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A Reading & Conversation with Erin Sharkey and Michael Kleber-Diggs

A Darker Wilderness book cover

What are the politics of nature? Who owns it, where is it, and what role does it play in our lives? Does it need to be tamed? Are we ourselves natural? Erin Sharkey and Michael Kleber-Diggs will discuss, A Darker Wilderness: Black Nature Writing from Soil to Stars, a collection of personal and lyric essays in conversation with archival objects of Black history and memory. The collection explores stories spanning hundreds of years and thousands of miles, traveling from roots to space–finding rich Blackness everywhere. Together we will consider the significance of nature in our lives and on the role of nature in the lives of Black folks.

Augsburg’s Environmental Action Committee, Pan-Afrikan Student Services, and MFA Department, along with our friends at the Upper Midwest Association for Campus Sustainability (UMACS), invite the Augsburg community and partners to an evening of exploration into the intersections between People and Planet: Intersectional Environmentalism.

Light refreshments will be served. Parking is available in Lot D. Our friends at Strive Publishing & Bookstore will have books for sale in person at the event or you can order them online at Milkweed Books. Photos from Augsburg’s Pan-Afrikan Archive will be on display.

Location: Augsburg University’s Hagfors Center, Room 150 & Zoom (Register in advance for virtual option here)

Contact: Monica McDaniel, Sustainability Officer (mcdaniem@augsburg.edu)

Erin Sharkey photo

Erin Sharkey Bio: Erin Sharkey (she/her/hers) is a writer, arts and abolition organizer, cultural worker, and film producer based in Minneapolis. She is the cofounder, with Junauda Petrus, of an experimental arts collective called Free Black Dirt and is the producer of film projects including Sweetness of Wild, an episodic web film project, and Small Business Revolution (Hulu), which explored challenges and opportunities for Black-owned businesses in the Twin Cities in the summer of 2021. Sharkey has received fellowships and residencies from the Loft Mentor Series, VONA/Voices, the Givens Foundation, Coffee House Press, the Bell Museum of Natural History, and the Jerome Foundation. In 2021, Sharkey was awarded the Black Seed Fellowship from Black Visions and the Headwaters Foundation. She has an MFA in creative writing from Hamline University and teaches with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop.

 

Michael Kleber-Diggs photoMichael Kleber-Diggs Bio: Michael Kleber-Diggs (KLEE-burr digs) (he/him/his) is 2023-2025 Jerome Hill Artist Fellow and a poet, essayist, literary critic, and arts educator. His debut poetry collection, Worldly Things (Milkweed Editions 2021), won the Max Ritvo Poetry Prize, the 2022 Hefner Heitz Kansas Book Award in Poetry, the 2022 Balcones Poetry Prize, and was a finalist for the 2022 Minnesota Book Award. Michael’s essay, “There Was a Tremendous Softness,” appears in A Darker Wilderness: Black Nature Writing from Soil to Stars, edited by Erin Sharkey (Milkweed Editions, 2023). His poems and essays appear in numerous journals and anthologies and he teaches Creative Writing in Augsburg University’s low-res MFA program. Michael is married to Karen Kleber-Diggs, a tropical horticulturist and orchid specialist. Karen and Michael have a daughter who is pursuing a BFA in Dance Performance at SUNY Purchase.

This event is part of Earth Month 2023. Visit the site to learn more about other events happening during the month of April to celebrate and engage in Environmental Stewardship at Augsburg.

EARTH MONTH 2023!!

Come rekindle community, self-heal, and reconnect with the Earth through celebrations during Earth Month. These campus-wide, cross-department collaborative events will allow Augsburg students, staff, and faculty further connection to green spaces on campus, engagement with educational experiences by all forms of teachers, and the opportunity to build solidarity with social justice work bonded by intersectionality. Together in community, engage with local writers Erin Sharkey & Michael Kleber-Diggs in celebration of A Darker Wilderness, share in the art of resistance, bike/walk/roll to campus, eat/buy local, love water, share your voice at the State Capitol, and finish the month with a community bonfire into the sunset. 

Mii omaa akiing endaayang – The Earth is our Home

For more information: Event details, descriptions, registration links, and virtual Zoom links can be found on this document. Follow @sustainable_augsburgu & @augsburg_eac on Instagram for regular updates. Subscribe to the Earth Month 2023 calendar for all event info.

Make a contribution! During April’s Earth Month (and year-round), the ShareShop is accepting donations of gently-used items! These items will be redistributed back to students in the fall. As you move out of your residence hall or do some spring cleaning, drop off your donations with a student leader at Science Hall 8. Checkout the ShareShop website for accepted items and expanded hours during MoveOut.

