DIJ EP 5: A Covid Christmas, Cultural Appropriation, and Environmental Justice w Vernice Miller-Travis

Delma and Shadiin take care through the latest wave of COVID as they dive deep into a debate on cultural appropriation, especially around who is capable of appropriating based on where whiteness is present and how systems of power really work. Environmental justice leader, Vernice Miller-Travis, founder of WE ACT for Environmental Justice and Executive Vice President alongside Shadiin at Metropolitan Group.

Vernice is one of the nation’s most respected thought leaders on environmental justice and the interplay of civil rights and environmental policy to build a social movement that is rooted at the intersection of race, environment, economics, social justice and public health. She was a contributing author to the landmark report “Toxic Waste and Race in the United States” and was awarded the Robert Bullard Environmental Justice Award by the Sierra Club.

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About the Podcast

Dive-In-Justice

Building ideal communities with our less than ideal selves

From systemic injustice to internalized oppression, apathy, and trauma, Shadiin Garcia, Delma Jackson, and guests will pull back the layers of struggle within social progress, and dream together, even as we remind one another that our personal tragedies, triumphs, and healing will inform our ability to create a better world.

If you love the idea of building intentional community, If you love history and pop-culture, If you want to dream into a society where intersectionality is baked into the culture, The Dive-In-Justice POD is for YOU.

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About your hosts

Delma Jackson

Delma Jackson III is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Whole Communities with a focus on story telling, campus engagement, and facilitation. He is also a writer and lecturer on multiple social justice topics.

He studied African-American Studies and Psychology at Eastern Michigan University and later obtained his Masters degree in Liberal Arts with a concentration in American & African-American Studies through the University of Michigan’s Rackham School of Graduate Studies.

He has conducted research on Afro-European identity in the Netherlands in both 1999 and again in 2014—studying slavery in the Netherlands, 21st century migration and immigration across Western Europe, and the impact of racialized pop-culture on Afro- Dutch identity.

He has lectured and/or facilitated workshops at New York University's, Tisch School for Performing Arts, Toledo University's Graduate School for Criminal Justice, the University of Michigan-Flint's School of Health and Professional Studies, the National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in Higher Education (NCORE), the United States Conference on AIDS, and The Office of Sustainability at Dartmouth College. For several years, he facili- tated a convening for Yale University’s Graduate School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, and The National Convening of City Leads for the Nature Conservancy.

SHADIIN GARCIA

Shadiin Garcia is Chicana and Laguna Pueblo from New Mexico and has lived in Oregon for 17 years. She has worked for over 20 years as a teacher, as a public school administrator, researcher, a policy analyst, Indigenous education leader, and as a consultant. She has a Bachelor's Degree from Yale University in English with a specialization in education; a Master's Degree in Educational Leadership and a PhD in Critical and Sociocultural Studies in Education from the University of Oregon.

Shadiin's work centers on organizational change; culturally relevant and sustaining curriculum; diversity, equity, and belonging; educational and systemic equity; philanthropic reform; culturally appropriate research; and community driven systemic change. She served as the Deputy Director of Policy and Research at Oregon’s Chief Education Office where she helped develop a research agenda driven by culturally appropriate practices and Indigenous methodologies for improving key educational outcomes. Dr. Garcia is board chair of the Women’s Foundation of Oregon. Through her work both professionally and personally, she has cultivated a network of amazing people who navigate across multiple systems and spaces - public, private, sovereign nations/tribes, non-profit, government, P-20, higher education and more. She often collaborates within these networks of experts, thinkers, and advocates which bring multiple minds and approaches to bear on complex topics.