Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
Small dunce help from small, small human areas small.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
It's so funky.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Greetings, my small docians, Welcome to another episode of this
long going podcast that continues to really excite me. I
feel so honored to have built this space and continue
to have a space where I get to meet with
folks like our guests today, Doctor rue Benjamin. You may
(00:37):
have come across Rue Benjamin during her very impactful and
viral commencement speech at Spellman College last year, which she
is a graduate of, where she's coined the phrase black
faces in high spaces will not save us.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Actually, here's a little bit of it right here. Black
faces and high places are not gonna save us. Just
look at the black proponents of Copcity in Atlanta's leadership class.
Black faces and high places are not gonna save us.
Just look at the black woman's hand ambassador at the
UN voting against a ceasefire in Gaza. That is, our
(01:24):
blackness and our womanness are not in themselves trustworthy if
we allow ourselves to be conscripted into positions of power
that maintain the oppressive status quo. Our blackness and womanness
are not themselves trustworthy. If we support the occupation of
(01:46):
black neighborhoods with so called better trained police, or remain
silent about the genocide of oppressed peoples around the world
funded by our tax dollars. And here let me please
shout out the incredible Spellman students and AUC siblings who
(02:11):
have been organizing with Stop Cop City and Justice in Palestine,
among many other troublemakers in this room. You all remind
us that college is not a waiting room to enter
the real world, but that you can start transforming that
world right here, right now. It goes without saying, but
(02:33):
let me just say it anyway. For student activis speaking
out courageously for Palestine and Congo and Haiti and to
stop Cop City, they should not be threatened with expulsion,
loss of scholarships, or or have public safety called on
(02:53):
them for protesting. Too often, our institutions celebrate student activists
after they've graduated, even giving them honorary degrees. But stiful
(03:21):
student activism while we are enrolled.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
When I tell you, I was a hootin and holler
and watching this and I was.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
Like, I've obsessed.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
And then you continue to do research about people and
you just see that they really stand on business and
her recent work. The Imagination manifesto is what is inspiring
our conversation today around imagination beyond the confines of simply
just artistic creativity. We talk so much on views for
Amandoland My Morning Show on YouTube Monday through Wednesday, ten
(03:55):
am Eastern about having to expand our minds to imagine
a different future, to imagine a different United States right,
to imagine a different way of existing that isn't simply
just reforming what has been handed down to us when
we know it doesn't work. And that is really what
I feel like becomes the work of quote unquote leftists
(04:18):
is just the concept of this could be different and
better versus this idea that what is here is the
only option and if it's making certain people rich, then
we need to uphold it. So we're coming into this
conversation today with the shared understanding that imagination is a
(04:39):
key component to liberation, it's a key component to elevation,
and it's also a key component to the oppressor keeping
folks down, keeping folks from considering a different future. You know,
there's always people to tell you, oh, you can't, you know,
that's not possible. Whether it's reparations right, whether it's ending
(05:03):
the United States connection with Israel. People will say things
in these really definitive ways that is beyond my scope
of comprehension because of my imagination. Like I heard Representative
Jasmin Crockett say a couple of weeks ago, the United
States will always be connected with Israel.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
That's just how it is.
Speaker 1 (05:19):
Well, if the United States wasn't always connected to Israel,
it actually became connected to Israel when Israel decided to
take a more violent approach to its incursion of lands
that other people were on. By the way, there's just
a constant thread of the United States being involved with
folks when they're ready to do harm.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
But let me not get off topic. I digress.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
I know, for me, my imagination has been something that
was actually really supported and cultivated throughout my life, and
it was my emotions that were actually very much suppressed
and quote held. And as I have come into this
new phase of awakening and freedom, I've realized that my
(06:08):
emotions are really finding their way out of like this
mass that it was behind.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
You know, they're.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Coming out of the zug to also be a part
of my imagination. Right, Like I'm literally getting imaginative about
how my emotions exist, about how I respond to them,
about what they mean beyond like.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Just the obvious.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
And it's been a dope process that I think is
also being applied to my point of view around politics,
around sociology, around really just existing. So join us as
we lock in. We're going to have a great conversation
with Ruha Benjamin. I'm so excited for making this happen,
(06:55):
and I'm so excited that she was so excited to
make this happen.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
So yay me side effects of the imagination right here.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
We are here today at Small Doses Podcast for one
of my fangirl moments.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Y'all know, I love a fangirl moment.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
I love an intellectual fangirl because there really ain't nobody
that I'm a fangirl out of just the you.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Know, singing a song.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
But we are joined by professor, by academic intellectual and
possibly my cousin by looks alone, Ruha Benjamin, author of Imagination,
a Manifesto and many other books. But that is your
most recent title, thus the title of this episode of
(07:45):
Small Doses Podcast.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
So just off top, how does imagination exist for you? Yeah?
You know, I think when I started really getting into
how serious we should take imagination was when I started
to teach full time. It started with my first sort
of teaching job, and like trying to teach myself how
to teach because they skip that part in grad school.
By the way, they don't really do that, and so
(08:08):
I was sort of like, do they teach you? They
teach you your subject, but they don't teach you how
to communicate and break it down and really, you know
that bring people into the thing, got it? So I
started trying to figure out, Okay, how do you do that?
How do you you who have now become an expert
in something, how do you bring people along the journey?
And so I started to just read everything that I
(08:29):
could and observe, like watch how people teach and communicate
to find the good the bad, and I can't.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
What are some of the goods and some of the bads? Okay,
let's see. So I think part of it is like
trying to retrace, like how you first got excited and
realizing that yes, we're talking about intellectual topics, but it
also matters the emotion, the feeling behind it. So understanding
that your excitement or boredom is contagious well, how yes,
(09:01):
the feeling that you bring to it is something that
has to go along with the ideas. It can't just
be droning on and on and on. And so understanding
that sort of mind body division that we inherit from enlightenment,
thinking that's fallacious, it's wrong with those things go hand
in hand, and so part of it is to really say,
if you've been with a subject for so long, you
can lose that excitement. So you have to bring yourself
(09:23):
back to that and like reignite the passion, the joy,
the anger and realizing anger is also part of teaching,
like that can be a fuel.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
So there's so much around that that.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
Really resonates to the comic because as a comic, you
tell a joke enough times, you got to remember that these.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
People didn't hit his joke exactly.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
I gotta sell this joke every single time like the
first time.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
It's the first time. And it's very similar sort of thinking.
And so before I got into the fields that I study,
I actually started as a drama major, as that was
my first when you know, like freshman, you know, what
do you want to do is drama? So I was like, oh,
there's a lot of transferable skill and a lot of
(10:11):
actually the language that we use in sociology is borrowed
from theater, like the way that we talk about society,
social roles, things being front stage, backstage. So much of
the language about society is borrowed directly. We don't give
credit usually, Well, you know, all the world is a stage,
is a stage, honey. As soon as you realize that,
(10:34):
a lot gets demystified, for sure, true the show. So
that's really where my sort of attention to imagination came from,
is really thinking about how to spark the imagination of
my students, but also recognized in mind has to be
sparked in the process. Yes, And so I came across
this famous study that NASA conducted decades ago, and they
(10:54):
basically were trying to study creativity. So they gave these kids,
sixteen hundred kids, a creativity test every year and was
basically measuring like their level of creator. It was the
same test that they would give the NASA recruits. And
then they started to realize as these kids got old, yes, yes,
you know, it diminished every year until first of all
(11:16):
five year olds almost one hundred percent our genius level
for what they call divergent thinking one hundred percent. Then
you get to fifteen year olds, only twelve percent have
this genius level divert two percent of adults. And so
basically the way that I attributed to again, this is
how I boil it down. This inherent genius that we
(11:39):
all possess is schooled out of us. And so the
more that things become standardized, the more that we have
to tranform rigid there's no incentive. Basically, the very place
we should go to spark our imagination is the place
where it's routinely squashed, ground down everything. So really it's
the institution. Like you know, we become these robots. We
(12:01):
learn how to sit still, we learn how to stand
in line, we learned how to raise our hand. None
of that really is a terrain in his grounds for
having a wild imagination, you know.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
What's so Also, like I remember that I was in
gifted classes and that was a foundation of our gifted classes.
But that should have been the foundation of all of
our classes. And I can completely attribute my retention of
that divergent thinking to it being supported and encouraged by educators.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
And the arts, and my mother used the arts being
used like like I could do a report, like I
did a report on Kenya that I still have.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
I think it's on YouTube too, But I did like
a video where I was in my backyard and my
mom is feeling me. I'm like, welcome to Kenya, you know.
But like that was allowed. And then even when I
got to Columbia, rest in piece of Professor Gregory, I
was like, I know you want me to write this
paper every week. Okay, it's not gonna happen.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
No, it's not.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
It's not gonna happen. I'm hosting on TV. Yeah, I
got Marrable over here, Like it's just not gonna happen. No,
can I write a poem exactly? And he said on
one condition. I was like, what's the condition? He said,
that you read it in front of the class. You
may't say nothing, but a work like that's extra, that's icy.
