Healing Forward: Arc of Systemic Allyship 2-Hour Workshop

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An introduction to a new, paradigm-shifting framework for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion within organizations

About this event

***This workshop, originally scheduled for Oct 13th, has been rescheduled for Oct 20thdue to unforeseen circumstances. We apologize for the inconvenience. If you have already registered for Oct 13th, you are automatically registered for Oct 20th, and there is no action required. Thank you for your understanding.***

Designed by Marc Bamuthi Joseph and Rika Iino from Sozo Vision, the unique approach engages the entire organization, using the guiding principles of THE 4Ps: PIPELINE, PEDAGOGY, PROGRAM, PROFILE to bolster organizations in their journey towards becoming institutionally anti-racist.

“Our social fabric is held together by cultural memory, community aspiration, and democratic institutions that foster American promise. Many of these institutions: civic, artistic, tech-based, and academic, weren’t always built with the most inclusive and compassionate strategies in mind.” — Marc Bamuthi Joseph

THE 4Ps: GUIDING PRINCIPLES OF HEALING FORWARD

• PIPELINE or the constituents who the organization is ethically and financially accountable to across the organization. They are the stakeholders, those we are in compliance with, and those who we share risk with.
• PEDAGOGY or the organizational culture and the social vision of the organization. This is the series of modalities and systems that speak from the theory of change an organization is employing.
• PROGRAM or the ways we showcase work, engage with communities or otherwise deliver our mission to our stakeholders. This is not just about the artistic works but extends into how we express audience engagement in our communities, how we educate, how we involve.
• PROFILE or the people and marketing program within the organization. This is the brand, the communication, the identity and how it is expressed.

And underlining this all is the idea of PROPRIETORSHIP of this work.

We - all institutions doing DEI and anti-racism work - do not create systemic change and allyship in a vacuum. It does not belong to any organization but is a long history of activism, social change artists that have developed the vocabulary over time. We honor this as the foundation of our work and we operate in the mold of that social justice tradition.

The HEALING FORWARD: Arc of Systemic Allyship 2-Hour Workshop is designed to introduce attendees to this unique approach and to spark a conversation on how it might deeply impact their organizations.

HEALING FORWARD was launched as a 3-day leadership retreat in Summer 2021. Here is what some of our participants had to say:

“You helped me really shift my mindset for how we approach our antiracism and DEI work. I moved from a place of uncertainty and frankly, fear, to a place of hope, compassion, and understanding. You provided a framework that will enable us to get out of the "cycle of inaction". I can now see a path forward to making real systemic changes in our work with young people and their communities and look forward to putting that framework into action.” —

Kasandra VerBrugghen, Executive Director, Kahlert Youth Media Arts Center

"HealingForward IS transformative and profound. The caliber of the concepts covered and the 4 P’s framework presented left me full of food for thought and action. Bamuthi’s facilitation was brilliant. The workshop, led by Bamuthi, side by side with the grounded leadership of Rika Iino and the Sozo team was outstanding and seamless. The community of leaders that gathered for this workshop —all dedicated to grappling with probing inquiry questions and to ‘heal forward’ within their organizations and communities— was truly exceptional. Onward.”

—   Diana Cohn, Consultant and Board Member of Magnum Foundation

SAVE THE DATE: Next leadership retreat is scheduled for February 10 & 11, 2022.
LEADING THE CONVERSATION
Marc Bamuthi Joseph

Marc Bamuthi Joseph is a TED Global Fellow, an inaugural recipient of the Guggenheim Social Practice initiative, and an honoree of the United States Artists Rockefeller Fellowship. Bamuthi’s opera libretto, We Shall Not Be Moved, was named one of 2017’s “Best Classical Music Performances” by The New York Times. His evening-length work created in collaboration with composer Daniel Bernard Roumain, “The Just and The Blind,” was commissioned by Carnegie Hall and premiered to a sold out house at Carnegie in March 2019. His upcoming piece, “Watch Night” is inspired by the forgiveness exhibited by the congregation of Emanuel AME church in Charleston, and will premiere at The Perelman Center in New York in 2023.

While engaging in a deeply fulfilling and successful artistic career, Bamuthi also proudly serves as Vice President and Artistic Director of Social Impact at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC. He is in high demand for his creative approach to organizational design, brand development, and community mediation, and has been enlisted as a strategic partner or consultant for companies ranging from Coca Cola to Carnegie Hall. His TED talk has been viewed more than 3 million times, and is a testament to his capacity to distill complex systems into accessible and poetic presentations. Bamuthi's community development philosophy, called "The Creative Ecosystem", has been implemented in dozens of cities across the United States and is the subject of several critical writings, including one of the seminal essays in "Cultural Transformations: Youth and Pedagogies of Possibility", published by Harvard Education Press.

Bamuthi is the founding Program Director of the exemplary non-profit Youth Speaks, and is a co-founder of Life is Living, a national series of one-day festivals which activate under-resourced parks and affirm peaceful urban life. His essays have been published in Harvard Education Press; he has lectured at more than 200 colleges and has carried adjunct professorships at Stanford and Lehigh, among others.

Rika Iino, Co-Host

Rika Iino (she/her) oversees a trio of Sozo companies: Sozo Artists, a dynamic roster of artists in dance, music, spoken word, new media and film focused on innovation and social justice; Sozo Impact, a non-profit organization dedicated to incubating work by BIPOC artists and producers; and Sozo Vision, a consultancy with Marc Bamuthi Joseph which partners with institutions to design social impact-facing programs and strategies. Rika’s work as producer/manager spans two decades and hundreds of live and digital projects with artists and organizations globally. Rika plays an active role in arts advocacy and leadership development across the industry including work with Creative & Independent Producer Alliance, Association for Performing Arts Professionals, and International Society for the Performing Arts. She is the first woman of color to receive the Patrick Hayes Award for transformative leadership in the arts.