*Scroll Down to find Workshops & more Detailed Descriptions*
In order to build towards empowering conclusions and concrete action plans, the workshops during the Confluence will be organized into four themed “streams.” Each stream will build from a basic foundation of educating about the issues and sharing stories, and move towards making concrete plans for projects and strategizing for collective action.
The 4 Confluence Workshop Streams are:
This stream is especially designed for young people across the Northeast aged 13-18 who will come together to share and learn about environmental and social justice. Workshops will be presented by youth themselves or by multi-generational facilitators and will cover a variety of Climate Justice related topics including: cultural exchange, creating sustainable communities across the urban/rural divide, skill sharing, the history of social change movements, and concrete strategy building. We hope that the Confluence will empower youth to return to their communities with new ideas, new regional networks, and action plans!
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Here are some of the workshops that will be part of the “Youth Track,” with lots more to come!
The goal of this stream is to begin conversations and make plans for creating a northeast regional disaster response network, so that no matter what form the coming disasters take we will be ready. Within each city, these plans can include rapid response call networks to deal with police violence or immigration raids, community evacuation plans, first aid trainings, and much more.
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Here are some of the workshops that will be part of the “From Ice Storms to ICE Raids: Disaster Preparedness Network” stream:
Disaster & Resistance
Description: a musical multimedia presentation of the work in Seth Tobocman’s new comic book “Disaster and Resistance: Comics and Landscapes for the 21st century.” Disaster and Resistance outlines pressing social and political struggles at the dawn of the twenty-first century - from post 9-11 New York City, to Israel and Palestine, to Iraq and New Orleans. He brings us a behind-the-scenes view from the frontlines, with heart and clarity, and turns static headlines into flesh and blood realities.
Who: Seth Tobocman
Food Sovereignty: Spiritual, Ecological and Political-Economic Grounding of our Struggles
Description: Popular-education workshop on the root causes of the current food crises, seed saving, and sustainable agriculture.
Who: Stepen Bartlett, Sustainable Agriculture of Louisville, National Family Farm Coalition / Via Campesina
Mountaintop Removal
Description: An introduction to coal extraction and the exploitation of the land and people of Southern Appalachia. This workshop will include a brief overview of the ecological impacts of mountaintop removal, and will focus on the social and cultural impacts of coal extraction. How are we connected to devastation, and how can we stop it?
Who: Marty Driggs, Rising Tide Boston
Community Organizing Against the BU Bio-Lab
Description: Klare is a seasoned community organizer who is tirelessly fighting Boston University’s proposed BSL-4 Bio-Terror lab in Roxbury, a community of color in Boston. She will share her thoughts on organizing against this kind of man-made disaster, and give some details on this important struggle.
Who: Klare Allen, Safety-Net / Stop The Bio-Lab Coalition
ICE Raids and the JP Rapid Response Network
Description: The Jamaica Plains Rapid Response Network is a group of pro-immigrant rights community volunteers who support immigrant workers and families. This workshop will introduce how they create a network of residents and neighbors of Jamaica Plains who are prepared to provide legal, material, and political support to immigrants in the event of an immigration emergency.
Who: Dorotea Manuela - Jamaica Plains Rapid Response Network
False Solutions Roundtable
Description: an overview of various false solutions to climate and the reason why it is important to confront these insidious profit-driven plans as a justice-based approach to dealing with climate change.
Who: Anne Petermann and Rachel Smolker of the Global Justice Ecology Project, Andrea Samulon of Rainforest Action Network’s Agribusiness campaign, and Brian Tokar of the Institute for Policy Studies
Building a Disaster Response Team: Experience & Overview
Description: A discussion about a model of community disaster response that can empower us and others as unspecialized
citizens to begin learning the skills our communities and families may need in times of disaster. This first half of a double workshop will focus on the experiences of people in Aftershock Alliance and Wrench in the Works in disaster situations, and discuss an overview of what disasters entail and what can be done about it.
Who: Aftershock Alliance & Wrench in the Works
Aftershock Alliance & Wrench in the Works Continued: Building a Disaster Response Network
Bio-Tech, Trees, & Next Generation Agro-Fuels
Description: By now, many people have heard of the problems with ethanol and bio-diesel produced from corn, sugar, and palm-oil. The industries’ response is next generation agrofuels like cellulosic ethanol and biomass. This workshop debunks these new myths, discussing the many problems with cellulosic fuels, genetically engineered trees, and other biotech applications, by exposing what this means for forests and forest peoples.
Who: Anne Petermann, Global Justice Ecology Project
Aftershock Skill-Share (Community Triage & Communication) (Continued from 4 pm block)
Description: We have spent a lot of time think tanking and prioritizing skills, breaking into groups of interest so that some members are more specialized as medics and others are in water filtration, food storage, or sanitation. All of us are committed to learning basic medic and radio operations, and building a safe and self sufficient community. What we have to offer is what we’ve come up with through those discussions, and for others to adopt or criticize and suggest their ideas.
