A group of women in Hawaii are showing the nation that post-pandemic economic recovery can be visionary, just, and transformative. They have crafted a plan that centers women, insists on gender equality, and advances deep cultural change. In this episode of Radical Imagination, host Angela Glover Blackwell speaks with Khara Jabola-Carolus, the executive director of Hawaii’s Commission on the Status of Women, which released the plan, titled “Building Bridges, Not Walking on Backs: A Feminist Reco...
Aug 01, 2020•30 min•Season 2Ep. 6
More than two million Americans live without access to clean, running water or a working toilette at home. Millions more predominantly in places like Flint, Michigan, the Navajo Nation, and migrant farmworker communities in California’s Central Valley have been disproportionately affected by high levels of led and arsenic in the water. In this episode of Radical Imagination, host Angela Glover Blackwell speaks with US Water Alliance CEO Radhika Fox about solutions to this national water crisis. ...
Jun 03, 2020•22 min•Season 2Ep. 5
Host Angela Glover Blackwell talks with writer, journalist and activist Tiq Milan about the the limiting and often toxic ways our society thinks about gender, and how we can do better. While the nation has come far in its inclusion of the LGBTQ community in recent decades, we have a long way to go. At least 25 transgender or gender-non-conforming people were reported murdered in 2019, and that’s an undercount, because most attacks go unreported. Join us as Milan describes his personal journey an...
May 01, 2020•27 min•Season 2Ep. 4
As Covid-19 sweeps the world, life feels too much like science fiction. On this episode of Radical Imagination, we explore an idea that’s tailor-made for this distressing moment. It’s called visionary fiction, and it uses sci-fi and fantasy to imagine not a dystopian future, but a better world — without poverty, prisons and inequality. It’s more than a literary genre; it’s a movement of people of color working to create the change they write about. Host Angela Glover Blackwell speaks with writer...
Apr 09, 2020•26 min•Season 2Ep. 3
For many years, undocumented students who came to the US as minors have been excluded from getting federal funding like grants or loans for college. While 23 states grant undocumented students in-state tuition, three states - Georgia, Alabama, and South Carolina - have a form of admissions ban against undocumented students. In 2010, the state banned undocumented students from applying to its top public universities and required them to pay out-of-state at the other public colleges. In response, ...
Mar 13, 2020•31 min•Season 2Ep. 2
We kick off season two of the Radical Imagination podcast with the story of two mothers who were experiencing homelessness. They moved into a house owned by an investment firm but sitting vacant for nearly two years. That courageous act, in Oakland, California, brought national attention to the housing crisis. Host Angela Glover Blackwell talks with Dominique Walker about why she occupied the house and about the collective she co-founded, Moms4Housing. The group is demanding the human right to h...
Feb 28, 2020•34 min•Season 2Ep. 1
Radical Imagination returns with host Angela Glover Blackwell in conversation with thinkers and changemakers on issues ranging from reimagining gender and visionary fiction, to housing as a human right and changing the criminal-legal system. Get ready to be enlightened, inspired, and moved to think in radically new ways. Tune into Radical Imagination as we dive into the stories and solutions that are fueling change. www.radicalimagination.us
Feb 18, 2020•1 min
Imagine an America free of urban gun violence. Host Angela Glover Blackwell speaks with Devone Boggan, CEO of Advance Peace in Richmond, California, a visionary program that offers young men with a history of gun offenses life-changing opportunities to work as community peacemakers. In this episode, the season one finale, we also hear from James Houston, who served 18 years in prison for shooting and killing a man. Houston is now a change agent in Richmond — and proof that investment in people, ...
Dec 15, 2019•32 min•Season 1Ep. 7
A federal job guarantee is an old idea making its way back this election cycle. It’s controversial and considered radical—but what makes more sense than making sure that everyone who needs a job can get one? A job guarantee would bring financial stability to millions of families. And it would put people to work doing things the nation needs, such as building affordable housing and caring for children. In this episode, Angela Glover Blackwell explores the tantalizing possibilities—and the feasibi...
Dec 03, 2019•21 min•Season 1Ep. 6
Climate change will displace more than 180 million people around the world by the end of this century. Along the Gulf Coast of the United States, rising seas are already threatening historic Black and indigenous communities. In Louisiana, for example, a piece of land the size of a football disappears into the water every hour-and-a-half. In this episode, Radical Imagination host Angela Glover Blackwell talks with Colette Pichon Battle, executive director at the Gulf Coast Center for Law and Poli...
Nov 17, 2019•30 min•Season 1Ep. 5
No major institution in America has wrestled more deeply with the question of reparations for African Americans than Georgetown University. Five years ago, a student discovered that Maryland Jesuits sold 272 slaves in 1838 to save the school from financial ruin. That forgotten history sparked an anguished conversation about Georgetown’s complicity in slavery and the school’s responsibility to the descendants of the 272 enslaved people. In this episode of Radical Imagination, Angela Glover Blackw...
Nov 03, 2019•29 min•Season 1Ep. 4
In this episode of Radical Imagination we visit Stockton, California. It was known as the nation’s foreclosure capital during the 2008 recession. Today, it’s the first city in the country to try universal basic income as a strategy to reduce inequality and boost economic security. This bold experiment gives residents a minimum monthly salary regardless of income or employment status. Angela Glover Blackwell sits down with Stockton Mayor Michael Tubbs, who became the first black mayor in the city...
Oct 20, 2019•26 min•Season 1Ep. 3
As cases of police abuse and misconduct gain attention, activists have moved beyond calls for reform to advocate for the abolition of police. It’s a controversial and widely misunderstood idea. How would police abolition work, exactly? How would we protect public safety? Radical Imagination host Angela Glover Blackwell explores these questions with humanitarian hip-hop artist Jessica Disu, a.k.a. FM Supreme, who has publicly called for police abolition. And we hear from Rachel Herzing, co-direct...
Oct 06, 2019•29 min•Season 1Ep. 2
The United States once had open borders. Migrants from all over the world would arrive fleeing war, escaping poverty and seeking opportunity. Open borders made our country strong. But many Americans today are horrified — or frightened — by the idea of “open borders.” Harsh new immigration policies are making it more difficult than ever to come to the U.S. or even ask for asylum. Nevertheless, violence, oppression, poverty, desperation, and hope continue to drive migrants to our borders. Last yea...
Sep 23, 2019•30 min•Season 1Ep. 1
A podcast focused on stories and solutions that are fueling change. Features conversations with thinkers and changemakers from multiple fields who are wielding instruments of influence — academia, activism, media, government — to deliver equity wins at scale. Tune into Radical Imagination as we dive into the stories and solutions that are fueling change. www.radicalimagination.us
Sep 04, 2019•1 min
