town in Oregon by a family of paper mill workers and was the first person in her family to graduate from college. After receiving her B.S. in Sociology and Women’s Studies from the University of Oregon in 2003, Crystal moved to Denver and soon began organizing around issues of gender justice, LGBTQ anti-violence, and racial justice, sparking her to put down roots in this mountain state. They are continually inspired by adrienne maree brown, author of Emergent Strategy, who reminds us that what we pay attention to grow. Crystal lives in southwest Denver and spends their spare time learning to garden, building their vinyl collection, sneaker shopping, and camping throughout the West. Music Inte-Gritty by Bianca Mikahn Art by Maite Nazario http://www.maitenazario.com
Podcast Description “We can’t talk about what’s broken with education and coding education in the bootcamp system without zooming out to look at the larger context of our educational system. Why is it that Trump is like “Oh, I’ve got 2 trillion dollars I’ve just spent on purchasing new weapons that we’re gonna use to kill innocent people and destroy cultural heritage sites” in violation of the Geneva Conventions…but they can’t find a quarter of that to fund all the free pre-K up through higher education that they wold need for everyone would just be able to access whatever education they wanted to have, so they could maximize their potential? That’s bullshit.” Sasha Costanza-Chock (pronouns: they/them or she/her) is a researcher, activist, designer, and media-maker. They are a Faculty Associate at the Berkman-Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, Faculty Affiliate with the MIT Open Documentary Lab, and creator of the MIT Codesign Studio (codesign.mit.edu). Their work focuses on social movements, transformative media organizing, and design justice. Sasha’s first book, Out of the Shadows, Into the Streets: Transmedia Organizing and the Immigrant Rights Movement was published by the MIT Press in 2014. Their new book, Design Justice: Community-Led Practices to Build the Worlds We Need will be published by the MIT Press in early 2020. Sasha is a board member of Allied Media Projects (alliedmedia.org) and a Steering Committee member of the Design Justice Network (designjusticenetwork.org). Transcription 00:30 Kim Crayton: Hello everyone, and welcome to today's episode of the #CauseAScene Podcast. My guest today is Sasha Costanza-Chock, and pronouns are: and she/her, they/them. Would you please introduce yourself to the audience? 00:44 Sasha Costanza-Chock: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me on the podcast. I am a fan. My name's Sasha Costanza-Chock. I'm currently an Associate Professor of Civic Media at MIT. But I'm also on the steering committee of the Design Justice Network. So, I hope we get to talk about that a little bit today. And I'm a board member of Allied Media Projects, which is best known for producing the annual Allied Media Conference. And I am a scholar and an activist; I work in the tech space, and I'm working on trying to figure out how we can build a technology ecosystem that is more radically just and inclusive and that will challenge rather than continually reproduce oppression and help us build a world that will be ecologically survivable as well. KC: Alright, you said mouthful of that, Sasha! [Laughs] So, we're gonna start as we always start. Why is it important to cause a scene? And how are you causing a scene? 01:46 SCC: Well, we need to cause a scene; there are so many reasons we need to cause a scene right now. Today. I mean, we're having this conversation at a really dangerous moment. I mean, all moments are dangerous for the last 400 or 500 years, though. But the Banana in Chief right now is trying to ramp up to a new war. Hopefully so that—for him—I think this is about remaining in power. But it's important to cause a scene because we live in a deeply fucked up world where racism, anti-Blackness, misogyny, trans-misogyny, misogynoir, ableism, Islamophobia, settler colonialism, and other axes of historical and ongoing oppression just continue to structure so many—well, all of our lives, really—in different kinds of ways. And we need to figure out, how do we break that? How do we break those systems? How do we challenge the "matrix of domination", as Patricia Hill Collins calls it? And how do we build a more liberatory world? And frankly, we need to figure out how do we survive? How do we build a world that we can survive in instead of act as if there's unlimited ecological and human resources that can just be continually exploited? Because at this rate, you know, we're not gonna have too many more generations of humans allowed to survive on this planet. 03:19
Maurice Cherry (designer and digital creator in Atlanta, currently working as a creative strategist at Glitch and the creator and host of the podcast Revision Path) and Taylor Simone (graphic design faculty member at BGSU, graphic artist, designer and writer from Metro Detroit) discuss highlighting the work of black designers, developers, and digital creatives, or more broadly, race, technology, and design. Transcript: Introduction: From Bowling Green State University and the Institute for the Study of Culture and Society. This is BG Ideas. Intro Song Lyrics: I'm going to show you this with a wonderful experiment. Jolie S.: Welcome to the Big Ideas podcast collaboration between the Institute for the Study of Culture and Society and the School of Media and Communication at Bowling Green State University. I'm Jolie Sheffer, associate professor of English and American culture studies and the director of ICS. Today I'm joined by Maurice Cherry and Taylor Simone. Cherry is a designer and digital creator in Atlanta, currently working as a creative strategist at Glitch and the creator and host of the podcast Revision Path where he highlights the work of black designers, developers, and digital creatives. Jolie S.: He was the 2018 recipient of the Steven Heller Prize for Cultural Commentary from the American Institute of Graphic Arts and was included in the 2018 edition of The Root's annual list of the most influential African-Americans age 25 to 45. Taylor Simone is a graphic artist, designer and writer from Metro Detroit. She previously worked at the Detroit Institute of Art. She's currently a faculty member teaching graphic design here at Bowling Green State University. Thanks so much for talking with me today. Maurice, can you tell us a little bit about how you came to focus your design work so much on social media and digital formats? Maurice C.: Oh wow, that's a really good question. So when I first started really working with design, it had all been on computers. It was really first starting out with the Apple IIe computer doing a little USA Rocket in basic. That was sort of my first time really experimenting with design and with computer graphics. So it kind of came together in that way. And then when I was in high school, I had the opportunity to redesign my school's newspaper. So that was my first time sort of cutting my teeth with using Adobe Photoshop, Adobe PageMaker, which doesn't exist anymore, Adobe Illustrator, etc. And I always sort of had digital design as sort of a hobby because I had been so into computers. I had started learning HTML in high school and it was something that I always did as a hobby on the side. So my design practice sort of evolved in the same time as my interest in working with computers and doing programming, so it sort of ran at the same pace. Jolie S.: How do you approach teaching design and what ideas or practices do you emphasize for young people entering into design fields? Maurice C.: I always think it's good to start with a project. There is a concept out there that's called Ultra Learning where essentially you are learning how to do something in a very quick amount of time. I think the old school ways of learning are, you read a book, you do the exercises in the book and then you hopefully try to apply those skills to your future work in some way. And I think what studies have shown is that can be somewhat of an inefficient process because the things that you do out in the real world or in your job are going to be different from what's in a textbook. That's a very sort of dated reference when you're doing that. Whereas if you're doing a project, you're able to apply the skills in real time to whatever it is that you're doing. And it doesn't necessarily have to be a public facing project. Maurice C.: It can be a private project. I'll give you an example. Back when I was a teenager, a lot of people were making fan pages on like Tripod and GeoCities and Angelfire of their favorite music artists. That's essentially a project. You're learning how to use HTML and how to use images and how to use all the different tags and commands for something that, granted it may not be of huge merit to the outside world, but you're able to apply these skills directly in a context that you see the results immediately. And so that's something that I think carries on whether you're, I think whether you're just starting out or even whether you're learning something completely new. It's a really good concept. Jolie S.: Well, and that leads me to one of the other questions, which is how both of you see your work in design related to community engagement. So you've suggested there Maurice that whether for your clients that is always present, you are very aware of kind of social movements and the current climate and thinking about the ways that design can support that. And what about for you Taylor? How do you see some of your design work or teaching in relationship to kind of the community engagement and social context? Taylor S.: Yeah, I think for the most part it's weird for me because I want my practices to start to merge, but I find them continuing to be these separate endeavors or initiatives. So when I think about community, I specifically think about working with the Design Justice Network, which is a network that's all about human centered design and really stepping down as the designer and kind of transitioning to facilitator. So within that idea it kind of pours back into this idea of individualized teaching, learning and experimentation. And that way where me and this group of designers are the members and the collective all work together to kind of approach communities that already have solutions to the problems that they're facing. And these are marginalized communities and kind of allow them to steer as we facilitate outside of that. Taylor S.: So it's this interesting I guess back and forth of collaboration between the two. And I really love thinking about design almost like a toolkit that people can take and use in the ways that they need. So it's not establishing these hard line rules. I think design is so expansive and it can be used in so many ways to bring people together or push ideas to the forefront. So that's kind of where I sit within design for social engagement or social impact. Jolie S.: Could you give an example of a project that you did with that collective and sort of how that process worked and sort of what the outcome was? Taylor S.: Yeah, I think the biggest thing I did with them was actually as an organizer coming together and organizing for a conference in Detroit called the Allied Media Conference where the conference is kind of set up like a big skill share almost where you're bringing together organizers and people that will be in the position to teach others and also collaborate with others. And just not necessarily going over workshops and tutorials, but ways to critically think about how you're approaching that and approaching teaching. That's honestly one of the things that made me realize that I love teaching and that was something that I wanted to pursue, not within necessarily the academic space, but within the ways that it can branch outside of that and engage the surrounding community. Jolie S.: Maurice, what about for you? I mean you're working in a lot of different areas and so many of the things you're working on are about relationships and about process. Could you talk about one example where you see some of these ideas at play where art and design are more than just creating something they're about kind of changing dynamics? Maurice C.: Sure, absolutely. So earlier this month I was in Boston. I was in Cambridge at the Black and Design Conference. It's a conference that the African American Student Union at Harvard Graduate School of Design puts on every other year. They started it in 2015 they've had one in 2017 so this was the third installment. In each of the times they've had the conference the theme has centered around the concept of space. The first year it was around the concept of physical space, starting from the neighborhoods to the city, to the state, to the region. The second year they did it, it was around organizing space, like how do we create spaces for organizing, for protest, etc. And the third theme, which was this year was around black futurism. And so granted that is a topic which of course relates to black people, but also it sort of extends out further with the concept of how do you use your design talents to create a more equitable future. Maurice C.: And so