freedom dreams freedom now university of illinois at chicago

Exploring what we are for not just what we are against

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UIC African American Academic NetworkAsian American Studies Program, LAS

Centers for Cultural Understanding and Social ChangeCenter for Global Health, COM

Chancellor’s Committee on the Status of BlacksCollege of Architecture, Design, & the Arts (CADA)

College of EducationCollege of Liberal Arts and Sciences (LAS)

College of Medicine (COM)College of Urban Planning and Public Affairs (CUPPA)

Department of African American Studies, LASGender and Women’s Studies Program, LAS

The Graduate CollegeGreat Cities Institute, CUPPA

The Honor’s CollegeInstitute for the Humanities, LAS

Institute for Policy and Civic Engagement, CUPPAInstitute for Research on Race and Public Policy, CUPPA

Jane Addams Center for Social Policy and Research,Jane Addams College of Social Work

Jane Addams Hull-House Museum, CADALatin American and Latino Studies Program, LAS

Office of DiversityOffice of the Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs

School of Public HealthTRIO Program

Community Partners and CollaboratorsArcus Center for Social Justice Leadership, Kalamazoo CollegeBertha Social Justice Institute – Center for Constitutional Rights

Black Youth Project (BYP 100)The Center for the Study of Race, Politics, and Culture, University of Chicago

Chicago Freedom SchoolChicago Public Radio (WBEZ)

Department of African American Studies, Northwestern UniversityFreedom University

The Mansfield Institute for Social Justice and Transformation,Roosevelt University

Organizing Neighborhood Equity (ONE DC)Project NIA

Project SouthThe Public Square a program of the Illinois Humanities Council

Students Against Mass Incarceration (SAMI)

Conference Partners & Supporters

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Going Beyond What Movements are ‘Against’ to What They are ‘For’Freedom Dreams Freedom Now asks the following questions: What language do we have that reflects the kind of world we want to live in? Is there a rubric under which “a” movement can rally today? What are the components of a shared analysis of this moment, what is needed, what is possible and how? What are new slogans, texts, terms that help us forge a collective analysis? What are the freedom dreams of this generation of activists?

Freedom Dreams Freedom Now is an intergenerational gathering of scholars, artists and activists commemorating the 50th Anniversary of Freedom Summer 1964 and mapping the landscape of contemporary social justice work.

We will engage in political and analytical quilting to connect different debates, communities and movements.

The conference format will be creative, engaging, accessible & interactive.

Conference Venue: Student Center West (SCW), University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) — 828 S. Wolcott Street (see map on page 31)

please check conference website for updates and full bios of participantschicagofreedomsummer.org

Logistical Information• A shuttle will transport conferees from Club Quarters hotel to conference

site & back each day and to and from the cultural event and dinner Thursday evening at Alhambra ($10 - $20 for dinner and party) and Friday evening to the Silver Room (Friday eve. event is free).

• Youth track available for children (ages 6 – 12, upon request). • Translation and sign language provided (please notify us of need).• Tweeting is encouraged #FDFN2014 @sji_uic• Photo, quilt and art displays will be at the conference site, please take time

to experience them.• Mary Scott Boria will preside over a quilters corner to help us craft a

freedom quilt during the conference. Please participate.• Box lunches are available Thursday and Friday in lobby for nominal fee

($5-$10). Make your choices at registration.• Gender-neutral restrooms available.

Concept and Overview

Watch a Live Stream of the Conference: chicagofreedomsummer.org/liveLike our Facebook page: www.facebook.com/UICSocialJusticeFollow us on Twitter @Sji_uic & tweet #FDFN2014 to join the conversation!Follow us on Instagram: SocialJustice_uic; post & tag your pics #FDFN2014

45Art & Creative Collaborations

“Freedom Quilts”, Gail Anne Johnson MitchellA retired New Jersey public school teacher, Gail Anne Johnson Mitchell uses quilting as a way to document African-American history. Her quilts engage and embrace audiences from young adults to senior citizens. On display at the Freedom Dreams Freedom Now conference are the quilts “Tribute to Ella,” “Black and White,” and “Tribute to August Wilson.” “Roots of My Resistance: Mississippi 1965-1967”, Maria VarelaOne of Maria Varela’s roles as a SNCC member included photographing marches as a way to protect protestors from violence. These photographs are important documents of the Civil Rights Movement. They are an enduring testament to the power of people to come together to change our society in the search for freedom, dignity and social justice. “Love and Struggle”, Sarah Jane RheePhotographer Sarah Jane Rhee has been participating in and covering social movements in Chicago for some time. Her photographs are an important record of social struggle. They are also beautiful and have inspired a lot of conversation in Chicago around the issues the images depict. Collectively, they also demonstrate the importance of struggle as a source of solidarity & love as people come together to fight for, and not just against, something.“Planting and Maintaining a Perennial Garden VI”, Faheem MajeedThis work is part of an ongoing series utilizing cedar wood panels based on the 1930’s New Bauhaus designed wood paneling of the South Side Community Art Center’s Margaret Burroughs Gallery. In commemoration of Freedom Summer 1964, the “Perennial Garden” will take the form of 13 soap boxes placed outside the main entrance of SCW encouraging the use of this space as a stage for performances, speeches, and congregating.“Our Freedom Dreams” Collective CanvasOn April 26th, 2014, UIC’s Latino Cultural Center, Jane Addams Hull-House Museum, and Social Justice Initiative invited people to come together to “unleash their radical imagination.” Noting that, “With the power of art and community, we can draw upon our diverse experiences and identities to share collective creative solutions,” this collective canvas was the result.“Freedom Dreams,” at the Jane Addams Hull-House MuseumHull-House reformers of the Progressive era shaped an emerging vision for democracy emphasizing the importance of freedom and play. Today, we asked civil rights leaders, artists, scholars, workers, and activists to contemplate on: “What is freedom?” and “When in your life have you felt the most free?” Use the provided postcards to add your voice. Your completed postcard will be displayed in the exhibit “Unfinished Business: The Right to Play” currently at the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum. Musical and spoken word artists as listed in the program

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4:00 – 6:00 p.m. Registration table open at conference site lobby for pre-registered participants: 828 S. Wolcott, second floor. Confirmation of lunch and dinner should be made at the registration table.

