On today’s show:
We dive into the legacy of the Freedom Rides with David Dennis Jr, son of legendary civil rights activist and organizer David Dennis Sr. Together, they’ve collaborated on a book called The Movement Made Us – looking not only at the life of David Dennis Sr, chronicling everything from his first freedom ride to his first meeting with Dr Martin Luther King Jr, to the birth of Freedom Summer, but also the mental, emotional, and spiritual impact of those times on Dennis Sr and his family. David Dennis Jr is a freelance writer, educator, editor, social commentator, and visiting professor of journalism at Morehouse College.
Then we move to a conversation with Samora Abayomi Pinderhughes, a Berkeley-born, Julliard trained pianist who designed and curated an exhibit at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts entitled The Healing Project. Fundamentally an abolitionist project, The Healing Project explores particularly the prison industrial complex through music, visual arts, film, a digital library of audio interviews. The works are rooted in interviews and relationships that Pinderhughes has fostered since 2011 and have been formed by over 100 storytelling and artistic collaborators. At the center of the project are the intergenerational voices of individuals across the country, including folks incarcerated in prisons and detention centers. Their stories, experiences, and ideas serve as the foundation for The Healing Project’s vision for societal transformation.
This week’s Artist Resistance in Residence is San Francisco Poet Laureate Tongo Eisen-Martin.
Follow David Dennis Jr on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DavidDTSS
Buy his book The Movement Made Us: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-movement-made-us-david-j-dennis-jrdavid-j-dennis-sr
Follow Samora Abayomi Pinderhughes on Twitter: https://twitter.com/samoraabayomi
Buy Samora’s music: https://samorapinderhughes.bandcamp.com/
Check out The Healing Project at YBCA: https://ybca.org/event/the-healing-project/
Follow Tongo Eisen-Martin on Twitter: https://twitter.com/_tongogara_