there are people there that are using their design to combat the incarceration system. They're using design to speak to equity in technology and media. They're using design to archive what designers are doing. At the Harvard Graduate School they have at the Francis Loeb Library, the African American Design Nexus, which is a way for them to sort of archive what black designers have done throughout the years. And so they're all taking these skills that we learn as designers and using them in ways that can benefit sort of the greater world. Maurice C.: So, that's been something that's been on my mind really. I mean since the conference it's been on my mind like how do we use the skills that we have to sort of impact the world? Because as digital designers, everything we create is pretty ephemeral. It can be destroyed, it can be overwritten, it can be deleted, that sort of thing. But there are huge issues out there that designers are sort of uniquely equipped to solve. There's immigration issues, there's climate change, there's a number of different things out there that designers can use their unique skills of process and analysis in order to really combat. Jolie S.: Taylor, you have said that your design practice is based around cultivating sustainable understandings of self communities and design justice. So we've been talking a bit about that. Could you elaborate on how you apply those ideas to your educational practices? Taylor S.: Yeah. I think for me, finding ways to engage outside of the classroom becomes really important for me. Just from a level of access, walking it back and thinking about self. I also think about the ways that the classroom starts to shift or shape me. So I tend to approach things from a collaborative space where I'm looking at not only how I can come and disengage my ego in the classroom and learn from my students and how it can become this back and forth exchange. It's interesting because this is my first semester being a full time teacher, so there's still so much to learn within the space of academia specifically. Taylor S.: I've had these experiences where I'm doing community workshops and things like that where it's a collectic group of people coming together. So there's still so much I have to learn about what can be leveraged, what can be bit, how these resources at the university can also be dispersed outside of it. So I'm in this interesting space where I thought I knew how this would kind of go but I think there's still so much to learn. I think academia is such a large powerful system that when you do talk about inserting some of these ideas of shifting the way that things are being taught, shifting the way that students are looking at material, that there's well bureaucracy that you have to move through. So it's really interesting and I'm really excited to kind of start engaging in a way that's less passive. Taylor S.: I feel I'm in a mode where it's listen, process and really understand the environment that you're in right now. And I have, like I said, that experience of teaching workshops. So it's how do I start to build the bridge or really take what I've learned in those instances and bring them into the classroom. And I think I'm achieving that in small ways, whether it just be encouraging students to be critical in a certain way or leaving those little nuggets of criticality. But there's just so much more that can be done. And I think that right now I'm kind of interested in how to build those networks or facilitate spaces kind of like Maurice is kind of even thinking about how black designers are kind of all disparate across all of these spaces and how to bring them in and connect them. Because I'm realizing that I'm this one individual who can make change, but there's something, I feel there's a large shift that I want to lean into that I'm still kind of trying to wrap my mind around. Jolie S.: Well, and that is I think an interesting point of contrast. You're new to this big bureaucracy of a university. Maurice you've been doing the podcast and your other work for a long time. I'm curious sort of now that you've done 300 and some podcasts, interviews with black designers and working in the tech industry, what are you now able to see about the industry or about the way individual artists and creatives kind of are able to create networks for themselves within a very dispersed and largely white system? Maurice C.: That's a great question. So certainly what I've seen over the years are more people starting to create their own enclaves, events, spaces. These are really cropped up a lot I'd say within the past five to six years now. We've seen a lot of these happen. There's the Hue Design Summit in Atlanta. There's Creative Control Fest, which is actually up here in Ohio. It's in Columbus. The Interact Project, which is out in, not California, it's in Seattle I think. Sorry, I know it's on the West coast. It used to be in California. I think it's also in Seattle as well, but there are a number of different initiatives out there that are starting to crop up sort of almost in response to the general kind of design industry as a whole. I think what's important to note is that the design industry is oddly multifaceted. Maurice C.: Design is a very broad kind of topic and whether you're talking about graphic design, industrial design, architecture, etc. Each of those different disciplines has their own sort of, I don't know, levels of issues that are going on within it. With black architects this is going on with black furniture designers. It's kind of endemic across all of these different sort of disciplines. So what I'm seeing is more people just carving out their own spaces. I would say the industry as a whole, what I think they are doing is recognizing the issue, but I don't think they're trying to fix it in any sort of a measurable way. I think it's still a lot of lip service. It's still a lot of sort of empty promises. There's actually a piece that, excuse me. There's a piece that came out recently from someone with AIGA Seattle or I think he was with AIGA Seattle named Timothy Bardlavens about AIGA, which is the American Institute of Graphic Arts professional institution for graphic designers. Maurice C.: And he came out with a piece recently on Medium about how AIGA upholds white supremacy. And it was a very sort of scathing critique of the organization, which many people have had before of the organization. And the organization is over 100 years old and is not really trying to change because whatever they're doing right now is working in service of sort of the greater industry. So there certainly is recognition of the issue. If we're looking at AIGA specifically, they do a design census, so they have the statistics so this is not like this is just coming up in a vacuum. This is an issue that has been around for over 30 years now. So they're recognizing it but big changes not really. And so what I'm seeing are more people just making their own thing, making their own space, creating community where they're at instead of trying to sort of buy into this larger sort of design industry as a whole. Jolie S.: You mentioned before that so much of design in the digital world is ephemeral and so that work, the podcast and now it being archived is a way of sort of ensuring there is a record and you mentioned at Harvard there's efforts there too, to archive some of this work. How do you Taylor kind of work into your practice again in teaching or in your own design work to kind of leave a record of some of these things so that it isn't all just ephemeral? Taylor S.: I think it's hard because I think that there really is no true guarantee that something won't be erased. So within my creative practice, I kind of lean into that ephemerality or the idea that some things aren't necessarily meant to last. It can be for now and that's fine. So as far as archiving and looking and thinking about the archive more so as this living thing or this living network versus something that is just contained to the actual thing that was put out. Because I think that when you insert something into culture and it makes an impact, whether it's small or little, it creates this network or this ripple or this riptide of ways in which is impacting just kind of what Maurice was saying about how people have gotten opportunities, so that moment lives on past the actual incident. So in a way, that's kind of how I think about archiving and also how I think about the power of the visual image in general. Yes, that is the act, but it's what lives on or how it transformed somebody when they engage with it versus that single moment. Jolie S.: So could you give an example of work that you've done where you've played with that idea of the icon and tried to disrupt it or play with it? Kind of impermanence. Taylor S.: Yeah, I think that even a piece, a video piece that I'm working on now that is meant to be played after the audience engages in some kind of ritual or some kind of act before that. Even just in the visual aesthetic of the piece itself, it's pixelated and that's where I kind of get into the destruction of those things where it's meant for you to enter but not meant for you to necessarily stay, if that makes sense. So I think a lot of that is just really inserted through how I approach my visual aesthetic and also just in the act of I've been really into happenings lately or things that kind of are meant for that moment and don't live past it. And that's what I'm kind of getting at with the ritual that it becomes more so about this shared moment that the people had in that time and space and less about the idea that the piece may live on. Jolie S.: Great. Maurice, do you an example? We haven't really talked about your design work, so could you give us an example of something you've worked on recently and sort of how it reflects some of your interests and approaches? Maurice C.: Oh wow. Design work. That's a good question because I don't really do a ton of design these days. Wow. I have to really think about that. Visual design, graphic design? Jolie S.: I'll leave that open. I mean you're a Renaissance person who I think design applies to a lot of different aspects of your life and career. So anything we haven't talked about yet that is a facet of how you apply design and creative thinking. Maurice C.: So I'll say probably my most recent project, which was the Design Anthology was Recognized is probably a good example of that. So, that was funded by Envision through their Design Forward funds. And essentially what I wanted to do with that was continue upon the legacy of Steven Heller from winning the Steven Heller Prize for Cultural Commentary. It's interesting because that's a prize for design writing and I'm a design podcaster and so it was interesting to receive the award, not for writing but for just doing these interviews. But so I wanted to be able to contribute to just the general corpus of design history by introducing more people of color and indigenous design writers to give their commentary on the industry and so we gave them a theme. Maurice C.: They wrote pieces on the theme. We had people that did submissions. We chose the best ones out of there, tried to sort of edit and polish them together for publication and then released them along with custom illustrations, which came from someone that I knew. And so that's had I think, a really good impact in terms of getting more design voices out there. A lot of my work has really been about showcasing the community and so I try to use my design talent in that way to try to help us all rise I guess. Jolie S.: We're going to take a short break. Thank you. Speaker 1: If you are passionate about big ideas, consider sponsoring this program to have your name or organization mentioned here, please contact us at icsatbgsu.edu. Jolie S.: Welcome back to the Big Ideas podcast. Today I'm talking to Maurice Cherry and Taylor Simone about graphic design, technology and race. So I have another question for both of you, which is that both of you do work that is very interested or by necessity because of the industry as it is at the intersection of design and technology. One of the things we're interested in, in the Institute is interdisciplinarity and what happens, what the benefits are for bridging kind of traditional disciplinary divides. So for each of you, I'd like to know kind of what you see as the particular benefits at this moment in time of bringing together kind of the history and processes of design with the particular tools and technologies available in our current moment. Will you start Maurice? Maurice C.: Yeah, sure. I think it's now more easier than ever to really put things together into a finished product. There's a lot of frameworks and tools and things that plug into each other and work together that will really allow you to create something out of nothing very, very quickly. I mean, when I started, this was back in the... I'm dating myself. This is back in the mid '90s or so, a lot of that was just reverse engineering whatever you saw out there on the internet. You viewed the source code and you just tried to figure it out. There was no tutorials, there was no classes or anything like that to kind of show you the way. A lot of it just kind of you made the