We Can Be podcast - The Heinz Endowments
Society & Culture
The very fact that our country is having a conversation about equity now is due in no small part to the groundbreaking work of Angela Glover Blackwell, who founded PolicyLink 20 years ago with a simple but profound aim: to advance racial and economic equity for all.
Doing just that has been her life’s work, first as a lawyer who founded Oakland, California’s Urban Strategies Council, where she pioneered new approaches to neighborhood revitalization, and later as senior vice president at The Rockefeller Foundation, where she headed their domestic and cultural programs.
She currently serves as Founder in Residence at PolicyLink, which has become one of the nation’s most respected policy and research entities. PolicyLink has been instrumental in building a potent broad-based movement for equity, engaging hundreds of partners in cities, suburbs, rural communities, and tribal lands across America.
Angela is co-author of “Uncommon Common Ground: Race and America’s Future,” and is an in-demand commentator for some of the nation’s top news organizations, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Salon and CNN. She is no stranger to podcasts either, having recently launched her own podcast, “Radical Imagination.”
Angela joins host Grant Oliphant to discuss The New York Times “Banks Should Face History and Pay Reparations” op-ed she co-authored; her upbringing in racially segregated St. Louis, Missouri; the lasting influence of PolicyLink’s Equity Atlas; and what the concept of “radical imagination” means to her.
“Radical imagination is fueling change,” Angela says. “And when we embrace it, true and transformational solidarity is possible.”
“We Can Be” is hosted by Heinz Endowments President Grant Oliphant, and produced by the Endowments, Josh Franzos and Tim Murray. Theme music by Josh Slifkin. Guest image courtesy of PolicyLink; photo credit, Peter DaSilva. Guest inquiries can be made to Scott Roller at sroller@heinz.org.
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What the Eyes Don't See: Mona Hanna-Attisha & Flint’s lead water crisis. (S01EP16)
The 45 Words that Define Us: Max King on a First Amendment under fire, why we let rights slip away & how we can save them (S01E15)
Environmental justice superhero Mustafa Santiago Ali and the Hip Hop Caucus are shifting minds and votes one community at a time. (S01EP14)
Born for Storms: Angela Blanchard was a rock during Houston’s Hurricane Harvey & now she’s out to change the world for good (S01EP13)
New Power: Author Henry Timms explains what it is, how to get it & why it’s changing our hyper-connected world. (S01EP12)
Brick by brick: Steve Shelton got his second chance & now he makes certain others have a shot at their own redemption (S01EP11)
Spinning our moral compass: Rabbi Ron Symons on why centuries-old traditions may be the secret to navigating race, wage & immigrant issues. SE01E10
R2-D2, Illah & Ethics: How robotics & AI genius Illah Nourbakhsh was inspired to use his superpowers for good SE01E09
Circles of love: Tammy Thompson draws on her own remarkable journey in her work to break poverty trauma cycles (S01EP08)
Humor, Rap, Poetry & Love: the New Muslim Cool of Hamza Perez (S01E07)
A Story of Two Wilsons: Janis Burley Wilson grew up in an arts-loving family in playwright August Wilson’s hometown, and now she leads his namesake Center for African American Culture. (S01E06)
From Miami to the Midwest: Change Agency’s Betty Cruz has made it her life’s work to make her city a welcoming place for immigrants. (S01E05)
Center for Coalfield Justice’s Veronica Coptis and her fight for one rural America county’s environmental justice (S01EP04)
Actor/writer David Conrad’s long journey home, identity of place, and the key role artists play in shaping our future (S01 EP03)
Kazakhstan candy, a Wisconsin dairy farm, PBS and innovative investigative news: the fantastic journey of PublicSource Exec. Director Mila Sanina (S01EP02)
Post-9/11 vets' unique role in a more perfect union w/ Nick Grimes of Veterans Breakfast Club (S01EP01)
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