Nearly 20 years ago, The Response host Tom Llewellyn was fortunate to experience Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove's Voices of a People's History of the United States live at the Berkeley Community Theater.

In 2018, after we finished our first set of audio documentaries for The Response, it was clear that the personal stories shared with us by those on the front lines of climate, political, and social disasters should also be brought to the stage.

And so, in homage, we have called these live performances, Voices of The Response.

We're still developing the full performance, but we were invited to workshop excerpts at

the Oregon Country Fair last year. With the support of Eric Brahman, we worked with local spoken word artists to perform unique pieces each day of the festival during the Storytelling Smorgasbord.

Today you'll hear the recordings from that event, including stories related to previous California wildfires.

Resources:

• Mutual Aid Los Angeles Network
• Mutual Aid 101 Learning Series
• Audio documentaries:
  • "The impact of Northern California fires on the undocumented community"
  • "Radical approaches to disaster relief in New York"
  • "Reimagining Paradise in an Age of climate disruption"
• Donate to The Response

Episode credits:

• Hosted and executive produced by Tom Llewellyn
• Produced and edited by Paige Kelly
• Stories in this week's episode written by Robert Raymond
• Stories in this episode were read by Shachar Efrati, Jen Hernandez, Tom Llewellyn, Jeany Snider, David Snider, Eric Brahman, and Shachar Efrati.
• A special thanks to Tzula for playing the harp during the performances
• Theme Music by Cultivate Beats

Follow The Response on Twitter and Instagram for updates, memes, and more. Our entire catalog of documentaries and interviews can be found at theresponsepodcast.org — or wherever you get your podcasts.

The Response is an award-winning podcast series produced by Shareable exploring how communities respond to disaster — from hurricanes to wildfires to reactionary politics and more.

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