road by walking, so to speak. Now there's so many single service ways to just fire up a website, fire up a database, a form, what have you to gather information, disseminate information. Maurice C.: There's social media now, which makes it even more easier to get your voice out there and connect with other people. And so because of those things you're able to use design in I think very, I want to say nontraditional ways, but you're able to use them in ways now more than you could before to create really anything that you want. If there's something that you feel you have an interest in, you can... I've seen people crowdsource design. They'll crowdsource what they want people to see and they'll take that and put it into their work. And so it becomes sort of this sort of public iterative process around creation and destruction or building something together with the community that you're trying to serve. Before all this technology and things were here I don't know if that, I mean that would've been a really impossible feat to kind of do. You'd sort of be standing out on the street just asking people to give input. Whereas now you can tap into anyone that has an internet connection all over the world and that's a really powerful tool. It's a really powerful tool. Taylor S.: I think that just as far as this shift of interdisciplinary kind of work that it's something like technology has always kind of been something that progresses design history. And I think that we're just at a moment where the technology is so vast and past people would perceive about even 10 years ago about what you could do. That it's just a really exciting moment and I get excited about the idea of adding layers of context to anything. So the idea that you can take this single thing and create a vast system, a visual system out of that is just really exciting to me. And there are a lot of ways within our and commercial design that I see these things happening, whether it be an expansive visual system, a flexible system or things that are just coming up within our exhibitions and things like that where it's expanding the discipline of graphic design but also collapsing the discipline of graphic design at the same time which, I think is an interesting place to be in at this moment in history. Jolie S.: Well thank you both. I think now we'll hear some questions from students. Anna E.: My name is Anna Elfkovich. I'm a graphic design student and I guess my question is for both of you. What advice do you have for us beginning designers just off the basis of us I guess creating our own design style and where to go from there. Taylor S.: Yeah, I think that I give the same advice to a lot of my students in general is to just anchor down and that individuality. You still want to learn the rules, learn the structures. But I think that at this point in time, the graphic design field is so vast and that really is something that I believe pushes you forward in a sea of just visual noise is really understanding that you're not trying to duplicate but amplify what you already have with the tools that you're given and I think that that sets just after for the post-school job search and things like that, it really sets you up. Taylor S.: I also encourage students to be thinking about ways in which they can form their own practices while they're in school. You don't have to wait to start a publishing company. You don't have to wait to start a podcast. These are things that take time and energy, but they're things that you can be thinking about. I think it's important that you kind of attack the cyme from all sides or set a seed and let it grow into a network of things that you may be interested in. Maurice C.: I think it's also important to just try and consume as much sort of design and media that you can from other sources. Certainly what you're learning in your current curriculum is something that the professors have put together, the institution has put together, and a lot of design curriculums tend to be from a particular kind of Eurocentric point of view. It's a huge world out. There's design systems throughout Asia, throughout Africa, throughout Australia, South America, even here in North America that you can gain inspiration from, and I think it's important to sort of decolonize your design view from what you may just see in your classes and really look out to other sources to gain inspiration. Really just to get a different point of view on what design means to other people and other cultures. And then at the end of the day, you as the designer you have now this vast toolbox of resources to pull from, from your work as opposed to just say a smaller subset than you would have before. Jolie S.: What you're both really talking about is the student sort of taking ownership and being curious and taking risks and trying things rather than kind of just being the good obedient student. Break things a little bit. Well, another question. Lexis Z.: My name is Lexis Zurich. Taylor had mentioned something along the lines of somethings are not always meant to last as well as Maurice had said something as a designer the digital world is ephemeral, if I can say that right. Do you guys think in any way you guys are seeing it on the same kind of viewpoint or do you think in a way that is in a way sounds is similar but totally different viewpoints in your design and the way you design your artwork? Maurice C.: I mean I think it's the same. I think it's about the same. I mean, I do agree that there are some things that you design that just won't be around forever. I mean, certainly there are styles that are constricted to certain eras of time. I think it's about the same. Do you want to chime in? Taylor S.: Yeah, I think everyone has their individual perspectives that they're coming from, but I do believe that there is this larger thread of thought that connects specifically black designers and black artists. There's for me, I tend to lean towards that mindset that there is this thread of thought that we're all kind of writing. I don't know. When I'm thinking about ephemeral in general and what I said specifically, I'm thinking about a summer school program that I started with my friend where [inaudible 00:32:18] and we approached the project knowing that it necessarily wasn't meant to last. That if it did what it was supposed to do, it wouldn't necessarily be needed for forever because it was meant to just give the community a leg up and that doesn't mean one year. We didn't have a time set but that's something that he said to me that it stuck with me and has come into the way that I think about design and some projects. Of course some things should be archived, should be saved. But it really depends on the project. Jolie S.: Yeah. There is no kind of one lifespan that is the goal. That certain things are meant to be shorter term. Some things you want to find a way to make sure they live on and maybe part of what you're both talking about is sort of being very intentional about which projects you want to continue. And even though the continuation may take a very different form. Maurice C.: And I think that if the project certainly has great impact, that impact lives on even if the artifacts don't. Jolie S.: Another question? Ethan B.: Ethan Bagwell, graphic design as well. So you said you were from Atlanta, which is an amazing and now well known area of culture and stuff. Does this help you reach out and find more designers in this kind of diversity area and does that help you promote your idea to have an impact on the world and not just your projects that you do? Maurice C.: Just being in Atlanta? Ethan B.: Just kind of does that promote it across the country or other areas as well? Maurice C.: Does that help promote it across the country? Jolie S.: Well maybe another way of asking that... Maurice C.: No, I can answer. Short answer is no it doesn't. The interesting thing about, I think podcast is while they do reach a national or global audience, they can still be in a local sense unknown. I mean Atlanta is a good entertainment city. Atlanta is a good culture city. Atlanta is not a good podcasting city not like New York would be or Chicago or Los Angeles. It's coming up. It's getting better. It's funny because I was relaying this to Jen Stucker earlier about how I sort of like that I have a bit of anonymity in Atlanta even though I do my show there and I've done it there for almost seven years now. Maurice C.: Where I can go out and nobody knows who I am, which is great, but I'm able to sort of have a much larger impact in other places that don't necessarily has to do with just where I stay at. I mean Atlanta's a great city. Atlanta bashing of culture, music, art, etc. I would say in a whole though for what I do with Revision Path, it doesn't help. I'm not saying it harms it but it doesn't help it either. It's just kind of a thing to know. Most people think I do the show out of New York, so if that gives any indication. Jolie S.: So, I have a twist on that question for both of you. So Taylor you are connected to Detroit. Maurice you're in Atlanta. In what ways have those particular cities shaped your could be designed sensibility or your sense of yourself as a black creative in the world? Taylor S.: Yeah, I'll say that Detroit first off just has this undercurrent of grassroots workers that are always at the forefront of conversations. And it may not necessarily be through the mainstream media, but there's just such a strong network. And within that, this sense of familiar within that network. I'm also, I think as far as my visual aesthetic, it really, and I haven't thought a lot about this, but it really has poured into the way that I see beauty in the idea of decay or destruction or learning to really see beauty through what would maybe be perceived as others as decay. And I think that for Detroit, for me that has just really shaped the way that I think about community and what design can really do, but also the ways that I know that I think about rebirth within that. Maurice C.: See Atlanta's interesting in that there are black people doing things at every single level. We've had just, if you want to just talk about leadership, we've had black mayors for the past 40 something years. I've never not known black people to be dope. I don't know if that's necessarily because of being in Atlanta. But certainly when you see that all around you, those possibility models become more and more concrete. I mean, it's easy for me to go somewhere and bump into a celebrity or bump into someone who's doing something great and it's not a big deal because you see it everywhere. It's just, I hate to give this comparison to Wakanda, but it's one of those things where you see it everywhere. And so because you see it everywhere you know that you can do it too. Maurice C.: It's not something where, I mean, even the city where I'm originally from is Selma, Alabama, which is well known in the civil rights movement, etc. To go from there to Atlanta at a time where I was beginning my education and really becoming my own as an adult, I knew just from seeing everything that I saw around me and I also went to a historically black college that all of this is possible for me as a black person. There are no limits for what I can achieve because I see other people doing it. And so I would say Atlanta is very unique in that because of the colleges, the culture, the leadership, the music, the art, the food, I mean everything. We're at all levels and so because of that, it's very easy to sort of see yourself succeed in that way. Jolie S.: Well, Maurice and Taylor, thank you very much for joining me today. If you're interested in learning more about Maurice's podcast Revision Path, visit revisionpath.com. Our producers for this podcast are Chris Cavera and Marco Mendoza an AC level. Research assistance was provided by ICS intern, Megan Napolitan with editing by Stevie Scheurich. This conversation was recorded in the Stanton Audio Recording Studio in the Michael & Sara Kuhlin Center at Bowling Green State University.
As Grace Lee Boggs so brilliantly stated, “In this exquisitely connected world, it’s never a question of ‘critical mass.’ It’s always about critical connections.” It is with gratitude that we both reflect on twenty years of the Allied Media Conference and look ahead to building on the legacy of the critical connections that have led us here today. Special thanks to: Rev. Joan Ross (WNUC Station Manager), Morris Porter (sound engineer), Puck Lo (editor), Emi Kane (AMP Board member, interviewer and co-wrangler of this project), and all of our guests, especially Sterling Toles for providing the theme music!
As Grace Lee Boggs so brilliantly stated, “In this exquisitely connected world, it’s never a question of ‘critical mass.’ It’s always about critical connections.” It is with gratitude that we both reflect on twenty years of the Allied Media Conference and look ahead to building on the legacy of the critical connections that have led us here today. Special thanks to: Rev. Joan Ross (WNUC Station Manager), Morris Porter (sound engineer), Puck Lo (editor), Emi Kane (AMP Board member, interviewer and co-wrangler of this project), and all of our guests, especially Sterling Toles for providing the theme music!