Who: Smokey, Katrina, Aftershock Alliance
From food, water, and energy, to housing, health care, and community justice - what does it take to build communities that are not dependent on the institutions attacking our communities and the planet? What projects already exist in the northeast, and what more do we need? It is always important to be able to meet our own basic needs - but in an era of spiraling food and gas prices, overflowing prisons, and a non-functioning health care system, figuring this out is essential!
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Here are some of the workshops that will be part of the “Building Self Sufficient Communities” stream:
Liberation Ecology
Description: Liberation Ecology is about exploring and creating the connections between sustainability and justice. The Liberation Ecology Project works to build conceptual, strategic and personal relationships between global movements for social and ecological health.
Who: Rafter Sass, Liberation Ecology
Green Grease Monkey
Description: General sustainability, humanure, or veggie oil possible collaboration with Scott Kellogg of the Rhizome Collective and RUST
Who: Patrick Keaney
Harm Reduction
Description: Our workshop will have two coordinators who wish to facilitate a circle discussion on participants’ thoughts on Harm Reduction and drug use, and to also offer real-world examples of grassroots organizing based on Harm Reduction’s principles. Contained within the discussion will be an optional skill-share open to all participants. The workshop seeks to focus on Harm Reduction, a collection of strategies that reduce the negative consequences of drug use. We would like workshop participants to view Harm Reduction as a liberating, non-judgmental, and effective way to interact with substance users. We hope to offer Harm Reduction as a model for, and as a part of, the activist’s concept of Public Health, particularly during a disaster situation.
Who: Willimantic Intravenous Substance Protection Coalition, or WISP
Intro to Permaculture
Who: Rafter Sass, Liberation Ecology
Radical Sustainability for Autonomous Communities
Description: A general overview of decentralized sustainable systems and technologies that I’ve worked with. Emphasizes the interconnectedness of environmental/sustainability and social justice movements, with an focus on systems that are cheap,simple,and that utilize waste and scavenged materials. Attention is given to how these technologies relate to climate change/energy depletion/food crisis issues. Systems described include: Bioremediation of toxic soils using natural processes, constructed wetlands for wastewater treatment, aquaculture, microlivestock, rainwater harvesting and DIY water purification, humanure, composting, worm composting, autonomous energy: passive solar, micro wind, biogas, etc.
Who: Scott Kellogg, Rhizome Collective and RUST
Ability Rights & Liberation (TENTATIVE)
Who: Kevin & Martina
Building Youth-Led Programming for Social Movements
Description: Discussion on building youth-led, adult supported programs for grassroots organizations who work for social justice and youth empowerment.
Who: Alicia Greene, Boston Area Gay, Lesbian, Transgendered, Bisexual, Youth
Why Herbalism?
Description: a three part workshop
a. A look at corporate health care and the failings of our “Health Care System”
b. A discussion about how and why herbalism and holistic health care wil change and empower our communities
c. Possible steps a person can take to educate oneself about becoming an herbalist or a natural health practitioner without spending tons of money.
The workshop will end with an open disscussion about concrete ways to avoid the corporate health care system and steps to take when dealing with an illness.
Who: Mary Blue, Farmacy Herbs
Guerilla Griots: Life off the Grid
Description: This workshop will offer an interactive discussion about rural living off-grid and the experiences of the facilitators — an African- Indigenous couple who are preparing for their sixth winter with wood heat, solar power, and well water. We will encourage all workshop participants to actively engage in a conversation about “the long emergency” and examine the ways in which the majority of the world survives with much less consumption, technology, and waste. The goal of the workshop will be to motivate all of us to take a personal inventory of our ecological footprint and to connect the dots between our lifestyle choices and our roles as activists, family members, community organizers, and human beings in safeguarding Mother Earth for the Seventh Generation.
Who: Jason Corwin & Leslie Jones, STAMP and Guerrilla Griots
Rock Dove, a Radical Community Health Network: This Is How We Do
Description: The Rock Dove Collective works to improve access to wellness for activists and traditionally marginalized groups through our provider network, referral services, skill shares and more. In this participatory workshop, we will tell the story of how we came together as a collective and developed a project based in mutual aid, self-care, and dialogue around how communities can better heal themselves, drawing not only upon our experiences but the knowledge of all participants.
Who: Rock Doves, Alana Lopez and Maryse Mitchell-Brody
Radical Sustainability for Autonomous Communities
Description: Repeat Workshop, Description Above
Who: Skotty, Rhizome Collective sustainable growth. From this discussion, we will facilitate a
Do-It-Yourself (DIY) Recording
Description: Tips and skills for recording your own revolutionary music. This will be hands-on and you’ll actually get to help record some of the music happening at the Confluence.
Who: Jory Leanza, Broadcast Live
Grassroots struggles around the world consistently challenge dominant frameworks of destruction and control. Understanding these movements is critical to our work regionally. What kind of strategies and tactics can we borrow from these movements? How can solidarity be developed and enhanced? This stream will include both education on issues, presentations from a range of organizations, and hands-on trainings to develop grassroots organizing skills.
