Sonic Journeys

Content warning: This episode talks about the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Relatives crisis. Please take care to protect your spirit.

Welcome to the final episode of Sonic Journey's pilot season. All season we’ve been listening to films from the 4th World Media family, and today we're joined by another emerging filmmaker, Amanda Erickson, who directed the feature documentary She Cried That Day. 

Amanda is a badass Native woman, and She Cried That Day is about more badass Native women. It gives an intimate look inside what families go through who are part of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Relatives crisis. In North America,  murder is the third leading cause of death for Native women. She Cried That Day is part of an impact campaign to bring affected families together in order to support each other and to effect policy change. 

Sonic Journeys is presented by 4th World Media, a matriarch-led organization dedicated to media justice, narrative sovereignty and the holistic care of underserved filmmakers. 

Host and Creator: Stina Thomas Hamlin

Supervising Producer: Jenny Asarnow

Executive Producer: Tracy Rector

Theme song: Tooh Nílíní by Kino Benally

Consulting Graphic Designer: Joel Schomberg 

Cover art: Mer Young

Connect with us on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Sonic Journeys is an independent podcast. You can find it on Apple Podcasts and anywhere else you get podcasts.

We're four episodes into our pilot season of Sonic Journeys, with one more to go. 

This isn’t going to be a full episode; we just want to introduce you to our collaborators and let you all know about what’s coming next for Sonic Journeys. Host Stina Hamlin is joined by Sonic Journeys executive producer Tracy Rector (in a blanket fort) and supervising producer Jenny Asarnow (mostly behind the scenes). 

The 4th World Media vibe is all about care for one another as collaborators, and care for the artists that these stories are supporting. It’s important to rest, it’s important to heal, and it’s important to create.

Sonic Journeys is presented by 4th World Media, a matriarch-led organization dedicated to media justice, narrative sovereignty and the holistic care of underserved filmmakers. 

Host and Creator: Stina Thomas Hamlin

Supervising Producer: Jenny Asarnow

Executive Producer: Tracy Rector

Theme song: Tooh Nílíní by Kino Benally

Consulting Graphic Designer: Joel Schomberg 

Cover art: Mer Young

Connect with us on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Sonic Journeys is an independent podcast. You can find it on Apple Podcasts and anywhere else you get podcasts.

Content Warning: This story discusses grief related to the loss of family.

Internal dialogue. Laughter. An ominous moment of dramatic sound. “Please answer me. I’m ready to listen now.” 

So far on Sonic Journeys we’ve been listening to a lot of documentaries, but today we’ll hear a drama. Thin Places, a short written and directed by Brit Hensel (Cherokee Nation), explores how the living can connect with those who have passed on. 

How does it feel to just listen to the quiet, and to sit in the not knowing? 

Content warning: subject matter (death) and strong language 

Sonic Journeys is presented by 4th World Media, a matriarch-led organization dedicated to media justice, narrative sovereignty and the holistic care of underserved filmmakers. 

Host and Creator: Stina Thomas Hamlin

Supervising Producer: Jenny Asarnow

Executive Producer: Tracy Rector

Theme song: Tooh Nílíní by Kino Benally

Consulting Graphic Designer: Joel Schomberg 

Cover art: Mer Young

Connect with us on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Sonic Journeys is an independent podcast. You can find it on Apple Podcasts and anywhere else you get podcasts.

Often on Sonic Journeys we hear from filmmakers about how they work with sound, but today we’re trying something different: we’re just going to listen to a short film. 

“WASKA: The Forest is My Family” feels like bathing in a forest. It honors co-director Nina Gualinga’s grandfather, a leader who had a deep relationship with the powerful – and coveted – plant medicine Hayakwaska. Gualinga explains that the film “invites us to collectively question the ways in which we seek to heal ourselves, so that we don’t perpetuate the legacy of extractivism.” 

What does it feel like to just listen to this film? We invite you to try. 

Learn more about "WASKA" on The Guardian’s website.  

Sonic Journeys is presented by 4th World Media, a matriarch-led organization dedicated to media justice, narrative sovereignty and the holistic care of underserved filmmakers. 

