Loam Listen

How might we collapse a world rooted in extraction and nurture one built on reciprocity? What can decomposition teach us about seeding sustainable futures? Join us as queer Hoodoo, earth tender, and living ancestor Jordan Alexander Williams contemplates the liberation of land, ourselves, and our communities from “radical individualism” in this soul-stirring conversation with Amirio Freeman. From meditating on a week spent at the revolutionary Soul Fire Farm to exploring the beauty of mycelial networks, Williams walks us through possibilities for planting world(s) worth growing into.

GUEST: Jordan Alexander Williams (they/them) is a queer Hoodoo, earth tender, and living ancestor. Jordan was born and raised in the so-called Chicagoland area of Illinois, lands stewarded by many peoples and lineages including: the Potawatomi, Miami, Ho-Chunk and at least a dozen more Indigenous Nations, and Hoodoos / Black African peoples of Turtle Island (so-called North America).

In 2016, Jordan graduated from the University of Illinois (a land-grab university) with a degree in environmental science and a concentration in human dimensions of the environment. They have since collaborated with human and more-than-human beings across Turtle Island to:

• develop the collective visions and leadership of environmental changemakers;
• facilitate organizational culture shifts towards anti-racism and cooperative leadership;
• cultivate food, climate, and ecological justice; and
• build liberatory practices, relationships, and spaces with Two-Spirit, Queer, and Trans / Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (2SQT/BIPOC).

Jordan trusts that the liberation and regeneration of people and planet will come by dancing in the moon and sunlight, getting our hands in the soil, caring for each other, and reclaiming and evolving the earth-sourced wisdom(s) of our ancestors.

RESOURCES: Soul Fire Farm

• Soul Fire Farm BIPOC Farming Immersion
• Farming While Black: Soul Fire Farm's Practical Guide to Liberation on the Land

Hoodoo

• Mojo Workin’: The Old African American Hoodoo System by Katrina Hazzard-Donald
• Ep. 25 Mama Rue Breaks the Juju Down (A Little Juju Podcast)

Nested Wholes & Fractals

• The Regenerative Life: Transform Any Organization, Our Society, and Your Destiny by Carol Sanford
• Regenerative Design for Change Makers by Abrah Dresdale
• Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds by adrienne maree brown

In the face of compounding crises, the work of multidisciplinary, multidimensional folk healer Richael Faithful is a call back into healing justice. Tune in as host Amirio Freeman and Faithful explore community organizing, connection to ancestral healing traditions, care work, and the birthing of new selves in this heart-filled episode. As Richael reminds us, there are many ways to heal, love, connect, and care. How can we make space for our multitudes? How can we nurture new possibilities for worldbuilding into being?

GUEST: Richael Faithful (they/them) is a Black trans southern multidisciplinary, multidimensional folk healer, culture worker, strategist, and creative rooted in Washington DC / Piscataway ancestral lands / Chocolate City.

RECOMMENDATIONS:

• Web: www.richaelfaithful.com, IG: @richaelfaithfulfolkhealer, FB: @faithfulfolkhealer
• Together at the Edge of the World: On Healing Justice
• Tell us about your healing justice and care work
• The Black Trans Prayer Book (Lambda Literary Award Winner, featuring "My Black Soul Absorbs Every Shade of Being")
• On Grief, Land and Ritual with Revenge of the DandeLions Griot Collective

With Earth in Color, sustainability scientist and designer Darel Scott is reclaiming the relationship between Blackness and Greeness through vibrant, community-oriented media. In the face of a mainstream environmental movement rooted in the erasure of the lived experiences of Black folx, Earth in Color is a call to reimagine, reclaim, and regenerate. Tune in as host Amirio Freeman connects with Darel to talk about creating spaces that center and celebrate Black connections to Earth, holding histories of harm, and activating meaningful allyship in Black-led spaces.

Guest:

Darel Scott is a designer, sustainability scientist, and the founder of Earth in Color, an emerging media platform and creative studio focused on Black culture, community healing, and the natural world. Through creative storytelling and nature experiences, Earth in Color celebrates Black culture connections to nature and helps us heal with the Earth. Darel is on a personal mission to cultivate collective healing, spark Earth curiosity, and nurture deep joy in the Black community. She is a tea fanatic and loves developing plant-forward recipes. You can check out those recipes and so much more @earthincolor.co!

