In this episode of Who Belongs? we speak with Alex Boskovich, who is the Government Relations Officer at the Alameda County Community Food Bank based in Oakland, which collects and distributes food and other resources to about 300 partner organizations throughout Alameda county, including food pantries, churches, senior centers, schools, and other organizations. Just prior to the outbreak of COVID-19 the food bank had partnered with the Othering & Belonging Institute’s Civic Engagement Narrative Change project for some trainings on cultivating inclusive messaging and developing an identity that can bridge across community to build voice and power. The focus of the interview is on the sudden and very powerful impact that pandemic has had on the demand for the services provided by the Alameda County Community Food Bank, and Alex’s observations on how the crisis has magnified the gross inequities in society in how different populations are experiencing the pandemic when it comes to access to food.

For more information and to access a transcript visit: https://belonging.berkeley.edu/whobelongs/food-bank

EP 22 - How this Bay Area food bank is responding to a surge in demand; with Alex Boskovich

Who Belongs? was launched in Fall 2018 as the Othering & Belonging Institute's official podcast. The question of who belongs in our societies, whether local, national, or global, is one of the central drivers that underpin how people are othered, or how the conditions of belonging are created. Our podcast addresses this foundational question to open pathways to explore a range of policies, movements, scholarship, and narratives that get us closer to the goal we seek, which is to advance a society where all belong.

For more information visit: https://belonging.berkeley.edu/whobelongs/about

Society & Culture

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Welcome back to Cultures of Care, a special new miniseries from Who Belongs? hosted by Evan Bissell and Giovanna Fischer. This series celebrates people that practice collective care in unconventional and insurgent ways. Visit the project, read more about our interviewees, and check out transcripts for this episode at https://belonging.berkeley.edu/cultures-of-care.

In this episode, we hear from photographer Naima Green and DJ Rich Medina.

Naima is an artist, photographer and educator from New York. Her work is an invitation to participate, observe and consider safety, utopia and intimacy. You can view her work here at http://www.naimagreen.com/, and follow her on social media on Twitter, @naimapatrice, and on Instagram, @naimagreen/.

Rich is a world-renowned, Philadelphia-based DJ, producer, poet, journalist, and lecturer on hip hop and music theory. Since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, Rich has been cultivating a vibrant online space for a globe-spanning community to gather, listen, dance, meditate, and tap into collective joy and release during a time of social isolation. You can see visit his website at https://richmedina.com/ and follow him on Instagram @richmedina.

These interviews were edited by Majo Calderon and adapted for podcast by Erfan Moradi, with original music created by Alex Lemire Pasternak. Additional music in this episode is by Mini Vandals, Bad Snacks, Emily Sprague, and Silent Partner.

Thanks for listening!

Cultures of Care, ep. 2 | Naima Green and Rich Medina

In this episode of Who Belongs?, we're debuting Cultures of Care, a special new miniseries hosted by Evan Bissell and Giovanna Fischer. This series celebrates people that practice collective care in unconventional and insurgent ways. Care is an essential, immediate and practical way to create belonging. Perhaps most vitally in our urgent times, at the heart of each profile you will find provocations that are seeds for reshaping society and how we relate to each other and the world. Visit the project, read more about our interviewees, and check out transcripts for this episode at https://belonging.berkeley.edu/cultures-of-care.

We spoke with Nicki Jizz and Kristina Wong for this episode.

Nicki is a Black, San Francisco-based drag queen who founded Reparations: an all-Black Drag Show in June of 2020. In the monthly online show, Nicki creates a vibrant online space centered around beautiful, hilarious, thought-provoking and sensual performances by Black performers. Check out Reparations at Oasis here, https://www.sfoasis.com/reparations, and follow Nicki on her social media to keep up with her work: @nicki_jizz on Instagram and @nickijizz on Facebook.

Kristina is a comedian and performance artist who founded the Auntie Sewing Squad, a network of hundreds of Aunties across the United States who have sewn and shipped tens of thousands of masks to First Nations, farmworkers, migrants seeking asylum, incarcerated communities and poor communities of color. Learn more about the Aunties here at their website, http://auntiesewingsquad.com/, and keep up with Kristina's work here at https://www.kristinawong.com/.

These interviews were edited by Majo Calderon and adapted for podcast by Erfan Moradi, with custom music created by Alex Lemire Pasternak. Additional music in this episode is by Emily Sprague, Puddle of Infinity, and Silent Partner.

Thanks for listening!

Cultures of Care, ep. 1 | Nicki Jizz and Kristina Wong

In this episode we speak with two of the founding members of the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, the President Desmond Meade and the Political Director Neil Volz. Together, Desmond and Neil have been working on restoring the rights of people who have a prior felony conviction, referred to as returning citizens. In 2018, they were successful in passing amendment 4 that restored the right of over 1.4 million Floridians to vote. How were they successful getting 65% of Floridians to support this amendment? Bridging. In this episode Desmond and Neil discuss their personal path into this work and how they successfully led a campaign through bridging that returned citizens and accordingly restored their right to vote.

This episode of Who Belongs? is part of a new series of podcasts focused on telling bridging stories. Throughout the series we’ll talk to leaders implementing bridging work and individuals who have experienced the bridging transformation. This project is led by OBI’s Blueprint for Belonging project (B4B), and this episode is hosted by strategy analyst Gerald Lenoir. This project is funded by The Annie E. Casey Foundation, Inc.

Visit our website at https://belonging.berkeley.edu/bridging-belonging-case-series to explore all of the case studies in the Bridging to Belonging series.

EP 47 - Returning Citizens

In this episode we speak with Reverend Ben McBride. Ben McBride is a spiritual leader and longtime activist for peace and justice in the Bay Area. McBride serves as a national leader around reconstructing public safety systems and gun violence prevention work. In 2014, McBride launched the Empower Initiative to support bridging and belonging work across the country. McBride shares how he conceptualizes the building, bridging, belonging, and becoming frameworks. He outlines how cultural and structural belonging can occur, and the role that we each can play in creating a world where everyone belongs. 
 
This episode of Who Belongs? is part of a new series of podcasts focused on telling bridging stories. Throughout the series we’ll talk to leaders implementing bridging work and individuals who have experienced the bridging transformation. This project is led by OBI’s Blueprint for Belonging project (B4B), and this episode is co-hosted by program researcher Miriam Magaña Lopez and EJ Toppin. This project is funded by The Annie E. Casey Foundation, Inc.

Visit our website at https://belonging.berkeley.edu/bridging-belonging-case-series to explore all of the case studies in the Bridging to Belonging series.

EP 46 - Co-creating a future where everyone belongs

In this episode we interview with Debbie Lacy. Debbie is the founder of Eastside for All, which serves communities outside of Seattle, WA including Bellevue, Kirkland, Redmond, Issaquah and Sammamish. Eastside for All has a mission to transform East King County into a place where racial, economic and social justice are realized, and belonging is made possible for communities of color. Debbie shares about her Build for Belonging Initiative and specifically her use of the co-creation framework as she advocates to build a cross-cultural center with belonging in mind.
 
This episode of Who Belongs? is part of a new series of podcasts focused on telling bridging stories. Throughout the series we’ll talk to leaders implementing bridging work and individuals who have experienced the bridging transformation. This project is led by OBI’s Blueprint for Belonging project (B4B), and hosted by program researcher Miriam Magaña Lopez. This project is funded by The Annie E. Casey Foundation, Inc.

Visit our website at https://belonging.berkeley.edu/bridging-belonging-case-series to explore all of the case studies in the Bridging to Belonging series.

EP 22 - How this Bay Area food bank is responding to a surge in demand; with Alex Boskovich

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