As part of the Word*Rock*&Sword festival in New York, Astraea presents a film screening and workshop with Invincible, the Detroit-based hip-hop artist/activist. Invincible will lead a strategic visioning session focused on supporting women musicians and media makers rooted in social justice.
You will see excerpts from “The Revival” film series (directed by Invincible), which documents independent women hip-hop artists. There will also be an opportunity to articulate the support you need, and exchange concrete skills in order to grow the women’s music movement.
September 23, 2011
7 pm – 9pm
Astraea Foundation
116 East 16th Street, 7th Floor [
map]
New York, NY
Free and Open to All!
More about Invincible: It is truly rare to find an artist like Invincible. Her spitfire wordplay has earned acclaim from hip-hop fans around the world, while her active involvement in progressive social change has taken her music beyond entertainment towards actualizing the change she wishes to see.
More about Word*Rock*&Sword : In response to the conservative political backlash against womens rights, the first Word*Rock*&Sword festival will unite New Yorkers for eight dynamic days of creativity, support and activism. Conceived by musician-activist Toshi Reagon, Word*Rock*&Sword offers performances, screenings, classes and discussions at Manhattan and Brooklyn performance venues as well as yoga studios, cafés and bookstores, September 18-25.
On the 20th anniversary of its Lesbian Writers Fund, the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice celebrates the shifts in acceptance of lesbian writing, and acknowledges work left to do.
ASTRAEA NAMES AWARD RECIPIENTS AND HOSTS LESBIAN WRITERS SHOWCASE IN NEW YORK CITY ON NOVEMBER 11th
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 21, 2011
Contact: Zavé Martohardjono
Media and Communications Officer
communications@astraeafoundation.org
NEW YORK, NY On the 20th anniversary of its Lesbian Writers Fund, the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice celebrates the shifts in acceptance of lesbian writing, and acknowledges work left to do. Since the Fund was established in 1991, Astraea has awarded more than half a million dollars in unrestricted funds to emerging lesbian poets and fiction writers to ensure their voices are supported and amplified. This years recipients are Francesca Austin Ochoa in Fiction and Lori Swartz in poetry. Astraea also named four finalists and six honorable mentions, distributing a total of $26,600. To mark the 20th anniversary of the fund, Astraea will host a Lesbian Writers Fund showcase on October 22nd.
Too often, lesbian writing is marginalized by literary venues and funding sources. Lori Swartz said, As lesbian or queer writers, there are so many barriers to writing down our stories. There is the struggle of coming out, accepting our histories and then having the guts to put it on paper. Putting our experiences in writing lends them credibility.
Both art and social justice can be expressions of how we see, and how we wish to see the world, said Francesca Austin Ochoa. It is about contributing to the library of human thought and imagination in a way that recomposes truth and reinterprets dreams.
Astraea Executive Director, J. Bob Alotta said, Along with the Lesbian Writers Fund, Astraea supports a range of arts and culture projects because they are an essential part of achieving social justice. She continued, They speak to us on a different level and allow more direct access to the heart without prejudices getting in the way.
Since its founding in 1977, Astraea has been on the cutting edge of progressive funding initiatives, providing more than $17 million to hundreds of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) organizations and projects that work to secure human rights for LGBTI people and advance gender, racial, economic and social justice across the U.S and internationally.
A prestigious panel of writers determined the 2011 Lesbian Writers Fund awards: Fiction panelists were Ana-Maurine Lara and R. Erica Doyle. Poetry panelists were Chrystos and Nikky Finney.
Also recognized for their work were Finalists in Fiction Sheree L. Greer and Chinelo Okparanta; Finalists in Poetry Donna M. Lane and Lauren Peterson; Honorable Mentions in Fiction Michele Koury, Sassafras Lowrey, and Jenie Pak; and Honorable Mentions in Poetry Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers, Nicole Santalucia, and Kirya Traber. More about the award recipients and samples of their work can be found at www.astraeafoundation.org.
As the discussion over gay rights continues, so, too, does the debate as to whether the gay rights issue is a civil rights issue, namely one that some say is reflective of the black civil rights movement.
As the discussion over gay rights continues, so, too, does the debate as to whether the gay rights issue is a civil rights issue, namely one that some say is reflective of the black civil rights movement. In the upcoming film, The New Black, filmmaker Yoruba Richen explores the histories of the African American and LGBT civil rights movements. The film specifically looks at homophobia in the Black church, and how the Christian right has exploited this phenomenon that exists in order to promote an anti-gay political agenda, says Richen. Her project is demonstrative of how the parallels and distinctions between the African American and gay rights movements are complex and multi-layered.
As both of these movements have reached maturation we have multiple generations working for civil rights, says J. Bob Alotta, executive director of the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice. Right now you would be talking about grandchildren and children of civil rights activists. Our elders were Black Panthers and marching with [Martin Luther King Jr]. Not only have we learned from them, but when we start talking about identity politics its apparent that many of us embody multiple identities.
Read the rest of the article on Black Enterprise.
Nearly 150 people celebrated with Astraea at our 6th annual Party with Pride! It was a wonderful evening full of great conversation, music, dancing and community. Tarrah Reynolds and Maryam Blacksher filled the first part of the evening with beautiful sounds of the violin and viola, and DJs RiMarkable and Tikka Masala ruled with incredible beats that kept the party moving. View the slideshow of the event!
Community is one of the hallmarks of Astraea. From the 1970s to today, Astraea has remained dedicated to nurturing the communities we care so deeply about, in New York and worldwide.
We know that the best kind of power is collective. In that spirit, sign up to learn more about Astraea and be invited to our next event!
