Archive

Explore how home-grown cannabis cultivation can repair the physical, mental, and economic health of our communities in this special conversation led by Rafi Aliya Crockett and Dewey Ortiz, Executive Producers of Higher Power (a documentary that chronicles the fight to end the criminalization of cannabis). Cannabis advocates Jamila Hogan, Kia Jackson, Tahmika and Jason Aldrich, and John Che Larracuente, and more chime in.

A virtual mental health and wellness check-in, Public Exchange: Love for Black Lives explores how our communities are navigating the COVID-19 crisis and the global movement for Black lives. Healing advocates Aisha Tyehimba (spiritual), Catherine Labiran (women), Pervis Taylor III (men), and Khumo Masege (LGBTQ+) join the conversation moderated by MoCADA’s Khethiwe Mnganga + Diamond Marie Gonzalez St. Baptiste.

Black Magic Afrofuturism Book Club and Moon Mother Apothecary founder, Suhaly Bautista-Carolina hosts Parable Lessons, a virtual conversation about the important lessons from Octavia E. Butler’s Parable series. As we reflect how protagonist Lauren Oya Olamina confronts the apocalypse with courage, community, and practical knowledge we will contemplate how our own skills can be cultivated for the future we want to create. 

Brittany Micek of Meditating for Black Lives presents a virtual, 30minute, guided meditation set to inspire us for action and reflection, as part of MoCADA’s virtual June-July 2020 schedule of programs, entitled The Cookout. Brittany is the founder and lead organizer of Meditating for Black Lives, a grassroots organization focused on bringing the principles and practices of various meditation traditions to heal the collective community conscious from oppression.

Offering a full range of freelance chef services (pop-up dining events, private cooking lessons, catering, food-centric event production, recipe development, etc, Chef Santana Caress Benitez is currently living in San Juan, Puerto Rico where she cooks and creates content for her web series, “I’ll Cook Like Your Mother”, and also runs La Clinica de Comida, a free community food and acupuncture/alternative healing program that was directly inspired by the Black Panthers. Watch episode two of ICLYM, entitled, “The Cookout: Guava Ginger BBQ Sauce + Ribs”, now.

Offering a full range of freelance chef services (pop-up dining events, private cooking lessons, catering, food-centric event production, recipe development, etc, Santana Caress Benitez is currently living in San Juan, Puerto Rico where she cooks and creates content for her web series, “I’ll Cook Like Your Mother”, and also runs La Clinica de Comida, a free community food and acupuncture/alternative healing program that was directly inspired by the Black Panthers. Watch episode one of ICLYM, Back to Basics: Caribbean Healing at Home, now.

Beyond being the first Black-owned cannabis dispensary in Portland, Oregon – co-owners, KC and Nicole, are also running the Green Hop Academy where they teach and educate their community (unapologetically Black) on ways to run a business in the cannabis trade. Through this program, the pair are disrupting the notion of gentrification with a new term, “reintrification”, which celebrates individuals who are returning to a community that once pushed them out to make positive change.