6:00 – 8:00 p.m. Opening Plenary Thompson Room, Student Center West (SCW)

WelcomeSlide show of Civil Rights images (courtesy of Maria Varela)Vocal opening by Avery Young, “Mississippi Goddamn”

Reflections on Freedom Summerwith Civil Rights Activists from 1964

Keynote Julian Bond, co-founder of SNCC, first President of the Southern Poverty Law Center, and former board chair of the NAACP.Introduction of Julian Bond by Joe Hoereth, Director of Institute for Policy and Civic Engagement at UIC

InterludeYoung Chicago Authors’ poets from the Team Englewood Community Academy: Alicia Hinton, David Holmes, Dallas Battle, Kenyatta Tolbert

Roundtable ConversationFreedom Summer Participants & SNCC veterans Julian Bond, Zoharah Simmons, Dottie Zellner, Peter Orris, Fannie Rushing, Charlie Cobb, and Maria VarelaModerator: Barbara Ransby, Professor & Director of Social Justice Initiative

A short suite of “Freedom Songs” by one of Chicago’s most gifted vocalists, Ms. Dee Alexander (7:45 – 8:05 p.m.)

8:30 – 10:00 p.m. Film Screening Thompson Room, SCWChicago premiere of PBS documentary, “Freedom Summer,” by award-winning filmmaker, Stanley Nelson (112 min)

Tweet your thoughts about the film at #FDFN2014 @sji_uic

Wednesday, May 28th

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8:00 – 9:00 a.m. Registration table at conference site lobby for pre-registered participants: 828 S. Wolcott, second floor. Confirmation of lunch and dinner should be made at the registration table.MCs for Thursday and Friday are:Isis Ferguson, Deana Lewis, Marco Roc, Obari Cartman, and Kesh Ross

9:00– 10:30 a.m. Plenary Thompson Room, SCW Reflections on Freedom Struggles of the Past: Charismatic Leaders, Feminist Voices and Grassroots OrganizingThis panel will bridge past and present struggles by examining first how we remember the past, who and what is left out, distorted or mythologized as we look back at the 1960s. Younger activists will address how they have been influenced by past movements but how contemporary realities differ.

Peniel Joseph, Professor, Tufts University, author of Stokely Robyn Spencer, Lehman College history ProfessorBeverly Guy-Sheftall, Professor, Spelman College, editor of Words of FireJasson Perez, BYP 100, former organizer for SEIUPhilip Agnew, Dream DefendersCathy Cohen, Professor of Political Science, Black Youth ProjectFannie Rushing, Professor and SNCC veteranModerator: Tracye Matthews, Center for Research on Race, Politics and

Culture at University of Chicago

10:15 – 10:30 a.m. Ella Baker Monologue by Ella’s Daughters and guest: Isis Ferguson, Aisha Truss-Miller, Sabina Varela, Alexis Pegues, and Ainsley Lesure

10:40– 12:00 noon Plenary Thompson Room, SCWCritical Struggles, Breaking Down Silos: Movement Building in 2014 and Correcting Myths about the Past One of the challenges of “movement building” past and present is how to get beyond single issues and single communities to forge a broad-based movement that seeks transformative justice. It is easier to focus on racism narrowly defined or immigration or jobs but a bigger challenge, which also confronted activists of the 1960s, is how to forge meaningful ties across the boundaries of difference that still recognize the inequality and privilege that exists among activists themselves. SNCC and Freedom Summer participants confronted this question but still addressed multiple issues of oppression: poverty, racism, war, and disenfranchisement and built alliances with an eclectic array of activists, organizations and individuals. In forging unity, what kind of “movement” is it that we seek?

Thursday, May 29th

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Emery Wright, Project SouthReyna Wences, immigration activist, Immigrant Youth Justice LeagueMarisa Franco, National Day Laborer Organizing NetworkCharlie Cobb, former SNCC member, Senior Writer and Diplomatic

Correspondent for AllAfrica.comLeena Odeh, student, Northeastern Law School and longtime activistModerator: Charlene Carruthers, BYP100

11:40 a.m. – 12:00 noon Complex Movements, a Detroit-based artists’ collective, will coordinate activity with audience engagement

12:00– 12:40 p.m. Lunch Break (sandwiches and salads available in lobby, including vegetarian options, for a small fee paid at the registration table)

12:25 - 12:35 p.m. Lunchtime Performance by Kuumba Lynx (invited) Thompson Room, SCW

12:40– 1:55 p.m. Plenary Thompson Room, SCWPolitics in the Age of Obama: The Power & Limits of Electoral StrategiesThe fight for the ballot was a life and death struggle in Mississippi in 1964. Democracy and freedom are often equated with ‘voting’ in the mainstream media. But while voting is important, it is also limited in terms of what we can vote for, who can afford to run for office, and even who is eligible and empowered to cast a ballot (given felony disenfranchisement and voter suppression). This is not a panel “about” President Obama but about how our views of voting may have shifted over time, especially in the wake of Obama’s election and two-term administration. More fundamentally, this panel seeks to ask the question – can we vote our way to freedom? Why is voting important on one level, but what needs to change to make democracy more of a reality on another level? And why are other strategies and tactics as important or, some argue, more important than electoral politics for realizing social change? How do electoral politics fit into our concept of ‘freedom’ in the broadest sense?

Rosa Clemente, former Green Party V.P. CandidateAmisha Patel, Grassroots CollaborativeKali Akuno, Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, Jackson, MSYohuru Williams, Professor and Director, Black Studies, Fairfield UniversityChe “Rhymefest” Smith, artist, activist & former Chicago Alderman

Candidate Moderator: Keeanga Taylor, Assistant Professor, African American Studies,

Princeton University, and activist

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2:05 – 3:25 p.m. Concurrent SessionsSession A: Trans-national & Indigenous Solidarity Work Thompson Room SCWThis session looks across borders and across time to ask questions about solidarity: how do we express our solidarity in a meaningful and principled way? With complex situations all over the world, it’s not enough to say we are with the South African people or the Cree Nation or Haiti or Syria. Internal divides within those countries / nations and movements are real. But how do ‘outsiders’ make a judgment? What are models for cross-border solidarity and how does the continued metaphor of borders relate to issues of indigenous and first people’s rights? Moreover, the session will talk about the importance of trans-national work and solidarity with indigenous struggles growing out of the experiences of the panelists. Most importantly, how are our struggles for freedom in the 21st century inescapably global and what are the terms, structures, documents and concepts around which we can rally? Human Rights? UN World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance from 2001 in Durban? Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW)?

Lisa Brock, Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership, Kalamazoo CollegeNadine Naber, UIC Prof. GWS, ASAM, & Arab Women’s Activist NetworkSteven Hawkins, Executive Director of Amnesty International USAPrexy Nesbitt, US Africa Network, and former Anti-Apartheid ActivistWalter Riley, Haiti support activist, Oakland, CA.Crystal Lameman, Bear Cree Nation and tar sands activist (Alberta)Andy Clarno, UIC sociologist researching South Africa and PalestineModerator: Lynette Jackson, Africanist historian and activist, Prof. at UIC,

GWS and African American Studies

Session B: The Black Community, Sexual Politics and Marriage Equality SCW 219Film screening & discussion: “The New Black” (TNB); www.newblackfilm.comThis acclaimed new documentary, “The New Black,” by Yoruba Richen chronicles the organizing effort to win marriage equality in Maryland and the struggle inside the Black community and the Black Church over this issue. Participants in the film and the campaign (in Maryland and elsewhere) will offer reflections on the issue within the context of the overriding Freedom Dreams Freedom Now conference question: what do we want and what is freedom in the largest sense of the term? Does marriage equality get us there or does it bring us closer? Does it democratize a longstanding patriarchal institution or does it promote conformity? How has the debate played out in the Black community?