Resources:

• Radicle Magazine
• “Black Nature: Four Centuries of African American Nature Poetry” by Camille Dungy
• “Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds” by adrienne maree brown
• “Braiding Sweetgrass” by Robin Wall Kimmerer

During an era when our bodily autonomy is under increasing threat, doulas — for birth, for death, for abortion, and more — are essential to supporting our collective capacity to meet change. In this vital episode, host Amirio Freeman talks with abortion doula Michelle Loo about their experiences with full-spectrum carework. Through situating the work of abortion doulas within a long history of communities innovating systems of care, Amirio and Michelle unpack the link between abortion access and diverse movements for liberation.

GUEST: Raised by Chinese-Malaysian immigrants in New York City and Philadelphia, and now residing in DC, Michelle Loo is an East Coast baby who is grounded by eating good food and building expansive networks of care. They are a queer and leftist trainer, educator, and doula. They like to ask good questions, listen, and make art.

RESOURCES:

• The Radical Doula Guide by Miriam Zoila Perez
• DIY Doula Self-Care for Before, During, and After Your Abortion by the Doula Project

As we explore (and expand) our understanding of matriarchy at Loam this year, this conversation with activist, healer, and creator extraordinaire Twiggy Pucci Garçon offers insight into how the Ballroom community redefines and reimagines nurturing relationship through creating unique spaces of care, support, and expression. From reflecting on queerness to excavating the link between spirituality and self, Loam Listen host Amirio Freeman and Twiggy dive deep in this world-building conversation.

GUEST: Raised in a southern, religious, Black community, Twiggy is a proud non-binary member of the LGBTQ+ community. As an activist, producer, healer and creator, Twiggy attributes the balance of struggle and strength they witnessed and experienced, early in life, to their ability to maneuver through spaces of power and represent for people without.

Praising literary greats like James Baldwin to the women in their family, Twiggy is quick to credit their ancestral warriors and pathmakers for the elevation of their own voice in a way that ultimately leads to progress. Since finding support in the Ballroom community at a very crucial moment in their life, Twiggy leverages every opportunity to generate conversations around equity for LGBTQ+ young people and create quality spaces for them to be centered in making decisions and solutions around the issue of homelessness.

With over 15 years of experience, both personally and professionally, Twiggy has collaborated with artists, filmmakers, academics and policymakers to increase visibility of both creative and sociopolitical agendas.

How can shaping new narratives on sex, climate, and community rewire our worldview? Tune in as educator Melissa Pintor Carnagey of Sex Positive Families reflects on the role of pleasure-centric, narrative-weaving strategies to practice with our young people at home and elsewhere in conversation Loam Listen Host Amirio Freeman.

Guest: Melissa Pintor Carnagey (she/they) is a Black and Latinx, Austin-based sexuality educator and licensed social worker who founded Sex Positive Families on the belief that all children deserve holistic, comprehensive, and shame-free sexuality education so they can live informed, empowered, and safer lives. Melissa provides puberty workshops for families and educational content for parents on topics of talking to kids across stages about pleasure, consent, and online porn. Melissa is a sex-positive parent to three young people ages 21, 11, and 7. They are the constant inspiration for the work.

Resources:

• Pleasure Activism by adrienne maree brown
• Sex Positive Talks to Have With Kids by Melissa Pintor Carnagey, LBSW
• In Case You’re Curious: Questions about Sex from Young People with Answers from the Experts by Planned Parenthood
• Vaginas and Periods 101: A Popup Book by Christian Hoeger and Kristen Lilla
• These Are My Eyes, This is My Nose, This is My Vulva, These Are My Toes by Dr. Lexx Brown-James
• The Sex Ed of Blackfolk Podcast by Dr. Tracie Q. Gilbert
• Six Minute Sex Ed Podcast by Kim Cavill

In our Season 3 inaugural episode, Loam Listen host Amirio Freeman connects with embodiment counselor tayla shanaye for an immersive conversation on somatics, semantics, and creation. This episode is an invitation into experience and so we suggest you tune into it when you have the time to truly ground (and get messy)!

