Gumbo YaYa Celebrates Women's History Month
with Love is Radical:
Approaches to Mother(ing), Daughter(ing), and Sister(ing):
Creative Arts Workshops, Performance, and Panel" (2:00-5:00)




Contact: Betty's Daughter Arts Collaborative
Media Alert
bettysdaughterarts@gmail.com
www.bettysdaughterarts.synthasite.com


Durham, NC- Feb. 26, 2009

Gumbo YaYa, ushers in Women's History Month with a series of creative arts workshops, performances, and community-wide discussions about the beautiful complexity of relationships among women of the African diaspora.

Gumbo YaYa Dates of Importance:
March 1: Alt(a)rations: Building Sacred Space in Community with SpiritHouse (this session will begin at CAARE and move to other sites.)
March 8: The Aesthetics of Intimacy: Daughter(ing) as Communal Performance with Ebony Noelle Golden
March 15: Love is Radical: Performing Mother(ing), Daughter(ing), and Sister(ing) with Gumbo YaYa Sister Circle
March 22: Performance Rehearsal
March 29: Community Performance and Panel Discussion with the Gumbo YaYa Sister Circle (this performance is open to the entire community)

Nancy (Nia) Wilson, executive director of SpiritHouse-NC, shares, "Thank you to our sponsors: The North Carolina Humanities Council, Healing with CAARE, Inc., betty's daughter arts collaborative, and everyone who has supported this process by providing child care, cooking a meal, or attending a session. Gumbo YaYa is such a wonderful way to begin or continue building a healthy relationship between women and girls in our communities."

Ebony Noelle Golden, creative director of Gumbo YaYa, is over-joyed by the response. "Our sessions have been generously attended every week. Mothers have brought their daughters and granddaughters. I can't wait to see what the final performance brings, and what the lasting effect of this 12-week session will be."

The "sista circle" uses improvisation, dance, journaling, meditation, storytelling, photography, theater, poetry, and music to explore the intergenerational relationships among black mothers, daughters, and sisters.

All sessions, materials, performances, and discussions are free for participants and audience members. Gumbo YaYa provides child care and dinner during every "sista circle". Participants do not have to be students, or affiliated with any particular institution to participate.

For more information about Gumbo YaYa visit www.iamnotaproject.wordpress.com, or email bettysdaughterarts@gmail.com.

--
Ebony N. Golden, MFA, MA
Creative Director
bettysdaughterarts.synthasite.com

Hire Betty's Daughter for your arts consulting needs!
"creating radical expressiveness in community"

Check out...Gumbo Yaya/or this is why we speak in tongues
"Creative Healing and Expression for Women of the Diaspora"
www.iamnotaproject.wordpress.com

some kind of way

for Shirlette

sometimes the only way is stomping your foot
'til your words get thunder cousins
beating up through the floorboards
ready to represent

sometimes the only way is to close your eyes
throw your body towards the ceiling
bumping chests with god in greeting
sometimes the only way is to jump

sometimes the only way is slippers
refrigerator refuge
sometimes the only way is a seat
made of prayer, shifting like hello

sometimes the only way is words
clapped together and throat lined with silver
to echo off our faces
fill our small fists of nothing

some people would call
what you do
making a way
out of no way

but i think

you are proof
that there is always
always always
some kind of way home.

Gumbo YaYa Continues Feb. 22
with "Meditation and Creative Visioning:
Building Intergenerational Bridges Among Black Women and Girls" led by Kenya Harris (3:00-5:30)




Contact: Betty's Daughter Arts Collaborative
Media Alert
bettysdaughterarts@gmail.com
www.bettysdaughterarts.synthasite.com


Durham, NC- Feb. 17, 2009

The North Carolina Humanities Council and SpiritHouse-NC sponsor a creative healing and expression process for women and girls of the African diaspora in Durham, NC. We are pleased to announce that Kenya Harris, Gumbo YaYa's Intern, will lead this session along with two youth participants Bryonna and Nadirah.

The 12-week process, Gumbo YaYa, began January 4 and as is now gearing up to enter its third month with a series of performance workshops that will lead up to the final performance, March 29. Gumbo YaYa continues to incorporate methods for growth,expression, and community-building to actualize individual and artistic processes. The theme of this session is "Love is Radical: Approaches to Mothering, Daughter(ing), and Sister(ing)".

The "sista circle" uses improvisation, dance, journaling, meditation, storytelling, photography, theater, poetry, and music to explore the intergenerational relationships among black mothers, daughters, and sisters.