I's like that was already built in.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
So no, I absolutely, And I bet you if we listeners,
if they would think about parts of their edgering, the
things that they actually remember, the assignments, the places that
actually stick invariably, it's going to be tied to some
kind of creative expressions. It's going to be tied. The
things that were just papers aka dada da da like
that just it's in and out, in and out. But
(13:37):
the things that stick is when you actually get to
put your heart into it, you actually get to use
your body, you actually get to you know, do something original,
and that sticks. So if we know that that works,
then we have to ask ourselves why don't we do it?
And it's not by accident, right, You want to control
the population. You want people who are not thinking outside
the box. Of course, education is going to be an
(13:58):
engine of conformity, at engine of control, and not the
place where you actually go to incite imagination, creativity and
you know, potential dissent, right right, How did you pitch
this book?
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Because I feel like this is an idea that it's like,
you need imagination to understand imagination, manifesto, imagination exactly.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
So it grew out of a previous So I was
working on looking at technology and looking at all these
new sort of emerging tools that were being sold to us,
and when I had to start talking about and sharing
that project with other people, I realized, oh, we're not
simply talking about technology. We're talking about the fact that
some people a small sliver of humanity are materializing their
(14:42):
imagination in these technologies. So the technology is like, is
a material manifestation of a certain kind of imagination about
the world, about what efficiency should be, about what social
good is, what the future should be. And so for me,
it was starting to look at actually harmful forms of imagination,
because imagination is not all good, and that's something that
(15:04):
I try to convey in the book. It's like, we
have a positive association with that word, but there are
all kinds of deadly forms of imagination. The premises exact
that these cracks came up with born in the imagination,
and so part of it is like, one, I want
us to kind of not romanticize imagination, like there's imaginations
(15:24):
that we need to fight that are materializing. But then
it's also to say, you know, if there are these
deadly forms of imagination that are being almost encoded into
our institutions, into our technologies, into the way that we
even think of education, then we need to foster alternatives.
So my work is always trying to think, Okay, what
do we need to uproot and what do we need
(15:46):
to see, what do we want to get rid of.
But also, like we have to carve out time and
space to actually do what we want to do. We
can't always be reactive and always thinking, Okay, this is
what we're against. No, y'all see why I'm thank God.
And so this is the fact of like, okay, how
can we make our classrooms education? Actually this site, this
(16:08):
grounds to foster imaginations that reflect our inherent interdependence as people,
and reflect solidarity, reflect ecological stewardship, you know, all the
things that we want to grow and foster in the world.
I think we can trace it back to whose imagination
gets to manifest in the things that we then take
for granted. We say, oh, this is inevitable that we
(16:29):
have this, you know, but no, it started somewhere, so
it can go somewhere else.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
In some ways, I mean, I feel like I'm trying
to constantly inform, but my goal is really to inspire
folks to use that information to imagine something better, different, action, etc. Right,
(16:56):
Because I feel like with teaching and educating, that's what atas,
that's what manifested for me. When I was being taught.
It wasn't enough for me to know now I needed
to do now.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
Yes, and even like to bring it back to Marrable.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
I just remember his first day being like him saying
that this program is not to study African American history.
This program is to learn the past, to apply it
to the present, to create a better future.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
Exactly to make history to be a student of, but
to actually be a protagonist, to actually feel agency in
that learning, right. And so it's not just stay it
up here, it's saying, okay, how can it spark energy action,
you know, so that we actually feel emboldened to create
the history that someone else is going to learn. But say, okay,
(17:44):
they weren't just you know, victims, they weren't just impacted
by but they shaped the world around us. And I
think that's the hallmark of really the best educators is
to not just fill people up, but to say now
it's your responsibility. Right. But going back to how you
you are an educator, like you're not limited to the
four walls of a classroom. And so in that I
(18:07):
think it's important to dig deep into the gritty the
things that we have to uproot. Like if we skip
over that part, which you never do, then you get
pie in the sky, an Boord like solution, delusion, delusions
about what because it's not grounded in the muck. It's
not grounded in the history that we need to know.
And so we can't skip that part. People who just
(18:28):
want to talk the nice life, they want to skip it.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
You can't like even the entire and I'm not sure
where you stand on this, but even the entire Democratic
run for president was based on fallacy of imagination because
the actions didn't.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
Support the actual goal.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Like we are in the United States where a woman
is raising a million dollars on a Christian go fundme
website for calling a black child the N word, and
you thought you was going to win a president and
by not having to move outside of a comfort zone.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
Yes, impractical, absolutely not. And so that's why for all
the talk of imagination, partly what we also want to
dig deep into is how to make some things unimaginable,
Like that should be unimaginable for someone to be able
to do that, that should be outside the skupe right.
And so again it's like, okay, that should be unimaginable.
The annihilation of our kin around the world, Palestine to Sudan,
(19:26):
that should be unimaginable. It should be unimaginable. This is
the thing about imagination is a terrain of struggle. It's
a battlefield, like we can't take for granted that the
good guys are going to win. We have to be
in the fight for an imagination that reflects the dignity
and worth of everyone, because otherwise we have this GoFundMe
and we have people actually profiting from racism, supremacy, surveillance.
(19:50):
Right that's the world that we have right now, is
that it's not just anaboration, it's a whole profit structure
around these really horrific I mean Georgian, yes, co sign.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
I have a one woman show called What Would the
Ancestors Say? And I do characters, I do commentary, I
do lecture all throughout this show, and the premise of
the show is asking the question what would our ancestors
say about where we are and what we've done with
what they did? Yes, And then it closes asking the
question what kind of ancestor are we to those who are.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Inevitably coming later?
Speaker 1 (20:28):
And you know, I talk about the fact that so
I play Harriet Tubman in the beginning and she says,
you know, during my time, Coonan was a matter of survival.
People chose this route largely in part because they felt
like there was no other way to really live within
this framework.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Y'all have made Coonan a career.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Wow, and like, because that's really where we are, like
weaponizing blackness. That's why your commencement speech was so impact
me personally, because it's so succinctly framed within a space
that definitely needed to hear it. The concept that a
cent within a white framework, a cent within white supremacist imagination,
(21:13):
is not a reflection of what black excellence is. No, No,
I don't believe that's what our ancestors imagined black excellence
to be. Maybe, and you know I've read enough where
I feel I stand on that, Like that wasn't the
goal maybe for some, but not in general. So when
you wrote this, did it end where you started the
(21:37):
Imagination book?
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Yes? Oh no. In fact, you know, it kind of
goes back to this point, like what's the point of
the knowledge, what's the point of the ideas? And so
as I was writing, I was thinking, Okay, it just
can't be a treatise on imagination sort of reflecting debates
and da da d. It has to end actionable, like
what do we do with what we've just learned? And
(21:59):
So the last chapter is what I call an Imagination Incubator,
which has prompts, exercises, activities that actually are meant to
be taken off the page in groups. You could do
it alone, but really in group settings, and you know,
to think about how can we grow, How can we
treat imagination like a muscle, like you work out your
physical muscles, how do you strengthen your imagination? And then
(22:23):
after the book was out, we realized, okay, this is fine,
these prompts, these exercises. But one of the scholars I
was citing throughout is a play scholar, Ariana Brazier, and
she's based in Atlanta. She's studied black childhood, black play
for years ethnographically in schools and neighborhoods. So I found
myself citing her dissertation quite a bit. And so I've
(22:44):
partnered with her to create an imagination playbook that now
lives online that's basically games like some that we know
from our childhood, but some that she's like developed and facilitated.
But again, it's this idea that we have to get
out of just a peer and get into our bodies
and exercise Isaiah exactly. So let's get in, you know,
to make this a more holistic experience. And so that
(23:05):
is just something that I wasn't anticipating but kind of
grew out of the process, like we have to move.
Part of it is that, you know, if we're too
cerebral in our approach to imagination, that itself is the
wholdest counter kind of Yeah, so we need to be
more playful. We need to be you know, we actually
need to not talk about creativity, but be creative. And
so the Imagination Playbook is sort of a free online
(23:28):
resource that teachers and other organizers have started to use
just to bring the ideas off the page. So we
can take this seriously as a terrain that we need
to invest in and grow. Is this a class you'd
want to teach? I think so. I think so. You know,
I teach some classes that are at this nexus of
science and fiction, like reading science fiction but actually like
(23:49):
writing it and designing speculative technologies that don't exist yet.
So in many ways, my classes are already like practicing
a lot of the things that I'm writing about. So
I don't I don't know that I have to create
a whole new class for that, but it's something that
I want to be more explicit about, like, this is
what we're doing when we do this speculative exercise. This
is what we're doing when you're doing this imaginative thing.
