Muse Unconference Guide 2021

OFFICIAL GUIDE

MUSE

UNCONFERENCE 2021

MARCH 4-7

BREAKING IT DOWN MUSE UNCONFERENCE 2021

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MUSE UNCONFERENCE MARCH 4-7 2021

WELCOME

Welcome to our annual gathering. For the past nine years, World MUSE has brought together local and visiting artists, activists, change-

makers and thought-leaders. In 2021, we will be hosting our first virtual MUSE UnConference. The term "unconference" has been applied to a wide range

WORLD MUSE believes individuals can change the world. Our year-round

of gatherings that try to break down hierarchical aspects of conventional conferences.

Before we move forward, we need to acknowledge the ways we have perpetuated harm, exclusion, and trauma through our past actions including prohibitive ticket pricing and content that far too often centered whiteness

programming includes

and viewed diversity through the lens of white saviorism, ableism, and

MUSE UnConference, MUSE

to learn and do better. Acknowledgement of our own complicity is an

Clubs, and MUSE Maker Program which provides

cisgender privilege. As an organization, and as individuals, we are working important part of breaking down where white supremacy lives in us and in our actions.

To that end, World MUSE has worked closely with Community Partners to

small seed grants to those

provide content that is more representative of our community as a whole,

who are working to inspire

pay what they can, and an online platform that provides greater overall

positive social change.

Throughout the year, we also offer special MUSE Events to encourage community connection, support, and inspiration.

an equity-based fee structure that allows anyone who wishes to attend to accessibility. We are grateful to those in our community who have called us up to do better.

We look forward to gathering together virtually to begin breaking down barriers through listening, learning, practice, and action. We will be breaking down issues including Youth Mental Health, Indigenous Food Sovereignty, Transgender Representation, Mutual Aid, Transforming Philanthropy, and Radical Self-Love.

We hope MUSE UnConference will provide time and space to break down issues, break down barriers, break down resistance, break down old ways of thinking, doing, being so that we can all ultimately begin the process of

theworldmuse.org

acknowledging, healing, and rebuilding.

Muse On.

WORLD MUSE

BREAKING IT DOWN 2

OFFICIAL GUIDE

PROGRAM & HIGHLIGHTS

THURSDAY, MARCH 4 MUSE YOUTH SUMMIT 5:30 pm - 7:30 pm

We will be screening a short documentary film produced

by World MUSE and Unlocked Films exploring the impacts of COVID-19 on young people in our community. The film features local youth and mental health providers, including YouthLine and Better Together. Following the film will be a panel discussion and audience Q&A.

MUSE SPOTLIGHT

DAREN TODD

Daren Todd (he, him) will be joining MUSE UnConference for a performance and a conversation around why representation matters in the Arts. Todd coopened the Downstairs Gallery in Portland amidst the COVID-19 pandemic to showcase works from BIPOC, LGBTQ+ and disabled artists. Under Todd’s direction, The Downstairs Gallery prioritizes the work and perspectives of artists from historically underserved populations, including Black, Indigenous and people of color and members of the disabled and LGBTQ+ communities.

FRIDAY, MARCH 5 MUSE UnConference

9:00 am - 4:00 pm

9:00 am-10:00 am Daily Practice facilitated by Jessica Amascual of Healing Justice Collective 10:30 am-12:00 pm Morning Listen & Learn Session Performance + Interview: Artist, Musician, Activist Daren Todd Panel: Producer Mona Sinha and Director Sam Feder of film Disclosure 12:30 pm-1:00 pm

Lunch & Learn Session: Special Guest with Emily Cureton of OPB 1:30 pm -4:00 pm Afternoon Listen & Learn Session Panel: Local BIPOC Leaders Janet Sarai Llerandi Gonzalez, Kerstin Arias, Jessica Amascual Keynote Segment: Special Keynote Guest with

Kerri Kelly of CTZNWELL

MUSE UNCONFERENCE 2021

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MUSE SPOTLIGHT

TWILA CASSADORE, Arizona-based forager, food educator, advocate for indigenous food sovereignty, and member of the San Carlos Apache Tribe

Twila Cassodore has been working with San Carlos Apache,

White Mountain Apache, and Yavapai peoples for the past 25 years, conducting interviews with elders to bring information back into the community to address health and social problems. With the Western Apache Diet Project,

Twila has documented the importance of foods like grass seeds and acorn seeds to the diets of Apaches before

people were moved onto reservations and became reliant on rations, and later, commodities. Her work is featured in the documentary Gather.

GATHER Film

Twila will be joining us for a panel discussion on Saturday to break down the need for Indigenous Food Sovereignty.

