For the last 18 years, YWCA Madison has brought together community members and organizations committed to learning about institutional racism and to build an ongoing practice of racial justice at their annual YWCA Racial Justice Summit. The annual event will continue that tradition this year on Oct. 15-16, at the Monona Terrace Convention Center in downtown Madison under the theme “Transforming Our Future.”
The Racial Justice Summit focuses on systemic racism and convenes nationally-known keynote speakers and researchers, in addition to local experts and advocates as presenters for an audience of over 800 participants. This year, the featured keynote speakers will be Alixa Garcia and Naima Penniman from “Climbing Poetree” and Edgar Villanueva, author of “Decolonizing Wealth.” Their presentations will include a combination of traditional keynotes, spoken word, film, music, and performance art to facilitate that attendees learn and connect with the legacies of resilience, resistance and co-liberation of individuals and communities throughout history as co-inspiration to transform our futures.
There will be three Full Day Deep-Dive Institutes focusing on skill-building and applied practice during the second day of the Summit with nationally renowned authors and educators Annahid Dashtgard, Bettina Love, and Heather Hackman.
This year’s Racial Justice Summit will offer over 35 breakout sessions with themes around Organizational Development and Advocacy (with an emphasis on skill-building), Collective and Holistic Dismantling of the System of White Supremacy and Whiteness, Envisioning Our Liberated Future, Bodies of Knowledge and Practices for Healing, Liberation and Resistance (Individual and Collective), Community Organizing and Systemic and Intersectional Activism for Structural Societal Change.
The Summit will also be featuring two social events open to all attendees on the first day: a racial justice-themed Loteria artistic engagement with Latinx artist collective, Synapsis, and local poet, Alondra Qechol, as well as an evening networking reception featuring the United States book launch of “Breaking the Ocean: Race, Rebellion and Reconciliation” by Annahid Dashtgard, a Canadian author and summit institute leader.
Click here to learn more about the 2019 YWCA Racial Justice Summit.
