Shaping the Shift Podcast

This week we are Dancing Through Change with diasporic dance icon, Marina Magalhaes! Join us for this episode as we sway and move through the uncertainty with ease and passion. We can't wait for you to listen!

MARINA MAGALHÃES is border-crosser, bridge-builder, and dance-and-change-maker from Brazil, based in Los Angeles. Her unapologetically feminist and latinx work has been shared throughout Los Angeles (REDCAT Theater, Ford Amphitheatre, Zipper Concert Hall, Highways Performance Space, UCLA Fowler Museum, Blaktina Festival), San Francisco (CounterPulse, Yerba Buena Night, Dance Mission Theater), New York (Bowery Ballroom), Brazil (Universidade do Rio De Janeiro, Centro de Teatro do Oprimido, and Parque das Ruínas in Rio), Cuba (Teatro Favorito in La Havana), South Africa (The Wits Theatre in Johannesburg and My Body My Space Festival in Mpumalanga), Botswana (Maitisong Festival in Gabarone) and France (University of the Arts MFA program in Montpellier). She was awarded the LA Weekly Theater Award for Best Choreography in 2013 for her original work in the pop musical phenomenon "Patty! The Revival".

In 2014 she received the Pennington Dance Group Space Grant @ ARC and the UCLA Hothouse Residency to create her critically acclaimed work, (UN)BRIDALED. Hailed as "the type of show that keeps concert dance relevant in our lives" by LA Dance Review and "an unrivaled dance theater experience" by Theatre Ghost, (UN)BRIDALED was adapted with a cast of South African women and performed at The Wits Theatre's Human Rights & Social Justice Season 2016 in Johannesburg, South Africa. There, it was hailed as "riveting... a physical and emotional feat" by Creative Feel magazine. In 2017 she began a multi-year choreography residency with the LA-based Viver Brasil Dance Company, who commissioned Cor Da Pele, a dance concert work selected by the National Endowment for the Arts as one of the top 40 best choreographic works of 2018. Other choreography credits include collaborations with visual artist Carolina Caycedo on the experimental film Apariciones / Apparitions (commissioned by The Huntington Library and officially selected for the Motion Capture series at Highways Space), music videos for the YouTube sensation Watsky (including "Moral of the Story" with over 9 million views), and live tours nation-wide with the rising East LA-based band Las Cafeteras.

Magalhães holds a B.A. in World Arts and Cultures with a Dance Concentration from UCLA, where she was the recipient of the international Moss Scholarship ($76,000) and had the opportunity to study with renowned artists such as David Rousseve, Victoria Marks, Barak Marshall, Susan Foster, Rennie Harris, Ronit Ziv, Maria Gillespie, and Cheng-Chieh Yu. Additionally, she has trained extensively in contemporary dance with Maria Bauman, House and Hip Hop with Jackie "Miss Funk" Lopez of Versa-Style, Afro-Brazilian dance with Rosangela Silvestre & Vera Passos of Bahia, Brazil, and conducted separate two-month long apprenticeships with Urban Bush Women in NYC and Gregory Maqoma of Vuyani Dance Theatre in South Africa in 2016. She is also an alum of the Association of Performing Arts Presenters (APAP) Emerging Leaders Institute (2014) & Director's Lab West (2014).

For seven years, Magalhães worked with CONTRA-TIEMPO Urban Latin Dance Theater as a Performer, Teaching Artist, Resident Choreographer, Director of Arts Education, Assistant Artistic Director and ultimately Artistic Director Interim, playing a crucial role in the company's development of a unique and powerful dance activist methodology. Magalhães has also performed in works by Victoria Marks (Smallest Gesture, Grandest Frame, voted runner-up in REDCAT Theater's A.W.A.R.D. show in 2011), Viver Brasil Dance Company (alongside Grammy Award-winning artist Sergio Mendes at the world-famous 18,000 seat theater Hollywood Bowl), as a guest soloist with Maria Bauman's MBDance Company, and as a guest artist with Bessie Award-winning choreographer Joya Powell and her company Movement Of The People.

Magalhães is a dedicated and experienced educator whose unique and inclusive approach to movement has been shared throughout the world. Her on-going movement research is called Dancing Diaspora, based on the fundamental belief that decolonization is inherently a transformative and futuristic process of reinventing and reclaiming tradition, and like the word diaspora communicates, it seeks to embody past and future, tradition and creativity, ancestry and individuality. In 2017 & 2018, Magalhães received the California Arts Council Artists In Communities award to provide the Dancing Diaspora class at Pieter Space free of charge, which she is currently offering a weekly basis. Additionally, Magalhães has taught in over twenty-five K-12 schools and designed dozens of original curricula that introduce young people to yoga and meditation, creative movement, and dance as resistance. Magalhães has taught Latin American Social Dances as Adjunct Faculty at various universities, including California State Polytechnic University of Pomona, Occidental College, Scripps College, and where she currently lectures, UC Riverside. She is a co-founder and faculty of UCLA Department of World Arts & Cultures's Travel Study program, which brings college students to study at the renowned Center for Theater of the Oppressed in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She is also a certified yoga instructor and a founding teacher of the East LA-based People's Yoga studio since 2014.

While Magalhães is based in Los Angeles, she has special ties to Latin America and especially Brazil, her native country, as she routinely travels to conduct her artistic research and share her work.

To learn more about Marina's work please visit her https://www.marinamagalhaes.com/. Follow her on Instagram @marinamagalicious, YouTube @marinaomagalhaes

Remember, it's no fun to SHIFT alone so share, review, like, and repost to invite your friends and loved ones along for the ride!