As Grace Lee Boggs so brilliantly stated, “In this exquisitely connected world, it’s never a question of ‘critical mass.’ It’s always about critical connections.” It is with gratitude that we both reflect on twenty years of the Allied Media Conference and look ahead to building on the legacy of the critical connections that have led us here today. Special thanks to: Rev. Joan Ross (WNUC Station Manager), Morris Porter (sound engineer), Puck Lo (editor), Emi Kane (AMP Board member, interviewer and co-wrangler of this project), and all of our guests, especially Sterling Toles for providing the theme music!
As Grace Lee Boggs so brilliantly stated, “In this exquisitely connected world, it’s never a question of ‘critical mass.’ It’s always about critical connections.” It is with gratitude that we both reflect on twenty years of the Allied Media Conference and look ahead to building on the legacy of the critical connections that have led us here today. Special thanks to: Rev. Joan Ross (WNUC Station Manager), Morris Porter (sound engineer), Puck Lo (editor), Emi Kane (AMP Board member, interviewer and co-wrangler of this project), and all of our guests, especially Sterling Toles for providing the theme music!
Hello and welcome to the Baha’i Blogcast with me your host, Rainn Wilson. In this series of podcasts I interview members of the Baha’i Faith and friends from all over the world about their hearts, and minds, and souls, their spiritual journeys, what they’re interested in, and what makes them tick. In this episode, I sit down with the multi-talented Kamal Sinclair, a dancer, percussionist, multi-media producer, and currently the Executive Director of 'Future Architects'. In this conversation we talk about being in 'Stomp', new technology and emerging media, the future of work, meeting Ruhiyyih Khanum, how art generates knowledge and the role beauty plays in the world, the difference between empathy and compassion, and the need to address trauma and abuse in the community. I hope you find this conversation as riveting as I did! To find out more about Kamal Sinclair and some of the things we covered in this podcast, check out the following links: * Learn more about 'Future Architects' here: https://futurearchitects.com/ * Here is Kamal's body of research relating to equality in emerging media: https://makinganewreality.org/ * Here's a link to STOMP, of which Kamal was a performer for six years: https://stomponline.com/ * Here's a Time magazine article about 'Question Bridge': https://time.com/75987/the-question-bridge-project-redefining-black-male-identity/ * Here's the trailer for Question Bridge: Black Males: https://vimeo.com/12010682 * We talk about Virtual Reality and Oculus Rift: https://www.oculus.com/ * We talk about the Sundance Institute: http://www.sundance.org/ * Here's a video interview with Kamal 'Storytellers of Tomorrow - Sundance Institute New Frontier Lab Programs with Kamal Sinclair': https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trSieVUB9p0 * Here's a Forbes podcast interview with Kamal: https://www.forbes.com/sites/christinawallace/2018/02/12/podcast-kamal-sinclair-is-charting-new-frontiers-in-digital-storytelling/#7861d5b23b99 * Here's a video of a talk by Kamal Sinclair about emerging media: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64v8yjI-Dw4 * Rainn mentions Oscar DeGruy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscar_DeGruy * Kamal talks about her meetings with Ruhiyyeh Khanum (https://bit.ly/303laAJ) and Violette Nakhjavani (https://bit.ly/2J12rQu). * We talk about the work of Ruha Benjamin, who was also a guest on this podcast: https://www.bahaiblog.net/2017/09/bahai-blogcast-rainn-wilson-episode-22-ruha-benjamin/ * Kamal talks about the Allied Media Conference: https://www.alliedmedia.org/ * Kamal mentions Bobby Aazami: https://www.bahaiblog.net/2018/05/six-million-dollar-kid-interview-bobby-aazami/ * Kamal shares one of her favourite quotes found in 'The Seven Valleys' by Baha'u'llah: "I say ‘Be,’ and it is, and thou shalt say ‘Be,’ and it shall be." * Learn more about 'The Seven Valleys' here: https://www.bahaiblog.net/2016/09/introduction-seven-valleys/ Be sure to subscribe to the Baha’i Blogcast for more episodes on: *YouTube: http://bit.ly/2JTNmBO * iTunes: http://apple.co/2leHPHL *Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/bahaiblogcast *Spotify: http://spoti.fi/2IXRAnb If you would like to find out more about the Baha'i Faith visit BAHAI.ORG, and for more great Baha'i-inspired content check out BAHAIBLOG.NET: http://bahaiblog.net/ Thanks for listening! -Rainn Wilson
Adrienne Maree Brown's writing style has been said to belong to the Afro-Futurism genre. In 2010, she published the Octavia Butler Strategic Reader with Alexis Pauline Gumbs. She is the author of Emergent Strategy and the recently released Pleasure Activism, and she’s the Co-editor of Octavia's Brood. Adrienne's also the co-host of How to Survive the End of the World podcast, a lifelong facilitator, doula and auntie living in Detroit. She has worked extensively with numerous organizations on social justice. Following college, she worked with the Harm Reduction Coalition in Brooklyn and started working as a social justice facilitator. She would go on to facilitate the World Social Forum, an annual meeting of civil society organizations, and work with social justice organizations in Detroit. In 2006, she served as a consultant with Detroit Summer "a multicultural, intergenerational collective" that "worked to transform communities through youth leadership, creativity, and collective action from the ground up" where she developed a strong relationship with the late activist Grace Lee Boggs. Adrienne has worked with the Allied Media Conference as a host and facilitator. In 2018 she Founded, the Emergent Strategy Ideation Institute a hub to experiment, think, facilitate, learn, and share emergent strategy. ESII exists to help groups, organizations, and movements bring these principles into their work through facilitation and training.
Resilience is deeply necessary for us to survive and thrive, but it can often be imposed, distorted, or misunderstood. So we wanted to hear from our people what it means to them, and how they cultivate it for themselves. This past June, our podcast volunteer team from all over the country took a trip to Detroit together for the 20th Annual Allied Media Conference (AMC), and hosted a workshop called Healing Justice Podcast Story Lab. We set up recording booths and asked participants to share the experiences, practices, and relationships that sustained them in their justice journey on the mics. In this episode we invite you to listen in and reflect on these many voices in their own words. Check out our Instagram Story Highlight from AMC for visuals to accompany these stories here: https://www.instagram.com/stories/highlights/17937918448104448/ --------- ACCESS TEAM Join our new Access Team to help us embody our commitment to disability justice, and specifically to volunteer transcribe all of our episodes from this past season. Sign up at www.tinyurl.com/hjptranscript --------- RESOURCES You heard Myra, Parke, and Rachel refer to the following Healing Justice Podcast episodes: -- 07 De-spa-ifying Healing & Accessibility with Third Root Community Health Center (Geleni Fontaine & Emily Kramer) -- 22 Sustaining Ourselves when Confronting Violence with Black Lives Matter Global Network & Black Visions Collective (Miski Noor & Kandace Montgomery) -- 03 Practice: Journaling Our Identity with Dr. Robyn Henderson-Espinoza Learn more about Allied Media Conference and their chrysalis year at https://www.alliedmedia.org/amc ---------JOIN THE COMMUNITY -- Become a sustaining member at www.patreon.com/healingjustice -- Find us on Instagram @healingjustice, like Healing Justice Podcast on Facebook, and tweet at us @hjpodcast on Twitter -- and check out our Instagram Story highlight for visuals from the workshop! -- Learn more and sign up for the email list to hear when new episodes drop at www.healingjustice.org --------- THANK YOU to: -- Rachel Ishikawa, Myra Al-Rahim, and Parke Ballantine for the creative direction and production of this episode, and your leadership at the workshop at AMC. -- Marcia Lee, Justin Campbell, and Kate Werning for co-designing and co-facilitating the Healing Justice Podcast Story Lab workshop at AMC in June 2018. -- Miriam Zoila Perez and JD Davids for being an essential part of the production team at the workshop. -- Kirin Kanakkanatt, Brittany Koteles, Charlie Bruce, Nat McClellan, and Josiah Werning for your volunteer support at AMC. -- Zach Meyer at the COALROOM for mixing and final production, Josiah Werning for graphic design, and Danny O’Brien for intro and closing music. AND THANK YOU TO OUR GUESTS: Each of these folks and many more attended our Story Lab workshop at AMC and generously shared their brilliance with us. The voices you heard include Chimaera Bailey, Hadassah Damien, Jekaren Olaoya, Symone Johnson, Nada Beydoun, Isis Rose, Rajelin Escondo, Vern Plotkin, Lydia Nylander, Sarahlyn Pablo, Unny Nambudiripad, Frankie Mastrangelo, Chaz Barracks, and Carlin Christy.
Our 2nd episode comes to you live from the Allied Media Conference in Detroit, MI this past June! We sat down with Phoenix-based organizers, Xyra and Crystal of Trans Queer Pueblo, an autonomous LGBTQ+ migrant community of color who work to generate community power for liberation. Xyra and Crystal dive deep into the importance of healing justice within anti-criminalization work, the value of disruption, and the necessity of creating alternative, autonomous spaces for queer and trans people of color. But before we dive into that conversation, we had two quick chats with rad organizers from former grantee partners Southerners on New Ground (SONG) & Black LGBTQIA+ Migrant Project. They stopped by our table to say hello in the AMC Exhibition Room and we asked them how their AMC was going, what knowledge they’re bringing back to their organizations, and of course, how funders can do better at respecting organizers time and labor. Trans Queer Pueblo receives multi-year support through Third Wave Fund's Grow Power Fund and have also received the Mobilize Power Fund for urgent community mobilization.
