CIIS Public Programs

This episode showcases selections from three previous episodes featuring poets who explore a variety of social justice issues through their work. This episode contains explicit language.

Part One

The episode begins with poet and scholar Cameron Awkward-Rich joined in conversation with writer and curator James Fleming. Cameron reads first from his recent award-winning book Dispatch followed by a poem from his 2016 book Sympathetic Little Monster, which broke new ground in Trans, Queer, Black, and American poetry.

Part Two

This excerpt features the poet Layli Long Soldier in conversation with San Francisco poet Brynn Saito. Layli reads a selection from her collection of poetry WHEREAS, and talks with Brynn about her journey writing these poems in response to the congressional resolution “Apology to Native Peoples.”

Part Three

The episode closes with diversity and inclusion specialist Denise Boston in a conversation with author and academic DaMaris B. Hill that spans poetry, history, and current events to illuminate the lives of extraordinary women and their impact on today's society. DaMaris also reads from her book A Bound Woman is a Dangerous Thing: The Incarceration of African American Women from Harriet Tubman to Sandra Bland.

Author and psychedelic explorer Chris Bache’s book, LSD and the Mind of the Universe chronicles his experiences and insights from 73 high-dose LSD sessions conducted between 1979 and 1999. This became the philosophical adventure of a lifetime, but one Chris had to keep largely hidden from his colleagues and society.

In this episode licensed psychotherapist and CIIS Professor Gisele Fernandes talks with Chris about his 20-year journey into the depths and heights of consciousness.

Modern technology has, and continues to transform the ways we grow, prepare, distribute, eat, and think about our food.

In this episode, food journalist Larissa Zimberoff and social sciences professor Julie Guthman share insights into food culture and examine the trends and technologies that are transforming the world of food. Is the future of food looking bleak or better than ever?

This episode contains explicit language.

Suzy Ross is an assistant professor and coordinator of recreation therapy and complementary and alternative medicine at San Jose State University, California.

In this episode, CIIS Chief of Staff and psychologist Richard Buggs talks with Dr. Ross about finding our path in life, journeys of personal transformation, and her book The Map to Wholeness.

With over 20 years of experience practicing and teaching Kingian Nonviolence, leading trainer Kazu Haga offers a practical approach to resolving conflict first practiced by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil Rights Movement. In his work, Kazu reclaims the energy and assertiveness of nonviolent practice and shows that a principled approach to nonviolence is the way to transform not only unjust systems, but broken relationships.

In this episode, Kazu Haga is joined by CIIS professor and restorative justice expert Sonya Shah for a conversation about his life, Kingian Nonviolence, and his book, Healing Resistance.

This episode contains explicit language.

For most of his life, Boston-based artist P.Carl lived as a girl and a queer woman, building a career, a life, and a loving marriage, yet still waiting to realize himself in full. After fifty years, he embarked on his gender transition amid the rise of the Trump administration and the #MeToo movement—a transition point in America’s own story.

In this episode, recorded shortly after the release of P. Carl’s memoir, Becoming a Man: The Story of a Transition, CIIS Human Sexuality Program Chair Michelle Marzullo talks with P. Carl about his personal journey, as well as gender, power, and inequality in America.

In this episode, Ecology and Religion Professor Elizabeth Allison provides an exploration into spiritual ecology. Discover how deepening our relationship with the natural world helps us thrive.

For more than four decades, Don Lattin has written about the social, spiritual, and political aspects of the psychedelic drug movement as a newspaper reporter, freelance journalist, and the author of four books of narrative non-fiction.

In this episode, KQED Science senior editor Kat Snow has a conversation with Don looking back on the long, strange trip his career has been.

Elizabeth Markle is a clinical psychologist turned radical community health innovator who brings decades of intentional community experience to her re-visioning of healthcare.

In this episode, health coach Susanna Merlo talks with Dr. Markle about her journey launching her community and “behavioral pharmacy”, Open Source Wellness, and her vision for the transformation of our nation’s clinical and social systems.

Chani Nicholas is a beloved astrologer and queer feminist activist with a loyal online following. For her, astrology isn’t about passively accepting our fate, it’s about action. In her inspirational and socially conscious weekly horoscopes, she encourages her devotees to take control—to confront themselves, their desires, and their needs—to fulfill their potential using the power of the stars.

Recorded live at the Herbst Theatre shortly after the release of her book You Were Born for This: Astrology for Radical Self-Acceptance, this episode features Chani in three parts. Beginning with a chart-reading and conversation with Fania E. Davis, a leading national voice on restorative justice, followed by a conversation with CIIS Professor Sonya Shah, and finishing with questions submitted by the audience.