Earth Month 2023 calendar of events. For printed calendar go to: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vqxYozznUJOMYf2NYTwO1U4XdC_mxYxI8xOwQm4tgRs/edit?usp=sharing

 

 

Support & Accessibility for All Earth Month Events

We want everyone to feel welcome and able to fully participate in all Earth Month festivities. If you are in need of any disability-related accommodations to fully participate in these events, please contact University Events at events@augsburg.edu or 612-330-1104. Remember to have the name, date, and time of the event(s) with you when contacting their office. Please allow for sufficient time to arrange the accommodation(s).

All virtual events will be hosted over the Zoom platform. For the Zoom links, meeting ids, and passwords for virtual events, please refer to the event description on this document. If you are affiliated with Augsburg University, please review these Zoom Articles to ensure that you are able to connect. If you are not affiliated with Augsburg University, you are welcome to participate in all of these events. For Zoom tech support, please refer to the Zoom website’s Resources tab.

If for any reason you are having trouble attending an event, please email the specific event’s contact and/or Augsburg University’s Sustainability Officer, Monica McDaniel at mcdaniem@augsburg.edu. We hope you enjoy Earth Month!!

Earth Month 2022!!

Come rekindle community, self-heal, and reconnect with the Earth through celebrations during Earth Month. These Environmental Action Committee-supported events will allow you further connection to green spaces on campus, engagement with educational experiences by all forms of teachers, exploration of inclusive career paths, and the opportunity to build solidarity with social justice work bonded by intersectionality. Together in community, learn from Indigenous cultures, be rewarded with rest and find its productivity, learn city biking techniques, have a ball with slow fashion, eat local, and then finish the month with a community bonfire into the sunset.

Mii omaa akiing endaayang – The Earth is our Home

For more information: Event details, descriptions, registration links, and virtual Zoom links can be found on this documentFollow @sustainable_augsburgu on Instagram for updates.

Make a contribution! During April’s Earth Month, the ShareShop is accepting donations of gently-used items! These items will be redistributed back to students in the fall or donated to the Sisterhood Boutique. As you move out of your residence hall or do some spring cleaning, drop off your donations with a student leader at Science Hall 8 or place them in a green cart in your residence hall. Checkout the ShareShop website for accepted items and expanded hours.

Support & Accessibility for All Earth Month Events

We want everyone to feel welcome and able to fully participate in all Earth Month festivities. If you are in need of any disability-related accommodations to fully participate in these events, please contact University Events at events@augsburg.edu or 612-330-1104. Remember to have the name, date, and time of the event(s) with you when contacting their office. Please allow for sufficient time to arrange the accommodation(s).

All virtual events will be hosted over the Zoom platform. For the Zoom links, meeting ids, and passwords for virtual events, please refer to the event description on this document. If you are affiliated with Augsburg University, please review these Zoom Articles to ensure that you are able to connect. If you are not affiliated with Augsburg University, you are welcome to participate in all of these events. For Zoom tech support, please refer to the Zoom website’s Resources tab.

If for any reason you are having trouble attending an event, please email the specific event’s contact and/or Augsburg University’s Sustainability Officer, Monica McDaniel at mcdaniem@augsburg.edu. We hope you enjoy Earth Month!!

Augsburg LEAD Fellows Explore Equity and Justice through a Virtual Lens

Augsburg students and staff posing in front of the REM5 studio backdrop.

This year the Leaders for Equity, Action, and Democracy (LEAD) Fellows have been reflecting critically on social issues of justice and equity, and discovering how they can use their own agency to organize and influence change. In the fall of 2021, the students engaged in organizing to raise voter participation and civic education on campus, and connected with Minneapolis City Council members to grow their understanding of community issues and policy. 

This Spring the LEAD Fellows ventured off campus to REM5 Virtual Reality Labs to experience the ways that REM5 and partners at RFTP (Rooftop) are using storytelling through technology in order to create learning experiences and build awareness.

Upon first sight REM5 is a large, warehouse-looking building. As you enter the space you are drawn in by an array of different technology- from big screens to small QR codes that transport you into augmented reality through your phone’s camera- which makes it a very creative space. The group started out by participating in a VR experience using REM5’s headset technology, the experience is titled “Traveling While Black,” and transports participants to different places to better explain what it is like to travel as a Black person in the Jim Crow-era (and beyond) in the US. The experience references the Green book: The Black Traveler’s Guide to Jim Crow America, a publication that referenced safe establishments for Black travelers.

Traveling While Black is an immersive experience that takes participants into well known establishments like the historically popular Ben’s Chili Bowl in Washington DC, sitting them right across the table from people giving accounts of their own travels across the US. Students were able to reflect on what it means to be able to walk into restaurants and shops without fear of discrimination and physical violence, and the fact that the spirit of such discrimination and violence is still very much alive today in many spaces and systems.

A group of students sitting in a circle of chairs, each student is wearing a virtual reality headset.