All sessions, materials, performances, and discussions are free for participants and audience members. Gumbo YaYa will provide child care and dinner during every "sista circle". Participants do not have to be students, or affiliated with any particular institution to participate.

Ebony Noelle Golden, Creative Director of Gumbo YaYa thanks the North Carolina Humanities Council, SpiritHouse-NC, and Healing with CAARE, Inc. for their generous sponsorship.

Nancy "Mama Nia" Wilson, Executive Director of SpiritHouse-NC said, "We are really looking forward to hosting Gumbo YaYa. This process will definitely help to continue conversations black women and girls are having about how we relate to each other. We hope this process helps mothers, daughters, and sisters strengthen their relationships with each other and the larger communities."

For more information about Gumbo YaYa visit www.iamnotaproject.wordpress.com, or email bettysdaughterarts@gmail.com.

--
Ebony N. Golden, MFA, MA
Creative Director
bettysdaughterarts.synthasite.com

Hire Betty's Daughter for your arts consulting needs!
"creating radical expressiveness in community"

Check out...Gumbo Yaya/or this is why we speak in tongues
"Creative Healing and Expression for Women of the Diaspora"
www.iamnotaproject.wordpress.com

Gumbo YaYa "Sista Circle" Continues with Feb. 15
with "Dancing with Our Spirits: Understanding Our Lives Through Rhythm" with
Mabinti Shabu (3:00-5:30)



Contact: Betty's Daughter Arts Collaborative
Media Alert
bettysdaughterarts@gmail.com www.bettysdaughterarts.synthasite.com


Durham, NC- Feb. 12, 2009

The North Carolina Humanities Council and SpiritHouse-NC sponsor a creative healing and expression process for women and girls of the African diaspora in Durham, NC. We are pleased to announce that Mabinti Shabu of The Magic of African Rhythm will lead the Gumbo YaYa Sisters in a 4-session choreolab that will inform and enhance the participants individual lives and craft the choreography for the final community performance, March 29.

The 12-week process, Gumbo YaYa, began January 4 and as is now in its second month. Gumbo YaYa continues to incorporate methods for growth,expression, and community-building to actualize individual and artistic processes. The theme is "Love is Radical: Approaches to Mothering, Daughter(ing), and Sister(ing)".

Up-coming Sister Circles Include

Feb. 22, "Meditation and Creative Visioning: Building Intergenerational Bridges Among Black
Women and Girls"

The "sista circle" uses improvisation, dance, journaling, meditation, storytelling, photography, theater, poetry, and music to explore the intergenerational relationships between black mothers, daughters, and sisters. The "sista circle" series culminates in multimedia theater performance March 29.

All sessions, materials, performances, and discussions are free for participants and audience members. Gumbo YaYa will provide child care and dinner during every "sista circle". Participants do not have to be students, or affiliated with any particular institution to participate.


Ebony Noelle Golden, Creative Director of Gumbo YaYa thanks the North Carolina Humanities Council, SpiritHouse-NC, and Healing with CAARE, Inc. for their generous sponsorship.

Nancy "Mama Nia" Wilson, Executive Director of SpiritHouse-NC said, "We are really looking forward to hosting Gumbo YaYa. This process will definitely help to continue conversations black women and girls are having about how we relate to each other. We hope this process helps mothers, daughters, and sisters strengthen their relationships with each other and the larger communities."

For more information about Gumbo YaYa visit www.iamnotaproject.wordpress.com, or email bettysdaughterarts@gmail.com.

In Your Hands

Introducing In Your Hands: A Letter Receiving Project
Since love is not scarce, our ancestors bathe us in it every moment that we dare to receive.

I have learned that there are sources of nurturing that are older than us and swifter than our bodies. I am noticing that those who are no longer here in physical form are teachers in the wind, showing us how we must relate to each other, if we want to survive longer than our bodies and longer than a system that denies us.

I have been writing urgent letters to my ancestors since before I knew they were watching and on the cusp of this new year they whispered a suggestion to me. “How about for this new year, as a gift to yourself, you receive some letters from us, the spirits of women that love you from eternity?”

As ever, my answer was yes. These daily letters from the most beloved of my known and chosen ancestors on behalf of all of the ancestors who have sent us love with their lives and dreams without us knowing came at exactly the right time. When I was afraid to trust myself, I was not afriad to trust their guidance for me. I re-learned a shifting methodology of loving myself firstly as their vessel and secondly as their recipient

Here is a letter I received from Ella Baker:

Big little sister,

Get your guard up against the traps that would seduce you away from your purpose and steer you towards convenience and charisma. Set yourself in the hard work of accountability and sharing. Sharing the work, sharing the skills, sharing the connections, sharing the insight. Like everyone else, I am talking about your health here.