Karess Taylor-Hughes, organizer featured in TNB about marriage equality & the Black Church

Yvonne Welbon, TNB co-producer, independent filmmaker & media scholarAngie Rollins, Chicago activist and BYP100 memberModerator: Cathy Cohen, political scientist, Black queer activist, Professor,

University of Chicago

Session C: Leadership, Popular Education and Organizing Styles and Strategies: Paulo Freire, Ella Baker and Education for Liberation 8175 COMRBMany times we talk about access to education, working conditions and pay for teachers and the defunding of public education, but this panel will talk about the approach, concept, philosophy and underlying values and politics that inform how we teach and learn. Each panelist will address the question: what does a liberatory education really mean from the vantage point of their experience or research working in a particular model, tradition or school setting? How can we set the stage for students to become social justice actors and schools to be sites for critical and liberatory thinking?

Albert Sykes, Advocacy and Policy Director, Young People’s Project, Jackson, MS.

Hilda Franco, Rudy Lozano Leadership Academy Tony Alvarado Rivera and Imani Smith, Chicago Freedom School Nakisha Hobbs, Village Leadership AcademyTara Mack, Education for Liberation NetworkNatalie Bennett, Granville Reading and Art Programme, Jamaica & UICFabricio Balcazar, Freirian Scholar, UICModerator: Amanda Lewis, Professor, African American Studies & Sociology,

UIC, author of Race on the Schoolyard

Session D: Alternative Media and Technology Tactics SCW 213Alternative media has always been critical for social justice movements. In many recent US and global movements, social media has played a role. Malcom Gladwell once wrote, “the revolution won’t be tweeted,” emphasizing the importance of face-to-face organizing. Still, traditional and alternative media (radio and print) as well as robust social media networks are important sites of organizing and struggle. As we imagine “freedom” how do these forms of media play a role? Are they democratizing or presenting new ways that divide us generationally and in terms of access to technology? What are the opportunities, challenges and what is the role of activist media in the context of a democratized and ‘free’ media in the best sense of the term?


Moya Bailey, former member, CRUNK feminist collectiveSuey Park, cyber activist and writerAkiba Solomon, reporter for Colorlines, New York CityShayla Scales, University of Michigan student activist with #BBUM

campaignElizabeth Robinson, longtime alternative media activist, Santa BarbaraLaura Flanders, GriTV, New York, journalist, author, media activistModerator: Alice Kim, writer and visiting lecturer, UIC

Session E: Sexual Freedom and Reproductive Justice SCW 206How can there be any freedom without basic freedom of one’s body and sexual expression? This panel will explore issues of reproductive justice from an intersectional perspective, including the legacy of women of color activism around these issues as in the case of Flo Kennedy. The panel will frame the discussion of sexual freedom, from LGBTQIA identities to the ways in which the politics of respectability, misogyny and patriarchy police the sexual expression of queer and heterosexual people. Debates about single motherhood and fatherhood are part of a larger set of structures and assumptions about how power operates in our society. How do we envision a society in which sexualities are not policed and bodies are not coerced to fit into certain identities? In the spirit of the conference we want to think imaginatively about liberatory possibilities but without assuming that everyone shares that same vision. Does this mean rethinking or transcending “family”? Does it mean new categories or no categories? What languages capture our visions in terms of ways of conceiving of our sexuality and reproductive roles?

Elena Gutierrez, Associate Professor, UIC Gender and Women’s Studies and LALS

Sherie Randolph, Asst. Professor, U. of Michigan, author of forthcoming book on Flo Kennedy

Kamayani Bali Mahabal, South Asia Coordinator of Peoples Health Movement and the Steering Committee Member of the National Alliance on Maternal Health and Human Rights

Dayo Gore, activist and historian, UC San DiegoDaisy Zamora, UIC student and queer activistOwen Daniel-McCarter, Legal Director at the Trans Life Center of Chicago

HouseDanielle McGuire, award-winning author and Assistant Professor in

History, Wayne State UniversityModerator: Jennifer Brier, historian and curator of “Out in Chicago”

exhibition at Chicago History Museum in 2012


Session F: Embodying Our Revolutionary Visions (an experiential workshop) SCW 218Grounded in principles of solidarity across movements and the value of dialogue across cultures, this interactive session combines Theatre of the Oppressed games and participant storytelling to engage the conference call, “What are we for?” as we collect varied experiences, responses and epiphanies of conference participants. Theatre of the Oppressed approaches emerging out of Freire’s work in Pedagogy of the Oppressed are employed internationally, combining image and story, discipline and freedom, to expand cultural understanding and imagine alternate outcomes and actions in a more socially just world.

Lori Barcliff Baptista, Director, African American Cultural Center, UICRosa Cabrera, Director, Latino Cultural Center, UICMegan Carney, Director, Gender and Sexuality Center, UICWilla Taylor, Director, Education and Community Engagement, Goodman

TheatreSara Vogt, Disability Specialist, Disability Resource Center, UICRebecca Gordon, Director, Women’s Leadership and Resource Center, UIC

Session G: Radical Lawyering, Rights and Repression: Can We Imagine a Truly Fair and Free System of Justice? 3175 COMRBThe courts are ostensibly the sites where justice is demanded and dispensed. Lawyers, litigants and those prosecuted have often found justice ellusive. Racism and class bias are rampant in our legal system: from the McCarthy era of the 1950s to COINTELPRO in the 1960s to surveillance and prosecution of dissidents today, including the continued plight of political prisoners and exiles. This panel will talk about the work of radical lawyers and legal campaigns and projects. The conference is about “freedom dreams” but who can dream of freedom in jail, in prison, locked up? The line between how popular consensus dictates who deserves, even nominally, to be ‘free’ and who doesn’t is a critical line. These lawyers have problematized notions of “the innocent” and “the guilty” and on some level have interrogated the assumptions that critical race theorists have so deftly challenged, about the so-called neutrality of the law.