(24:10):
It's because it's not just that it's fun. It's this
important because you need to go out in the world
to be able to challenge the dominant forms of imagination
and cultivate alternatives as well.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
Have you seen the show Scavenger's Rain? No, okay, so
that's your assignment, Okay, homework. It's animated, and I normally
wouldn't watch. I like animation, but I'm not like a junkie,
you know, But as far as imagination goes, really, it's
gonna take you there. Okay, it's gonna take you there
on multiple levels. Sociologically okay, biologically wow, bio sociologically.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
Okay, yeah, I gotcha. I got It's literally just fascinating
in the mind.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
He had to be on LSD, oh, he had, Like,
but it's it's grounded.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Yeah, it's trippy, but it's grounded.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
It's definitely like it's maybe not LSD, but what's the
kenne Meine, what's the one that they do like the
little drops just to get.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
You microdos and something something microdosing.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Yeah, but it's a very I bring it up because
I feel like the intersection for a lot of people
with imagination and doing stops once they leave creativity as
an art like they only think of imagination and.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
As the purview of artists. Yes, as we're pushed and
we also select in the certain tracks like they're the
sciencey people, the techie people, the artsy and it's like
if you are not in that mold, then all of
a sudden. But one of the things that I'm trying
to say is that you can find imagination in the
most mundane, banal areas of our life. A spreadsheet that
(25:55):
tells you, okay, how much funding are different schools getting
in a state that that's a certain kind of eugenic
imagination that essentially says the lives and the minds of
some children are valued higher. But you see that eugenic
imagination in little numbers in a spreadsheet. So part of
it is to understand that imagination is everywhere. It's not
(26:17):
just on a stage, the arts Broadway, you know, film,
It's in our budgets, it's in our institutions, and oftentimes
the most harmful ones are the ones that are under
the radar that no one questions because this is just
the way that we've always done things, and that's reproducing
the oppressive status quo. And so part of it is
to be able to shine a light on that so
(26:40):
that we can denaturalize and say, no, it doesn't have
to be like this, This is not how it should be.
I feel like what you're describing is like imagination is
your coding yes, yes, the ones and zeros yes.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
And how they're organized and their willingness or capability today detours.
I watched the video the other day with this economy
well he's not an economists, but this intellectual David Suzuki,
and he was talking about how economics is a bunch
of bullshit. He was like, this is not real.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
Oh, I think I might have seen that. Yeah, seen
a clip like that.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
It's from a documentary called Surviving Progress, Okay, And he
was like, economics is not real. It's not a science.
And he was like, they come up with all these
numbers and all these formulas. But he was like, it's
not a science because and it speaks to exactly what
you're saying. It doesn't consider the code that all of
this is taking place in He was like, if you're
doing economics around trees and logging, but you're not considering
(27:36):
the seasons, and you're not considering the soil, and you're
not considering the animals, then this isn't.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
A real thing.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
No, And he was like, by nature of economics, it
doesn't consider those things because it doesn't care about those exactly.
And it's the thing about economics, about math, things that
seem quantitative and fixed. Part of the power that accruse
with that is that we don't question it. We're taught
to think this is objective, this is fixed. Yes, that's
(28:05):
how I feel about the ninety two percent number. That's
how I feel about that.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Seriously, where if this number comes, let's talk. I mean,
so let me give you a quick example, like an
anecdote of exactly what you're saying about economics. So there's
one of these tech guys who his bitcoin company lost
investors billions of dollars. Sam Bankman freed up for trial,
and his defense attorney he's basically saying Sam didn't have
any malice in his heart, he just had math in
(28:30):
his head. And that should be a red flag because again,
if people are making decisions purely on math. They don't
care about the impacts on people's lives, and so he
was using this as a defense. But my thing is, like,
that is the problem is that when we have people
running things supposedly just by pure math or pure economics,
(28:51):
all of that other context falls out of the frame.
And that is the problem. But we've been taught that
that is the goal, that that is the objective is
so it can be pure objective a political No, all
of that is political, and we have to think about, like, Okay,
why are we investing so much power and so much
authority to economics as a field, to people who are
(29:12):
purely mathematical in their calculations. There's a racial arithmetic to
that supposed pure math that I think we can see
the consequences of now in terms of how people are valued.
It's like deifying math, yes exactly. It's literally like you
can't challenge it. It's not to be questioned, and if
you do, you're dumb, et cetera. Or you're not as
(29:35):
elevated as I am, et cetera. Like when I was
asking people where did this number ninety two percent come from?
No one could tell me I'm like, where did this
number come from? Was it a Gallup poll?
Speaker 1 (29:45):
Was it from CNN? And it's important to know where
that number came from. Yes, because these numbers are so
often used to steer us and to play with our minds.
This is all propagandized, right, So when I would say that,
people got very upset with and we're just like, you know,
you're a problematic now, you're this leftist, you think you're
better than everybody, and it's like, that's not what it is.
Speaker 2 (30:06):
It's just that once you see the code, it really
is like the natrid it is it is. Once you
see it, you can't see it.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
And by the way, it's annoying as fun for the
record exactly like sometimes I'm like, I don't I know, you.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
Just want to take what is it the red pill?
Be like okay, yes, just go back to sleep. But
you know what, it's impossible really like it's everywhere, and
so part of it is the going back to like
what do you do with that knowledge? Like do we
make people feel dumb for not seeing the code? How
do we embolden people to clarify their vision in order
(30:41):
to you know, build mass movements that can actually sort
of unplugg Have you done a book tour with this
book I have? Did you do like a traditional bite?
Speaker 1 (30:51):
Did?
Speaker 2 (30:51):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Did you do anything different on that book tour since
this is such a in your body kind of topic. Yeah,
because if you didn't, I feel like in moving forward
you be doing some improv at these books tools.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
I love how you're giving me. Are you giving me homework?
I'll take it though, I take it. So there's one
thing that I've done differently with that tour, and that
is to actually do an interactive exercise with audiences, right,
so we can actually show in stark terms what it
means to have a certain kind of imagination like by
(31:22):
the mega rich and elites, to show Okay, these are
the things because they have a wild imagination when it
comes to some things, Okay, AI superintellent, building bunkers underground,
you know we're gonna do. And then you get to
something like okay, you want to go to Mars, but
you don't want to have free public transportation. Oh you
want to build bunkers underground for the AI, but you
(31:43):
don't want to build affordable housing. So part of it
is to illustrate how some things are made to seem
unfeasible that are within grasp that will actually preparations exactly
benefit people yesterday versus the things that they're aspiring to
that are gonna benefit the small sliver. But we are
made to think that those are within reach, right, And
so part of it is to have this kind of
(32:04):
interactive where we can feel the contradiction, we can feel
the hypocrisy in our bodies. So it's again not just theoreticals,
like no, actually, by doing this, we're leaving this behind, right,
and we're trapped inside the lop sided imagination of those
who monopolize power and resources for the few at the
expense of the many. And so part of it is
(32:26):
to like feel it, so it emboldens us to do
something about it. And I think that actually came about
by going to There was some event. It started out
before the book tour started in New York a pub
is it Joe's Pub? I don't know. Yeah, So they
held a little event and so I was talking about
the book, and I was like, how do I get
people who are like, you know, tipsy and like, you know,
(32:47):
having their comra, how do I like bring them into
be present with me in that moment rather than and
I was like, okay, we got to do something interactive.
So it started out more just like out of necessity
in that moment, and then I've just I've just kept
doing it everywhere and people a theater geek till you die. Yes,
that's the end. That's really, It's all it is, honey,
(33:09):
It's all it is.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Yes. So, when you're in this day and time, which
is a very trying, mentally trying time, and if you're
anyone who cares about Palestine, it was already you know, trying,
(33:31):
where do you feel like your students, where does imagination
feel for them existing in this time? Because I feel
like as grown ups, you know, we end up having
to do a lot of labor to get to the imagination.
And I wonder if in the world that they're in,
because I don't know a world like I wasn't their
(33:52):
age in a world, you know, like I had to
have my imagination because there wasn't anything giving me one.
So I'm curious for them what it's like.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
I think that's such a beautiful question that I haven't
like whatever, I will say, it's just more out of
observation rather than asking them. But I think it's a
beautiful question for me to actually ask them. But I
think there's like two things happening. Part of it is
like the inundation of death and violence and grief and heartbreak.
(34:22):
Like the fact that at any given moment we can
open this little device and just see the most horrific
So if that is like constantly available, I think part
of what they're having to do to maintain their commitment,
maintain this sort of marathon of what this struggle is
(34:43):
like they know what they're doing now. It's not going
to happen overnight, whether it's pulling these university endowments out
of the war machine, whatever. They know that it's not
going to happen in their little tenure few years at
the universe. They're doing something seating a possibility that they're
not going to be But because the graphic nature of
the violence is unprecedented in our fingertips, a lot of
(35:07):
what is happening too, I think is having to protect
their imagination from that, so being very careful about how
much they take in, Like you want to be informed,
but you don't want to be impaired exactly. It's sort
of totally overwhelmed by it. But there's the guilt associated
with Okay, I'm living, I'm doing, and this is like
(35:30):
it's parallel universe, you know. So, for example, one of
the photojournalists that my lab has partnered with an exhibit
called the Phoenix of Gaza, which is a virtual reality
project developed by Palestinians. The photojournalist who was capturing the images,
he was just violently killed yesterday. A beautiful soul, a
(35:50):
beautiful soul, yahyah sobe. And so we get this news
and he has just earlier that morning celebrated the birth
of his his first daughter, celebrating and then the cafe
where he and other friends and relatives are celebrating is bombarded.
And so we are like trying to reckon with the grief,
(36:13):
the heartbreak, the rage associated with that, but knowing like
he poured his life and his professional you know, work
into this project, and so we also have this obligation
now we have to keep this going, you know. So
it's like how to balance like things that are just
so at odds for one psyche and one heart to hold.
(36:37):
And so it's really I don't think we'll know the
repercussions of this attempt to be present for the inhumanity,
the grief, and at the same time try to channel
it and metabolize it into something that is actually regeneritive
and that will actually, you know, just help the very
communities that are suffering. And so what I see with
(36:58):
the students that I get to engage with is a
moral clarity about this that is unwavering. Like it's a
kind of like they can cut through the bullshit, they
can cut through the rhetoric, they can cut through the propaganda.
