Embedded Files
Session Objective: to challenge traditional conceptions of power that undermine the voices of underrepresented stakeholders
Radical Recognition is not simply about superficially noticing nontraditional actors or tokenising marginalised communities. It’s about truly acknowledging and valuing a wide variety of agents. This includes appreciating the power they hold.
Environmental justice and the animal rights movement owe a great deal to critical disability studies, gender studies and queer theory, and critical race theory. These fields have examined, critiqued, and expanded mainstream Western academic ideas about power, capacity, and agency. In class, we’ll talk about some of the ways future generations, non-human animals, and other underrepresented stakeholders ‘speak’ to us – and how we can better learn to listen.
Diverse Forms of Power
Recognise: the relational agency of ‘non-traditional’ stakeholders through this “Theory at a Glance” overview.
At a Glance_ Agency.pdfExamine: the framework of Indigenous environmental justice, which provides a “set of logics that recognizes the agency of non-human beings as well as the Earth itself”.
Dr Deborah McGregor holds the Canadian Research Chair in Indigenous Environmental Justice. She lectures in both the Osgoode Hall Law School and Faculty of Environmental Studies at York University. Professor McGregor’s research has focused on Indigenous knowledge systems and their various applications in diverse contexts including water and environmental governance, environmental justice, forest policy, and management, and sustainable development.
Professor McGregor previously served in the Department of Geography at the University of Toronto and as Senior Policy Advisor for Aboriginal Relations at Environment Canada-Ontario Region. Professor McGregor is Anishinaabe from Whitefish River First Nation, Birch Island, Ontario.
Stephen Whittaker started his career as a Countryside Ranger before spending time as a supply teacher, followed by several roles that developed both curriculum-based and informal education, as well as wider community engagement in a variety of green spaces. He became Senior Ranger for City of York Council before leaving to gain a PGCE teaching qualification and a Masters in Education specialising in learning outside the classroom. He is now bringing his knowledge and experience together in pursuit of a PhD in Learning in the Natural Environment at the University of York.
Mahisha Sritharan is a Research Intern at Sustain Ontario focusing on urban and residential agriculture. She is candidate for a Master in Environmental Studies at York University, and her research interests lie in food access and health. She is passionate about improving access to local healthy foods for communities. You can read more about Mahisha’s ethnographic work examining “The Impacts Of Climate Change On The Health And Well-being Of The Peoples Of Whitefish River First Nation, Ontario” here.
Celebrate: the power of dance through this video, which celebrates that “the art is alive. It has the power to heal, you know. It saved my life. But because I learned to do dance to save my life, I want it to save other people’s lives. And give other people a voice.”
A Bay Area native, Purple Fire Crow (also known as Mr Antoine Hunter) is an award-winning African, Indigenous, Deaf, Disabled, Two Spirit producer, choreographer, film/theater actor, dancer, dance instructor, model, poet, speaker, mentor and Deaf advocate. Mr Hunter has been trained in dance and acting training at Skyline High School in Oakland; the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts); and the Paul Taylor Dance School in NYC.
The founder and artistic director of Urban Jazz Dance, Hunter has performed with dozens of troupes around the world. Credits include Head Choreographer of the D-PAN: Deaf Professional Arts Network ASL Music Video of “Call Me Maybe” by Carly Rae Jepsen.
optional, but highly recommended:
Realise: that ‘disability’ is a construct of colonialism and capitalism – both of which hold narrow understandings of ‘power’ and ‘ability’ in order to exploit them for profit – through this paper written by Nicole Ineese-Nash.
Nicole Ineese-Nash is an Anishinaabe (Oji-Cree) educator, researcher, and writer from Constance Lake First Nation. Nicole completed her Bachelor of Arts in Early Childhood Studies, with a minor in psychology in 2016. She then pursued a Master of Arts in Early Childhood Studies at Ryerson University. She is currently completing a PhD in Philosophy focusing on Social Justice Education and Indigenous Health at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto.
Ineese-Nash’s research has focused on inclusivity in early childhood education and on bringing First Nations leaders, and elders together with academics to find answers together. Her current work looks at land-based education as a mechanism for youth leadership and spiritual healing.
Nicole is the director and co-founder of Finding Our Power Together, non-profit organisation providing mental health services, cultural programming, and educational support to Indigenous youth. She also works as a research associate and contract lecturer in the Schools of Early Childhood Studies and Child and Youth Care at Ryerson University.
Learn: about the incredible story of the Florida Highwayman while appreciating the power that water and wind have over us, both emotionally and physically.
“Untitled (Crashing Waves on Shore)” (Oil on Board, n.d.)© Harold Newton, Courtesy the Walker Collection. Photo by Tariq Gibran
Harold Newton was born in 1934 in the Jim Crow South. A talented painter, Newton was one of the founding members of the Florida Highwaymen: a group of primarily self-taught Black artists focused on capturing natural landscapes. In the midst of segregation, shut out of museums and galleries, the group nonetheless managed to make a living with their art.