Purvi Shah, Bertha Social Justice Institute, Center for Constitutional RightsFlint Taylor, People’s Law Office in ChicagoJasmine Davis, Know Your Rights Project in Englewood with First Defense

Legal AidCheryl Graves, J.D., Community Justice for Youth Institute Dima Khalidi, Attorney, Palestine Solidarity Legal Support Alejandro Molina, Boricua Human Rights Organization, Chicago Moderator: Leena Odeh, Law Student at Northeastern Univ. Law School


Session H: Sage Community Health Collective, Healing, Rejuvenation Space/ Workshop (sagecommunityhealth.org) 6175 COMRBIn this session we will spend time thinking and practicing the values of Healing Justice. Together we will ask and answer the questions: What is the difference between self-care and healing justice? How does healing justice intersect with Transformative Justice and Prison Abolition? What are we doing in Chicago to address generational trauma? And what additional tools does our community need to make this concept real? Using mind, body and spirit connections, participants will leave equipped to integrate Healing Justice values and concrete tools into their existing work. This workshop will be hands-on and participatory.

Shira Hassan, Director of the former Young Women’s Empowerment ProjectStacy Erenberg, Sage Community Health Collective

Session I: Family Room / Break Room SCW 216

3:30 – 4:50 p.m. Plenary Thompson Room, SCWThe Power of Art: Freedom Dreams and the Manufacture of DesireArt is at the crux of “freedom dreams.” Artists help us imagine new possibilities. This panel will explore the radical transformative possibilities of art and art making. If the liberatory power of art and culture is one side of the equation, the manipulation and manufacture of our desires through commodity culture is the other. How do we envision a different role for artists in our society and in movements for change? How does misogynist culture and commercialized art compromise our ability to envision liberatory art practices? Where do neoliberalism and new technologies of production and distribution fit in? This panel of artists, art scholars, activists and organizers will explore these questions as they wrestle with the central theme of the conference: forging our collective dreams of freedom.

Tony Bogues, Professor, Brown University, author of Empire of Liberty: Power, Freedom and Desire and co-curator of “Reframing Haiti-Art”

dream hampton, writer, filmmaker, social justice organizer, Detroit, MIMark Anthony Neal, cultural critic, author, Duke University ProfessorKevin Coval, poet, author, educator, founder of “Louder Than a Bomb”

poetry slamCoya Paz, Free Street Theater, Chicago, ILRonak Kapadia, Gender & Women’s Studies Professor (UIC) & former

member of Fierce, has written about artists M.I.A. and Wafaa BilalIván Arenas, SJI Fellow, former member, ASARO arts collective in Oaxaca,

MexicoModerator: Lisa Yun Lee, Director, Art & Art History Program, UIC


5:00 – 6:15 p.m. Plenary Thompson Room, SCWWhat is the 21st Century Landscape of Injustice? Carceral States: Surveillance, Prisons, Police, and Immigration DetentionThis panel will explore what Beth Richie and others term “the carceral state.” The focus will be on the growing prison industry and the links to the criminalization of communities from the increased surveillance of the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission and COINTELPRO in the 1960s to NSA surveillance practices, and the epidemic of mass incarceration today.

Beth Richie, Professor, UIC, author of Arrested Justice: Black Women, Violence and America’s Prison Nation

Mariame Kaba, Project NIAJohn Dittmer, Bancroft prize-winning historian of Local People and Good

DoctorsLiat Ben-Moshe, editor of Disability Incarcerated: Imprisonment and

Disability in the United States and CanadaJoey Mogul, People’s Law OfficeAhmad Rahman, UM-Dearborn Professor, former Black Panther political

prisonerModerator: Randolph Carr III, anti-mass incarceration activist, New York

6:45 – 9:00 p.m. Mega-Community Dinner with suggested seating to make sure everyone is included and dialogue across various boundaries occurs. We will be graciously hosted by Alhambra Palace Restaurant, 1240 W. Randolph. Two performances will punctuate the evening followed by music and dancing. Suggested donation for dinner is on a $10-$20 sliding scale. Shuttles will be available.

7:00 – 7:20 p.m. Dinner Performance by About Face Theater on themes of queer undocumented youth. In a preliminary reading of this original play, characters explore the often overlooked intersection between immigration and the LGBTQIA experience. Through storytelling, spoken word, and movement, these talented young people share experiences of coming out and growing up. Inspired by the burgeoning “Undocuqueer” movement in our country, Checking Boxes is based on the true experiences of the ensemble members and members of the LGBTQIA community.

“We have to talk about liberating minds as well as liberating society.”

Angela Davis


7:20 – 8:30 p.m. Dinner and discussion

8:30 – 9:10 p.m. Performance of “Two Years Later (after Trayvon),” a performance by six incredible and inspiring young poets from Chicago who interrogate and explore their truths in response to the loss of Trayvon Martin and the trial of George Zimmerman. Tweet your thoughts about the dinner performances at #FDFN2014 @sji_uic

9:10 p.m. – Midnight. Music and dancing with Chicago DJ Collective at Alhambra Palace RestaurantShuttles will transport out of town guests and those in need of transport back to campus and hotels beginning at 10:30 p.m. to midnight.

“Without new visions, we don’t know what to build, only what to knock down. We not only end up confused,

rudderless, and cynical, but we forget that making a revolution is not a series of clever maneuvers and tactics,

but a process that can and must transform us”

Robin D.G. Kelley,

“We fight the same battles over and over again. They are never won for eternity, but in the process of

struggling together, in community, we learn how to glimpse new possibilities that otherwise never would have

become apparent to us, and in that process we expand and enlarge our very notion of freedom.”

Angela Y. Davis

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9:00 – 10:00 a.m. Registration table at conference site lobby for pre-registered participants: 828 S. Wolcott, second floor. Confirmation of lunch and dinner should be made at the registration table.

10:00 – 11:30 a.m. Plenary Thompson Room, SCWIntergenerational, Youth and Campus OrganizingThis session will begin with a short overview of the struggles of Black students in the 1960s, which laid the foundation for Black Studies and the further desegregation of higher education. We will then shift to hear about the current struggles on four key campuses, yet not simply as a report from the battlefield, but rather on what the visions of change and freedom are that underlie these efforts. What do student organizers in 2014 want? A ‘freedom budget’ and new economic priorities? Ethical investment policies related to global justice and prisons? Fair and humane policies for undocumented students? A “freedom agenda” as implied by the work of BYP100 and Dream Defenders? What is the “dream” of collective freedom today as it plays out in these youth-led struggles? How might they link to one another?

Martha Biondi, Black Revolution on Campus author, Prof, Northwestern U.Kashira Ayers, UCSB activist on prison divestment and anti institutional racismAlexis Wright, UCSB, Black Student Union activistJalil Bishop, Dartmouth University activistOzi Uduma, #BBUM at U of MichiganSuha Najjar, Students Allied for Freedom and Equality, Divest UM, U of

MichiganJessica Pierce, BYP 100, Washington, D.C.Imani Brown, Columbia Prison DivestCiara Taylor, Dream DefendersModerator: Toussaint Losier, recent Ph.D., & former student activist at

Harvard U. and University of Chicago

“To create knowledge that transforms our views of the world and, through sharing and application, transforms the world.”