They see the hypocrisy of their institutions and people who
give voice to all of these. So part of it
is like we are moved beyond language, like we can't
(37:20):
trust what people say, we see what they do. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But then it actually in the process makes you value
truthfulness more. The more you encounter the opposite. It makes
you say, oh, so there is actually something that is
precious about being truthful, about bearing witness, about being guided
(37:41):
by love and solidarity. So it actually makes you just
hold these things, I think with greater care because everywhere
around you people are defying and going against that, you know. Yeah,
And so it's been like my greatest privilege to just
stand side by side with this generation that I think
(38:03):
is embodying a kind of clarity of conscience and conviction
and sacrifice and courage that we all should be learning from,
not punishing and arresting as my students have been and suspending.
You know, It's like in this case they have become
the teachers in many ways, and those who have the
(38:24):
titles and the things they need to need to sit
down and take note. In my opinion, are you Jamaican? No,
but I have a partner who's from Saint Croix Croix
because I was like, I know it's Sarah accent. Come,
it's it's the living around and judge the musician. Yes, yes,
my accent it's there, it's there. You know.
Speaker 1 (38:52):
I love hearing you say that, namely because, like someone
on my YouTube the other day said to me, I'm
a boomer activist artist and I just want you to
know that even if you separate yourself from celebrity, you
are still a celebrity. So let me just remind you
of that, because while you were pursuing your dream, I
(39:15):
was doing this work and I was already in this
and I don't want you to sound like somebody who
just found radicalism and is now the know it all,
and I.
Speaker 2 (39:27):
Said, ooh, I got the black you venue, Yes, I
got I got the blacks.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
It's like, you know, I mean, there's so much to say,
but this is the biggest reason why, because I don't
stand for this continued effort at perpetuating a chasm between
generations by stating that my wisdom is more valuable than
your wisdom.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
Ultimately, youth have like we.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Just discussed an imaginative access that is a version of
wisdom that is you useful and invaluably and has merit.
And so when we ignore that and just act like, well,
just because I've been longer here longer, I am the
only source of wisdom, we're selling ourselves.
Speaker 2 (40:12):
Sure, absolutely, we're cutting off ourselves from and also just
ignoring history and the fact that at every moment it's
always been the younger people who and the older ones like, oh,
let's let you know. And then the other thing about
that weird formulation from that person is like, you know,
the battlefield is everywhere, like the front is everywhere, like
(40:34):
in every profession is infected by these supremacist ideas. So
there's no this is the real organizing and this is
you know, like it's everywhere and looking historically, like how
many artists do we cite today who were writers and
actors who also understood they're not limited to their professional title.
(40:56):
You know. Part of it is like, yeah, that is
part of what you do do, but we all have
a larger obligation beyond our little professional titles that should
bind us and not be grounds for being like you there,
you're over there. You know it's like, well.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
I mean I definitely have. It would be like a
man need to pick her lane. No, it's the it's
the you know, stop that speaks to the imagination, but
that speaks to the what you're talking about with the
we get put in these lanes exactly, and it limits
our ability to even conceptualize other people's capabilities. I mean
when I was doing I used to do music and
(41:31):
I was singing and rapping, and it was like.
Speaker 2 (41:34):
Oh, well you can't. You can't do both those, And
then Lauren Hill did both of them and it was
like you can. Why. It's control, fear and control. And
you know, if you think about academics, there's all this
gripe about you know, when your work goes from being
scholarly to activists and you get a demotion if people
think that you're being too activisty, and it's like, what's
(41:57):
the difference, Oh, my goodness, yeah, it's like, oh, now
that I actually care, literally like what is considered now
that I actually care about, Like I'm actually saying not
what is, but what should be. So when you turn
to what should be, when you are in any way
prescriptive or you care about what the scholarship that you're
producing does in the world, oh like you stepped over
(42:20):
a line, and we give a little space for it
in terms of you can have some policy implications for
your scholarship. And that's usually like the last paragraph at
the end of a very long, you know, manuscript, right
right right, as opposed to being like, no, up front,
this is and that's why I call the book imagination
of manifestos. I don't pick this up if you think
that I don't exactly know what this is going to be.
(42:41):
I'm not pretending to not care for the sake of
you respecting me. That's what it is.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
Is.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
Because I want to garner your favor, your respect, your
esteem that I am an intellectual, then I have to
pretend that I don't care about what's at stake. In
naming these particular problems or in projecting, this is how
we want to go. And so no matter what field
it is, people are always trying to keep you in
your place. You know, Caretha Mitchell, my wonderful colleague, know
(43:10):
your place aggression, right. I want to keep you in
your place, and when you get out of place, there's
gonna be some consequences. And so part of it is
like we just need to build up the kind of
skin that lets it roll off. You know. It's like,
that's a you problem. That really is a you problem.
You should talk to your therapist about that. That's what
I tell people. That's not for me. I can't help
(43:30):
you with that, not at all. If there is someone
who can, they have went to school, yes, exactly.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
So we're gonna go to our special Patreon only segment
where I have some special Patreon only questions about how
Misruha Benjamin exists in imagination, particularly in safe space, like
what does a safe space look like for you imaginatively
and what do you do to expand your imagination? So
(43:56):
we're gonna head on over to the Seal Squad to
get these answers.
Speaker 2 (44:06):
The last.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
So what I get from so much of this conversation,
and what I know I try to really talk to
people about is the concept of imagination as resistance, and
I wanted to know if you could speak to how
that exists in your work beyond simply just well, I
guess basically as like just having an imagination at this
(44:34):
point literally feels like resistance.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
Yes, would you agree that with this? Yeah? And it
matters what kind of imagination I think, part like.
Speaker 1 (44:41):
Yeah, right right, right, right right, yes, bring that back,
bring that back you really?
Speaker 2 (44:45):
I mean, so like that same pruning that you describe
with friends, It's like we need to prune the kinds
of imagination that has infected our own, our own liberatory imagination,
because we can adopt certain ways of things thinking and
doing things without even knowing that's infected from you know,
So they're the obvious enemies. But then there are those
(45:08):
who are you know, closest to us, that we seem
to have things in common with, that are still really
perpetuating certain ways of thinking and doing things that are
just maybe softer versions of the fascism that we see
in the White House. So part of it is taking
imagination seriously, is doing an inventory of our own sort
(45:31):
of imaginative ecosystem that think about, Okay, what in here
is you know, life affirming? What in here is a
reflection of truth, the truth that we are connected to
one another, that I, despite fancy titles, am the same
as you, you know, like when in terms of value,
and so going through and doing an inventory and then
(45:51):
trying to take those sensibilities and put them into practice,
and so so much of the work of imagination is
like this twofold thing of life, like you know, pushing
things away and cultivating things at the same time.
Speaker 1 (46:04):
It sounds like it's really pushing indoctrination away. Yes, absolutely,
to make room for imagination. I like that distinction and
doctrination be imagination.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
That is it? That is it beautiful. I'm running with that,
and I'm going to TM you every time.
Speaker 1 (46:22):
Yes, because that's really you know, I think for a
lot of folks right now, what we are seeing is
an opportunity for the imagination to flourish because by nature
of the fact that what they really stood on, they're seeing.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
Absolutely exactly bullshit exactly.
Speaker 1 (46:38):
Yeah, And for some people that makes them mad, it
makes them embarrassed. But the work that you're doing, I
think is really necessary to help people get through those emotions,
to get to not being mad and not being embarrassed,
which can be very kind of putting you in stasis
and paralysis, but turning that into alchemy and allow that
(47:00):
to be about, Okay, how do I expand because that's
the thing that imagination does for me. It is really
about expanding, and that's what the fascists don't want, No.
Speaker 2 (47:12):
Not at all. And I think to that point, part
of it is like recognizing, like I might have picked
up the indoctrination in certain terrains, but I'm still indoctrinated
in others. So the humility comes with realizing that it's ongoing,
Like I might understand the anti racist da da da,
but the ableism could be deep deep in there working
(47:32):
on it, okay, And so that it just like understands like, Okay,
I have some things figure out, but I need to
learn from other folks to help me pick out like
how that ableism is still infecting my imagination, or how
that classism or how that eurocentrism by just virtue of
proximity to academic whatever it is, it's ongoing. So having
grace with each other in that ongoingness like that. We're different,
(47:56):
you know, and different points in the journey depending on
what access of domination that we're focused on at any
given time.
Speaker 1 (48:03):
Well, y'all focus on getting Benjamin's Imagination Manifesto as well
as where can they get access to the playbook.
Speaker 2 (48:10):
Imagination playbook dot com and it will pop up there
you go.
Speaker 1 (48:15):
Thank you for having me, Thank you so much for
joy
Small dunce help from small, small human areas small.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
It's so funky.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Greetings, my small docians, Welcome to another episode of this
long going podcast that continues to really excite me. I
feel so honored to have built this space and continue
to have a space where I get to meet with
folks like our guests today, Doctor rue Benjamin. You may
(00:37):
have come across Rue Benjamin during her very impactful and
viral commencement speech at Spellman College last year, which she
is a graduate of, where she's coined the phrase black
faces in high spaces will not save us.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Actually, here's a little bit of it right here. Black
faces and high places are not gonna save us. Just
look at the black proponents of Copcity in Atlanta's leadership class.
