Collections by Michelle Brown

Originally from Chicago, as a youth, L. Michael Gipson lived briefly in Wiesbaden, Germany, where he excelled as an honor student. After returning to the United States when he was 16, Gipson came out to his family and was subsequently kicked out of his home.

Gipson describes himself as a Street Kid Made Good. Situationally homeless at age 16, the trajectory of his life changed dramatically following a chance meeting with two dynamic Black doctoral candidates in Chicago. They saw his potential taking him under their wings and mentoring him. The rest, as they say, is history.

L Michael Gipson is clearly a master of all trades! With his warm, humorous storytelling, you’re in for a ride as we follow Michael’s colorful journey from a young adult shaped by two life-changing mentors to becoming a life-changing mentor himself.

Gipson is deeply appreciated and respected as a blogger who publishes a popular daily microblog, “The Gipson Gazette,” where he and over 6000 followers talk about film, music, culture, politics, and anything else that interest him and his readers that day. 

In DC, Atlanta, California, Cleveland and Detroit in each city where he has landed, this founder of the Black Bear Brotherhood, this writer, researcher, advocate, cultural curator, and art critic, has left his mark.

April is National Poetry Month. It was established in 1996  as a way to increase awareness and appreciation of poetry in the United States.

In a special crossover event Collections .and SAGE Metro Detroit team up to close out  National Poetry Month together.

SAGE METRO DETROIT’s Executive Director, Angie Perone talks about the organization's work not only in Wayne, Oakland, Macomb and Washtenaw counties but throughout the state. SAGE Metro Detroit was launched in October 2015. It was formerly known as The LGBT Older Adult Coalition which was originally formed in 2010. It is working to establish effective programs and services for LGBTQ older adults.

 SAGE USA is America's oldest and largest non-profit organization dedicated to improving the lives of the LGBTQ community focusing on the issue of LGBTQ Ageing. According to its mission statement, "SAGE leads in addressing issues related to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) aging. In partnership with its constituents and allies, SAGE works to achieve a high quality of life for LGBT older people, supporters, and advocates for their rights, fosters a greater understanding of aging in all communities and promotes positive images of LGBT life in later years.

Award-winning poet Kelly Native Child Brown is a prominent slam poet, a public speaker, and a licensed therapist who empowers survivors of domestic and sexual abuse to share their stories and begin healing from trauma.  She channels her feelings into writing and performing slam poetry. Working with survivors of domestic abuse and writing poetry has given her the opportunity to heal through words

Chief Activist of the Bayard Rustin Center for Social Justice Robt Seda-Schrieber continues to find ways to serve the LGBTQ community.

Like many nonprofits during these days of social-distancing, quarantines, and shutdowns the Center has had to shut its doors, canceling its programs and suspending services. Another unintended consequence is the loss of funds not just in donations but from cancellation of training the Center provides to local businesses, organizations, and schools. It is a double whammy!

The Center is surviving while it continues to provide for the community while its doors are closed,  Organizations like the Bayard Rustin Center for Social Justice are showing up for us, providing virtual space for gathering in the Princeton, New Jersey community like so many others across the country. Weeknights the Cheif Activist Robt Seda Schreiber reaches out to the community virtually with the BRCSJ  Social Justice Power Hour. Programs include "Drag Queen Monday," Queer Yoga on Tuesday, an Open Mic as well as interviews with local/national activists, authors and others.

The Center provides inspiration by the beauty of the ways it is holding each other virtually and symbolically at this moment.

Elizabeth Crenshaw returns to talk about life in Pontiac today as a journalist, community activist, and owner of Yaktown Yoga.

In this “new normal” we may find ourselves experiencing a whirlwind of emotions: fear, hopelessness, gratitude, and confusion. Crenshaw shares her sage advice for coping during this unsettling time, shedding light on ways we can maintain our sense of emotional stability and community.

She believes It's time to tune into ourselves mentally, physically, and emotionally.

Yaktown Yoga provides Community-based yoga in Pontiac, Auburn Hills, and surrounding communities in the Metropolitan Detroit area. 

Its mission is to reach out into the community and make yoga accessible to EVERYONE to create a SAFE and INCLUSIVE space for students, and to bring HEALING to underserved communities.

In this time of COVID-19 the Mayor of Ypsilanti Michigan Beth Bashert wears many hats. She is a longtime community activist, a parent/grandparent, and spouse of Lisa Marshall Bashert. She is an out and proud leader in the LGBTQIA community. She works in sales at an Ann Arbor Auto Dealership and she is the Mayor of Ypsilanti, Michigan.  Ypsilanti is a city in Washtenaw County in Michigan, perhaps best known as the home of Eastern Michigan University. A

In these days of COVID-19 she is right at the heart of many decisions impacting not just her family and employment but the lives of her friends, community, and constituency as well.

How are Beth and her family handling the constraints of social isolation/distancing? What are her observations as someone whose employment has been directly impacted? How is it affecting members of the LGBTQ community? And how, as an elected official, is she leading in this time of crisis.

Compassionate, community governance in the days of a global pandemic - Beth shares many insights fro every aspect of her life as community member, activist, family member and elected official,

As a Health Wellness Advocate / Transformational Coach Kim Ford uses her fitness journey to assist and motivate others to find body and soul balance. Kim believes that we already have everything we need to get to live our life with power, purpose, clarity, and intention.