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Here are some of the workshops that will be part of the “Connecting Grassroots Struggles” stream:
Ability Rights & Liberation
Description: Overview of issues around disability rights and activism. This is usually left out of social justice circles. Most people, including those with disabilities themselves, are unaware of the history of disabled people in this country. Capitalism sees people with disabilities as a “burden” and they are only allowed to participate in society as much as others want them to. I hope this discussion will inform people about the realities of disabilities and how they can be better served in society.
Who: Martina Robinson and Kevin Heaton
Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War
Who: Ashanti Alston
No War, No Warming
Who: Nadine, Oil Change International
Challenging Challenging Pollution and Prisons… Down With This Rotten-Ass System!
Description: (Follow-up to the Political Prisoner workshop)
This workshop will offer participants an opportunity to connect the dots between the pervasiveness of the life-threatening systems of colonialism, imperialism, war, and death and the presence of pollution and prisons which threaten the future of the Seventh Generation. We will reflect on the movement to liberate political prisoners in the United States and Canada, and examine the inter-connectedness of freedom struggles which empower “The People” to protect our communities and Mother Earth. The goals of this workshop will be to have a candid discussion about the criminalization of dissent and to highlight the cases of freedom fighters behind the walls and in exile.
Who: Jason Corwin & Leslie Jones, Southern Tier Advocacy & Mitigation Project, Incorporated (S.T.A.M.P.)
Introduction to the Beehive Collective
Description: An introduction to the work and theories of the beehive collective - with lots of photos of their many graphic campaigns, stories of local organizing in rural maine, and descriptions of their many varied educational tours, this workshop will provide an introduction and behind the scenes look into the collective that has produced some of the best known modern social movement imagery.
Who: Tyler Norman and Noah, Beehive Collective
History of Palestine & Palestinian Resistance
Description: This workshop is an introduction for people who are not very familiar with the history of Palestine or are confused about conflicting information that they may have received. Its format would be a brief presentation, followed by discussion and an opportunity for participants to ask questions and hear directly from Palestinians about their history and experience. Since this history is constantly presented in the “United States” as a “complex situation” etc., this workshop is a chance to dispel many of the pro-Zionist myths that circulate here, even in what passes for the “pro-Palestinian” account.
Who: New England Committee to Defend Palestine
Ecofeminism
Description: An introduction into the philosophy and implication of ecofeminism, which connects the ways that patriarchal societies are based on environmental destruction
Who: Sonia Acevado
Beehive Collective: Plan Columbia
Description: The Bees take audiences on an interactive VISUAL tour of the connections between COLONIZATION, MILITARIZATION, and RESOURCE EXTRACTION in the Americas. We will be exposing the agendas of the Free Trade Area of the Americas, Plan Colombia, and celebrating resistance to the “Plan Puebla Panama” in Mesoamerica. Join in as we deconstruct the complex and overwhelming issues that are shaping our world, using bioregionally accurate depictions of animals and insects as metaphors to link cultural and ecological diversity.
Who: Tyler Norman and Noah, Beehive Collective
Confronting Zionism in Social Movements
Description: This workshop is intended for people who are already familiar with basic history and who recognize the need for a serious Palestine solidarity movement here. Its purpose is to deepen our collective understanding of how Zionism functions politically in the “United States”—especially within movements for social and political change—and to develop strategies for fighting it. Since Zionism has an impact not only on Palestine, but also on the suppression and disruption of anti-colonial movements here, this workshop also offers the opportunity for people to come to terms with the need to confront Zionist political power in order to move forward in building resistance to imperialism and the national security state.
Who: New England Committee to Defend Palestine
CORI Reform and the Prison Industrial Complex
Description:
Who: Boston Workers Alliance
No Class
Description: “No Class” is an interactive workshop about recognizing and combatting classism in its many forms. Based on participants’ personal experiences and family backgrounds, the workshop will go into the ways that class standing pushes people into different positions and perspectives.
Who: Sonia Acevado
Rainforest Action Network(RAN): Global Finance Campaign
Description: Dirty coal plants, industrial agrifuels, destructive oil extraction and pipelies, and unsustainable logging operations all depend on one thing: the financial support of major banks. By balancing boardroom negotions with grassroots direct action pressure, RAN’s Global Finance team is holding banks like CitiBank and Bank of America accountable for the climate-changing industries they finance. Don’t let Wall Street use your money to bankroll climate change. See how you can become a part of the solution.
Towards a Radical Movement for Climate Action
Description: Increasingly dire predictions of worsening climate chaos arouse both rage and despair among activists. While rage can inspire meaningful and creative action, successful social movements also need to envision a forward-looking, socially reconstructive agenda. We will explore the philosophy of social ecology, which envisions a radically transformed relationship between human societies and the rest of nature, and discuss the lessons of an earlier wave of US anti-nuclear activism that halted plans for a massive expansion of nuclear power, while advocating a decentralized and directly democratic solar-powered world. The workshop will critically examine the relevance of these models and philosophies for today’s climate action movement.
Who: Brian Tokar, Institute for Social Ecology