Black faces and high places are not gonna save us.
Just look at the black woman's hand ambassador at the
UN voting against a ceasefire in Gaza. That is, our
(01:24):
blackness and our womanness are not in themselves trustworthy if
we allow ourselves to be conscripted into positions of power
that maintain the oppressive status quo. Our blackness and womanness
are not themselves trustworthy. If we support the occupation of
(01:46):
black neighborhoods with so called better trained police, or remain
silent about the genocide of oppressed peoples around the world
funded by our tax dollars. And here let me please
shout out the incredible Spellman students and AUC siblings who
(02:11):
have been organizing with Stop Cop City and Justice in Palestine,
among many other troublemakers in this room. You all remind
us that college is not a waiting room to enter
the real world, but that you can start transforming that
world right here, right now. It goes without saying, but
(02:33):
let me just say it anyway. For student activis speaking
out courageously for Palestine and Congo and Haiti and to
stop Cop City, they should not be threatened with expulsion,
loss of scholarships, or or have public safety called on
(02:53):
them for protesting. Too often, our institutions celebrate student activists
after they've graduated, even giving them honorary degrees. But stiful
(03:21):
student activism while we are enrolled.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
When I tell you, I was a hootin and holler
and watching this and I was.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
Like, I've obsessed.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
And then you continue to do research about people and
you just see that they really stand on business and
her recent work. The Imagination manifesto is what is inspiring
our conversation today around imagination beyond the confines of simply
just artistic creativity. We talk so much on views for
Amandoland My Morning Show on YouTube Monday through Wednesday, ten
(03:55):
am Eastern about having to expand our minds to imagine
a different future, to imagine a different United States right,
to imagine a different way of existing that isn't simply
just reforming what has been handed down to us when
we know it doesn't work. And that is really what
I feel like becomes the work of quote unquote leftists
(04:18):
is just the concept of this could be different and
better versus this idea that what is here is the
only option and if it's making certain people rich, then
we need to uphold it. So we're coming into this
conversation today with the shared understanding that imagination is a
(04:39):
key component to liberation, it's a key component to elevation,
and it's also a key component to the oppressor keeping
folks down, keeping folks from considering a different future. You know,
there's always people to tell you, oh, you can't, you know,
that's not possible. Whether it's reparations right, whether it's ending
(05:03):
the United States connection with Israel. People will say things
in these really definitive ways that is beyond my scope
of comprehension because of my imagination. Like I heard Representative
Jasmin Crockett say a couple of weeks ago, the United
States will always be connected with Israel.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
That's just how it is.
Speaker 1 (05:19):
Well, if the United States wasn't always connected to Israel,
it actually became connected to Israel when Israel decided to
take a more violent approach to its incursion of lands
that other people were on. By the way, there's just
a constant thread of the United States being involved with
folks when they're ready to do harm.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
But let me not get off topic. I digress.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
I know, for me, my imagination has been something that
was actually really supported and cultivated throughout my life, and
it was my emotions that were actually very much suppressed
and quote held. And as I have come into this
new phase of awakening and freedom, I've realized that my
(06:08):
emotions are really finding their way out of like this
mass that it was behind.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
You know, they're.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
Coming out of the zug to also be a part
of my imagination. Right, Like I'm literally getting imaginative about
how my emotions exist, about how I respond to them,
about what they mean beyond like.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
Just the obvious.
Speaker 1 (06:34):
And it's been a dope process that I think is
also being applied to my point of view around politics,
around sociology, around really just existing. So join us as
we lock in. We're going to have a great conversation
with Ruha Benjamin. I'm so excited for making this happen,
(06:55):
and I'm so excited that she was so excited to
make this happen.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
So yay me side effects of the imagination right here.
Speaker 1 (07:10):
We are here today at Small Doses Podcast for one
of my fangirl moments.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Y'all know, I love a fangirl moment.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
I love an intellectual fangirl because there really ain't nobody
that I'm a fangirl out of just the you.
Speaker 2 (07:23):
Know, singing a song.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
But we are joined by professor, by academic intellectual and
possibly my cousin by looks alone, Ruha Benjamin, author of Imagination,
a Manifesto and many other books. But that is your
most recent title, thus the title of this episode of
(07:45):
Small Doses Podcast.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
So just off top, how does imagination exist for you? Yeah?
You know, I think when I started really getting into
how serious we should take imagination was when I started
to teach full time. It started with my first sort
of teaching job, and like trying to teach myself how
to teach because they skip that part in grad school.
By the way, they don't really do that, and so
(08:08):
I was sort of like, do they teach you? They
teach you your subject, but they don't teach you how
to communicate and break it down and really, you know
that bring people into the thing, got it? So I
started trying to figure out, Okay, how do you do that?
How do you you who have now become an expert
in something, how do you bring people along the journey?
And so I started to just read everything that I
(08:29):
could and observe, like watch how people teach and communicate
to find the good the bad, and I can't.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
What are some of the goods and some of the bads? Okay,
let's see. So I think part of it is like
trying to retrace, like how you first got excited and
realizing that yes, we're talking about intellectual topics, but it
also matters the emotion, the feeling behind it. So understanding
that your excitement or boredom is contagious well, how yes,
(09:01):
the feeling that you bring to it is something that
has to go along with the ideas. It can't just
be droning on and on and on. And so understanding
that sort of mind body division that we inherit from enlightenment,
thinking that's fallacious, it's wrong with those things go hand
in hand, and so part of it is to really say,
if you've been with a subject for so long, you
can lose that excitement. So you have to bring yourself
(09:23):
back to that and like reignite the passion, the joy,
the anger and realizing anger is also part of teaching,
like that can be a fuel.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
So there's so much around that that.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
Really resonates to the comic because as a comic, you
tell a joke enough times, you got to remember that these.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
People didn't hit his joke exactly.
Speaker 1 (09:44):
I gotta sell this joke every single time like the
first time.
Speaker 2 (09:49):
It's the first time. And it's very similar sort of thinking.
And so before I got into the fields that I study,
I actually started as a drama major, as that was
my first when you know, like freshman, you know, what
do you want to do is drama? So I was like, oh,
there's a lot of transferable skill and a lot of
(10:11):
actually the language that we use in sociology is borrowed
from theater, like the way that we talk about society,
social roles, things being front stage, backstage. So much of
the language about society is borrowed directly. We don't give
credit usually, Well, you know, all the world is a stage,
is a stage, honey. As soon as you realize that,
(10:34):
a lot gets demystified, for sure, true the show. So
that's really where my sort of attention to imagination came from,
is really thinking about how to spark the imagination of
my students, but also recognized in mind has to be
sparked in the process. Yes, And so I came across
this famous study that NASA conducted decades ago, and they
(10:54):
basically were trying to study creativity. So they gave these kids,
sixteen hundred kids, a creativity test every year and was
basically measuring like their level of creator. It was the
same test that they would give the NASA recruits. And
then they started to realize as these kids got old, yes, yes,
you know, it diminished every year until first of all
(11:16):
five year olds almost one hundred percent our genius level
for what they call divergent thinking one hundred percent. Then
you get to fifteen year olds, only twelve percent have
this genius level divert two percent of adults. And so
basically the way that I attributed to again, this is
how I boil it down. This inherent genius that we
(11:39):
all possess is schooled out of us. And so the
more that things become standardized, the more that we have
to tranform rigid there's no incentive. Basically, the very place
we should go to spark our imagination is the place
where it's routinely squashed, ground down everything. So really it's
the institution. Like you know, we become these robots. We
(12:01):
learn how to sit still, we learn how to stand
in line, we learned how to raise our hand. None
of that really is a terrain in his grounds for
having a wild imagination, you know.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
What's so Also, like I remember that I was in
gifted classes and that was a foundation of our gifted classes.
But that should have been the foundation of all of
our classes. And I can completely attribute my retention of
that divergent thinking to it being supported and encouraged by educators.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
And the arts, and my mother used the arts being
used like like I could do a report, like I
did a report on Kenya that I still have.
Speaker 1 (12:39):
I think it's on YouTube too, But I did like
a video where I was in my backyard and my
mom is feeling me. I'm like, welcome to Kenya, you know.
But like that was allowed. And then even when I
got to Columbia, rest in piece of Professor Gregory, I
was like, I know you want me to write this
paper every week. Okay, it's not gonna happen.
Speaker 2 (12:57):
No, it's not.
Speaker 1 (12:58):
It's not gonna happen. I'm hosting on TV. Yeah, I
got Marrable over here, Like it's just not gonna happen. No,
can I write a poem exactly? And he said on
one condition. I was like, what's the condition? He said,
that you read it in front of the class. You
may't say nothing, but a work like that's extra, that's icy.
I's like that was already built in.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
So no, I absolutely, And I bet you if we listeners,
if they would think about parts of their edgering, the
things that they actually remember, the assignments, the places that
actually stick invariably, it's going to be tied to some
kind of creative expressions. It's going to be tied. The
things that were just papers aka dada da da like
that just it's in and out, in and out. But
(13:37):
the things that stick is when you actually get to
put your heart into it, you actually get to use
your body, you actually get to you know, do something original,
and that sticks. So if we know that that works,
then we have to ask ourselves why don't we do it?