The art of the Highwaymen (which did include a lone woman, Mary Ann Carroll, whose worked is featured on 21 April) focused on palm trees, alligators, sunsets, and other iconic scenes from Florida’s natural beauty. This work was chosen to accompany today’s look at agency both for the incredible story of the Highwaymen – who painted orange trees when they were instead expected to pick them as exploited labour – and for the way their art captures the power of nature itself.
The “Climates of Resistance: Raise Your Voice” Project
During Unit 3, we are going to be engaging in a special project all together. The “Climates of Resistance: Raise Your Voice” project brings incredible scholar-artists together to work with us on themes of anti-racism and environmental justice. They will be guiding us in the co-creation of a music video celebrating our course community and highlighting diverse perspectives.
During class in Week 7, we will conduct a brainstorming exercise to build some content for our music video. Prepare for that by getting to know the Lab and their work though the notes below.
Learn: about our producers for this project, Raise Your Voice Labs.
People are finding their agency: using their voices to call for justice, looking inward to heal and unlearn harmful patterns we have inherited, and dreaming of a different – and better – future. Raise Your Voice Labs was created in and for this moment: to unlock our fullest creative potential; to deepen our abilities to respond as bridge-builders; to use the power of song and group processes to make space for people to learn how to truly listen, share vulnerably, and work through (as well as learn from) conflict – an inevitability when difference is present.
We help groups in changing times build brave spaces to have the discussions that matter – and embody new visions of community through musical co-creation. Through the power of music, dialogue, and video production, Raise Your Voice Labs brings creativity, vulnerability, and supportive accountability to teams, organisations, companies, and communities.
We are musicians, facilitators, filmmakers, educators, and community members who believe in the power of music, intentional conversations, and powerful visual storytelling to change people, relationships, and the systems we are a part of.
Austin Willacy, Raise Your Voice Labs
(pronouns: he/him/his)
Austin Willacy
For the past 23 years, Austin Willacy has directed Youth in Arts’ ‘Til Dawn, an award-winning teen a cappella group that empowers youth to find their voices in many ways. He is also a veteran member of The House Jacks, with whom he has produced 10 full-length albums and completed multiple world tours.
Austin has served on the boards of the Rainforest Action Network, a grassroots effort taking action against industries driving climate change, and Freight & Salvage, a nonprofit community arts organisation promoting public understanding of traditional music with a focus on racial and gender justice. As a facilitator for YES!, Austin has co-founded Arts for Social Change Jams in the US, Turkey, and India; the Black Diaspora Jam; and the Mens Jam.
Micah Hendler
Micah Hendler is a musical changemaker working to harness the power in each of our voices to make a difference. After studying international relations at Yale, Micah blended his academic knowledge of conflict and mediation with his artistry to found the Jerusalem Youth Chorus, an Israeli-Palestinian music and dialogue project. The chorus empowers young singers from East and West Jerusalem to share their truths, become leaders in their communities, and inspire others to join their work for peace, justice, inclusion, and equality.
Micah recently moved back to the US to work with the Justice Choir, a grassroots movement using the collective power of music to promote social and environmental justice, and Braver Angels, a relationship-building initiative depolarising the Red-Blue divide through dialogue. Named as a Forbes 30 Under 30, Micah also writes for Forbes about music, resistance, and global affairs.
Micah Hendler, Raise Your Voice Labs
(pronouns: he/him/his)
Watch: the music video created by the Spring 2021 cohort, as well as another environmental video produced by the Lab as part of a recent project for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. These will give you an idea of what we might create together.
“The Wrong Amazon is burning, and the wrong ICE is melting”.
The Spring 2021 iteration of Climates of Resistance included both a formal academic class taken by undergraduate students at Syracuse University, and a collection of Discussion Groups in a Community Audit version open to the general public. Participants represented 17 different countries and ranged in age from 16 to 82 years old (with occasional special guest appearances from younger family members).
The course community created this music video together with Raise Your Voice Labs, as they though about which voices are not heard in conversations about the environment - and how we can raise those voices in an effort to bring equity and action to the urgency of this global environmental and sociopolitical moment.
The young people of the IUCN “One Nature, One Future” Global Youth Summit share their frustration with tokenism, their commitment to action, and their hope for the future.
We are not your photo op.
We are the youth of this world,
Whose future hangs in balance.
You tell us: “What can we do?”
We’re ready for the challenge!
We are the Ocean, the Forest
Breathing for humanity.
Come with me,
We’re gonna save Our Planet.
Complete: your Learning Log for this session via the form below.
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