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HELP BUILD AND STRENGTHEN YOUR MOVEMENT BY ATTENDING:
Artful Activism & Effective Organizing for Human Rights
3 DAYS OF FREE WORKSHOPS (come to part or all) Friday, June 24, through Sunday, June 26
*sponsored by: Martin Luther King Coalition*
for Jobs, Justice and Peace <http://www.mlkcoalitionforjobsjusticeandpeace.org/>
Daytime workshops held at: Southern California Library for Social Studies and Research
6120 South Vermont Avenue
Los Angeles CA 90044
Evening events held at: Kwazi’s House
Echo Park
*SUPPORT A GREEN PLANET - IF POSSIBLE BRING EATING AND DRINKING CULTERY*
*THIS EVENT IS WHEELCHAIR ACESSIBLE AND DISABILITY AFFIRMATIVE. *
* IF YOU HAVE ANY SPECIFIC ACCOMODATIONS, PLEASE CONTACT US *
CALL 213.250.3986 OR 213.884.5190 FOR DIRECTIONS
SCHEDULE FOR THE 3 DAY WORKSHOPS
Friday, June 24
10:00 am-4:00 pm: SO CA LIBRARY
Advanced Strategy & Creative Tactics Intensive for Artful Activism
Boston’s “Shield, Sword & Offer Strategy” for Post-Foreclosure Eviction Protection and Buy-Back
6:00 PM-9:00 pm: Location Kwazi’s in Echo Park
Community-Building Potluck w/ Victory Stories from Around the Country Saturday
Saturday, June 25
10:00 AM-12:30 AM: SO CA LIBRARY
Art Track: Giant Banner Building
12:30 PM-1:30 PM: SO CA LIBRARY
Lunch (POTLUCK) Roundtable: Building A Movement That Makes a Difference in Peoples’ Lives
1:30 PM-3:30 PM: SO CA LIBRARY§
Intro to Creative Tactics: The New ART of Organizing (Bill Moyer)
The Boston Strategy: Sword & Shield
3:30 PM-6:30PM: SO CA LIBRARY
Art Track: Drumming for Demonstrations, and The New “Flash Mob” Propaganda Technique (Design and implementation, EXPERIENCES TO DATE)
Organizing Track: Sword & Shield (Fighting the Corporations and Banks, defending our communities
6:30 PM-7:30 PM: ***Kwazi’s in Echo Park
POTLUCK DINNER WITH REFLECTION AND SHARING ABOUT LOCAL AND NATIONAL STRUGGLES
7:30-9:00 PM: ***Kwazi’s in Echo Park
Talent Share: Music, Acting, Singing, Spoken Word and Stories About Creative APPROACHES TO Organizing
Sunday, June 26
10:00 AM – 1:00 PM: SO CA LIBRARY
Creative Tactics Track (DEVELOPING AND IMPLEMENTING EFFECTIVE NEW APPROACHES & TECHNIQUES FOR THE STRUGGLES IN FRONT OF US)
The Boston Strategy: Sword & Shield ( CONTINUED)
10:00 am-1:00 pm: SO CA LIBRARY
Art Track: using Giant Helium Powered SIGNS & Overpass Banner Build, Planning an L.A FLASH MOB ACTION
Organizer Track: APPROACHES TO Campaign Planning, Leading Mass Meetings AND ACTIONS
1:00 PM-2:00 PM: SO CA LIBRARY
WORKING LUNCH (POTLUCK): PLANNING FOR ROLE PLAY
2:00 PM-3:30 PM: SO CA LIBRARY
ROLE PLAY ACIVITIES: THINKING-ON-YOUR-FEET USING WHAT WE’VE LEARNED
3:30 PM – 4:00 PM: SO CA LIBRARY
CLEAN-UP, HOB-NOBBING
BIO SKETCHES
Bill Moyer (the political artist-activist, not Bill Moyers the journalist!) is the Executive Director and co-founded the Backbone Campaign in 2003. Bill has had a dual and intersecting path as both an activist and artist. Bill's involvement with social change work stretches back to the 80's, when as a student he was deeply involved in the anti-nuclear movement and the anti-interventionist movement, lived at Big Mountain to assist Dineh elders refusing to relocate off their traditional land, and attended the Institute for Social Ecology. Bill also brings his background as percussionist and sound designer to his political work, applying lessons of composition, performance, and pedagogy to the Backbone Campaign, a project he considers a kind of "theme and variation composition", helping a variety of community-based movements around the country to learn and use some of the new organizing techniques of this period. An essential aspect of this is the integration of effective political art and novel communication techniques into the organizing process.
Community Organizer Steve Meacham of City Life/Vida Urbana is fighting on the frontlines of the foreclosure crisis. Meacham and his colleagues at City Life employ a community organizing strategy they call “the Shield and the Sword”. The "Shield" is a strategy of legal defense: teaching City Life members about their rights under the law, plus providing access to volunteer legal assistance. The "sword" is a public relations strategy, where City Life organizes protests in front of banks, and eviction blockades in front of people's homes. For these protests, City Life tries to attract as much media attention as possible, trying to draw public scrutiny towards what they argue are unfair banking and eviction practices in their community. "We find that the two [strategies] work extremely well in combination," says Meacham. City Life/Viva Urbana has had impressive success in a unique cooperative campaign which has returned ownership of bank-foreclosed properties back to the original homeowners. They feel that organizing techniques used in this effort can be successfully applied to many other issues and struggles.A major goal of this workshop is to build networks between various local struggles, and to promote a general exchange of skills and methods between serious local activists around the country.