Guest: tayla shanaye is a cis-gendered woman of color, a mother, a healer, a researcher, and a living body. She holds a Masters in Psychological Studies with a concentration in somatic psychology from the California Institute of Integral Studies, where she is currently pursuing her PhD in Women’s Spirituality. She lives in the occupied Anishinaabek lands of the so-called Upper Peninsula of Michigan with her sun, partner, and elder 4-legged. She is committed to a loving relationship with the Living Earth, so that the land, waters, and seasons can do their good work of shaping her body and humbling her mind. You can find her @taylashanaye and at taylashanaye.com

Recommended Resources: Revolutionary Mothering: Love on the Front Lines edited by Alexis Pauline Gumbs, China Martens, and Mai’a Williams

Nourishing the Nervous System by tayla shanaye

The last episode in our Homespace listening series is a deep dive between Amirio Freeman and Farah Jesani of One Stripe Chai into chai, authenticity, origin, and identity. This episode has everything—reflections on history and homespace from Farah, a sublime recipe for One Stripe Chai goodness from Amirio—and we can't think of a better conversation to curl up to during these colder days.

Guest: Farah Jesani started One Stripe Chai with the simple goal of bringing chai back to its South Asian roots after realizing that the chai being served in coffee shops was nothing like what she grew up with at home. Since its inception, One Stripe Chai has evolved into a South Asian beverage company that continues to re-introduce classic South Asian drinks, such as haldi doodh. Farah’s goal is to use One Stripe as a platform to reclaim the drinks that reflect her South Asian heritage and upbringing.

This illuminating conversation between Loam Listen host Amirio Freeman and forager Alexis Nikole Nelson is affirmation that you have a right to earthly joy and connection—wherever, however, and whoever you are. From reflecting on the boundary between "carefree" and "careful" that Black folx have to walk (Garnette Cadogan) to meditating on the meaning of play, Alexis Nikole Nelson's brilliant and bighearted spirit will inspire you to truly bloom where you're planted.

Guest: Alexis Nikole Nelson is a social media manager by day, TikTok forager by night. A perfect pair of professions to confuse her Boomer-aged parents. She’s always championed fostering a connection with your surroundings, and now teaches others to appreciate their local ecology with her TikTok and Instagram pages. You can find her @blackforager on IG and @alexisnikole on TikTok!

What shapes can community organizing take as we navigate this era of pandemic and protest? Community organizer E.N. West shares reflections on relationship building in times of crisis in this expansive and engaging conversation with Loam Listen host Amirio Freeman. Brimming with heart and inspiring lessons, E offers us all a blueprint for how to take care of each other when the world surrounding us is shifting.

Guest: E.N. West, affectionately known as "E" (they/E), proudly hails from the DC metropolitan area, by way of Alexandria, Virginia. They graduated from William & Mary with dual degrees in American Studies and Government. E deeply believes "we are uninhibited when we know our power" and is committed to co-creating a world where everyone intimately knows how powerful they are and directs that power toward collective liberation. They are many things, but at the heart of all of them, they are a community organizer based in Seattle, Washington.

E feels called to community organizing as both a vocation and way of life. They are also deeply committed to lifelong leadership formation. To those ends, they’re currently:

• Building toward a Black queer feminist future at Surge Reproductive Justice.
• Learning nonprofit leadership as a Community Impact Fellow through RVC.
• Organizing around faith land and equitable development with The Church Council of Greater Seattle.
• Serving on the board of and organizing with Got Green, a BIPOC-led environmental justice organization rooted in South Seattle.

In their moments of play and rest, E enjoys reading social justice literature, listening to podcasts of all kinds (especially those featuring QTPOC) & being the queer jock of their own dreams (boxing, capoeira, biking & training for a 10k).

Recommended Resources:

• Emergent Strategy - adrienne maree brown
• Pedagogy of the Oppressed - Paolo Freire
• Jubilee (Leviticus 25 & Luke 4:18)
• Yes! Magazine
• Puget Sound Sage CREST Cohort - Seattle, Washington
• Leaven Community Land & Housing Organizing - Portland, Oregon
• Equitable Development Initiative, Office of Planning & Community Development - Seattle, Washington
• Hayoa Miyazaki // Studio Ghibli
• Animal Crossing
• Song: Saturn - Stevie Wonder
• Album: What’s Going On - Marvin Gaye, song: “Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)” & “What’s Going On”