Excerpt from UIC’s mission

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11:40 – 1:10 p.m. Plenary Thompson Room, SCWWhy is Education the Epicenter of the Struggle for Freedom in the U.S.?From the struggle for public education in the wake of slave emancipation to the Supreme Court battles over desegregation in the 1950s, to the recent fierce and brilliant Chicago Teachers Union strike, the value of education has been a critical issue in the struggle for racial and social justice. Who gets educated and how are key. The amount of resources devoted to educating some and not others; access to higher education; the climate in schools and on campus as well as the content of what students learn are hotly debated topics. Schools (k-12 and college) are major ‘socializing’ institutions in our society and have the potential to eiter breed conformity or produce critical thinkers. This panel will not only critique current assaults on public education, but more importantly, discuss how we might imagine education and learning differently. This includes form and content, the physical space of schools, and how teachers and students are taught and treated. How is education linked to a whole host of other social problems and possibilities?

Karen Lewis, President, Chicago Teachers Union Prudence Browne, UIC, NOLA and Education in CrisisAsha Ransby-Sporn, activist, student: SAMI, Columbia Divest Laura Emiko Soltis, Freedom University, Atlanta, GAPauline Lipman, UIC Professor, and Teachers for Social JusticeModerator: Elizabeth Todd-Breland, Asst. Professor of History, UIC

1:00– 1:10 p.m. Artistic Intervention Thompson Room, SCW

1:10 – 1:55 p.m. Lunch Break (sandwiches and salads available in lobby, including vegetarian options, for a small fee paid at registration). Author book signing: Beverly Guy-Sheftall, Joey Mogul, Martha Biondi, John Dittmer, Roderick Ferguson, Nadine Naber, Rhonda Williams & other authors will be available to sign books at the Haymarket Book table in the lobby.

2:05– 3:45 p.m. Concurrent SessionsSession A: Faith-inspired Freedom Struggles and Faith-Based Opposition 6175 COMRBFaith, religion and spirituality have been catalysts for social justice movements, and the source of strength for oppressed people to endure hardship. They have also been used as wedges to divide, conquer and condemn. However, from liberation theology to the role of progressive Black Churches during the Civil Rights Movement, the spirit of generosity and forgiveness that is a part of Islam, Judaic traditions, Buddhism and others, there is a basis that spiritual people draw upon to fight the good fight for justice. How do we honor these traditions without becoming self-righteous or sectarian, looking down upon

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secular activists? How do we cling to “our faith” of choice or birth, but find room to accept others as allies and collaborators in social justice work? What is the role of ‘faith’ in primarily secular struggles and campaigns and in politics in general? How do we recognize the individual beliefs of others but still navigate a common ground of acceptance for choices and policies that might not conform to religious teachings? Reproductive choice and LGBTQIA rights are but two examples.

Rachel Harding, Assistant Professor of Indigenous & Spiritual Traditions, University of Colorado, Denver

Rami Nashashibi, Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN), Chicago Rabbi Brant Rosen, author of Wrestling in the Daylight: A Rabbi’s Path to

Palestinian Solidarity Reverend Janette Wilson, Attorney & National Director, PUSH ExcelCo-moderator: Zoharah Simmons, former SNCC member with Quaker, Baptist

and Sufi background, Asst. Professor of Religion, University of FloridaCo-moderator: Aja Reynolds, UIC College of Education student

Session B: Civil Disobedience as a Tactic: Immigrant Rights, Civil Rights, Economic Justice and Anti-militarism Non-violent Direct Action 8175 COMRB Martin Luther King, in his famous “Letter from the Birmingham Jail,” called on all Americans to actively but peacefully oppose laws that were morally wrong. Civil disobedience continues to be a widely used tactic to protest injustice. How is it also a part of liberation and envisioning freedom? How do such tactics also ‘free us from fear’ individually and collectively? During the Civil Rights Movement, SNCC and other groups engaged in civil disobedience and were also harassed and arrested even when they did not break the law. Today, immigration activists and “Moral Mondays” protests in North Carolina have involved hundreds of arrests. Similarly, the anti-eviction and pro-health access movements in Chicago has experienced numerous protestor arrests. Each of these activists will talk about personal choices and the political tactics of civil disobedience as part of envisioning freedom.

Tim Tyson, “Moral Mondays”, Prof., Duke Divinity School, author & historianLulu Martinez, immigration rights activist held in detention for her actionsMaya Ann Evans, UK based activist who has mainly focused on campaigning

against the ongoing war in AfghanistanRosi Carrasco, immigration rights activist involved in civil disobedienceToussaint Lossier, historian, anti-eviction campaignFannie Rushing, Professor, Benedictine University, SNCC veteran, and

Freedom Summer ParticipantModerator: Amalia Pallares, Director, Latin American & Latino Studies, UIC,

co-author, Marcha!

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Session C: Fighting for the Right to the City Thompson Room, SCWChicago is the site of a fierce battle over the future of its neighborhoods, services and institutions. The same is the case for Detroit, Newark, and in different ways, New York and New Orleans. Who has a right to public spaces and resources, the wealthy who get tax breaks to invest in cities and want protected urban playgrounds free of public housing and other signs of poverty, or the majority of urban residents? These are critical questions as the nature of modern cities change. A coalition, named “Right to the City” describes its mission this way: “Right to the City (RTTC) emerged in 2007 as a unified response to gentrification and a call to halt the displacement of low-income people, people of color, marginalized LGBTQ communities, and youths of color from their historic urban neighborhoods.” This panel will explore what is going on in key cities not as descriptive ‘horror stories’ but rather as an invitation to imagine, as the Boggs Center does in Detroit, the possibilities for new urban farms, coalitions, communities and experiments. Unaffordable housing and gentrification are key problems, but grassroots mobilizations by women as well as university-community partnerships may hold hopeful signs for future change and transformations. Panelists will briefly offer examples of these actions and models looking forward.

Tawana Petty, James and Grace Lee Boggs Center, Detroit, MIZenzele Isoke, activist and author of Urban Black Women & the Politics of

ResistanceRosemary Ndubuizu, ONE DCShana Griffin, New Orleans activist, Women’s Health and Justice InitiativeKali Akuno, Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, Jackson, MSRhonda Williams, Social Justice Institute, Case Western Reserve UniversityAdam Green, historian, University of Chicago Moderator: Teresa Cordova, Director, Great Cities Institute, UIC

Session D: Food Sovereignty, Environmental Justice & Racism SCW 206Food justice and sovereignty are key issues, as is environmental justice. What is our cutting edge analysis of how this fits into or is an overarching issue in terms of social justice / social transformation and ‘freedom’? Perhaps we could flip the question and say: We could have food sovereignty and still not have full freedom but we cannot have full freedom without food justice. Is that a fair statement? What is the importance, power, potential and limits of a food justice movement? And what terms are the most useful in our political language around this issue: “food justice,” “food sovereignty,” “environmental justice,” or “sustainability.” How do you see links with environmental justice and food justice work / analysis? How do class and race fit in? How do the current food and environmental crises relate to the general crisis of capitalism? How do we make analytical and people-to-

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people connections with food and environmental justice activists in other parts of the world given the unequal realities and interdependencies based on privilege? What are some contradictions and limits of ongoing work and the political framing within which it occurs? What are critical principles, demands, practices and models?