And it's not by accident, right, You want to control
the population. You want people who are not thinking outside
the box. Of course, education is going to be an
(13:58):
engine of conformity, at engine of control, and not the
place where you actually go to incite imagination, creativity and
you know, potential dissent, right right, How did you pitch
this book?
Speaker 1 (14:11):
Because I feel like this is an idea that it's like,
you need imagination to understand imagination, manifesto, imagination exactly.
Speaker 2 (14:19):
So it grew out of a previous So I was
working on looking at technology and looking at all these
new sort of emerging tools that were being sold to us,
and when I had to start talking about and sharing
that project with other people, I realized, oh, we're not
simply talking about technology. We're talking about the fact that
some people a small sliver of humanity are materializing their
(14:42):
imagination in these technologies. So the technology is like, is
a material manifestation of a certain kind of imagination about
the world, about what efficiency should be, about what social
good is, what the future should be. And so for me,
it was starting to look at actually harmful forms of imagination,
because imagination is not all good, and that's something that
(15:04):
I try to convey in the book. It's like, we
have a positive association with that word, but there are
all kinds of deadly forms of imagination. The premises exact
that these cracks came up with born in the imagination,
and so part of it is like, one, I want
us to kind of not romanticize imagination, like there's imaginations
(15:24):
that we need to fight that are materializing. But then
it's also to say, you know, if there are these
deadly forms of imagination that are being almost encoded into
our institutions, into our technologies, into the way that we
even think of education, then we need to foster alternatives.
So my work is always trying to think, Okay, what
do we need to uproot and what do we need
(15:46):
to see, what do we want to get rid of.
But also, like we have to carve out time and
space to actually do what we want to do. We
can't always be reactive and always thinking, Okay, this is
what we're against. No, y'all see why I'm thank God.
And so this is the fact of like, okay, how
can we make our classrooms education? Actually this site, this
(16:08):
grounds to foster imaginations that reflect our inherent interdependence as people,
and reflect solidarity, reflect ecological stewardship, you know, all the
things that we want to grow and foster in the world.
I think we can trace it back to whose imagination
gets to manifest in the things that we then take
for granted. We say, oh, this is inevitable that we
(16:29):
have this, you know, but no, it started somewhere, so
it can go somewhere else.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
In some ways, I mean, I feel like I'm trying
to constantly inform, but my goal is really to inspire
folks to use that information to imagine something better, different, action, etc. Right,
(16:56):
Because I feel like with teaching and educating, that's what atas,
that's what manifested for me. When I was being taught.
It wasn't enough for me to know now I needed
to do now.
Speaker 2 (17:08):
Yes, and even like to bring it back to Marrable.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
I just remember his first day being like him saying
that this program is not to study African American history.
This program is to learn the past, to apply it
to the present, to create a better future.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
Exactly to make history to be a student of, but
to actually be a protagonist, to actually feel agency in
that learning, right. And so it's not just stay it
up here, it's saying, okay, how can it spark energy action,
you know, so that we actually feel emboldened to create
the history that someone else is going to learn. But say, okay,
(17:44):
they weren't just you know, victims, they weren't just impacted
by but they shaped the world around us. And I
think that's the hallmark of really the best educators is
to not just fill people up, but to say now
it's your responsibility. Right. But going back to how you
you are an educator, like you're not limited to the
four walls of a classroom. And so in that I
(18:07):
think it's important to dig deep into the gritty the
things that we have to uproot. Like if we skip
over that part, which you never do, then you get
pie in the sky, an Boord like solution, delusion, delusions
about what because it's not grounded in the muck. It's
not grounded in the history that we need to know.
And so we can't skip that part. People who just
(18:28):
want to talk the nice life, they want to skip it.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
You can't like even the entire and I'm not sure
where you stand on this, but even the entire Democratic
run for president was based on fallacy of imagination because
the actions didn't.
Speaker 2 (18:46):
Support the actual goal.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Like we are in the United States where a woman
is raising a million dollars on a Christian go fundme
website for calling a black child the N word, and
you thought you was going to win a president and
by not having to move outside of a comfort zone.
Speaker 2 (19:03):
Yes, impractical, absolutely not. And so that's why for all
the talk of imagination, partly what we also want to
dig deep into is how to make some things unimaginable,
Like that should be unimaginable for someone to be able
to do that, that should be outside the skupe right.
And so again it's like, okay, that should be unimaginable.
The annihilation of our kin around the world, Palestine to Sudan,
(19:26):
that should be unimaginable. It should be unimaginable. This is
the thing about imagination is a terrain of struggle. It's
a battlefield, like we can't take for granted that the
good guys are going to win. We have to be
in the fight for an imagination that reflects the dignity
and worth of everyone, because otherwise we have this GoFundMe
and we have people actually profiting from racism, supremacy, surveillance.
(19:50):
Right that's the world that we have right now, is
that it's not just anaboration, it's a whole profit structure
around these really horrific I mean Georgian, yes, co sign.
Speaker 1 (20:05):
I have a one woman show called What Would the
Ancestors Say? And I do characters, I do commentary, I
do lecture all throughout this show, and the premise of
the show is asking the question what would our ancestors
say about where we are and what we've done with
what they did? Yes, And then it closes asking the
question what kind of ancestor are we to those who are.
Speaker 2 (20:26):
Inevitably coming later?
Speaker 1 (20:28):
And you know, I talk about the fact that so
I play Harriet Tubman in the beginning and she says,
you know, during my time, Coonan was a matter of survival.
People chose this route largely in part because they felt
like there was no other way to really live within
this framework.
Speaker 2 (20:48):
Y'all have made Coonan a career.
Speaker 1 (20:49):
Wow, and like, because that's really where we are, like
weaponizing blackness. That's why your commencement speech was so impact
me personally, because it's so succinctly framed within a space
that definitely needed to hear it. The concept that a
cent within a white framework, a cent within white supremacist imagination,
(21:13):
is not a reflection of what black excellence is. No, No,
I don't believe that's what our ancestors imagined black excellence
to be. Maybe, and you know I've read enough where
I feel I stand on that, Like that wasn't the
goal maybe for some, but not in general. So when
you wrote this, did it end where you started the
(21:37):
Imagination book?
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Yes? Oh no. In fact, you know, it kind of
goes back to this point, like what's the point of
the knowledge, what's the point of the ideas? And so
as I was writing, I was thinking, Okay, it just
can't be a treatise on imagination sort of reflecting debates
and da da d. It has to end actionable, like
what do we do with what we've just learned? And
(21:59):
So the last chapter is what I call an Imagination Incubator,
which has prompts, exercises, activities that actually are meant to
be taken off the page in groups. You could do
it alone, but really in group settings, and you know,
to think about how can we grow, How can we
treat imagination like a muscle, like you work out your
physical muscles, how do you strengthen your imagination? And then
(22:23):
after the book was out, we realized, okay, this is fine,
these prompts, these exercises. But one of the scholars I
was citing throughout is a play scholar, Ariana Brazier, and
she's based in Atlanta. She's studied black childhood, black play
for years ethnographically in schools and neighborhoods. So I found
myself citing her dissertation quite a bit. And so I've
(22:44):
partnered with her to create an imagination playbook that now
lives online that's basically games like some that we know
from our childhood, but some that she's like developed and facilitated.
But again, it's this idea that we have to get
out of just a peer and get into our bodies
and exercise Isaiah exactly. So let's get in, you know,
to make this a more holistic experience. And so that
(23:05):
is just something that I wasn't anticipating but kind of
grew out of the process, like we have to move.
Part of it is that, you know, if we're too
cerebral in our approach to imagination, that itself is the
wholdest counter kind of Yeah, so we need to be
more playful. We need to be you know, we actually
need to not talk about creativity, but be creative. And
so the Imagination Playbook is sort of a free online
(23:28):
resource that teachers and other organizers have started to use
just to bring the ideas off the page. So we
can take this seriously as a terrain that we need
to invest in and grow. Is this a class you'd
want to teach? I think so. I think so. You know,
I teach some classes that are at this nexus of
science and fiction, like reading science fiction but actually like
(23:49):
writing it and designing speculative technologies that don't exist yet.
So in many ways, my classes are already like practicing
a lot of the things that I'm writing about. So
I don't I don't know that I have to create
a whole new class for that, but it's something that
I want to be more explicit about, like, this is
what we're doing when we do this speculative exercise. This
is what we're doing when you're doing this imaginative thing.
(24:10):
It's because it's not just that it's fun. It's this
important because you need to go out in the world
to be able to challenge the dominant forms of imagination
and cultivate alternatives as well.
Speaker 1 (24:26):
Have you seen the show Scavenger's Rain? No, okay, so
that's your assignment, Okay, homework. It's animated, and I normally
wouldn't watch. I like animation, but I'm not like a junkie,
you know, But as far as imagination goes, really, it's
gonna take you there. Okay, it's gonna take you there
on multiple levels. Sociologically okay, biologically wow, bio sociologically.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
Okay, yeah, I gotcha. I got It's literally just fascinating
in the mind.