This episode focuses on Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion, EDI for short and features three guest who've been working tirelessly in this arena. Amita Lonial leads our conversation. Amita, (she/her/hers) is currently the Principal Librarian for Learning, Marketing, and Engagement at San Diego County Library. She also currently serves as the co-chair for the PLA Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Task Force. Racial and social justice is something she have always been passionate about. Prior to becoming a librarian she spent 8 years in the non-profit sector working with organizations engaged in direct action organizing and policy reform. Working in public libraries has deepened her commitment to doing liberation based work in our communities and with library staff. Katie Dover-Taylor is a Reference Librarian at the William P. Faust Public Library in Westland, Michigan, where she focuses on library technology and digital literacy training. Katie has developed her understanding of power and oppression in public libraries through both community organizing and scholarship. In 2015 and 2016, Katie co-coordinated the Radical Librarianship Track at the Allied Media Conference, bringing the first official gathering of library-centric content to an annual conference which draws a diverse spectrum of creative and technology-savvy people engaged in social justice work. In 2017, Katie co-authored the chapter "Disrupting Whiteness: Three Perspectives on White Anti-Racist Librarianship" for Topographies of Whiteness: Mapping Whiteness in Library and Information Science. She is currently a member of PLA's Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Task Force. Mia Henry (she/her/hers) is the Executive Director of the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership. Mia joined the team in 2014 with over 18 years of experience in nonprofit management, training facilitation, intergenerational community organizing, and civic and history education. Mia was the founding director of the Chicago Freedom School (CFS), a nonprofit organization that supports youth-led social change and youth-adult partnerships in community organizing. Since her work with CFS, Mia has been a consultant nationally with Safe Places for the Advancement of Community and Equity (SPACEs), and in Chicago with the Chicago History Museum, Chicago Public Schools, the University of Chicago Hospital, and the University of Chicago Oriental Institute. Mia is the owner and operator of Freedom Lifted, a small business dedicated to providing civil rights tours. She is also the founder of Reclaiming South Shore for All, a diverse, grassroots group of residents committed to mobilizing the South Shore (Chicago) community and institutionalizing systems that promote peace, youth leadership, and political accountability. She has been a visiting lecturer at the University of Illinois at Chicago and Harold Washington College, as well as a high school history teacher and International Baccalaureate (IB) program coordinator for Chicago Public Schools. Mia is deeply passionate about social movement history, positive youth development, and civic engagement through an anti-oppression lens. She serves on the Boards of Directors for the Mikva Challenge and the Community Justice for Youth Institute. Mia earned her B.S. from Rutgers University and her M.S.Ed. from the University of Pennsylvania.
In this practice, you’re joining Alexis Francisco and Cicia Lee for the meditative experience of Centering Prayer. They describe it as a constant practice of letting go of factors we can’t control in order to get our egos out of the way and be able to show up well to our lives and our work. Origin: Centering Prayer practice is said to be created by Trappist monks in fairly recent history, and draws on a rich lineage in Christian mysticism, particularly in the catholic tradition in Europe through St. John of the Cross, and Teresa of Avila. Primary among these historical lineages is that of the Black tradition of the desert fathers and mothers, religious communities of African Christians who sought to build alternative communities outside of empire, who refused to be ruled and corrupted by the lies and compulsions of the world, and sought a lifestyle devoted to freedom in Christ, and practices to support that. Though this practice has a clear lineage and is deeply rooted in the Christian mystical tradition, and it is also influenced by Buddhist meditation and mindfulness practices. Practice instructions begin at around the 10 minute mark. The steps Alexis and Cicia share are: 1) Choose an anchor word for your practice.2) Settle into a relaxed position and take some deep breaths. Silently introduce your sacred word.3) When you notice yourself get pulled away by thinking, gently return to your sacred word as a gesture of consent to the presence of God.4) At the end of your time of prayer, rest in stillness for a few moments before transitioning to your next activity. You can download the corresponding conversation (episode 33) to hear Alexis and Cicia talk about contemplative activism with Teresa P Mateus. -- ✨ Join our email list to stay in touch! ✨ Join our email list at www.healingjustice.org -- we’ll be emailing out a PDF of a cool zine we gave away at the Allied Media Conference and CommonBound, and staying in touch over the summer during our season break. -- ABOUT OUR GUESTS Our guests all come to us via the Mystic Soul Project. The Mystic Soul Project is creating spaces that center the voices, teaching, practices, and wisdom of People of Color at the intersections of mysticism, activism & healing. More here: https://www.mysticsoulproject.com/about-us Cicia Lee is an organizer, trainer, and contemplative practitioner. She currently works with Momentum, a training institute and movement incubator supporting organizers across the country to build social movements that can shift the terrain of what's politically possible. She is a 3-wing-4 on the enneagram and a taurus. Alexis Francisco is an an organizer, educator, and currently serves as assistant pastor at New Day United Methodist Church in the Bronx, New York. Alexis' work focuses on centering spirituality and healing praxis in the work of community building and shifting dynamics of power and oppression in the Bronx, New York City and beyond. Teresa P Mateus is one of the cofounders of Mystic Soul, a trauma therapist, and a regular on this podcast. To learn more about Teresa, visit at mysticsoulproject.com-- JOIN THE COMMUNITY: Sign up for the email list at www.healingjustice.org Social media: Instagram @healingjustice, Healing Justice Podcast on Facebook, & @hjpodcast on Twitter This podcast is 100% volunteer-run. Help cover our costs by becoming a monthly sponsor at www.patreon.com/healingjustice or giving a one time gift here https://secure.squarespace.com/commerce/donate?donatePageId=5ad90c0e03ce64d6028e01bbPlease leave us a positive rating & review in whatever podcast app you’re listening - it all helps! THANK YOU: Image cover photo by David Leon MorganAudio content editing by Blake Chastain of Exvangelical PodcastMixing and production by Zach Meyer at the COALROOMIntro and Closing music gifted by Danny O’BrienAll visuals contributed by Josiah Werning
Welcome to part 3 of a 3-part collaborative series between the Mystic Soul Project and Healing Justice Podcast! This week, Cicia Lee, Alexis Francisco, and Teresa P Mateus join us to talk about the role of contemplation in activism, queerness in spiritual community, what POC-centered contemplation can look like, lamentation and grief, and how attending to the internal and breaking through illusion *is* a form of action. Download the corresponding practice episode to practice Centering Prayer with Alexis and Cicia. Practice episodes always publish on Thursdays. To hear the rest of the series, download episode 26 to hear from Mystic Soul about POC-centered spirituality, and episode 29 to join the discussion on indigenous reclamation. --- ✨ Join our email list to stay in touch! ✨ Join our email list at www.healingjustice.org -- we’ll be emailing out a PDF of a cool zine we gave away at the Allied Media Conference and CommonBound, and staying in touch over the summer during our season break. --- ABOUT OUR GUESTS Our guests all come to us via the Mystic Soul Project. The Mystic Soul Project is creating spaces that center the voices, teaching, practices, and wisdom of People of Color at the intersections of mysticism, activism & healing. More here: https://www.mysticsoulproject.com/about-us Cicia Lee is an organizer, trainer, and contemplative practitioner. She currently works with Momentum, a training institute and movement incubator supporting organizers across the country to build social movements that can shift the terrain of what's politically possible. She is a 3-wing-4 on the enneagram and a taurus. Alexis Francisco is an an organizer, educator, and currently serves as assistant pastor at New Day United Methodist Church in the Bronx, New York. Alexis' work focuses on centering spirituality and healing praxis in the work of community building and shifting dynamics of power and oppression in the Bronx, New York City and beyond. Teresa P Mateus is one of the cofounders of Mystic Soul, a trauma therapist, and a regular on this podcast. To learn more about Teresa, visit at mysticsoulproject.com-- JOIN THE COMMUNITY: We need your help to fund this volunteer project! Please help cover our costs by becoming a monthly sponsor at www.patreon.com/healingjustice or giving a single gift at our one-time donation link here: https://secure.squarespace.com/commerce/donate?donatePageId=5ad90c0e03ce64d6028e01bb Sign up for the email list at www.healingjustice.org Social media: Instagram @healingjustice, Healing Justice Podcast on Facebook, & @hjpodcast on Twitter Please leave a positive rating & review in whatever app you are listening - it all makes a difference! THANK YOU: Content editing by Blake Chastain of Exvangelical PodcastMixing and production by Zach Meyer at the COALROOMIntro and Closing music gifted by Danny O’BrienAll visuals contributed by Josiah Werning
Join Cedar Landsman of Relational Uprising in learning how to inquire appreciatively into what we may be inclined to judge, reject, exclude, dismiss, or devalue about another’s experience. We see what new information this brings to us, helping us to see beyond our own entrenched perspective. This activity is meant to be done in conjunction with a relational storytelling and resonance practice, which creates the necessary support to do this activity well. (To learn Resonance Practice, see Healing Justice Podcast Episode 20 with Mark Fairfield.) Follow along with this worksheet to really dig in to some supported reflection and also revisit later or share with others: Relational Inclusion Worksheet from Relational Uprising https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Kc4b5qUe-590SudKQ4AirmXQZc47O0La Download the corresponding conversation (32: Bridging Complexity Collectively) to hear Lucién Demaris & Cedar Landsman of Relational Uprising about individualism as a system of oppression; “heroic” cultures of organizing; indigenous traditions of healing in Ecuador; repairing rupture, suspicion, and judgment; and bridging as a form of increasing our ability to hold complexity in our movements. --- ✨ Join the email list to stay in touch! ✨ Join our email list at www.healingjustice.org -- we’ll be emailing out a PDF of a cool zine we gave away at the Allied Media Conference, and staying in touch over the summer during our season break. --- ABOUT OUR GUEST Cedar Landsman is a heart-centered community organizer, trainer and facilitator who has worked in the field of social justice for over 17 years, from the global justice movement to the low-wage labor movement to the fight for a just and fair food system. She co-founded and co-directs Relational Uprising with Lucién Demaris, which is a training and coaching institute that supports social movements to foster a relational culture of embodied support, interdependence, and inclusion in their organizations and communities. More at www.relationaluprising.org --- JOIN THE COMMUNITY: Sign up for the email list at www.healingjustice.org Social media: Instagram @healingjustice, Healing Justice Podcast on Facebook, & @hjpodcast on Twitter This podcast is 100% volunteer-run. Help cover our costs by becoming a sponsor at www.patreon.com/healingjustice or giving a one time gift here https://secure.squarespace.com/commerce/donate?donatePageId=5ad90c0e03ce64d6028e01bb Please leave a positive rating & review in whatever app you are listening - it all makes a difference! THANK YOU to all our production volunteers: Content editing by Rachel IshikawaMixing and production by Zach Meyer at the COALROOMIntro and Closing music gifted by Danny O’BrienAll visuals contributed by Josiah Werning