Attendees will be invited to watch the film Gather Friday evening to prepare for the conversation.

GATHER is the story of the rebuilding of

Native food systems. This feature film is

an intimate portrait tracing the intentional destruction of Native American foodways our renaissance and resilience, our inherit right, to reclaim it.

MUSE SPOTLIGHT

LOCAL BIPOC ARTISANS

This year, many of our guests and attendees will receive special gifts created by local BIPOC artisans Spring Alaska Olson of Sakari Botanicals and Kerstin Arias of K. Arias Creatives who are also both being featured in panel discussions over the course of MUSE UnConference. We are grateful for the opportunity to support our local community in this way.

MUSE SPOTLIGHT

JANET SARAI LLERANDI GONZALEZ

Founder of Mecca Bend

"Mecca Bend was born from the desire to see my friends,

who are my second family, integrate into the community

of Central Oregon. As a Latina woman, and mother of two, my pride is in the work ethic my parents showed me from

a young age. And never disregarding the challenges they faced as foreigners in this country.

Today, in my work with the Latinx community, I serve as the

voice for our friends and family who sometimes feel forgotten. And I do it with Latina pride!"

Janet will be joining other BIPOC leaders for a panel titled: We are not a monolith - Honoring the differences that help build solidarity in our movements

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OFFICIAL GUIDE

SATURDAY, MARCH 6 MUSE UnConference

MILCK

9:00 am - 4:00 pm

9:00 am-10:00 am Daily Practice facilitated by Acosia Red Elk of Pendleton Yoga 10:30 am-12:00 pm Morning Listen & Learn Session Performance + Interview: Artist, Activist MILCK Panel: Oregon-based Activists

Acosia Red Elk, Erika McCalpine, Morgan Schmidt, Kina Condit-Chadwick 12:30 pm-1:00 pm Lunch & Learn Session: Interview with MRG Foundation Director Se-Ah-Dom Edmo 1:30 pm-4:00 pm Afternoon Listen & Learn Session Panel: Indigenous Activists Spring Alaska Olson,

Brigette McConville, Twila Cassadore

Keynote Segment: Sonya Renee Taylor Special Dance Party HOSTED BY CTZNWELL

MUSE SPOTLIGHT

MILCK MILCK’s life took a 180 degree turn after

a cell phone video of her performing her song “Quiet”

with a choir of 25 strangers at the 2017 Women’s March went viral. “Quiet” was named Billboard’s #1 protest song of the year and earned distinction as part of

NPR’s “American Anthem” series. And in 2018, it brought MILCK to the March’s main stage in New York City, where she performed alongside the legendary Yoko Ono.

​Having “​cemented her status as one of music’s voices for the women’s movement​,” MILCK continues to

use music as a means to work towards social justice.

Written amidst protests for Black Lives Matter, MILCK’s

new song “Somebody’s Beloved” (Ft. Bipolar Sunshine) honors those we have lost too soon to causes fueled by systemic racism.

IN CELEBRATION OF WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH, BendFilm, Scalehouse + World Muse are partnering to bring you a weekend of creativity, conversation, and connection through the art form of film.

MUSE SPOTLIGHT

ACOSIA RED ELK Acosia Red Elk is an Enrolled

Member of the Umatilla Reservation in Northeastern Oregon. She is a 10x World Champion Jingle Dancer, Indige-

nous Yoga Teacher and Facilitator. Acosia travels the world sharing cultural knowledge and movement, and is known for her unique style of dance, indigenous approach to

MARCH 11TH - 14TH, 2021 TINPANTHEATER.COM/INDIEWOMXN PRESENTED BY

yoga, public speaking and storytelling.

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We will not go back to normal. Normal

never was. Our pre-corona existence was

never normal other than we normalized greed, inequity, exhaustion, depletion, extraction, disconnection, confusion, rage, hoarding, hate and lack. We should not long to return, my friends. We are being given the opportunity to stitch a new garment. One that fits all of humanity and nature."

