Public Classes & Events

Offered Through Embody Equity:

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Class Archive

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Fog on the Lens of White Culture Series:

“My job is to put a little fog on the lens so that you can see it’s there.” — Bushra Aziz, filmmaker & Teaching Artist

“We’re trained from a very early age not just to be independent, but to be better.” — Michele Gelfand, Professor, Stanford University

“I find that White groups tend to use action as a bandaid to avoid sitting with the pain of what has happened.” – Jim Bear Jacobs, Co-Director for Racial Justice, MN Council of Churches

We’ve all felt them:  the urge to DO something about a situation and the need not to share our methods - from family recipes to successful work strategies. These come from White cultural norms that operate on a subconscious level. In leadership positions, there’s also external pressure to act fast and be the best. Yet, neither of these ways of being helps us build a new, antiracist culture. Beyond learning the skills of collaboration and reflection, we must unlearn what holds us back.

In this introductory workshop, we will move our head-learning about collaboration and time for pause into embodied learning so that we can operationalize the things we’ve intellectualized. Join us to expand cultural understandings, and come away with increased stamina for holding difficult emotions, tools to move out of stuckness, and a keener sense of which cultural trait is most beneficial to enact in the moment.

Mediation & Communication:

Civil dialogue is claiming and caring for my identity, needs & beliefs while not degrading yours. — Brené Brown

Engaging in a mediation session or facilitated conversation with an outside expert can feel freeing as people move past where they’ve been stuck. Can you equip your team to do this work internally? Yes. But there is an unwelcome guest to watch out for:  the punitive model of justice itself.  This model is what most of us grew up with, and while it may provide clarity, it fails to build a positive, proactive culture that could minimize future harm.

Drawing upon Restorative, Transformative, and Loving justice models, this course centers on identifying shared values, then building a system that fits them. Along the way, participants learn and practice  models of listening and dialogue that allow learning, empathy, accountability, clear boundaries, and co-creation of positive next steps. 

Embodiment-Based Sessions:

“. . . We’re all embodied in one way, shape, or another. But the question is, are we embodying liberation? Are we embodying our wholeness? Are we embodying our healing?” — Thérèse Cator, EmbodiedBlackGirl.com 

We don't often embody our healing and wholeness. No matter our ancestry, we’ve been exposed to the division and isolation that are the primary tools of colonization. We’ve been taught to idealize independence and individualism, and overlook interdependence and wholeness - starting at the level of our own body and mind. This can make liberation and healing seem like DIY “fixer-upper” projects that we’re responsible for, leading to a culture of burnout and sniping in White antiracist communities. 

"The last place the colonizer leaves is your mind.” — Hari Kondabolu 

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Spontaneity, humor & lightness in community are part of our human birthright, and they are essential to our liberation from colonizer culture. 

Join us as we cultivate these qualities of interdependent wholeness. Using simple, gentle movement practices we will quiet our busy, bossy minds to better integrate the quiet voice of our embodied wisdom. We’ll then extend our awareness from our personal bodies to the group "social body," as a step toward reconnecting in true community. 

"While the mind may be aware of and challenge the impacts of white supremacy, capitalism and patriarchy, the body indicates, often at the most inconvenient times, ways we've been shaped by these systems." -- Kelsey Blackwell

"The body is where we fear, hope, and react; where we constrict and release; and where we reflexively fight, flee or freeze.” -- Resmaa Menakem

This workshop builds upon Resma Menakem and Tada Hozumi’s cultural somatics work. As a somatic practitioner, I know that White-bodied people need remedial somatic work in order to operationalize the things we intellectualize. A Black colleague told me that her BIPOC clients easily locate responses to racial situations in their bodies, whereas her white clients look at her “like I’m from Mars” when asked to do this simple task. 

This is important to Truth-Telling because White-bodied people must be able to hear, feel and process counternarratives. Truth shatters cherished beliefs about our “founding fathers,” our “exceptional” governance, our vaunted economic system, even our family histories. We must develop the skills to discern, unpack and honestly express our own resistance - resistance that comes from the shattering of these false narratives upon which we have built families, systems and self-images.

HOW CAN I INTERROGATE MY OWN RACIAL EXPERIENCE GROWING UP WHITE IN CALIFORNIA’S CENTRAL COAST AREA? — RIE ALGEO GILSDORF

I’m excited to announce this May 19 evening with Points of Light Music and Conie Borchardt. Conie developed Freeing Refrains as a container for embodied storytelling relating to the questions,

What binds you? What Liberates you?