Every year in June, social justice organizers, artists, and media makers from around the country (and beyond) gather in Detroit for the Allied Media Conference. Autumn and adrienne sat down on day 3 of the event, with over 200 activists, and held our first ever live show. We talk about sisterhood, survival, and liberation through pleasure. HEADS UP: Become a patron this month to get a limited run APOCALYPSE POTION, handcrafted by Dori Midnight! (If you're already a patron, you get the potion too! We'll be in touch.) www.patreon.com/Endoftheworldshow Music by Tunde Olaniran and Mother Cyborg Image by Emily Yue - endoftheworldshow.org @endoftheworldPC --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/how-to-survive-the-end-of-the-world/message
This week, we’re talking with Lucién Demaris & Cedar Landsman of Relational Uprising about individualism as a system of oppression; “heroic” cultures of organizing; indigenous traditions of healing in Ecuador; repairing rupture, suspicion, and judgment; and bridging as a form of increasing our ability to hold complexity in our movements. Recommended listening that this episode builds upon: Episode 20: Relational Culture with Mark Fairfield. Download the corresponding practice (32 Practice: Relational Inclusion) to join Cedar in learning how to inquire appreciatively into what we may be inclined to judge, reject, exclude, dismiss, or devalue about another’s experience. We see what new information this brings to us, helping us to see beyond our own entrenched perspective. Practice episodes always publish on Thursdays. --- ✨ PODCAST NEWS ✨ Thank you to all of you who joined us last week in Detroit for Allied Media Conference! It was truly amazing to be there as a team.. Check out our Instagram @healingjustice & Facebook ‘Healing Justice Podcast’ to get a glimpse of the action. We also made a custom healing justice zine featuring the work of Autumn Brown, Maryse Mitchell Brody, Caitlin Metz, and Marcia Lee, so if you want access to the PDF so you can print one for yourself or a whole bunch for your community, join our email list at healingjustice.org and we’ll be sending that out soon! And if you’ll be at CommonBound in St. Louis this weekend (June 22-24), come join us for our workshop on Saturday morning: Healing Justice & Economies of Collective Care, co-hosted with the local 4A Project. In a couple weeks we are beginning a summer break for reflection, restructuring, fundraising, and discernment. Will you let us know what you’ve loved, what you want more of, how you’ve used the practices, and how you want to show up in this community? As we head into a summer break for discernment and planning, we want to shape season 2 based on your input! Click here to take the survey and let us know your thoughts: https://goo.gl/forms/ykXYxg0iFq6pUxBF3 --- ABOUT OUR GUESTS Relational Uprising is a training and coaching institute that supports social movements to foster a relational culture of embodied support, interdependence, and inclusion in their organizations and communities. More at www.relationaluprising.org Cedar Landsman is a heart-centered community organizer, trainer and facilitator who has worked in the field of social justice for over 17 years, from the global justice movement to the low-wage labor movement to the fight for a just and fair food system. She co-founded and co-directs Relational Uprising, which brings relational practice and theory to changemakers, particularly activists and organizers engaged in frontline movement building. Lucién Demaris is a Somatics-based healer, educator and consultant, training in the US and internationally for the last 15 years. He currently serves as Co-Director at Relational Uprising, a project incubated at The Relational Center in Los Angeles, where he developed a Relational Somatics frame for activists. Lucién is formally trained as a Guild Certified Feldenkrais Practitioner of Somatic Education, a California Licensed Acupuncturist and a Nationally Certified Bodyworker.--- JOIN THE COMMUNITY: Sign up for the email list at www.healingjustice.org Social media: Instagram @healingjustice, Healing Justice Podcast on Facebook, & @hjpodcast on Twitter This podcast is 100% volunteer-run. Help cover our costs by becoming a sponsor at www.patreon.com/healingjustice (and consider joining at $8/month or above to sponsor a gift for one of our brilliant guests or volunteers!). You can also give a one time gift here https://secure.squarespace.com/commerce/donate?donatePageId=5ad90c0e03ce64d6028e01bb Please leave a positive rating & review in whatever app you are listening - it all makes a difference! THANK YOU to all our production volunteers: Content editing by Rachel IshikawaMixing and production by Zach Meyer at the COALROOMIntro and Closing music gifted by Danny O’BrienAll visuals contributed by Josiah Werning
Join Teo Drake in this incredibly simple embodied exercise to practice privileging your heart above your head. The questions Teo asks in this practice are: To whom do I belong? Who holds me? Who am I in love with? Who do I carry with me at my heart center? What can my heart come home to? There are lots of reasons that different versions of the yoga pose Balasana (Child’s Pose) that Teo offers might not work in your body. Here’s one option of an instructional video offering various options: https://bodypositiveyoga.com/modifications-for-childs-pose-balasana/ And please, be empowered to find any position that does work for your body to connect with a sensation of privileging your heart above your head -- either literally or energetically. Your practice is all yours! Download the corresponding conversation (31 Intention & Impact: Showing Up Right-Sized) to hear Teo talk about the relationship between intention and impact, what it means to be right-sized, the rage of coming of age during the AIDS epidemic, Being Trans and HIV+ poster child, having a quiet nature AND fighting white supremacy, and risk as a devotional act. --- ✨ Don’t miss out on our Zine! ✨ Sign up to stay in touch with us at www.healingjustice.org -- we’ll be emailing out a PDF of a cool zine we are giving away at the Allied Media Conference to our email list soon, so join now so you can get it! --- ABOUT OUR GUEST Teo Drake is a spiritual activist, an educator, a practicing Buddhist and yogi, and an artisan who works in wood and steel. Teo says that as a blue collar queer-identified trans man living with AIDS, he has 101 reasons to not want to be present in his own skin. The physical and spiritual practice of yoga and Buddhist traditions made it possible to begin to heal and feel at home in his own body. When he isn’t helping spiritual spaces be more welcoming and inclusive of queer and transgender people or helping queer and trans folks find authentic spiritual paths, he can be found teaching martial arts, yoga, and woodworking to children. His writing can be found in the anthology Yoga and Body Image and at the blog Roots Grow the Tree. --- JOIN THE COMMUNITY: Sign up for the email list at www.healingjustice.org Social media: Instagram @healingjustice, Healing Justice Podcast on Facebook, & @hjpodcast on Twitter This podcast is 100% volunteer-run. Help cover our costs by becoming a sponsor at www.patreon.com/healingjustice or giving a one time gift here https://secure.squarespace.com/commerce/donate?donatePageId=5ad90c0e03ce64d6028e01bb Please leave a positive rating & review in whatever app you are listening - it all makes a difference! THANK YOU to all our production volunteers: Content editing by Katie McCutcheonMixing and production by Zach Meyer at the COALROOMIntro and Closing music gifted by Danny O’BrienAll visuals contributed by Josiah Werning
This week, we’re talking with Teo Drake about the relationship between intention and impact, what it means to be right-sized, the rage of coming of age during the AIDS epidemic, Being Trans and HIV+ poster child, having a quiet nature AND fighting white supremacy, and risk as a devotional act. Download the corresponding practice (31 Practice: Heart Over Head) to join Teo in privileging your heart above your head. It’s simple, short, and embodied. Practice episodes always publish on Thursdays. --- ✨ If you’re listening to this right when it comes out the week of June 11, we are currently at Allied Media Conference in Detroit! Check out our instagram @healingjustice for live updates from the conference and to peek in on what we’re up to, and if you’re THERE join us at 11am Friday June 15 for our Healing Justice Podcast Story Lab workshop to be part of a future episode. We're giving out healing justice zines at the AMC -- if you want to print some for yourself, join our email list at www.healingjustice.org and we'll share the PDF with you! There’s still time to chip in to support our travel costs along with our friends from Tonic Podcast: donate at www.gofundme.com/hjamc if you have something to give. Thank you! ✨ --- ABOUT OUR GUEST Teo Drake is a spiritual activist, an educator, a practicing Buddhist and yogi, and an artisan who works in wood and steel. Teo says that as a blue collar queer-identified trans man living with AIDS, he has 101 reasons to not want to be present in his own skin. The physical and spiritual practice of yoga and Buddhist traditions made it possible to begin to heal and feel at home in his own body. When he isn’t helping spiritual spaces be more welcoming and inclusive of queer and transgender people or helping queer and trans folks find authentic spiritual paths, he can be found teaching martial arts, yoga, and woodworking to children. His writing can be found in the anthology Yoga and Body Image and at the blog Roots Grow the Tree.--- JOIN THE COMMUNITY: Sign up for the email list at www.healingjustice.org Social media: Instagram @healingjustice, Healing Justice Podcast on Facebook, & @hjpodcast on Twitter This podcast is 100% volunteer-run. Help cover our costs by becoming a sponsor at www.patreon.com/healingjustice (and consider joining at $8/month or above to sponsor a gift for one of our brilliant guests or volunteers!). You can also give a one time gift here https://secure.squarespace.com/commerce/donate?donatePageId=5ad90c0e03ce64d6028e01bb Please leave a positive rating & review in whatever app you are listening - it all makes a difference! THANK YOU to all our production volunteers: Content editing by Katie McCutcheonMixing and production by Zach Meyer at the COALROOMIntro and Closing music gifted by Danny O’BrienAll visuals contributed by Josiah Werning
The 2oth Annual Allied Media Conference takes place in Detroit June 14-17, 2018 on the campus of Wayne State University. The Conference emerges out of 20 years of relationship-building across issues, identities, organizing practices and creative mediums. Since the first conference (then the Midwest Zine Conference) in 1999, people have been compelled by the concept of do-it-yourself media. The zine conference was rebranded as the “Underground Publishing Conference” for a couple years and then became the Allied Media Conference in 2002. The shift to Allied Media attracted more people who were interested in using participatory media as a strategy for social justice organizing. NADINE MARSHALL (pronouns They/Them) is a queer black poet from Detroit who has appeared at TED x U of M (2016), The Rustbelt Regional Poetry Slam in Columbus, OH (2016), and The National Poetry Slam Competition in Oakland, CA (2015). They are the content coordinator for the Allied Media Conference. She joined the team in 2017 and specializes in strategic planning, community engagement, and program development. Nadine graduated from Wayne State University with an MSW in 2017 and hopes to continuously engage her passion to uplift, bridge, and empower minority communities through creative platforms. In 2015 the Conference surpassed 2,500 attendees and now includes. “AMC @ Night,” a five-day music festival during the AMC, showcasing local and national musical talent.