Rose Brewer, Professor, University of MinnesotaSeneca Kern, We Farm AmericaAntonio Lopez, Little Village Environmental Justice Organization Baba Fred Carter, The Black Oaks Center Ethan Viets-VanLear, Circles & Ciphers and Rogers Park gardening project Myrtle Thompson-Curtis, co-founder ‘Feedom’ Freedom Growers, DetroitModerator: Dara Cooper, Brooklyn food justice activist

Session E: Alter Destiny: Afro-Futurism and Black Radical Imagination as Engaged Creative Practice 3175 COMRBAfro-futurism, the radical imaginary, surrealist thinkers, experimental films and other art forms provoke us to think beyond the here and now, beyond the contemporary realities of injustice and suffering to the possibilities of a different way or being, of ordering society, or of relating to one another. We have to exercise the muscles of our imaginations in order to engage in truly transformative work. The quick fix approach to social change will only get us so far. This session focuses on a curated film series entitled “Black Radical Imagination” by Amir George and Erin Christovale, and the visionary work of artist and scholar Denenge Akpem whose work is inspired by the likes of Sun Ra and Octavia Butler. The session will include performative engagement with the audience, and screening of three short films from the series: “Black Bullets,” “Black Magic at the White House,” and “Memory Room.” Tie-ins will be made to anti-prison work.

Denenge Akpem, faculty member at Columbia College & teaches on Afro-Futurism and Black liberation

Erin Christovale, film curator, Los Angeles, CAAmir George, founder of Cinema Culture, a grassroots film organization in

ChicagoModerator: Bryant Brown, Students Against Mass Incarceration, NYC

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“Transformed circumstances require new theories and practices.”

Angela Davis

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Session F: “Woke Up Black,” A film by Mary Morten SCW 218 The film chronicles the lives of five Black teenagers and young adults for two years. It offers a glimpse into the ways they confront and navigate racism, sexism, homophobia, as well as the humor, tenacity and toughness that is required to survive. Above all “Woke Up Black” combats myths that portray Black youth as homogeneous and disrupts stereotypes that negate their humanity. There will be a post-screening discussion with Mary Morten, Jasmine Thomas, and Jessica Disu (FM Supreme), who will conclude the session by performing some of her work.

Mary Morten, filmmaker, and President of the Morten GroupJessica Disu, rap artist and activistJasmine Thomas, Chicago Freedom School Freedom Fellow

Session G: The Neoliberal University: Higher Education in Crisis and Struggle SCW 213The move toward the privatization and corporatization of higher education, an over-emphasis on the market and a de-emphasis on public funding characterize this transformation that many have termed “the neoliberal university.” This panel will both diagnose the problem and articulate alternative visions. Discussants will talk about how neoliberal policies and practices have impacted their institutions and work. This session will also engage how student activism, union organizing, and transnational solidarity with colleagues in other parts of the world have pushed back against the dominant trends on college and university campuses.

Rod Ferguson, Professor and author of The Reorder of the ThingsJennifer Alzate, United Coalition for Racial Justice at Univ. of MichiganSekile Nzinga-Johnson, Asst. Professor, Gender and Women’s Studies, UICSarah Gonzalez, teacher and education activistMelissa Padilla and Mayowa Willoughby, Dartmouth student activistsGina Dent, UC Santa Cruz, feminist scholar, author and activistModerator: Deana Lewis, UIC graduate student, activist with GirlTalk at

juvenile detention center

Session H: Through a Different Lens: Social Justice Film and Photography SCW 219This panel on freedom and filmmaking / photography will ask the question “how do we do the work differently if we are doing racial and social justice work?” How do images capture what words cannot in terms of exposing injustice and provoking us to imagine justice? Maria Varela from SNCC will show some of her photos from the 1960s and then the group will imagine new projects that could be transformative.

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Maria Varela, photographer, SNCC activistObari Cartman, photographer, community activist and psychologistPamela Sporn, educator and documentary filmmakerSarah Jane Rhee, photographer and social justice activistModerator: Yvonne Welbon, filmmaker, Professor Bennett College


4:00– 5:30 p.m. Concurrent SessionsSession A: Freedom and Work: Labor Struggles and Economic Justice Thompson Room, SCWThe growing wealth gap, rising poverty and a decrease in union labor raise fundamental questions about the “freedom” we can imagine without work. At the same time, technology challenges us to rethink work. The 8-hour workday was a novel concept at one point. With a growing population, the changing nature of production and new technologies making certain forms of labor obsolete, how might we rethink work? Also, with the push of the market into every aspect of life, how can we question the logic of capitalism by looking at solidarity economies and cooperative economics?

James Thindwa, labor organizer, AFTJessica Gordon Nembhard, Economist & author of Collective Courage: A

History of African American Cooperative Economic Thought and PracticeVeronica Avila, ROCUnited, restaurant workers organizerDominic Moulden, ONE DCTania Unzueta, National Day Labor Organizing Network (NDLON), D.C.Therese Quinn, Faculty United union activist and Dir. of Museum Studies, UIC Martin Macias Jr., Students Against Sweatshops, SJI member, UIC studentModerator: Premilla Nadasen, Professor, Barnard College, author of Welfare

Warriors

Session B: Anti-Violence, Anti-Prison and Restorative Justice Work SCW 213Through the growing prison abolition movement and corollary restorative justice projects and campaigns, social justice activists are challenging the Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) and the epidemic of mass incarceration. This panel invites us to not only critique what Michelle Alexander calls the New Jim Crow, but to imagine alternatives to punishment as a remedy for violence and crime. Can we imagine a world without prisons? Without violence? What does it mean not simply to be anti-violence but pro-peace? Where does healing get factored in as a response to traumatized bodies and communities? How can we avoid the danger of anti-violence discourse descending into individual blame?

