For its inaugural year, the Marilyn T. and Byron C. Shutz Lecture Series was entitled "SPEAK UP! Building Racial Justice through Art, Pedagogy, and Writing."
This presentation brings to light the reductive ways in which the technologies and bureaucracies of schooling attempt to flatten our differences. Dr. Stommel critiques the notion that students are interchangeable—that whether they are food insecure, queer, or homeless is of no real consequence to a system (of grades, tests, and credentials) that attempts to rank them tidily against one another. He advocates for identifying more ways to involve students in the design of their own learning. In view of this, Dr. Stommel encourages educators to design for the least privileged, most marginalized students, the ones more likely to have felt isolated even before the pandemic. He advocates for writing new policies and imagining new ways forward for students already facing exclusion.
Dr. Jesse Stommel is a faculty member in the Writing Program at the University of Denver. He is co-founder of Digital Pedagogy Lab and Hybrid Pedagogy: the journal of critical digital pedagogy. Dr. Stommel earned his Ph.D. from the University of Colorado, Boulder. Stommel is co-author of An Urgency of Teachers: The Work of Critical Digital Pedagogy, as well as co-editor of Disrupting the Digital Humanities and Critical Digital Pedagogy: a Collection. He is also a documentary filmmaker and teaches courses about pedagogy, film, and new media.
The pandemic and the social justice movements of 2020 revealed continuing racial disparities in communities across the United States. Dr. Sheryll D. Cashin invites attendees to engage in a conversation about redlining and residential segregation in hopes of a more integrated and equitable future that leads to community healing in times of strife. By exploring the local history of redlining and its legacies with creative writers, lawyers, historians, and urban designers, she provides participants with a moment for reflection on this important history. Dr. Cashin suggests that we can envision and plan for a better future together by accounting for multiple perspectives and recognizing the ongoing inequities in our communities.
Sheryll Cashin is Professor of Law, Civil Rights, and Social Justice at Georgetown University. She is an acclaimed author who writes about the U.S. struggle with racism and inequality. Her most recent book, White Space, Black Hood: Opportunity Hoarding and Segregation in the Age of Inequality, addresses the role of segregation and redlining in reproducing inequality. Her books have been nominated for the NAACP Image Award for Nonfiction (2015), Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for Nonfiction (2005, 2009, and 2018), and an Editors’ Choice in the New York Times Book Review (2004). Cashin is contributing editor for Politico Magazine. She has also written commentaries for the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, Salon, The Root, and other media.
In collaboration with the Educate-Organize-Advocate (EOA) Conference, Shutz presented the following two events as part of the inaugural UMKC Social Justice Month in October 2022.
The EOA Conference encouraged participants to familiarize themselves with the Emergent Strategy philosophy and embrace the real power of change. It called for deepening relationships, building trust, and consolidating political partnerships. Attendees learned about the principles of Emergent Strategy, including adaptation, interdependence, collaborative ideation, fractal thinking, transformative justice, and resilience. Speakers used science fiction as a tool for strengthening imagination and invite participants to think beyond binaries and linear, short-term outcomes. The goal was to foster connection by considering how cultural practices such as song circles, altars/community power tables, and spaces for play and dance help us meet essential spiritual and emotional needs.
During this session, we will learn all about the Emergent Strategy philosophy. We will learn how to acknowledge the real power of change and be in the right relationship to it. The desire to deepen relationships, build trust, and political alignment are key objectives in this work. This is what we will strive to awaken in people’s longing, imagination, and work.
Mia Herndon (she/her/they/them) is a fellow at Harriet's Apothecary and serves on the advisory council of Black Feminist Future. Previously, she/they fulfilled the role of Executive Director of the Third Wave Foundation. Herndon is a queer-identified Black mother from the South, who dances and bikes for joy and mental health. She/they support(s) the healing and well-being of people, working as a network facilitator, licensed acupuncturist, somatic coach, and therapeutic bodyworker based in Brooklyn, NY.
Kawanza Billy (she/her) is Founder and Social Impact Strategist at K.Billy Push, a consulting company dedicated to creating community-centered social impact initiatives. Billy received her BA from The City University of New York at John Jay College where she majored in Political Science, focusing on Urban and Community Affairs. Currently, she manages youth advocacy and community service campaigns, leading educational, environmental justice, and public health programs. Billy also serves as National Advocacy Chair for the National Urban League Young Professionals.
chelsea cleveland (they/them) helped co-found Hearing Youth Voices, an intergenerational Black community organizing group focused on youth where they wore many hats such as organizer, facilitator, and Program Director. They are a multi-racial Black non-binary person who are also queer, fat, and disabled. cleveland are a Black feminist and a sci-fi/weirdo thinker from New London, CT. They are currently an Emergent Strategy Facilitator with Emergent Strategy Ideation Institute. They have led trainings on abolition, white supremacy, anti-blackness, racial monopoly capitalism, Black queer feminism, gender & sexuality, and many other topics.
In this workshop, Marie Thompson explored the importance of storytelling in communicating the human experience.
Marie Thompson is Associate Professor of Communication in the School of Social Science and International Studies at Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio. She studies how it is that stories take up space in bodies over and through time. Guided by feminist modes of inquiry, Thompson has pioneered narrative mapping, a method which deepens the understanding of the personal/political nature of health and healing. She has offered narrative mapping workshops for professionals in different fields and published in Health Communication, Communication Teacher, Encyclopedia of Health Communication, Review of Communication, and others.
Panelists Sandi L. Wisenberg and Monica Prince engaged attendees in a conversation about how laughter eases tension, delivers a new perspective, changes power dynamics, and provides a respite.
Panelists Janine Antoni, Victoria Vesna, and Kate Mondloch engaged in a conversation concerning inquiries into open-ended practices of art making and encouraged audience members to reflect on the role of aesthetics, bodily awareness, interpersonal consciousness in healing practices.
Traumatic events can impact multiple members of a community. While community resilience efforts have often focused on preventing trauma from occurring, prevention is only one aspect of resilience. We must consider how we navigate and heal from trauma, building safe and trustworthy relationships that prioritize equity and justice in our communities. Come prepared to consider how you can connect with various communities to respond to trauma in innovative and strengths-based ways.