Speaker 1 (25:00):
He had to be on LSD, oh, he had, Like,
but it's it's grounded.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
Yeah, it's trippy, but it's grounded.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
It's definitely like it's maybe not LSD, but what's the
kenne Meine, what's the one that they do like the
little drops just to get.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
You microdos and something something microdosing.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Yeah, but it's a very I bring it up because
I feel like the intersection for a lot of people
with imagination and doing stops once they leave creativity as
an art like they only think of imagination and.
Speaker 2 (25:34):
As the purview of artists. Yes, as we're pushed and
we also select in the certain tracks like they're the
sciencey people, the techie people, the artsy and it's like
if you are not in that mold, then all of
a sudden. But one of the things that I'm trying
to say is that you can find imagination in the
most mundane, banal areas of our life. A spreadsheet that
(25:55):
tells you, okay, how much funding are different schools getting
in a state that that's a certain kind of eugenic
imagination that essentially says the lives and the minds of
some children are valued higher. But you see that eugenic
imagination in little numbers in a spreadsheet. So part of
it is to understand that imagination is everywhere. It's not
(26:17):
just on a stage, the arts Broadway, you know, film,
It's in our budgets, it's in our institutions, and oftentimes
the most harmful ones are the ones that are under
the radar that no one questions because this is just
the way that we've always done things, and that's reproducing
the oppressive status quo. And so part of it is
to be able to shine a light on that so
(26:40):
that we can denaturalize and say, no, it doesn't have
to be like this, This is not how it should be.
I feel like what you're describing is like imagination is
your coding yes, yes, the ones and zeros yes.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
And how they're organized and their willingness or capability today detours.
I watched the video the other day with this economy
well he's not an economists, but this intellectual David Suzuki,
and he was talking about how economics is a bunch
of bullshit. He was like, this is not real.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
Oh, I think I might have seen that. Yeah, seen
a clip like that.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
It's from a documentary called Surviving Progress, Okay, And he
was like, economics is not real. It's not a science.
And he was like, they come up with all these
numbers and all these formulas. But he was like, it's
not a science because and it speaks to exactly what
you're saying. It doesn't consider the code that all of
this is taking place in He was like, if you're
doing economics around trees and logging, but you're not considering
(27:36):
the seasons, and you're not considering the soil, and you're
not considering the animals, then this isn't.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
A real thing.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
No, And he was like, by nature of economics, it
doesn't consider those things because it doesn't care about those exactly.
And it's the thing about economics, about math, things that
seem quantitative and fixed. Part of the power that accruse
with that is that we don't question it. We're taught
to think this is objective, this is fixed. Yes, that's
(28:05):
how I feel about the ninety two percent number. That's
how I feel about that.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Seriously, where if this number comes, let's talk. I mean,
so let me give you a quick example, like an
anecdote of exactly what you're saying about economics. So there's
one of these tech guys who his bitcoin company lost
investors billions of dollars. Sam Bankman freed up for trial,
and his defense attorney he's basically saying Sam didn't have
any malice in his heart, he just had math in
(28:30):
his head. And that should be a red flag because again,
if people are making decisions purely on math. They don't
care about the impacts on people's lives, and so he
was using this as a defense. But my thing is, like,
that is the problem is that when we have people
running things supposedly just by pure math or pure economics,
(28:51):
all of that other context falls out of the frame.
And that is the problem. But we've been taught that
that is the goal, that that is the objective is
so it can be pure objective a political No, all
of that is political, and we have to think about, like, Okay,
why are we investing so much power and so much
authority to economics as a field, to people who are
(29:12):
purely mathematical in their calculations. There's a racial arithmetic to
that supposed pure math that I think we can see
the consequences of now in terms of how people are valued.
It's like deifying math, yes exactly. It's literally like you
can't challenge it. It's not to be questioned, and if
you do, you're dumb, et cetera. Or you're not as
(29:35):
elevated as I am, et cetera. Like when I was
asking people where did this number ninety two percent come from?
No one could tell me I'm like, where did this
number come from? Was it a Gallup poll?
Speaker 1 (29:45):
Was it from CNN? And it's important to know where
that number came from. Yes, because these numbers are so
often used to steer us and to play with our minds.
This is all propagandized, right, So when I would say that,
people got very upset with and we're just like, you know,
you're a problematic now, you're this leftist, you think you're
better than everybody, and it's like, that's not what it is.
Speaker 2 (30:06):
It's just that once you see the code, it really
is like the natrid it is it is. Once you
see it, you can't see it.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
And by the way, it's annoying as fun for the
record exactly like sometimes I'm like, I don't I know, you.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
Just want to take what is it the red pill?
Be like okay, yes, just go back to sleep. But
you know what, it's impossible really like it's everywhere, and
so part of it is the going back to like
what do you do with that knowledge? Like do we
make people feel dumb for not seeing the code? How
do we embolden people to clarify their vision in order
(30:41):
to you know, build mass movements that can actually sort
of unplugg Have you done a book tour with this
book I have? Did you do like a traditional bite?
Speaker 1 (30:51):
Did?
Speaker 2 (30:51):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (30:52):
Did you do anything different on that book tour since
this is such a in your body kind of topic. Yeah,
because if you didn't, I feel like in moving forward
you be doing some improv at these books tools.
Speaker 2 (31:01):
I love how you're giving me. Are you giving me homework?
I'll take it though, I take it. So there's one
thing that I've done differently with that tour, and that
is to actually do an interactive exercise with audiences, right,
so we can actually show in stark terms what it
means to have a certain kind of imagination like by
(31:22):
the mega rich and elites, to show Okay, these are
the things because they have a wild imagination when it
comes to some things, Okay, AI superintellent, building bunkers underground,
you know we're gonna do. And then you get to
something like okay, you want to go to Mars, but
you don't want to have free public transportation. Oh you
want to build bunkers underground for the AI, but you
(31:43):
don't want to build affordable housing. So part of it
is to illustrate how some things are made to seem
unfeasible that are within grasp that will actually preparations exactly
benefit people yesterday versus the things that they're aspiring to
that are gonna benefit the small sliver. But we are
made to think that those are within reach, right, And
so part of it is to have this kind of
(32:04):
interactive where we can feel the contradiction, we can feel
the hypocrisy in our bodies. So it's again not just theoreticals,
like no, actually, by doing this, we're leaving this behind, right,
and we're trapped inside the lop sided imagination of those
who monopolize power and resources for the few at the
expense of the many. And so part of it is
(32:26):
to like feel it, so it emboldens us to do
something about it. And I think that actually came about
by going to There was some event. It started out
before the book tour started in New York a pub
is it Joe's Pub? I don't know. Yeah, So they
held a little event and so I was talking about
the book, and I was like, how do I get
people who are like, you know, tipsy and like, you know,
(32:47):
having their comra, how do I like bring them into
be present with me in that moment rather than and
I was like, okay, we got to do something interactive.
So it started out more just like out of necessity
in that moment, and then I've just I've just kept
doing it everywhere and people a theater geek till you die. Yes,
that's the end. That's really, It's all it is, honey,
(33:09):
It's all it is.
Speaker 1 (33:10):
Yes. So, when you're in this day and time, which
is a very trying, mentally trying time, and if you're
anyone who cares about Palestine, it was already you know, trying,
(33:31):
where do you feel like your students, where does imagination
feel for them existing in this time? Because I feel
like as grown ups, you know, we end up having
to do a lot of labor to get to the imagination.
And I wonder if in the world that they're in,
because I don't know a world like I wasn't their
(33:52):
age in a world, you know, like I had to
have my imagination because there wasn't anything giving me one.
So I'm curious for them what it's like.
Speaker 2 (33:59):
I think that's such a beautiful question that I haven't
like whatever, I will say, it's just more out of
observation rather than asking them. But I think it's a
beautiful question for me to actually ask them. But I
think there's like two things happening. Part of it is
like the inundation of death and violence and grief and heartbreak.
(34:22):
Like the fact that at any given moment we can
open this little device and just see the most horrific
So if that is like constantly available, I think part
of what they're having to do to maintain their commitment,
maintain this sort of marathon of what this struggle is
(34:43):
like they know what they're doing now. It's not going
to happen overnight, whether it's pulling these university endowments out
of the war machine, whatever. They know that it's not
going to happen in their little tenure few years at
the universe. They're doing something seating a possibility that they're
not going to be But because the graphic nature of
the violence is unprecedented in our fingertips, a lot of
(35:07):
what is happening too, I think is having to protect
their imagination from that, so being very careful about how
much they take in, Like you want to be informed,
but you don't want to be impaired exactly. It's sort
of totally overwhelmed by it. But there's the guilt associated
with Okay, I'm living, I'm doing, and this is like
(35:30):
it's parallel universe, you know. So, for example, one of
the photojournalists that my lab has partnered with an exhibit
called the Phoenix of Gaza, which is a virtual reality
project developed by Palestinians. The photojournalist who was capturing the images,
he was just violently killed yesterday. A beautiful soul, a
(35:50):
beautiful soul, yahyah sobe. And so we get this news
and he has just earlier that morning celebrated the birth
of his his first daughter, celebrating and then the cafe
where he and other friends and relatives are celebrating is bombarded.
And so we are like trying to reckon with the grief,
(36:13):
the heartbreak, the rage associated with that, but knowing like
he poured his life and his professional you know, work
into this project, and so we also have this obligation
now we have to keep this going, you know. So
it's like how to balance like things that are just
so at odds for one psyche and one heart to hold.