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Danton Floyd, Truth n’ Trauma Program, Chicago State UniversityCharity Tolliver, Chicago activist, Soros FellowErica Meiners, Prison Arts Program, NEIUDorian Barnwell, Students Against Mass Incarceration, New York CityAlice Kim, anti-death penalty activist and Chicago Torture Justice Memorials

memberLeslie Etienne, Project South, Atlanta, GAXavier McElrath-Bey, activist, Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth,Moderator: Natalie Moore, reporter, Chicago Public Radio

Session C: Health as a Human Right: Health, Mental Health and Radical Community Health Projects 3175 COMRBThis session will focus on health as a human right. Without health there is very little freedom, quite literally. Panelists will explore Chicago’s healthcare struggles and the ways in which poor and uneven healthcare and the absence of prevention and healing occur because of systemic problems. The panel will look back to the 1960s for two powerful examples of ‘radical doctoring’ and health provision: the Medical Committee on Human Rights (affiliated with SNCC) and the Black Panther Party’s community health clinics and their efforts to pioneer new community-centered approaches to preventive healthcare and healing. These and other examples of healthcare struggles will feed into a bigger discussion of how we can re-imagine ‘health and healing.’

John Dittmer, Prof. Emeritus, DePauw University & author, The Good DoctorsAlondra Nelson, Prof. at Columbia U. & author of Body & SoulSam Roberts, Assoc. Prof., Columbia U. & medical historianKamiyani Bali Mahabal, South Asia Coordinator of Peoples Health

Movement and the Steering Committee Member of the National Alliance on Maternal Health and Human Rights

Moderator: Linda Murray, former pres. of American Public Health Assoc., M.D., and activist

Session D: Complex Movements Workshop 8175 COMRBComplex Movements is a Detroit-based artists’ collective composed of graphic designer / fine artist Wesley Taylor, music producer / filmmaker Waajeed, hip-hop lyricist / organizer Invincible, and creative technologist / multimedia artist Carlos (L05) Garcia. They develop interactive performance work and workshops that illuminate connections between complex science and social justice movements to support the transformation of communities. Their current project “Beware of the Dandelions,” integrates elements of sci-fi, gaming, hip-hop, techno, animation, and architecture, and is being co-produced by

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Sage Crump. Sage is co-director of Art is Change, which supports work to transform culture in the areas of economy, ecology, community, and creativity. Sage is also a long time member of Alternate ROOTS, and sits on the national advisory committee of Women of Color in the Arts.

Session E: Grassroots Mobilizations in the 1950s and 1960s: Black Agency and the White Anti-Racist Tradition – Ella Baker, the Black Church and Anne Braden” SCW 206A clip from a film on Braden’s extraordinary life will be shown. This panel focuses on two individuals and one institution that offer a counter-narrative to the top down views of Civil Rights and Southern history: Ella Baker, Anne Braden and rank and file members of the Black Church. Panelists will address principled anti-racist white and interracial activism from the Civil Rights era to the present. Why is it important to remember the Anne Bradens of the Black Freedom Movement? What is the link between Black agency and anti-white racism? How does this history and present politics fuel or animate our freedom dreams in terms of the politics of race and legacy of white supremacy?

Cate Fosl, Assoc. Prof. of Women’s & Gender Studies / History, and Director, Anne Braden Institute (ABI) for Social Justice Research & author of Subversive Southerner

Jamie Beard, Staff at ABIMariam Williams, Staff at ABIAldon Morris, Prof., Northwestern University, author of Origins of the Civil

Rights MovementAnn-Meredith Wootton, NOLA and youth and arts activist, and grad student

College of Education, UICTim Tyson, historian and author of Radio Free Dixie: Robert Williams and the

Roots of Black PowerModerator: Jennifer Ash, historian, UIC Ph.D. student, and former faculty

member, Bennett College

Session F: A Workshop with Honey Pot Collective SCW 219Introduction by Prudence Browne, Souls Journal Managing Editor, UICHoney Pot Performance is a collaborative creative community committed to chronicling Afro-diasporic feminist and fringe subjectivities amidst the pressures of contemporary global life. HPP draws upon a central notion found both in performance studies and black feminist discourse: non-Western, everyday popular and / or folk forms of cultural performance are valuable sites of knowledge production and cultural capital for subjectivities that often exist outside of mainstream communities.

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Session G: Freedom Quilting: A Workshop 6175 COMRBA group of quilters invite you to help assemble a “Freedom quilt.” The quilt will reflect the different “patches” of work of conference participants. Our goal for the conference is to engage in political and intellectual quilting and to break down some of the silos that currently contain our work: to cross boundaries of age, region, issues and identities. The practice of quilting is tedious, creative, collective work that requires patience, perseverance and attention to detail. The actual quilt parallels the metaphoric quilting work of the conference. Please consider joining the quilters circle to create a tangible outcome and artwork that marks the conference event.

Mary Scott Boria, quilter and activistElizabeth Smith, quilterGeorgette Sinkler, quilter and Philosophy Professor, UIC

Session H: “The Stuart Hall Project” SCW 218“The Stuart Hall Project” is a film centered on the life, politics and work of the renowned Jamaican-born intellectual Stuart Hall. Relying on archival and media footage of Hall’s appearances on British radio and television, the film explores the themes of memory, race and identity through the juxtaposition of events from Hall’s life. In this acclaimed documentary, a major filmmaker tackles a major thinker (“the foremost intellectual of the left in Britain”). Filmmaker John Akomfrah’s wide-ranging, multi-layered portrait of Hall, is described as “more akin to jazz, not only incorporating generous selections of Hall’s favorite musician Miles Davis but also editing together multiple strands of archival material in scintillating riffs that interweave Hall’s life with a political/cultural history of the era.” An abbreviated screening of the film will be followed by a discussion of Hall’s influence on Black diasporic and anti-imperial thought as well as how a discussion of his life sets the stage for next year’s Social Justice Initiative conference, “Bandung and Beyond,” marking the 50th anniversary of the historical anti-colonial gathering in Indonesia. Cultural theorist Stuart Hall was a significant intellectual force among the visual artists and film-makers of what became known as the British Black Arts Movement (BAM) of the 1980s, early 1990s and beyond. He died in February, 2014.

Ronak Kapadia, Gender & Women’s Studies Professor, UIC, & former member of Fierce

Tony Bogues, Professor, Brown University, author of Empire of Liberty: Power, Freedom and Desire and co-curator of “Reframing Haiti-Art”

Lori Barcliff Baptista, Director, African American Cultural Center, UIC


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6:00 – 8:15 p.m. Closing Plenary Thompson Room, SCWWelcomeEmily Williams, Associate Director, Social Justice Initiative at UIC, and activist with US Africa Network and Grassroots Curriculum Task Force will introduce this final plenary

The Art of Freedom

Artist ResponseArtists Malcolm London and Sage Morgan-Hubbard engage the work of Angela Davis and Robin D.G. Kelley

Closing ConversationFreedom dreams remarks and conversation with

Angela Y. Davis and Robin D.G. Kelleymoderated by Barbara Ransby

What is the meaning of freedom? Angela Y. Davis’ life and work have been dedicated to examining this fundamental question and to ending all forms of oppression that deny people their political, cultural, and sexual freedom. Davis’ praxis confronts interconnected issues of power, race, gender, class, incarceration, conservatism, and the ongoing need for social change in the United States. “It is not too much,” writes Robin D.G. Kelly in the introduction to The Meaning of Freedom, “to call her one of the world’s leading philosophers of freedom.” As for Kelley himself, the title of this conference is borrowed from his book, Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination, in which he eloquently insists: “Without new visions, we don’t know what to build, only what to knock down. We not only end up confused, rudderless, and cynical, but we forget that making a revolution is not a series of clever maneuvers and tactics, but a process that can and must transform us.” It is the engaged struggle and rigorous thinking of both Angela Davis and Robin Kelley as scholars, authors, and activists, that have inspired this gathering.