As AirGo hits 100 episodes, we run it back with the parent of Chicago's radical renaissance Mariame Kaba. The wonderful organizer, educator, and community creator talks about her move back home to New York, angry old Socialists, a shift in battlefield since the election, and more. NOTE: this is the first episode of #AirGoRunItBack, a five-week series featuring return conversations with folks who have been on the show through the first 100 episodes. Share your favorite episode on social media with hashtag #airgorunitback! Recorded 6/18/17 at Allied Media Conference in Detroit Music in this week's episode: Unreleased Kanye Beat Tape Track No. 7 - Kanye West Mariame Kaba - @solpatches
Pop Up Youth Radio is a project of Yollocalli Arts Reach. PUYR is a youth-led, community-centered, pop-up Internet radio program. This show was recorded live at the Allied Media Conference 2017, in Detroit. A conversation about DIY Internet Radio and how it offers people a platform to curate their media, voice their values and amplify communities.
In this special mini-episode, Cecilia Caballero from Chicana M(other)work teamed up with Trina Greene Brown, Black feminist mama-activist and founder of Parenting for Liberation, for a panel titled "Mothering the Revolution" at the Allied Media Conference 2017. The podcast begins with a dedication to the memory of Black mothers killed by police, Charleena Lyles and Megan Marie Hockaday, and we honor their spirits that guide our visions for justice. Ceci and Trina share their reflections about moderating their AMC session, including the shared role of digital storytelling in our respective projects and some challenges such as the difficulty of solidarity-building between parents and caregivers of color and white allies. Then, participants from the AMC session discuss their thoughts about what Mothering the Revolution means to them. We share tips, strategies, affirmations, resources, our fears, laughs, and more.
Join the Beyond Borders team as they discuss the Day of the African Child, remember Soweto with Peter Ngcobo of the Soweto Street Beat, discuss Guyanese/ Caribbean Youth, get a report from Puerto Rico and the Student resistance from Reynaldo Padilla of the University Sin Fronteras, and hear from Jovan Julien at Allied Media Conference.
Join the Beyond Borders team as they discuss the Day of the African Child, remember Soweto with Peter Ngcobo of the Soweto Street Beat, discuss Guyanese/ Caribbean Youth, get a report from Puerto Rico and the Student resistance from Reynaldo Padilla of the University Sin Fronteras, and hear from Jovan Julien at Allied Media Conference.
In this mini-podcast, Parenting for Liberation teamed up with Chicana M(other)work to debrief our session Mothering the Revolution session at the 2017 Allied Media Conference. Cecilia and I discuss why our work centers mothers of color, our experience of holding space in a mixed race group, and also share reflections from conference attendees, recorded live from the AMC!
Queer & Trans Artists of Color Vol 2 A celebration of queer and trans black and brown genius...building on the groundbreaking first volume, Queer and Trans Artists of Color: Stories of Some of Our Lives, Nia King is back with a second archive of interviews from her podcast We Want the Airwaves. She maintains her signature frankness as an interviewer while seeking advice on surviving capitalism from creative folks who often find their labor devalued. In this collection of interviews, Nia discusses biphobia in gay men's communities with Juba Kalamka, helping border-crossers find water in the desert with Micha Cardenas, trying to preserve Indigenous languages through painting with Grace Rosario Perkins, revolutionary monster stories with Elena Rose, using textiles to protest police violence with Indira Allegra, trying to respectfully reclaim one's own culture with Amir Rabiyah, taking on punk racism with Mimi Thi Nguyen, the imminent trans women of color world takeover with Lexi Adsit, queer life in WWII Japanese American incarceration camps with Tina Takemoto, hip-hop and Black Nationalism with Ajuan Mance, making music in exile with Martin Sorrondeguy, issue-based versus identity-based organizing with Trish Salah, ten years of curating and touring with the QTPOC arts organization Mangos With Chili with Cherry Galettte, raising awareness about gentrification through games with Mattie Brice, self-publishing versus working with a small press with Vivek Shreya, and the colonial nature of journalism school with Kiley May. The conversation continues. Bear witness to QTPOC brilliance. Included in the evening will be performances by: Ryka Aoki is the author of Seasonal Velocities, He Mele a Hilo (A Hilo Song) and Why Dust Shall Never Settle Upon This Soul. She has been honored by the California State Senate for her “extraordinary commitment to free speech and artistic expression, as well as the visibility and well-being of Transgender people. Ryka was the inaugural performer for the first ever Transgender Stage at San Francisco Pride, and has performed in venues including the San Francisco Pride Main Stage, the Columbus National Gay and Lesbian Theatre Festival, the National Queer Arts Festival, and Ladyfest South. Ryka also appears in the recent documentaries “Diagnosing Difference” and “Riot Acts.” She has MFA in Creative Writing from Cornell University and is the recipient of a University Award from the Academy of American Poets. She is a professor of English at Santa Monica College.Winner of the People Before Profits Poetry Prize, Meliza Bañales aka Missy Fuego is the author of Say It With Your Whole Mouth (Poems) and the Xicana-Punk-Rock-Coming-of-Age novel Life Is Wonderful, People Are Terrific which was a 2016 Lambda Literary Award Finalist. She was a fixture in the San Francisco Bay Area spoken-word and slam communities from 1996-2010, where she became the first Xicana to win a poetry slam championship in 2002. She is a Visiting Professor of Literature and Counter-Culture at UC San Diego and the feature film of her novel is currently in pre-production in Los Angeles.Nadia Ann Abou-Karr is an artist, writer and practitioner of holistic healing arts. She has been self publishing her own zines since middle school, with the most recent being THE ICONOCLAST Revolutionary Love series which highlights the complexities and confusion that arise from loving in the 5th dimension. Ultimately she always come back to the realization that self love is the best kind, and she uses all of her creative production to create an optimal climate for free love.Kim Tillman is an LA-based singer/songwriter, lead singer of the band Tragic Gadget and half of the music duo Kim Tillman & Silent Films. Her songs have been featured in film and television including American Girl: Saige Paints the Sky, the 2014 documentary feature Off the Floor, on Love & Hip Hop Atlanta and the ABC Family series Switched at Birth. Armed with a honey-velvet voice and precise, evocative lyrics, she aims simply to move you. Praise for Queer & Trans Artists of Color Vol 2 “Nia King’s essential project is about demystifying the artist’s life, and centering expression at the heart of radically diverse QTPOC lives. This second volume of artists’ voices is full of heart and wisdom, struggle and triumph. Another must-read for anyone dedicated to living creatively.” —Jeff Chang, author of Who We Be and We Gon’ Be Alright“With all the talk in the entertainment industry about a lack of diverse voices in our media, Nia King does the big work that is necessary to rescue the entertainment industry from itself. She is going out there to highlight these voices, not because they are diverse, but because they are absolutely necessary.” —W. Kamau Bell, host of United Shades of America“Queer and Trans Artists of Color, Volume 2 continues to amplify beautiful voices that need to be heard. Refreshingly honest and illuminating, these interviews combine to form a powerful statement on the journey of the artist, and the person behind the art, towards creating a world where we can all thrive as our true selves.” —Mat Johnson, author of Loving Day and Pym“Nia King once again provides a vital space where LGBTQ artists of color can share their unique experiences working in their creative fields. This volume, like its predecessor, will be a must-read for years to come.” —Hari Kondabolu, writer and comedian“This book shines a spotlight on QTPOC artists, activists and self-proclaimed weirdos, a group who rarely receive such attention. Through fluid and compelling conversations with King, readers learn about the creative processes, identities, organizing, and politics that inform their art. This is a beautiful archive as well as a rich source of information for creative people seeking inspiration.” —Farzana Doctor, author of All Inclusive and Six Metres of Pavement“In this new volume Nia King continues the invaluable work of amplifying the voices and interrogating the ideas of a new generation of joyous, committed creators. If you want to know who is shaping the culture of the next century, this is a book you must have: a book brimming with honesty, intelligence and heart.” —Nayland Blake, artist and professor“This book is a revolutionary literary gesture, providing both practical information to artists and also doing the work of expanding the archive. I love the way that King brings interviews to the page, disseminating artists’ knowledge while also creating a window into their language and lives. The honesty of the unscripted conversations feels both intimate and subversive.”—Virgie Tovar, author of Hot & Heavy: Fierce Fat Girls on Life, Love and Fashion Nia King is a queer Black, Lebanese, Hungarian, and Jewish artist and activist from Canton, Massachusetts living in Oakland, California. She is the author of Queer & Trans Artists of Color: Stories of Some of Our Lives and the host and producer of We Want the Airwaves podcast. Her writing and comics have been published in Colorlines, East Bay Express and Women & Performance: a journal of feminist theory. She has spoken about her work at schools and conferences such as Stanford University, Swarthmore College, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Facing Race, the Allied Media Conference, and the National Association for Ethnic Studies Conference. You can find more of her work at artactivistnia.com and contact her at NiaKing@zoho.com. Elena Rose, a Filipina-Ashkenazi trans lesbian mestiza, rode stories out of rural Oregon and hasn’t stopped telling since. As an ordained minister, writer, and organizer, she has been published in magazines including Aorta and Make/shift, co-founded the Speak! Radical Women of Color Media Collective, co-curated the acclaimed National Queer Arts Festival show Girl Talk: A Trans and Cis Women’s Dialogue, works as a nationally-recognized interfaith educator on justice issues, and serves on the boards of the Solar Cross Temple and the Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples. She can be contacted at takingsteps@gmail.comand on Twitter @burnlittlelight.