“When the lesbian blogger Amina Arraf in Syria was revealed to be a white American man named Tom MacMaster, it fueled the myth that Arab lesbians dont exist. They do. And the anonymity of the Internet does create one of the few spaces that lesbian Arabs can come out and find each other…”
Astraea published an op-ed in The Progressive: “When the lesbian blogger Amina Arraf in Syria was revealed to be a white American man named Tom MacMaster, it fueled the myth that Arab lesbians dont exist. They do. And the anonymity of the Internet does create one of the few spaces that lesbian Arabs can come out and find each other…”
Read the rest of the op-ed on The Progessive.
Read Astraea’s take on funding sex worker organizing as part of achieving gender justice.
Summer 2011 eThreads just released! Read Astraea’s take on funding sex worker organizing as part of achieving gender justice. Hear about our 2011 International Fund grantees and their work to end hate violence to seize political moments. Find out how flexible funding has allowed a New York grantee to innovate, and meet two donor partners who have launched a new giving circle. Plus, Astraea travels the globe for LGBTI human rights.
Read eThreads here: www.ethreads.org
Get down for justice, eat, drink, and dance while supporting some of the fiercest LGBTI activists around the world. Join Astraea on June 18th in Brooklyn for a fabulous evening featuring the beautiful violin sounds of Tarrah Reynolds and the righteous beats of DJ RiMarkable and DJ Tikka Masala. Hosted by the Astraea staff and held at the beautiful Brooklyn home of our Executive Director.
Saturday, June 18, 2011
7 pm9 pm $40.00+
Featuring the beautiful violin sounds of
Tarrah Reynolds & cocktails from WitchesBrew!
(you’re welcome to stay for the whole evening)
9 pm1 am $25.00+/- (more if you can, less if you can’t)
Cant attend? RSVP to sponsor a ticket.
Purchase Your Ticket!
Or click here to RSVP and pay at the door.
Questions or to purchase your tickets over the phone call 212.529.8021
Astraea is pleased to announce that Go Magazine has selected Executive Director J. Bob Alotta and Board Member Ileana Jimenez as two of its class of 2011 “100 Women We Love.” Also honored were grantee partners Amber Hollibaugh of Queers for Economic Justice, B. Cole of the Brown Boi project, Lisbeth Melendez Rivera of Unid@s, and Chong Moua of Shades of Yellow.
100 Women We Love
June 17, 2011
J. Bob Alotta
“I aim to connect the dots to reveal a brilliant constellation of LGBTI righteousness: we are such amazing, diverse, thoughtful, ever-present and ever-growing people. The phrase, ‘We are everywhere,’ doesn’t just imply geography. We are inside of, affected by and affecting every issue,” Alotta points out. “It is my job to make sure justice is a verb.”
[read more]
Ileana Jimenez
Ileana Jimenez is the founder and sole blogger at FeministTeacher.com and an educator at the progressive Little Red School House & Elisabeth Irwin High School in New York. She teaches courses on feminism, Latino/a literature, LGBT literature and more to prep the next generation of feminist thinkers. An Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice board member since 2005, Jimenez received the 2010 Distinguished Fulbright Award in Teaching to conduct research on gender and education in Mexico and spoke at Mexico Citys first international conference on bullying.
[read more]
The top movers and shakers in New Yorks lesbian and social justice community came together at the Deity in Boerum Hill on April 9 to welcome J. Bob Alotta as the Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justices new executive director.
Astraea is a global foundation dedicated to providing financial support to lesbian-led LGBT and progressive organizations. Board Chair Mary Li also honored founding executive director Katherine Acey with an emeritus standing at the Brooklyn event.
EDGE spoke with Alotta the day before her public reception to find out a bit about the woman who will take the helm of the touted 30-year-old organization that granted more than $1.7 million to 146 organizations and individuals in 40 countries in 2010. “My background is a little diverse,” she said. “By trade I’m a filmmaker; I come from a traditional film media/activist/academic background. I did digital filmmaking at Columbia, new media at Zeitbyte and was board chair at FIERCE. I invested quite a lot in that organization.”
[Read the rest of the article at www.edgenewyork.com]
Astraea International Program Officer Dulce Reyes moderates a telebriefing for grantmakers exploring the role they can play in mitigating or aggravating risks and exposure facing their grantees (particularly human rights defenders).
FIRST DO NO HARM: GRANTEE SAFETY FOR LGBTI AND DISABILITY RIGHTS CAMPAIGNERS AND OTHER HUMAN RIGHTS DEFENDERS
Co-sponsored by: Funders for LGBTQ Issues, The International Human Rights Funders Group and The Disability Funders Network.
April 13, 2011
12:30 PM – 2:00 PM ET
This event is for grantmakers only.
The murders and ongoing persecution of LGBTI activists in Uganda and Honduras, and the growing threats faced by disability rights campaigners in Uganda and Ukraine remind us yet again that attention must be paid to both the concerns/risks that all human rights organizations and defenders share and those that are identity- or issue-specific. Presenters on this call will offer both a “grantee safety 101” and an examination of the distinct security issues faced by LGBTI and disability activiststwo particularly vulnerable and marginalized groups of human rights defendersand discuss the specific considerations for funders working with them. What are some general best practices that funders can implement to avoid harm? What practical steps are there for funders working with marginalized groups?
PRESENTERS
Terry Greenblatt, Executive Director and CEO, Urgent Action Fund
Nguru Karugu, Executive Director, Public Health Innovations
Diana Samarasan, Director, Disability Rights Fund.
MODERATOR
Dulce Reyes, Program Officer, International Fund for Sexual Minorities, Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice
Please RSVP to Marvin Webb at marvin@lgbtfunders.org for dial-in information.
You will see excerpts from “The Revival” film series (directed by Invincible), which documents independent women hip-hop artists. There will also be an opportunity to articulate the support you need, and exchange concrete skills in order to grow the women’s music movement.