Sensitive to the racial dynamic of these questions, Conie curates their audiences so that some bring a mix of racial identities and others are only for Black, Indigenous or Racialized folks.

This will be an open session for people of all racial identities and experiences.

Conie approaches embodiment and liberatory practices through the voice. They have a way of getting us out of our heads by getting us to sing, even/especially if we don’t think of ourselves as “singers.” Their Points of Light Music tagline is

TENDING PRACTICES OF LISTENING AND EXPRESSION TO SHIFT CULTURE, ONE HEART AT A TIME

Practices of Listening and Expression. That’s what it’s all about, after all. Becoming more aware of and skilled in our listening and expression. Conie teaches in an oral style much like the way dance is taught: I observe a phrase, I get it in my body and repeat it. And with enough repetition we all end up sounding and feeling confident!

This event will bring me back to my roots - both of my rural childhood and of my movement performance days. Expect to watch and hear some stories with movement, participate in a simple song or two with the gathered community, and to explore what binds you and liberates you via the Stuck practice. In Social Presencing Theater, Stuck is not a pathology, it’s a treasure trove of information about the system you’re stuck in. And, as my teacher Manish Srivastava says,

ALL BEAUTIFUL THINGS ARE STUCK BEFORE THEY ARE BORN: A FLOWER INSIDE THE SEED, A CHILD IN THE WOMB, A POEM IN THE MIND OF THE POET.

Last but not least, Stuck is not sustainable; and your body has some ideas about how to move you past it. And, as we respond to my stories, we will tend to our practices of listening to our bodies and allow them to express their insights, which we often discount.

Children & Race:

 “If we give all children dignity and richness, everything changes on the administrative and political level.” - L. Malaguzzi

How can we incorporate multiple perspectives into a design process? How can we see and sense the system of early childhood education as a whole? And how can we de-center white narratives of “developmental appropriateness” and support teachers to co-construct a universal story that honors children’s experiences?

Research shows that children as young as 6 months recognize race; that by age 2 they take race into account in decision making; and that by 5 years they prefer the white doll and, if exposed to white imagery of God, they prefer white leaders. The false narrative is already ingrained. 

Where better to find multiple narratives and truths than in a classroom of young children? Yet, in practice many white adults wait for the subject of race to come up to talk about it. The problem with this is that white-bodied adults often experience bodily tension when race does come up, so even very young children can sense that it is a taboo subject - without a word said. The consequence? Race simply does not come up in many white-centric early childhood programs, leaving white children unconscious or dys-conscious about our shared racial history in this country. The false narrative lives on, and is played out daily in playgrounds and other less intensely supervised settings. Our workshop reveals all of this.

How do conversations about human differences really happen in early childhood classrooms?

How can the environment, the teacher, & the group of children extend each others' thinking?

Join us for a collaborative conversation where we’ll look at the traces of student work: photos, recordings, snippets of conversations, etc., then share our impressions & questions, and talk about next steps.

The Doc Lab is a great way to build a community of equitable practice, and for individual educators to feel seen, supported and even prompted to explore new avenues in their work.

Personal Discernment:

After the demonstrations, prayer tents & verdicts; After the learning groups & ballot measures - What now? What's next as a White abolitionist?

Do you find yourself feeling the urgency of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s words, "Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy," yet not understanding the next steps in your journey of antiracism?

Not wanting to be that White person who quit showing up? Or, tired of feeling like a skyway onlooker but not sure how to get out of its seeming safety?

Longing for meaningful, transformative action toward the Beloved Community King spoke of so often, but wary of charging in with some ill-conceived plan?

Right now there's a real sense among many White people of being so much more ready than a year ago, but -- ready for what, exactly?

Dr. King himself engaged in discernment many times. This mini-retreat will allow you to discern "What is my gift and how do I give it?" starting from "Who is my Self in this racial landscape?" and "What is my Work in reforming it?" These are questions we must ask and periodically re-ask of ourselves as we find the landscape shifting and ourselves growing into new roles. Through journaling, visualization, paired conversations and gentle movement activities you'll begin to see the larger system as it currently stands, and your emerging role within it. You'll leave with more clarity and a sense of the possible.