(36:37):
And so it's really I don't think we'll know the
repercussions of this attempt to be present for the inhumanity,
the grief, and at the same time try to channel
it and metabolize it into something that is actually regeneritive
and that will actually, you know, just help the very
communities that are suffering. And so what I see with
(36:58):
the students that I get to engage with is a
moral clarity about this that is unwavering. Like it's a
kind of like they can cut through the bullshit, they
can cut through the rhetoric, they can cut through the propaganda.
They see the hypocrisy of their institutions and people who
give voice to all of these. So part of it
is like we are moved beyond language, like we can't
(37:20):
trust what people say, we see what they do. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But then it actually in the process makes you value
truthfulness more. The more you encounter the opposite. It makes
you say, oh, so there is actually something that is
precious about being truthful, about bearing witness, about being guided
(37:41):
by love and solidarity. So it actually makes you just
hold these things, I think with greater care because everywhere
around you people are defying and going against that, you know. Yeah,
And so it's been like my greatest privilege to just
stand side by side with this generation that I think
(38:03):
is embodying a kind of clarity of conscience and conviction
and sacrifice and courage that we all should be learning from,
not punishing and arresting as my students have been and suspending.
You know, It's like in this case they have become
the teachers in many ways, and those who have the
(38:24):
titles and the things they need to need to sit
down and take note. In my opinion, are you Jamaican? No,
but I have a partner who's from Saint Croix Croix
because I was like, I know it's Sarah accent. Come,
it's it's the living around and judge the musician. Yes, yes,
my accent it's there, it's there. You know.
Speaker 1 (38:52):
I love hearing you say that, namely because, like someone
on my YouTube the other day said to me, I'm
a boomer activist artist and I just want you to
know that even if you separate yourself from celebrity, you
are still a celebrity. So let me just remind you
of that, because while you were pursuing your dream, I
(39:15):
was doing this work and I was already in this
and I don't want you to sound like somebody who
just found radicalism and is now the know it all,
and I.
Speaker 2 (39:27):
Said, ooh, I got the black you venue, Yes, I
got I got the blacks.
Speaker 1 (39:33):
It's like, you know, I mean, there's so much to say,
but this is the biggest reason why, because I don't
stand for this continued effort at perpetuating a chasm between
generations by stating that my wisdom is more valuable than
your wisdom.
Speaker 2 (39:50):
Ultimately, youth have like we.
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Just discussed an imaginative access that is a version of
wisdom that is you useful and invaluably and has merit.
And so when we ignore that and just act like, well,
just because I've been longer here longer, I am the
only source of wisdom, we're selling ourselves.
Speaker 2 (40:12):
Sure, absolutely, we're cutting off ourselves from and also just
ignoring history and the fact that at every moment it's
always been the younger people who and the older ones like, oh,
let's let you know. And then the other thing about
that weird formulation from that person is like, you know,
the battlefield is everywhere, like the front is everywhere, like
(40:34):
in every profession is infected by these supremacist ideas. So
there's no this is the real organizing and this is
you know, like it's everywhere and looking historically, like how
many artists do we cite today who were writers and
actors who also understood they're not limited to their professional title.
(40:56):
You know. Part of it is like, yeah, that is
part of what you do do, but we all have
a larger obligation beyond our little professional titles that should
bind us and not be grounds for being like you there,
you're over there. You know it's like, well.
Speaker 1 (41:10):
I mean I definitely have. It would be like a
man need to pick her lane. No, it's the it's
the you know, stop that speaks to the imagination, but
that speaks to the what you're talking about with the
we get put in these lanes exactly, and it limits
our ability to even conceptualize other people's capabilities. I mean
when I was doing I used to do music and
(41:31):
I was singing and rapping, and it was like.
Speaker 2 (41:34):
Oh, well you can't. You can't do both those, And
then Lauren Hill did both of them and it was
like you can. Why. It's control, fear and control. And
you know, if you think about academics, there's all this
gripe about you know, when your work goes from being
scholarly to activists and you get a demotion if people
think that you're being too activisty, and it's like, what's
(41:57):
the difference, Oh, my goodness, yeah, it's like, oh, now
that I actually care, literally like what is considered now
that I actually care about, Like I'm actually saying not
what is, but what should be. So when you turn
to what should be, when you are in any way
prescriptive or you care about what the scholarship that you're
producing does in the world, oh like you stepped over
(42:20):
a line, and we give a little space for it
in terms of you can have some policy implications for
your scholarship. And that's usually like the last paragraph at
the end of a very long, you know, manuscript, right
right right, as opposed to being like, no, up front,
this is and that's why I call the book imagination
of manifestos. I don't pick this up if you think
that I don't exactly know what this is going to be.
(42:41):
I'm not pretending to not care for the sake of
you respecting me. That's what it is.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
Is.
Speaker 2 (42:47):
Because I want to garner your favor, your respect, your
esteem that I am an intellectual, then I have to
pretend that I don't care about what's at stake. In
naming these particular problems or in projecting, this is how
we want to go. And so no matter what field
it is, people are always trying to keep you in
your place. You know, Caretha Mitchell, my wonderful colleague, know
(43:10):
your place aggression, right. I want to keep you in
your place, and when you get out of place, there's
gonna be some consequences. And so part of it is
like we just need to build up the kind of
skin that lets it roll off. You know. It's like,
that's a you problem. That really is a you problem.
You should talk to your therapist about that. That's what
I tell people. That's not for me. I can't help
(43:30):
you with that, not at all. If there is someone
who can, they have went to school, yes, exactly.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
So we're gonna go to our special Patreon only segment
where I have some special Patreon only questions about how
Misruha Benjamin exists in imagination, particularly in safe space, like
what does a safe space look like for you imaginatively
and what do you do to expand your imagination? So
(43:56):
we're gonna head on over to the Seal Squad to
get these answers.
Speaker 2 (44:06):
The last.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
So what I get from so much of this conversation,
and what I know I try to really talk to
people about is the concept of imagination as resistance, and
I wanted to know if you could speak to how
that exists in your work beyond simply just well, I
guess basically as like just having an imagination at this
(44:34):
point literally feels like resistance.
Speaker 2 (44:36):
Yes, would you agree that with this? Yeah? And it
matters what kind of imagination I think, part like.
Speaker 1 (44:41):
Yeah, right right, right, right right, yes, bring that back,
bring that back you really?
Speaker 2 (44:45):
I mean, so like that same pruning that you describe
with friends, It's like we need to prune the kinds
of imagination that has infected our own, our own liberatory imagination,
because we can adopt certain ways of things thinking and
doing things without even knowing that's infected from you know,
So they're the obvious enemies. But then there are those
(45:08):
who are you know, closest to us, that we seem
to have things in common with, that are still really
perpetuating certain ways of thinking and doing things that are
just maybe softer versions of the fascism that we see
in the White House. So part of it is taking
imagination seriously, is doing an inventory of our own sort
(45:31):
of imaginative ecosystem that think about, Okay, what in here
is you know, life affirming? What in here is a
reflection of truth, the truth that we are connected to
one another, that I, despite fancy titles, am the same
as you, you know, like when in terms of value,
and so going through and doing an inventory and then
(45:51):
trying to take those sensibilities and put them into practice,
and so so much of the work of imagination is
like this twofold thing of life, like you know, pushing
things away and cultivating things at the same time.
Speaker 1 (46:04):
It sounds like it's really pushing indoctrination away. Yes, absolutely,
to make room for imagination. I like that distinction and
doctrination be imagination.
Speaker 2 (46:14):
That is it? That is it beautiful. I'm running with that,
and I'm going to TM you every time.
Speaker 1 (46:22):
Yes, because that's really you know, I think for a
lot of folks right now, what we are seeing is
an opportunity for the imagination to flourish because by nature
of the fact that what they really stood on, they're seeing.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
Absolutely exactly bullshit exactly.
Speaker 1 (46:38):
Yeah, And for some people that makes them mad, it
makes them embarrassed. But the work that you're doing, I
think is really necessary to help people get through those emotions,
to get to not being mad and not being embarrassed,
which can be very kind of putting you in stasis
and paralysis, but turning that into alchemy and allow that
(47:00):
to be about, Okay, how do I expand because that's
the thing that imagination does for me. It is really
about expanding, and that's what the fascists don't want, No.
Speaker 2 (47:12):
Not at all. And I think to that point, part
of it is like recognizing, like I might have picked
up the indoctrination in certain terrains, but I'm still indoctrinated
in others. So the humility comes with realizing that it's ongoing,
Like I might understand the anti racist da da da,
but the ableism could be deep deep in there working
(47:32):
on it, okay, And so that it just like understands like, Okay,
I have some things figure out, but I need to
learn from other folks to help me pick out like
how that ableism is still infecting my imagination, or how
that classism or how that eurocentrism by just virtue of
proximity to academic whatever it is, it's ongoing. So having
grace with each other in that ongoingness like that. We're different,
(47:56):
you know, and different points in the journey depending on
what access of domination that we're focused on at any
given time.
Speaker 1 (48:03):
Well, y'all focus on getting Benjamin's Imagination Manifesto as well
as where can they get access to the playbook.
Speaker 2 (48:10):
Imagination playbook dot com and it will pop up there
you go.
Speaker 1 (48:15):
Thank you for having me, Thank you so much for
joy
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