"We Seek to Intervene:" From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation Meeting 2

A look into what’s being talked about in the BLM to Black Liberation group as they prepare for the next meetup:

A reflection from Shira Cohen on our last session leads us in…

Thank you so much Keeanga for hosting and sharing about this amazing book last night. Apologies for slipping out early. Thought about this while leaving and wanted to share - One thing I've been thinking about is ownership of movements. We talked a lot about who wields decision making power in the movements for Black liberation, who "founds" movements and takes credit for victories and shifts, the role of traditional political party politics and moving or resisting spaces of liberation, and how schools and society take ownership or do not or absolves it/themselves of responsibility of being a part of the work of educating and talking about liberation rather than the work resting on individuals. This also seems to connect to who takes ownership and responsibility in organizing spaces as well particularly when taking on anti racist organizing practice. Thinking about alot!  Thank you all for sharing, Keeanga, Chris, Ismael for bringing the group together and the wisdom in the room and looking forward to the next one. 

This time we'll take a look at the beginning of "What's next?" as we came to it to close out our previous discussion. This includes Chapter 6 and Chapter 7. (sorry as that might be a really short reminder on chapter recommendations)  

Recently, Keeanga was featured on DemocracyNow where she offered this as a response to the political theatre of the DNC: 

"So, I guess I was thinking that the speech, along with the convention as a whole, in many ways has demonstrated this gap between the kind of symbolism and the reality that exists on the streets of Philadelphia and around the country. And so, I think that Hillary Clinton gave a speech that was full of platitudes and that, in some ways, I guess, was of symbolic value, but that really lacked any kind of specificity in terms of how we are going to address very serious crises in this country...I think that what we’ve learned from the Obama presidency is that we have to move from symbolism into actual policies and programs that are going to improve the lives of everyday, ordinary people."

This should be a timely cross-examination with the visionary call to action set forth today by The Movement for Black Lives' #Vision4BlackLives, which collaborated with many on-the-ground Black-led organizations to express policy demands to support and uplift Black lives: 

"We have created this platform to articulate and support the ambitions and work of Black people. We also seek to intervene in the current political climate and assert a clear vision, particularly for those who claim to be our allies, of the world we want them to help us create. We reject false solutions and believe we can achieve a complete transformation of the current systems, which place profit over people and make it impossible for many of us to breathe."

I feel like the visions of what we have planned for the future of our work in Philadelphia, in conversation with what Keeanga has written towards, what the Democratic Convention has failed to live up to, and what movement organizers have made concrete shall make tomorrow a really awesome dialogue. See you then!

From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation

In the recent week, we have seen the intensifying of the call for action and justice with a mass re-activation of social protest against the continued injustices of the US police state. As we continue on with this book club, I hope that it allows us space to gather ourselves, build momentum, and contribute in both the street-level protests and beyond. 

I had this idea of writing up a neatly written synopsis on our last meeting from what I understood; we covered a lot of ground. There's a very amateur-ish scribing that I put together in one of the photos. From dismantling myths of racial progress to accounting for the internalizing of traumatizing logics about ourselves and our choices that hide the system's role in creating it...

But then Keeanga dropped this today and I thought what better to focus on than taking our readings and bringing them to our current reality: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/11/dallas-black-lives-matter-protests?CMP=share_btn_fb

Please continue to use this forum as a space to reflect on the book or pre-emptive questions that we can continue using in our book group. If you would like to publish as a blog post, let me know! Read more at http://phlbookclubs.blogspot.com/We offered Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 in the last session as "to be read", Keeanga sent me an email this morning adding Chapter 5 as significant.

So check out the photos, which include some questions we hope to carry into future dialogue and get prepared for our next session, on July 19th, 5-7pm.  

I also think it would be great to begin a conversation here about ways you have contributed (physically, financially, socially, etc.), or are seeking to contribute to this current moment in the movement. As we move toward the DNC, we are seeing a significant rise in actions, all useful, and all pointing us to new visions. There are lots of roles we all can play. 

Building a Movement by Reading Together: Sign up for a Summer Book Club Today!

In 2014, when the Caucus of Working Educators was just a few months old, WE teamed with TAG-Philly to offer 9 book groups with about 85 participants for the purpose of bringing people together and learning about social justice unionism, threats to public education, and racial justice struggles in Philadelphia. Last year, WE and TAG sponsored twelve groups with 170 participants with a focus on racial justice.

This year, based on survey results, WE and TAG are excited to announce 15 book groups for 2016!

Want to meet other people committed to educational justice struggles and other social movements in Philadelphia? Want to learn about the school-to-prison pipeline, the #BlackLivesMatter movement, organizing, feminism, gender & sexuality in education, or another topic? Want to read a classic by bell hooks or Paulo Freire or a New York Times best seller by Ta-Nehisi Coates? Want to be part of a strong and growing movement of educators and allies committed to public education?

Sign up for a book (or five) today!

This summer, we continue the tradition of bringing together people from all walks of life and all parts of the city- parents, teachers, nurses, counselors, activists, community members, students, and anyone else!                 

Want to learn more about past book clubs and how they started? Read this article on the Summer Reading Series in Perspectives on Urban Education by WE supporting member Kathleen Riley.