Living Cities and Gumbo Media Launch "Reckoning With Race" Storytelling Initiative

WASHINGTON, June 17, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Living Cities and Gumbo Media announce the "Reckoning with Race" Storytelling Project, which supports cities participating in Living Cities' Year of Reckoning Cohort. The goal of the project is to tell a history of race and its impacts through art. It will be publicly accessible at bit.ly/ReckoningWithRace on the morning of Saturday, June 19.

Through participation in a "Year of Reckoning," six U.S. cities--Albuquerque, NM; Austin, TX; Memphis, TN; Minneapolis, MN; Rochester, NY; and Saint Paul, MN--have made a profound 10-year commitment to racial equity at all levels and will work intensively over the next decade to reckon with the role local government has played and continues to play in creating inequities and to chart a new path forward. Living Cities and Gumbo Media are collaborating with community-based storytellers in each of the six cities.

"It's an honor to dwell in Tiwa territory and be able to elevate the voices of my fellow residents for this project on racial equity. Black and Indigenous people, immigrants and refugees, latinoamericanos, Chicanx and people of mixed racial and ethnic backgrounds - we all experience this city differently but have a shared goal: change," said Sheryl Felicia Means, a storyteller from Albuquerque, NM, about the project.

The Reckoning With Race project is being released on Juneteenth, a day marking the end of bondage for Black people in America, to honor the holiday as both a celebration commemorating the end of slavery in the U.S., and a reckoning of how violent and deeply embedded this history is in our nation's legacy. Each of the six stories is unique, ranging from a personal account of how highway construction in Austin, TX has pushed Black folks out of their homes to a work of magical realism in which the spirits of recent ancestors slain by the police visit a Black organizer in Minneapolis. They each represent just one among many stories about race, but together, they reflect how anti-Blackness is foundational to the structures that harm Black, Indigenous and people of color in the United States, and how communities of color have embodied hope even in the face of that harm.

Clare Verbeten, the Equity and Inclusion Program Manager for the City of Saint Paul, MN stated that "the Reckoning With Race project supports our reckoning with the impacts of racism in Saint Paul by shining light on community voices that often go unheard by city government and providing us with a framework for applying what we learn to design more equitable policies and practices."

As public servants, Year of Reckoning Cohort members are constantly shaping narratives for their communities and city leadership. This project serves both to support public servants in growing their storytelling skills as well as deepening our collective understanding of history.

Founded in 1991, Living Cities is a collaborative of the world's largest foundations and financial institutions. We foster transformational relationships across sectors to connect those who are willing to do the hard work of closing racial income and wealth gaps.

*** Interviews are available with Living Cities spokespersons and city leaders. To book an interview, contact [email protected] ***

Contact: Hafizah Omar, [email protected], 646-442-3231

SOURCE Living Cities

Related Links

www.livingcities.org

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