As a worker, for justice, I was able to situate myself in the crucial places where my selflessness could birth community, but I was not so tied up in my own popularity among the inner circles of the movement(s) that I was not able to make the difficult choices, especially for economic justice, that had me excluded from so many spaces and conversations.

You are right to be youth-focused because this is about access. You are right to be obsessed with both the old and the dead because that is where you will get your grounding and context. You are right when you remember that you are not the one inventing this.

It is the example of your grandparents, your accountability to the youth and your living relationships to your sisters that will make your life and work meaningful. Never forget who your people are and what they deserve, which is all of who you are.

You have work to do.

EB

And my ancestors are socialist, so of course they would ask me to share these intimate insights and gifts with you. Of course they would want me to bring their messages to your waiting ears, but more than that I want to share this practice and encourage that you engage it for yourself.

I don’t know what ancestors speak to you or why and when they do, but I have been asked to ask you to listen, lovingly for what the universe wants you to know.

Can you join me? Think of the people who have influenced you, while they were living or through their written, or retold legacies. Just think about them and let your mind relax, let their energy surround and fill you. Create quiet times in your days in case they have something to say.

I encourage you to add your insights here on the “your letters” page if your feel that what you have received could provide healing and wisdom for the rest of us. I encourage you keep your writings for yourself if you feel that they should remain private. The messages of our living dead are sacred. They transcend the norms of intellectual property, and they should be treasured by your best impulse.

My intention here is to share with you an abiding sustaining faith in presence of those who have gone before and their participation in our everyday.

I invite your observance or participation with love.

Always,

alexis

Get Hip and Get Some Free Poetry in Your Life!

Get Hip and Get Some Free Poetry in Your Life!

Greetings lovers of poetry, art, and culture!

Betty's Daughter Arts Collaborative is now accepting poetry, residency, and performance bookings for Black History, Women's History, and National Poetry Months.

If your organization, non or for profit, is located in New York and California, as well as in Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Houston, Seattle, New Orleans, Tucson, and Washington D.C, you are in luck! Poets & Writers, an organization dedicated to bringing literary arts to communities across the country, will help pay the honorarium. Just visit http://www.pw.org/funding for more information.

Here is a short list of what I can offer:

1. Residencies: Poetry, Spoken Word, Performance Poetry, Experimental and Community-Based Performance
2. Readings: Poetry, New Works, Performance Works (original works)
3. Workshops: 1 hr, 1 1/2 hrs
4. Combos: Performance and Workshop
5. Teacher/ Artist Trainings: 1 hr, 1 1/2 hrs

Visit
http://bettysdaughterarts.synthasite.com/a-poetics-of-process.php for teaching philosophy and sample lesson plan.

Bio:
Ebony Noelle Golden is the daughter of Pearl Glover, Bertha Sims and Betty Sims. She is a native of Houston, TX. Ebony holds a BA in English Literature and Poetry from Texas A & M University an MFA in Poetry from American University and a MA in Performance Studies from New York University. Ebony is an artist and cultural worker who has been awarded grants from the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Fund for Southern Communities, North Carolina A & T University and New York University. She has been published by Black Issues and Books Review, American Book Review, Obsidian, Pluck, and Third World Press. Ebony serves as the creative director of Betty’s Daughter Arts Collaborative, a boutique arts consulting group, based in NYC and NC. Her current projects include, “Gumbo Ya/Ya or This is Why We Speak in Tongues”, Images: for Younger SiStars, The Community Writing Intensive, i hear you breathing for me/ an embodied blues for meagan williams (multi-media performance) and “again, the water carriers” (a full length book of poetry). Ebony’s work is informed by her ancestral and spiritual family, guides, and homes, primarily. She can be reached at bettysdaughterarts@gmail.com or ww.bettysdaughterarts.synthasite.com.

Betty's Daughter Arts Collaborative looks forward to working with you to create "radical expressiveness in community".

Yours truly in the arts,

Betty's Daughter Arts Collaborative
www.bettysdaughterarts.synthasite.com
www.iamnotaproject.wordpress.com

The Revolution Starts at Home!!!!!

Hey all,
Check out a review by Aaminah Hernandez of the zine "The Revolution Starts at Home: Confronting Violence in Activist Communities" which features a segment on the work of Durham NC's UBUNTU family!

http://feministreview.blogspot.com/2009/02/revolution-starts-at-home-confronting.html