Love and Fear Series: Racial Justice Organizing beyond Fear with Robin Wright-Pierce
05/21/22 • 45 min
In this episode, we talk about our bodies play a crucial role in requiring us to shift from unsustainable social justice organizing from fear, anxiety, hyper-vigilance, and chaos to organizing from the more sustainable care, trust, love, and even joy. We also talk about the how organizational dynamics such as perceived leadership, funding, and results strengthen fear, too. Our guest invites us to "build our capacity to enter into new relationship with white supremacy, patriarchy, and sexism."
"Freedom is both personal and collective."-Robin Wright-Pierce
Our guest, Robin Wright-Pierce is a coach and facilitator of individual and collective liberation with more than a decade of experience cultivating race equity in organizations and in social change efforts. She is the founder of The Wright Institute for Transformative Change which partners with individuals and organizations to build their capacity to advance courageous change. Robin has worked on issues related to community re-entry and rights for returning citizens, education justice, voting rights, LGBTQ rights, immigration justice, and ending anti-Black police brutality. Her approaches to change spanned formal and informal pursuits involving policy and legislative change, community organizing, design thinking and inclusive facilitation, research and advocacy, and field training and development.
Robin is a thought leader. Her insight and perspective has been captured in NPR’s WBEZ Chicago, KCUR, and WVXU. Her wisdom has been captured in The New York Times, Diversity Issues in Higher Education and in the documentary This Changes Everything now available on Netflix. Recently, she was named one of the top 22 leaders in the country to learn from by Bunch, a coaching company. She is a proud alumnus of both The Ohio State University where she received her Master of Public Administration from the John Glenn College of Public Affairs and Kent State University where she obtained a Bachelor of Arts in Pan-African Studies.
Resources:
Robin Wright's website The Wright Institute .
Originally recorded on May 12 , 2022.
To recomend a guest contact us at: [email protected]
To support Collective Power join our Patreon
In this episode, we talk about our bodies play a crucial role in requiring us to shift from unsustainable social justice organizing from fear, anxiety, hyper-vigilance, and chaos to organizing from the more sustainable care, trust, love, and even joy. We also talk about the how organizational dynamics such as perceived leadership, funding, and results strengthen fear, too. Our guest invites us to "build our capacity to enter into new relationship with white supremacy, patriarchy, and sexism."
"Freedom is both personal and collective."-Robin Wright-Pierce
Our guest, Robin Wright-Pierce is a coach and facilitator of individual and collective liberation with more than a decade of experience cultivating race equity in organizations and in social change efforts. She is the founder of The Wright Institute for Transformative Change which partners with individuals and organizations to build their capacity to advance courageous change. Robin has worked on issues related to community re-entry and rights for returning citizens, education justice, voting rights, LGBTQ rights, immigration justice, and ending anti-Black police brutality. Her approaches to change spanned formal and informal pursuits involving policy and legislative change, community organizing, design thinking and inclusive facilitation, research and advocacy, and field training and development.
Robin is a thought leader. Her insight and perspective has been captured in NPR’s WBEZ Chicago, KCUR, and WVXU. Her wisdom has been captured in The New York Times, Diversity Issues in Higher Education and in the documentary This Changes Everything now available on Netflix. Recently, she was named one of the top 22 leaders in the country to learn from by Bunch, a coaching company. She is a proud alumnus of both The Ohio State University where she received her Master of Public Administration from the John Glenn College of Public Affairs and Kent State University where she obtained a Bachelor of Arts in Pan-African Studies.
Resources:
Robin Wright's website The Wright Institute .
Originally recorded on May 12 , 2022.
To recomend a guest contact us at: [email protected]
To support Collective Power join our Patreon
Previous Episode
Educational Excellence despite the system with Dr. Ishmail Conway and Dr. Rodney Hopson
In this episode, we look at examples of educational excellence throughout African American history in the face of tremendous challenges. Two deeply committed educators challenge us to think about the educational system more broadly given the many ways we learn. They offer examples of questioning language and reconnecting to self, community, and land bring forth healing.
Our guest, Ishmail Conway Ph.D., is a “public intellectual” and “catalyst.” Dr. Conway is a third-generation educator, professional dramatist, father and activist. His youth was spent in Southside Richmond, Bronx, New York and Philadelphia. As a youth, he performed with Duke Ellington in the Concert of Sacred Music, Ahmal and the Night Visitors and several other operas. He co-founded Soweto Stage company in Richmond and has appeared in films and performed for the Colonial Williamsburg, Valley Forge Foundation. Conway’s work as a theatrical director is critically acclaimed including two world premiere plays and a produced premiere opera on Richmond’s Churchill. Dr. Conway worked on interview projects for the nation’s 50th celebration of the Brown Decision. Many of the interviews were published in the book The Unfinished Agenda of Brown v. Board of Education. At the National Archives, he presented a lecture on his research model for the kickoff of the National Archives year-long research of Brown thru May 2004. Last year, his work interviewing teachers and activists, over the past 20 years was noted in Harvard’s History of Education Quarterly. The Association of College Unions-International selected Ishmail as the Multicultural Educator of the Year.
Our other guest, Rodney Hopson is the first born of two passionate and lifelong learners and teachers, blessed to inherit a spirit of resolve and perseverance, an unwavering commitment to his fellow (wo)man, and an increased desire to leave the world a better place than the one into which he was born. Hopson currently serves as a professor of Evaluation in the Department of Educational Psychology, College of Education, University of Illinois Urbana Champaign where he holds appointments/affiliations in the Department of Educational Policy, Organization, & Leadership and the Center of African Studies. Nearly 25 years as a university professor, Hopson has received funding from the National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, Robert Woods Johnson Foundation, W. K Kellogg Foundation, and other local and international funders in support of his evolving research and evaluation that lie in understanding factors that contribute to the optimal aspirational and academic success of underserved and underrepresented groups in social and natural sciences. His post-doctoral/sabbatical studies included academic positions at the University of Namibia (as Fulbright Scholar), the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Hygiene and Centre of African Studies, Cambridge University.
Resources mentioned on the show
African American evaluators article
Education of Blacks in the South 1860-1935 book
Contact Dr. Ishmail Conway email: [email protected]
Contac
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Next Episode
Love and Fear Series: Power is Neutral with Organizer Pastor Daniel Hughes
In this episode, we look at the Church's participation in white supremacy as the complete opposite of Jesus' tradition as a community organizer, himself. We look into religious concepts such as mercy and grace as they inform our personal, relational, and social way of organizing our society. Two GenXers in conversation about relationships, connections, and healing for the generation of latchkey kids who didn't feel tended to.
"A lot of churches have resources, but they don't have the hearts of the people." --Pastor Daniel Hughes
"Choose to Risk something for love!" --Pastor Daniel Hughes
Our guest, Daniel Hughes is a gifted speaker, poet, leadership coach, and community organizer. Connected to the marginalized, he co-creates and uses his gifts in communication and organizing for the AMOS project in partnership with the Hamilton County Office of Reentry. Daniel works to reduce gun violence and deaths, mass incarceration, and recidivism in the county while leading inter-faith organizations to create real change for good in their communities.
Resources:
Originally recorded on May 20, 2022.
To recomend a guest contact us at: [email protected]
To support Collective Power join our Patreon
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