The VR experience was paired with a live storytelling session with RFTP, a consulting group that creates space for deep reflection through storytelling, active listening and group dialogue. RFTP facilitated discussion about how we view safety in different areas in our lives, and how we all have a responsibility to not only proclaim the spaces we hold and create to be safe, but to intentionally change our environments so that when people enter spaces they actually feel safety, belonging and protection, physically and psychologically. 

“The more you are able to put yourself in someone else’s shoes the more you are able to understand and connect with others. This makes other people feel welcomed and understood, makes them feel heard and that makes them feel safe. That is why it is always important to hear what others have to say and listen with an open heart.” – Barbara Sabino Pina (’23)

 

Students were invited to explore other VR games and activities offered inside the REM5 studio. Below are some of the responses students gave when asked about future topics they would like to see addressed through this platform:

“Success while dealing with trauma, healing from the sociological trauma within BIPOC community, how to cultivate generational wealth with real estate, stocks/bonds, ntfs, etc.” -LEAD Fellow, class of 2023

Hope Kannare (’23) sitting, wearing a virtual reality headset, is engaged in a VR experience.

 

“Mental health and mental disorders. Understand better the perspective of a person who is differently abled.” -LEAD Fellow, class of 2023

The LEAD Fellows look forward to continued learning and integration of technology to leverage social justice.

Fall 2019 Opportunities with the Sabo Center

event in community gardenJoin the Sabo Center for Democracy and Citizenship this fall for a wealth of opportunities to learn and connect!

The Sabo Center for Democracy and Citizenship is Augsburg University’s civic and community engagement center. We connect students, faculty, staff, and community members in the everyday work of learning together to address public issues, make change, and build democracy.  

 

Curious to learn more about what the Sabo Center does? Check out our 2018-2019 Year In Review for highlights from the past school year, and follow us on Facebook!  Opportunities to connect to the Sabo Center in the coming months include:

Sabo Center Open House

September 11, 3;30-5p, Sabo Center (LL Anderson Residence Hall)

Drop in for food and connection! Come learn about the Sabo Center, meet our staff, and eat some delicious snacks. Students, faculty, staff: ALL are welcome!

Sabo Snapshot #1 (bring your lunch!)

September 16, 12-1p, Marshall Room

Faculty and staff, join the Sabo Center for a brown bag lunch while we present a “snapshot” of our work and how you can connect it with your classes, department, or program.

Constitution Day Dialogue: Census 2020

September 17, 9:45-11a, OGC 113

Join us for a dialogue on the 2020 Census and the many interconnected issues that touch this important topic.

Community Opportunity Fair

September 19, 11a-1p, Christensen Center

Looking to get connected to the wider community? Come to the Community Opportunity Fair for a chance to meet with local organizations seeking to connect with students.

Sabo Snapshot #2 (bring your lunch!)

September 24, 11:30a-12:30p, Riverside Room

Faculty and staff, join the Sabo Center for a brown bag lunch while we present a “snapshot” of our work and how you can connect it with your classes, department, or program.

Community Organizing 101

October 16, 3:10-4:40p, OGC 100

Participants in this workshop will gain an understanding of relational power, the difference between public and private relationships, and how self-interest motivates us to act.

One-to-One Relational Meetings Training

October 31, 3;40-5p, Marshall Room

If you want to create change, few things are more important as one-to-one relational meetings. Participants in this workshop will learn and practice one-to-one relationship building for organizing and public work.

Equity & Justice in Environmental Action

November 11, 4:30-6:30p, Room TBD

Join us for a storytelling event around how environmental justice shows up in our lives and on campus. Together we will collectively envision Augsburg’s commitment to environmental action beyond 2019.

Power Mapping

November 19, 3:40-5p, Lindell 301

People interested in promoting positive social change–through public work, civic action, advocacy, and other vehicles–need to be aware of who else cares about their cause, and the political and social power structures in play. Power mapping gives participants a way to think about different kinds of power, and a set of tools to access the power needed to make things happen.

 

Join the Sabo Center for a One-to-One Relational Meetings Workshop

Blog post by Emily Braverman.

 

Do you want to learn significant tools for building bonds with others and making social change?

 

If you want to create change, few things are more important than one-to-one relational meetings. One-to-ones are when two people who intentionally engage in conversation to learn about one another, sharing personal knowledge and values to build a connection that will eventually create public action. These conversations are focused on establishing a public relationship with someone. By sharing stories, participants can understand one another’s motivations and self interests, and find commons areas for collaboration and action.

 

The Sabo Center is hosting two opportunities to learn about one-to-one meetings and to practice this important tool for relationship building, organizing, and public work. Come and join us!