As so many face the challenges of isolation due to the COVID-19 epidemic Kim shares how this can be a time to reset and find our own unique journeys and paths filled with dreams and visions of the lives we want to live.

Each of us moves along our own unique journeys and paths filled with dreams and visions of the lives we want to live. This movement not only through exercise, yoga, and meditation but our interactions with others can help us redefine how we live in community with one another,

She has over 20 years’ experience working with grassroots, community-based, and national nonprofit organizations. Based in New York, Her work has been intergenerational, has crossed boundaries and been pioneering.

Kim helps others along those paths as they uncover and recognize their individual talents, gifts and abilities. As a development coach, she uses her skills and knowledge to work with non-profit leaders by providing them with tools, and helping them discover the resources they need to build and execute their strategy, and reach their goals.

Johnson calls both Saginaw and Kalamazoo, Michigan home. She has been a public scholar teaching at Grand Valley State University, Michigan State University, Saginaw Valley State University and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.

She was one of the co-founders and Executive Directors of Fire Historical and Cultural Arts Collaborative in Kalamazoo. And every Saturday morning as DJ Disobedience she hosts Radio "Slip Back Soul" on Kalamazoo’s WIDR 89.1 FM.

She formed Playgrown in 2003 with an eye on creating play spaces and experiences for teens and adults. Playgrown creates accessible intergenerational play spaces and exercise opportunities that provide transformative principles of play for populations of play-deprived teens and adults.

Playgrown partnered with play organizers like interplay to create spaces and generate experiences in existing places to bring people together to play across age, gender, sexuality, race, ethnicities, and physical abilities.

She applied for and received an Arcus Center for Social Justice and Leadership fellowship at Kalamazoo College from September 2011 to April 2012. During this fellowship, she researched multi and intergenerational play and focused on how play functions as a basic need. Dr. Johnson collected local, national and international data and visited playground organizers and manufacturers in parts of Europe.

Beginning in Kalamazoo the project will grow to collaborate with stakeholders such as employable neighbors, urban farmers and other cultural producers to provide a café and studio lodging.

Famika Edmond is a Senior Public Health Educator for the HIV/STI Prevention Division of Detroit Health Department.

As a child, her mother brought Famika and her siblings to Michigan from New York. When her family found themselves homeless, Famika signed out of high school and went to work to help take care of the family. Six months later, after her family was able to get housing, she went back to school and received her GED. One of her goals was to attend a four-year college. She ended up getting accepted to four different colleges. Famika attended Eastern Michigan University, where she completed her Bachelor of Science degree in Health Administration. She also earned her Master’s in Health Administration and is returning for a second Masters in Public Health.

Famika realized the need for women to have a safe space to be able to express themselves and be supported by other women. She founded and created ‘For the Love of H.E.R. (Healing, Empowerment, Resilience), which is a five-week workshop in which participants are given the opportunity to examine their journey and its rising themes in order to identify experiences that have potentially blocked or slowed personal and or professional growth.

In February 2019 she was accepted into Black AIDS Institutes, Black AIDS Ambassador program. The program’s purpose will is to build engagement and movement around HIV and sexual health for Black women in the Metro Detroit Area.  She was also part of a Detroit based team scheduled to present an NGO Parallel event as part of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women. The panel was canceled due to the COVID-19 crisis but Famika and her team hope to present the panel at other venues later in the year.

Dree Cooper's hood feminism is a throwback to a very old concept in the black community when women not only raised their families, they nourished entire ecosystems of neighbors and kin.

She makes her home in an area of Detroit some call “Prostitute Row” but she calls it home, her neighborhood.

She looks out for the elders, the children, and yes, the sex workers providing food, clothing shelter and love to all who cross her path. Also, an animal lover, Dree has rescued at least 300 dogs and probably as many cats.

Dree is a water rights activist who believes every citizen should have access to clean, affordable water. She has lived without access to water when a landlord didn’t pay the water bill and she couldn’t afford to move. This experience fuels her fight to stop other families from being denied access to water for their families.

She defines her activism as hood feminism because she cares about people who are of color, nonbinary, ghetto, rachet, homeless, disabled, mentally ill, trans, the people who do hair out of their homes, cook fish on Fridays for sale, sex workers – especially those who are black and trans – and those fixing cars in their garage. Dree accepts all of these people.

Danielle Hall aka Passion the Lioness. Danielle is a poet, Model, Actress, and Mentor. Through her poetry and work as a model/actress, she empowers women to love themselves just as they are. Passion the Lioness pushes back against societal images of “what a woman should be/look like” with her message of body positivity.

Danielle has worked as a model for four years. She has done runway and print work and has been published in several magazines. Danielle also writes and performs poetry. Recently Danielle has been getting into acting as well. She is very passionate about everything she does and loves inspiring other people especially young women

She started modeling because for a while she felt lost in life. She wasn't confident about herself and began to lose hope. She felt like she didn't belong in this world. Modeling gave her confidence. Now she is not only helping herself but helps others.  

Danielle's goal is to be known worldwide, to not only be a pretty face but to make a difference. She feels that if one person wins we all win. Danielle wants to be that encouragement for the little girls who believe they aren't good enough. She is dedicated and determined to make y dreams come true. I will continue to make my mark in this industry.