Host and Creator: Stina Thomas Hamlin

Supervising Producer: Jenny Asarnow

Executive Producer: Tracy Rector

Theme song: Tooh Nílíní by Kino Benally

Consulting Graphic Designer: Joel Schomberg 

Cover art: Mer Young

Connect with us on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Sonic Journeys is an independent podcast. You can find it on Apple Podcasts and anywhere else you get podcasts.

A gorgeous short film transports us to Alaska – to the birch trees, salmon swimming upstream, and the humans that care for them. Gath & K’iyh: Listen to Heal documents a community gathering on Lower Tanana Dene lands in Fairbanks, Alaska. Yo-Yo Ma plays cello as a group gathers together to grieve climate change and honor the land.  

Gath & K’iyh’s director Princess Daazhraii Johnson (Neets'aii Gwich'in) listens back on the film and shares her reflections about “how critical it is to find that time to listen so that we can protect our ways of life.” 

Learn more about Gath & K’iyh

Sonic Journeys is presented by 4th World Media, a matriarch-led organization dedicated to media justice, narrative sovereignty and the holistic care of underserved filmmakers. 

Host and Creator: Stina Thomas Hamlin

Supervising Producer: Jenny Asarnow

Executive Producer: Tracy Rector

Theme song: Tooh Nílíní by Kino Benally

Consulting Graphic Designer: Joel Schomberg 

Cover art: Mer Young

Connect with us on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Sonic Journeys is an independent podcast. You can find it on Apple Podcasts and anywhere else you get podcasts.

Welcome to Sonic Journeys, the podcast where we listen to films, and hear filmmakers from all over the world talk about how they shape meaning with audio. 

We’re kicking off the podcast by listening to Remaining Native. It won the 2025 Special Jury Award and Audience Award for documentary feature at SXSW. Remaining Native is a running film; it's a coming of age film; and it’s a film that showcases Indigenous resilience and resistance. It follows a Native American teenager from the Yarrington Payute reservation in Nevada who’s chasing his dream to become an elite college distance runner – all while honoring the memory of his great grandfather, who ran to escape an Indian boarding school.

Remaining Native’s director Paige Bethmann (Haudenosaunee) joins host Stina Hamlin in conversation about how she crafted the film’s sound. Paige uprooted her life in New York City and moved to Nevada for three years to make the documentary. She says: “The idea of tapping into ancestral muscle memory was the goal of this film.” 

Learn more about Remaining Native, see where it’s playing next, request a screening and more by going to www.remainingnativedocumentary.com or Instagram @remainingnative. The team would love to hear from you!

Sonic Journeys is presented by 4th World Media, a matriarch-led organization dedicated to media justice, narrative sovereignty and the holistic care of underserved filmmakers. 

Host and Creator: Stina Thomas Hamlin

Supervising Producer: Jenny Asarnow

Executive Producer: Tracy Rector

Theme song: Tooh Nílíní by Kino Benally

Consulting Graphic Designer: Joel Schomberg 

Cover art: Mer Young

Connect with us on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Sonic Journeys is an independent podcast. You can find it on Apple Podcasts and anywhere else you get podcasts.

Close your eyes. Open your ears. Sonic Journeys is a podcast that explores the rich world of cinematic audio. With global filmmakers as our guides, we peel back the layers of sound design in film and immersive media. A podcast for story lovers, cinephiles, and deep listeners.

Season 1 features independent films on the festival circuit right now, that you can't hear anywhere else. Join us to listen to film soundtracks and hear from the filmmakers about how they create meaning with sound. 

Coming September 11!

Hosted and conceived by Stina Thomas Hamlin, produced by Jenny Asarnow, with Executive Producer Tracy Rector. 

Sonic Journeys is presented by 4th World Media, a matriarch-led organization dedicated to media justice, narrative sovereignty and the holistic care of underserved filmmakers. 

Host and Creator: Stina Thomas Hamlin

Supervising Producer: Jenny Asarnow

Executive Producer: Tracy Rector

Theme song: Tooh Nílíní by Kino Benally

Consulting Graphic Designer: Joel Schomberg 

Cover art: Mer Young

Connect with us on Instagram and LinkedIn.

Sonic Journeys is an independent podcast. You can find it on Apple Podcasts and anywhere else you get podcasts.