- Sonya Renee

Artist, Activist & Founder of The Body is Not an Apology

MUSE SPOTLIGHT

SONYA RENEE TAYLOR Sonya Renee Taylor is the Founder and Radical Executive Officer of The Body is Not An Apology, a digital media and education company promoting radical self-love and body empowerment as the foundational tool for social justice and global transformation. Sonya’s work as a highly sought-after award-winning Performance Poet, activist, and transformational leader continues to have global reach. Sonya is a former National and International poetry slam champion, author of two books, including The Body is Not an Apology: The Power of Radical Self-Love (Berrett-Koehler Feb 2018), educator and thought leader who has enlightened and inspired organizations, audiences and individuals from board rooms to prisons, universities to homeless shelters, elementary schools to some of the biggest stages in the world. Believing in the power of art as a vehicle for social change, Sonya has been widely recognized for her work as a change agent. She was named one of Planned Parenthood's 99 Dream Keepers in 2015 as well as a Planned Parenthood Generation Action's 2015 Outstanding Partner awardee. Bustle

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Magazine named her one of the 12 Women Who Paved the Way for Body Positivity and in September 2015, she was honored as a YBCA 100, an annual compilation of creative minds, makers, and pioneers who are asking the questions and making the provocations that will shape the future of American culture; an honor she shared alongside author Ta'Nahesi Coates, artist Kara Walker, filmmaker Ava DuVernay and many more. In 2016, she was named a Champion of Women’s Health

by Planned Parenthood and commissioned to write the official poem for Planned Parenthood’s 100-year centennial celebration. In the same year, Sonya was also invited to the Obama White House to speak at their forum on the intersection of LGBTQIAA and Disability issues. In 2017, Sonya was awarded the Quixote Foundation’s “Thank You Note, a $25,000 award for leaders and artists working in the field of reproductive justice. In the fall of 2017, Sonya was named one of 28 global changemakers selected into the inaugural cohort of the Edmund Hilary Fellowship, a 3-year international fellowship of world-leading entrepreneurs and investors, innovating purpose-driven global impact projects from New Zealand.

SPECIAL THANKS We’d like to extend a special thank you to our

Resource Partner High Desert Law for providing funds to support local BIPOC Artisans.

SUNDAY, MARCH 7 MUSE UnConference 9:00 am - 12:30 pm

9:00 am -10:00 am Daily Practice facilitated by Halie Devlin of Healing Justice Collective.

10:30 am -12:30 am

Performance: Infinity’s Song Break It Down Session: a workshop session to

break down all that we heard and learned over the course of the unconference and create individual and collection action steps to move forward.

INFINITY'S SONG MUSE SPOTLIGHT

INFINITY'S SONG

Since its formation Infinity’s Song has consistently performed around NYC, cultivating a grassroots fanbase through pop up street performances in Central Park and the NYC subway stations. Singing on stages both small and great, the group has toured the U.S., been featured on NBC’s The Today Show and ABC’s The View, and frequently collaborates with other musical acts, most recently Kanye West, Jon Batiste, Tori Kelly and more. In the summer of 2015, the group released their first EP and in the fall of 2016 were officially signed to Roc Nation Records by Jay Z.

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THANK YOU PARTNERS

RESOURCE PARTNERS businesses and foundations that support

MUSE with financial and promotional resources.

SE-AH-DOM EDMO MUSE SPOTLIGHT

SE-AH-DOM EDMO

COMMUNITY PARTNERS individuals and organizations that support MUSE with content development.

Mecca Bend

Love Your Neighbor

Healing Justice Collective

K. Arias Creatives

Embrace Bend CTZNWELL

Salmon King Fisheries Out Central Oregon

Se-ah-dom (Shoshone-

Bannock, Nez Perce and Yakama) is currently the executive director of MRG Foundation and a founder of the Northwest Justice Funders Collective. Se-ah-dom comes from a

background of advocacy and organizing work on behalf

of tribes and LGBTQ justice. She is the co-editor of the Tribal Equity Toolkit 3.0: Tribal Resolutions and Codes for Two

PRODUCTION TEAM Liz Allore Shurmur, Abby June Becker of Ideal Solutions SOCIAL MEDIA DIRECTOR Jasmine Wilder of Honeybeast Digital EVENT GUIDES Rita Schenkelberg, Pixie Lighthorse, Shanan Kelley GRAPHIC DESIGN Euijin Gray

Spirit and LGBTQ Justice in Indian Country and American Indian Identity: Citizenship, Membership & Blood.

PROGAM SPOTLIGHT

MUSE Clubs

Our MUSE Clubs encourage and support youth to become social change leaders in their school and community.

Our clubs reach youth in elementary, middle and high schools across Central Oregon.

Please consider becoming a MUSE Member today to help support our efforts to provide free, accessible youth programming in local schools.

VISIT: WWW.THEWORLDMUSE.ORG

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OFFICIAL GUIDE

Love Your Neighbor

A community conversation project in Central Oregon

Founded with a mission to allow Central Oregonians to get to know people of color in the community, the Love Your Neighbor project is a series of community forums and conversations that foster an open exchange of ideas and stories.

Learn more about us, support our work or attend one of our upcoming forums by visiting our Facebook page, Love Your Neighbor Bend, OR, or by emailing us at loveyourneighborbend@gmail.com.