Join Bridget, James, and Thanasis as we are joined by Dr. Moya Bailey. Dr. Moya Bailey is an assistant professor in the Department of Cultures, Societies, and Global Studies and the program in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Northeastern University. Her work focuses on Black women’s use of digital media to promote social justice as acts of self-affirmation and health promotion. She is interested in how race, gender, and sexuality are represented in media and medicine. She currently curates the #transformDH Tumblr initiative in Digital Humanities (DH). She is a monthly sustainer of the Allied Media Conference, through which she is able to bridge her passion for social justice and her work in DH. She is a graduate of the Emory University Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Department. She is the founder and co-conspirator of Quirky Black Girls, a network for strange and different black girls and now serves at the digital alchemist for the Octavia E. Butler Legacy Network. She attended Spelman College where she initially endeavored to become a physician. She fell in love with Women’s Studies and activism, ultimately driving her to graduate school in lieu of medicine. As an undergrad she received national attention for her involvement in the “Nelly Protest” at Spelman, a moment that solidified her deep commitment to examining representations of Black women in popular culture. We talk about the role of the academic in social change, DH and intersectional social change, the Allied Media Conference, the story of Quirky Black Girls, the Octavia E. Butler Legacy Network, the concept of "Misogynoir". We touch on Dr. Bailey's dissertation on how representations in medical school curriculums shape how doctors see different marginalized groups and how the Nelly protest shaped her research and activism, how problematic portrayals become international, and dismantling binaries. Dr. Bailey talks about the possibilities of linking activists, academics, and scifi writers at the Black To The Future conference. Octavia E. Butler Legacy Network: http://octaviabutlerlegacy.com/ The Allied Media Conference: https://www.alliedmedia.org/amc Black To The Future Conference: https://blacktothefuture.princeton.edu/ Books mentioned by Dr. Bailey: Parable of the Sower by Octavia E. Butler https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/52397.Parable_of_the_Sower Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements, edited by Walidah Imarisha, adrienne maree brown https://www.akpress.org/octavia-s-brood.html News item mentioned: Students at Spelman College protest Nelly's video "Tip Drill." http://www.alternet.org/story/18760/dilemma Credits: Brought to you by the Northeastern Graduate History Association Sound editing: Beka Bryer Produced: Dan Squizzero Music by Kieran Legg Rate, review, and subscribe on iTunes! Feedback/love/hate/comments/concerns/suggestions: breakinghistorypodcast@gmail.com Facebook page: www.facebook.com/breakhist/ breakinghistorypodcast.com/
In this week's podcast, we look at the different ways youth in our community take action for social change. Many people are unfamiliar with the social justice work of Girl Scouts, but for more than a century, girls and young women have tackled social and environmental issues through their programming. We talk with Girl Scouts of New Mexico Trails to learn more. And our GJ youth members report back on their experience attending the 18th annual Allied Media Conference where they learned about digital organizing, surveillance and many more of today’s most pressing social justice and media justice issues.
Chea Bou with his wife Sambath Nhep. Tonight, we learn about Chea Bou, a Cambodian refugee who is facing deportation. Linda Tam with the East Bay Community Law Center and Chea Bou's wife, Sambath Nhep talk about his case. To support Chea, here's the link to the petition. Soh Suzuki with the Detroit Asian Youth Project. Photo by Bryan MacCormack with Left In Focus Then we take you to Detroit with tape from the Allied Media Conference, an annual gathering of vibrant and diverse people using media to incite change. We were fortunate enough to be there for the beginning of a week-long celebration for activist Grace Lee Boggs' 100th birthday including an Asian American history tour of Detroit by the Detroit Asian Youth Project! And finally, we delight your taste buds and with a happy sound pancake and get you ready for Kearny Street Workshop's Dumpling Wars! Community Calendar Friday, July 10, get your bootie over to Bindlestiff Studio in San Francisco for a lively report back from an exposure trip to the Philippines. The event that includes musical performances by Dirty Boots and Power Struggle and is hosted by local funny guy, Joe Cascasan. All funds collected will support the International Peoples' Tribunal this in Washington D.C. and the Salugpongan schools in Mindanao. On July 18, catch Tony Robles reading from his new book, Cool Don't Live Here No More: A Letter to San Francisco, at East Wind Books in Berkeley on July 18 along with Amy Uyematsu reading from her new book The Yellow Door. Remember to get your tickets for Kearny Street Workshop's Dumpling Wars! Teams of home cooks try to win your vote for your favorite gastronomic morsels, while you feast on a delicious spread graciously provided by local restaurateurs and enjoy family-friendly activities. Dumpling Wars is at Oakland Asian Cultural Center on Sunday, July 26. Yum! The post Deportation, Allied Media Conference, and Dumpling Wars appeared first on KPFA.
Rohingya refugees in the Nayapara camp. Photo by Ruben Flamarique/Austcare. Tune in tonight to learn about the terrifying plight of Rohingya Muslims in the Buddhist state of Burma or Myanmar. Preeti Shekar talks to journalist and Burma expert, Sufyan bin Uzayr, and Bay-Area-based Burmese immigrant activist and feminist, Nwe Oo, about how this state-sanctioned massacre is unfolding even as Nobel Peace prize winner Aung San Suu Kyii has been widely criticized for her shocking apathy on the issue. We also feature a quick update on the Allied Media Conference that took place last weekend in Detroit, Michigan, including highlights from a powerful network gathering of Asian American activists called Igniting a Model Minority Mutiny which had a goal to collectively reflect and work on dismantling the model minority myth and internalized anti-Black racism in our communities, and be better allies for #BlackLivesMatter. The post APEX Express – June 25, 2015 appeared first on KPFA.
When trans women of color take over the world, Lexi Adsit will be to blame. This recent SF State graduate is currently co-organizing the first International Trans Women of Color Network Gathering for the upcoming Allied Media Conference. In this interview, she discusses her background as a student organizer of the Queer Yo' Mind Conference, and her research on trans women of color affected by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Read the transcript at scribd.com/artactivistnia. Support the podcast at patreon.com/artactivistnia. Find more episodes at artactivistnia.com.
Alixa and Naima are two poets who together make up Climbing PoeTree, an award winning performance duo. Mixing poetry and politics they seek to use their words to educate and inspire. On this edition, we hear performances by Climbing PoeTree and hear how their performances have evolved over the years. Featuring: Alixa and Naima, Climbing PoeTree performance poets For More Information: Climbing PoeTree http://www.climbingpoetree.com/ Allied Media Conference http://alliedmedia.org/ Youth Speaks http://youthspeaks.org/ Invincible http://emergencemedia.org/invincible Hurricane Season http://www.hurricaneseasontour.com/** Las Krudas: To Be Lesbian, Feminist, and Hip-Hop in Cuba! by Yoshie Furuhashi http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/2006/furuhashi080206.html Videos: Climbing Poetree perform “Being Human” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Z6lYyP2vOk Las Krudas http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ExRUUKE2R3s The post Making Contact – Art is Our Weapon: A Conversation With Climbing Poetree appeared first on KPFA.
Jenny Lee is a co-director of Allied Media Projects, a Detroit organization focused on the intersection of media and social justice. AMP stages the annual Allied Media Conference and, partnered with the Detroit Digital Justice Coalition, organizes on a variety of media education and outreach programs for communities marginalized by traditional media. Jenny and I talk about digital justice, inequality, media landscapes (or should we call them ecologies?), the relationship between offline and online community, narratives, and the myth of individualism. You will hear echoes of systems thinking that has appeared in Frances Whitehead, Wes Jackson, and David Korten. Speaking of Korten, he appears directly when we discuss narratives. Gabriel Stempinski's ideas are present but offstage, especially when we discuss whether the internet can foster meaningful physical communities.
Jenny Lee is a co-director of Allied Media Projects, a Detroit organization focused on the intersection of media and social justice. AMP stages the annual Allied Media Conference and, partnered with the Detroit Digital Justice Coalition, organizes on a variety of media education and outreach programs for communities marginalized by traditional media. Jenny and I talk about digital justice, inequality, media landscapes (or should we call them ecologies?), the relationship between offline and online community, narratives, and the myth of individualism. You will hear echoes of systems thinking that has appeared in Frances Whitehead, Wes Jackson, and David Korten. Speaking of Korten, he appears directly when we discuss narratives. Gabriel Stempinski's ideas are present but offstage, especially when we discuss whether the internet can foster meaningful physical communities.
''SPEAK! is a group of women of color media makers. With contributions from all over the U.S., these recordings are testimonials of struggle, hope, and love. Proceeds of this album will go towards funding single mothers traveling to the 2009 Allied Media Conference in Detroit, MI.'' (from the album liner notes)Here is my interview with Adele Nieves, who produced the album as well as contributed its first track. This CD packs a punch, and you're welcome, you needed that. Powerful, lyrical, musical, beautiful, angry, strong and vulnerable, Adele Nieves and the women of SPEAK! are not sitting around waiting to be granted a seat at the table. They have discovered themselves. So, if you're ready to shut up, sit down and listen to radical women of color media makers, you can buy the CD at www.speakmediacollective.com.The interview opens with Adele reading her piece, Why Do You Speak?, and our conversation ends with a taste of Wishful Thinking by Alexis Pauline Gumbs. Watch for this poem set to music to be released as a single on iTunes! You will want it and you will want to give it to every woman you know.