Arts and Social Justice

In "The Quantum Nature of Black Revolutionary Theatre" part of Black Theatre Commons' A Call for Revolutionary Theatre 2020 series, Sage Crump discusses how quantum ideas "evident in nature and how our communities organize outside of government control, can support honing the practice of Black Revolutionary Theatre."

As protests for racial justice seethed through Philadelphia, "Philadelphia’s Bread & Roses Community Fund, a grant-making organization with a social-justice mission, received as much in donations — more than half a million dollars — as it would normally get for the whole year," The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

Pillars recently introduced its Muslim Narrative Change Cohort, integrated by Muslim artists, practitioners, academics, and thinkers who, according to the announcement, "are creating a transformative narrative strategy that will offer us the opportunity to change stories, ideas, behaviors and, ultimately, society".

The full transcript of this podcast is published below.
Explore the full GIA podcast.

The full transcript of this podcast is published below.
Explore the full GIA podcast.

The Ford Foundation asked 40 thinkers to reimagine the future of the creative industry in the midst of "the social, racial, and economic reckoning laid bare by COVID-19 and a growing movement for Black lives." Creative Futures: 40 Provocations to Reimagine the Arts, Documentary, and Journalism is the result of that inquiry, a series of short essays that will unfold through the fall of 2020.

"When it comes to racial bias, you either participate in it actively or through silence, or you use your power and privilege to dismantle it. Each day you make this choice – when you serve as a juror, when you call the police or see someone else call and when and for whom you vote. If oppression happens, then we are allowing it to happen and we are all in the position to stop it."

It started in Fall 2016, when Staten Island Arts — the local arts council for the fifth borough of New York City — was approached by Kerry McCarthy and Michele Kumi Baer of The New York Community Trust, Betsy Dubovsky and Laura Jean Watters of The Staten Island Foundation, and Karen Rosa of the Altman Foundation. This group of concerned funders had observed that Staten Island’s arts programming audiences weren’t racially diverse, and came to us seeking to partner on a program that would thoughtfully address the issue.

In "Organizing Mutual Solidarity Projects as an Act of Resistance in Puerto Rico," Jorge Díaz Ortiz writes in A Blade of Grass Magazine about exercises of autonomous action and organizing in Puerto Rico and how "possibilities for self-governance must be grounded in a culture of mutual solidarity to generate and nurture new and existing structures in society, engaging in a praxis of autonomous action and collective agency."

The National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy's Adam Fishbein discusses disability justice activism and what the philanthropic community can do to center the disability community in efforts to eradicate systemic racism in an interview with Zakiya Mabery, founder of B. Global Diversity & Inclusion Strategic Planning.