8:00 – 8:15 p.m. Concluding remarks

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9:00 p.m. – midnight. Closing Conference Socials. In collaboration with the Freedom Dreams Freedom Now conference, Jane Addams Hull-House Museum and The Silver Room present

Soul Inspiration Party with Mr. Jaytoo spinning soul jams

at The Silver Room1442 N Milwaukee Ave.

Chicago, IL 60622

Shuttle will leave UIC at 8:30 for The Silver Room.

9:00 - 9:45 p.m. Black Power TV author Devorah Heitner introduces Black public affairs television from the 1960s and 70s, exploring the groundbreaking national and local programs that showcased radical dialogues about black liberation and black creativity. Powell’s Bookstore will be selling Black Power TV from 8:00 - 10:00 p.m.

Founded in 1997, The Silver Room consistently pushes the parameters of traditional retail operation – building community through social exchange. The Silver Room is a jewelry store, art gallery and vibrant space for community gatherings. Named Chicago’s Best Jewelry Store by the Chicago Reader, The Silver Room is a Chicago cultural institution.

Chicago Historic Jazz Showcase806 South Plymouth Ct

Chicago, IL 60605

Limited tickets ($15) for 10:00 p.m. set featuring Chicago drummer and Black music scholar, Dana Hall. Ask at registration and information table.

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“In the poetics of struggle and lived experience, in the utterances of ordinary folk, in the cultural products of social movements,

in the reflections of activists, we discover the many different cognitive maps of the future, of the world not yet born.”

Robin D.G. Kelley

2627 27 Films at Freedom Dreams Freedom Now

Several filmmakers have generously allowed us to screen their films at little or no cost. We thank them.“Freedom Summer,” by Stanley Nelson. For more info: http://firelightmedia.tv/project/freedom-summer/“Black Radical Imagination,” curated by Amir George & Erin Christovale. For more info: https://www.facebook.com/lackRadicalImagination“Woke Up Black,” by Mary Morten. For more info: http://wokeupblack.com“The Stuart Hall Project,” by John Akomfrah. For more info: http://smoking-dogs-films.myshopify.com/collections/all “Anne Braden: Southern Patriot,” by Ann Lewis and Mimi Pickering. For more info: http://newsreel.org/video/anne-braden-southern-patriot“The New Black” by Yoruba Richen, Director, Producer, Writer & Producer Yvonne Welbon. For more info: http://www.newblackfilm.com/the-film/

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Freedom Dreams Freedom Now conferees are invited to submit articles to the upcoming issue of Souls on “50th Anniversary of Freedom Summer and the Struggles of 1964” (August 1st submission deadline)

The Souls Journal is a quarterly interdisciplinary journal founded in 1999 and published by Taylor & Francis. It is housed in the African American Studies department of the University of Illinois at Chicago and edited by historian and activist Barbara Ransby.

Souls aspires to produce scholarship representing a critical black studies – analytical and theoretical works in the living tradition of scholar/activist W.E.B. Du Bois. Souls is an intellectual intervention that seeks to inform and transform black life and history.

The journal accepts unsolicited manuscripts by electronic submission. Manuscripts are peer-reviewed by members of our Editorial Working Group (EWG) and our Editorial Advisory Board (EAB), as well as other affiliated scholars.

For more information please contact: [email protected]

Souls Journal

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Bandung and Beyond: A Conference on Empire, Colonialism & Visions of ‘a’ Free WorldChicago, Illinois – Spring, 2015

Check SJI’s website in September for more details: http://www.uic.edu/depts/oaa/sji/

Pipeline to Justice at University of Illinois, ChicagoThe Social Justice Initiative at University of Illinois at Chicago is launching a new scholarship, mentoring and support program for community organizers interested in returning to college. The project will provide scholarships to a small cohort of activists who have contributed to social justice work, demonstrate economic need and are engaged in work that contributes to oppressed communities and advances social justice. We invite donations to this new project. Please contact us for more info: [email protected]

SJI Programs & Events

PJ2

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The Social Justice Initiative would like to extend a special thanks to the following people who helped to make Freedom Dreams Freedom Now a success.

and a very special thanks to the invaluableSocial Justice Initiative Coordinating Committee

and all our amazing volunteers

The Program Committee:Beth Richie

Lisa LeeNadine Naber

The Social Justice Initiative Staff:Barbara RansbyEmily WilliamsIván ArenasAlice Kim

Aja ReynoldsAnn-Meredith Wootton

Ashley TolliverBre Mac FaddenCharlotte Jackson

Daisy ZamoraEllen Kang

Jasson PerezLilian Paniagua

Marco RocMartin Macias Jr.

Skyla HearnConference Planning Contributors:

Deana LewisIsis FergusonJennifer Ash

Megan CarneyPrudence Browne

Rachel CaidorWebsite & Poster Design:

Jiba Molei AndersonMike Oleon

Silvia Gonzalez

Artistic Contributors:David Marquez &

The People’s DJ CollectiveDee AlexanderElizabeth SmithElla’s DaughtersFaheem Majeed

Gail MitchellGeorgette Sinkler

Maria VarelaMary Scott BoriaSarah Jane RheeTeam Englewood

The Young Chicago AuthorsThe Latino Cultural Center Radical

Art Banner CommitteeConference Social Events:

Eric WilliamsAlhambra Restaurant

Maha JaradSteve SaltzmanMike Nourse

Youth Programming:Chicago Child Care Collective

The Chicago Grassroots Curriculum Task Force

Media:Essence McDowell

Bakari KitwanaDawn Bailey

Natalie MooreThe League of Young Voters

Chicago Public Radio,(WBEZ & Vocalo)

The Chicago Reporter

Acknowledgements

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Social Justice Initiative Office:1253 S. Halsted Street, Suite 310 M/C 096

Chicago, IL 60607Office Phone Number: (312)-355-5922 [email protected] / twitter / facebook

Conference Venue: Student Center West (SCW)at the University of Illinois at Chicago

828 S. Wolcott Street&

College of Medical Research Building (COMRB)835 S. Wolcott Street

For emergencies please contact:UIC Security (312) 996 - 2830

SCW

COMBRW Taylor StW Taylor St

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