 

Wednesday, October 24, 3:10-5:10 pm, OGC 100

Thursday, October 25, 3:40-5:40 pm, Marshall Room

Poster for One-to-One Relational meetings Workshop

Democracy Augsburg Teach-In: A Personal Look at Our Criminal Justice System

Blog post by Emily Braverman

The Smart Justice Campaign and personal experience with the Minnesota criminal justice system are two topicsPoster for Democracy Augsburg: A Personal Look at the Criminal Justice System event with details that will be discussed, explored, and analyzed during a Democracy Augsburg Teach-In coming up mid-October.

Elizer Darris and Anika Bowie, both organizers with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), will discuss their experiences with the Minnesota criminal justice system and their organizing work through the Smart Justice Campaign.

After successfully getting his life sentence overturned on appeal, Elizer Darris became an activist in prison and an advocate for his fellow inmates. Upon release, he began working in local politics. He currently runs field operations for the Smart Justice Campaign. Based in the Twin Cities, the Smart Justice Campaign is focused on reducing America’s prison population and combating racial inequity across the country. Darris’s main goal is to reduce widespread incarceration.

Anika Bowie is a powerful advocate for people of color. As co-chair of the Minneapolis NAACP Criminal Justice Reform Committee, she connects with government officials, community members, and local youth around reform of the criminal justice system, and is best known for being a group organizer, educator, and leader.

The Sabo Center for Democracy and Citizenship will be hosting Elizer Darris and Anika Bowie for a Democracy Augsburg Teach-In on October 15, 2018, at 5 p.m. in the Oren Gateway Center, Room 201. Please join us.

What’s at Stake on the Sixth?

A Democracy Augsburg Teach-in

Blog post by Emily Braverman

 

The Midterm Elections.  Poster for What's at Stake on the Sixth? Event.

If you aren’t aware of what the midterm elections are, no worries! Here at the Sabo Center, we broke it down into an easily understandable, short guide:

U.S. presidents serve four-year terms. In between these terms, there is a midterm election. Participation during these elections tend to be lower than general elections, but they are very important!

During the midterm election:

  • Members of the U.S House of Representatives are up for election.
  • Most U.S. states elect their governors.

In addition, the political landscape may change because the president’s party may lose seats in both houses of Congress; this might change which party is in control of the legislature. This, in turn, will impact the president’s ability to pursue an agenda during the second half of his/her term.

Augsburg University’s Sabo Center for Democracy and Citizenship welcomes everyone to a presentation by political science professor Andrew Aoki, followed by a discussion about the midterm elections. This will take place on October 19th, at Oren Gateway Center – room 100, between 4:30-5:30 p.m.

The 2018 midterm elections will bring forward many important issues to discuss and vote on. Topics at “What’s at Stake on the Sixth?” might include:

  • Donald Trump’s presidency
  • Immigration
  • Healthcare
  • Marijuana
  • International Affairs

Let’s talk: consequences, redistricting, implications for control of Congress, the presidency, presidential-congressional relations, Supreme Court, and myriad public policies.

If you want to discuss these or other issues and to understand the importance of the midterm elections, we will see you at What’s at Stake on the Sixth.

Learn to Communicate Across the Political Divide with the Better Angels Workshop

A Democracy Augsburg Workshop

Blog post by Emily Braverman  Poster: Better Angels Workshop

“Political ideology” is a term used frequently by political activists, students, and generally by anyone who considers themselves a political enthusiast. What exactly does it mean? Simply put, it is a term describing a person’s political views.

As a myriad of recent examples from American politics display, when diverging political ideologies collide the result is not necessarily respectful or peaceful. Even some of the most qualified politicians have not mastered the skill of respectfully engaging in conversation with those who have a different political ideology.

In response to this challenging reality, The Sabo Center is partnering with Better Angels to offer a workshop where participants will learn effective ways to communicate with others who differ from them politically. Better Angels is a national citizens movement that aims to reduce political polarization in the United States by bringing together liberals and conservatives to understand each other beyond stereotypes, to form red/blue community alliances, to teach practical skills for communicating across political differences, and to make a strong public argument for depolarization.

Come join The Sabo Center for a fish bowl-style discussion in which an equal number of self-declared conservatives and progressives join together in conversation about their differences and how to embrace each other’s side:

Wednesday, October 17, 3:30pm – 5:30pm, Old Main Room 105.

 

Whose Democracy is it Anyway?

Join the Sabo Center and a panel of distinguished guests in exploring the questions: What role do citizens play in our democracy? What role do elected officials play? In a thriving democracy, how do (or should) the two interact?

October 4, 2018

4:00 – 6:00 p.m.

Hagfors Center, Room 150, Augsburg University

 

Panelists:

Catalina Morales, Lead organizer with ISAIAH and Faith in MN

Harry Boyte, Senior Scholar in Public Work Philosophy, Sabo Center for Democracy and Citizenship  

Councilmember Jeremiah Ellison, Minneapolis Ward 5

Irene Fernando, Candidate for Hennepin County Commissioner – District 2