Follow us @shapingtheshiftpodcast and host Thea Monyee´ @theamonyee on IG! There are many ways to support this joy-centered, pleasure-focused work! Thea's Patreon, Ca$h App ($theamonyee), or Venmo (@theamonyee), so pick your favorite and show us some love!

This episode of Shaping the Shift is an intimate moment with host Thea Monyeé, and a tribute to our collective grief and hope as we continue to navigate this new world together.

This week we are joined by my Dem Black Mamas Podcast Co-Host, Crystal Tennille Irby. This episode we are keeping it extra REAL! Join us for this episode In Real Life with Crystal Irby. We can't wait for you to listen!

To learn more about Crystal's work please visit her www.crystaltennilleirby.com. Follow her on Instagram @crystaltennilleirby, YouTube @crystaltennille

This week we are joined by my personal reiki teacher and healer, Tiffany De Leon, also known as Tutubi Asul, to discuss healing for healers and her own healing journey This episode is soothing in so many ways. We can't wait for you to listen!

To learn more about Tiffany's work please visit her website to learn more about her healing practices. Follow her on IG @_holding.space_.

This week we are joined by a true Oya Priestess, Iyanifa Fatumininu Adeola, to discuss Embracing Oya and decolonizing spirituality. This episode is filled with candid conversation about confronting the impact of white supremacy on Black spirituality and how our spirituality connects to our liberation!

To learn more about Iya Fatu please visit her website to learn more about her Ifa Journey all of the ways to support her work with Hili&Mac Apothecary, Follow her on IG @iyafatu!

We are halfway through our first season and who knew how prophetic naming this podcast Shaping The Shift would be? Our guest this week is evidence of the intention of this platform and Devi Brown has been using her voice and her platform to help people of color to access and awaken their inner power through meditation. Join us as we have THE BEST conversation EVER about meditation as an ancestral practice and necessary part of our liberation, especially NOW.

This episode recaps our first month of Shaping The Shift as host, Thea Monyeé discusses aspects of her own journey and shared a mantra for maintains our sovereign sacredness during these times 🖤🙏🏾🖤.

All you love and support continue to be felt and appreciated! Please share, review, spread the word, and most of all, ENJOY!

There's no way I could recap this month's juiciness all by myself. I had to bring in the incomparable EbonyJanice Moore to have a heart to heart with me about the gems and joys we have experienced on Shaping The Shift in five episodes!

EbonyJanice Moore is a womanist scholar, author, and activist doing community-organizing work, most specifically around black women's body ownership as a justice issue, black women's access to ease, dreaming, and play, and Hip Hop as a tool for sociopolitical and spiritual/religious movement making.

If you aren't following her work you are missing out on pure LIFE! Follow her on IG & Twitter @ebonyjanice. Support her work via Cashapp ($EbonyJanice), Venmo (@ebonyjanice) or Paypal.me/ebonyjanice

Remember, it's no fun to SHIFT alone so share, review, like, and repost to invite your friends and loved ones along for the ride!

Follow us @shapingtheshiftpodcast, Thea Monyee´ and EbonyJanice on IG! There are many ways to support this joy-centered, pleasure-focused work, so pick your favorite and show us some love!

Welcome Back ShiftShapers!

This week we are joined by the game-changing Ev'yan Whitney to discuss how to SHIFT with loss, change, and allow ourselves to evolve through the uncertainty of it all! Make sure you have a copy of your SHIFT SHEET ready! Don't have one? Join our patreon for your free copy! It's no fun to shift alone so share, review, like, and repost to invite your friends and loved ones along for the ride!

Follow us @shapingtheshiftpodcast and Ev'yan @evyan.whitney on IG!

This week Shaping The Shift welcomes gamechanger Akilah S. Richards for a deliciously candid conversation about what it means to BE BRAVE, particularly as Black women. This episode is filled with gems so make sure you have a copy of your SHIFT SHEET, if not, we highly recommend you pause and visit our website cause you are not gonna want to miss these bars!

Here are just a few receipts!

Akilah S. Richard | Unschooling Organizer | Founder, Raising Free People Network.

Raising Free People Network helps families, organizations, and corporations to examine and learn from big issues in education, leadership, and personal development. By tapping into techniques and philosophies of the Self-Directed Education movement, Akilah uses independent broadcast media, namely podcasts, along with live trainings and events to support and sustain cultures of belonging, equity, and confident autonomy. She is an international speaker, and a founding board member of The Alliance for Self-Directed Education. Her latest book, Raising Free People: Unschooling as Liberation and Healing work, will be out this Fall. Akilah and her partner, Kris, are currently raising two self-directed teens, Marley and Sage-Niambi.

Where else can you find Akilah?

• @fareofthefreechild on IG
• @radicalselfie on FB and YouTube

How can you support her brave and incredible work?

• https://www.patreon.com/akilah
• Venmo: @Akilah-Richards
• Cashapp: $raisingfreepeople

You will probably need a good nap after this episode, but first! Be sure to visit our website and sign up for the STS email list to receive your monthly Ride & Thrive Study Guide, and if you choose to support our work by becoming a patron through our Patreon you can enjoy 29% off sitewide on the drippiest crystal jewelry in Cali through our Shift Sister, Gilded Grotto!

Thank you for listening and we invite you to share, review, and enjoy Shaping The Shift across all major platforms as we bring you weekly episodes designed to SHIFT you towards the life you desire!