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M.I.R.R.O.R
Moving IN: Recognizing and Remembering Ourselves in Racism

an Antiracism and Awareness Through Movement Class Series

“Every emotional state corresponds to a personal conditioned pattern of muscular contraction without which it has no existence.” Moshe Feldenkrais Elusive Obvious

 

If you missed this class series and would like to be informed of future Antiracism/ATM offerings fill out the INTEREST FORM BELOW. 

“Being an antiracist requires persistent self-awareness, constant self-criticism, and regular self-examination.” Ibrim Kendi ibrimxkendi.com

“The fight against racism is our issue. It’s not something that we’re called on to help People of Color with. We need to become involved with it as if our lives depended on it because really, in truth, they do.”
Anne Braden

“White-body supremacy doesn’t live in our thinking brains. It lives and breathes in our bodies.” Resmaa Menakem My Grandmother’s Hands

4 wk series, Sunday afternoons, 4-6PM NOV 1st-22nd, 2020

In this series we will use Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement lessons to help build our capacity to stay engaged when we feel uncomfortable. In this time of ever more polarizing rhetoric, when we need more than ever the capacity to be with others whose life experiences, world views and ideas are different from our own without shutting down or dismissing them, Feldenkrais can help us stay connect to ourselves so that we can do just that.

In this series, we will explore content related to better understanding racism, work in small groups or pairs to share observations, challenge assumptions and learn to recognize some of our embedded habits and racial scripts, build our capacity to be with uncertainty, discomfort and the muscle to do honest self reflection so that together we will work toward a healed humanity.

Through this work we hope to build capacity to:

  • See racial constructs
  • Lean into our discomfort of exposing unconscious bias
  • Examine how racial bias lives through us
  • Challenge historical patterns
  • Examine characteristics of white supremacy culture
  • Discover our habits of racism and white supremacy

photo by shane rounce at unsplash

This experience is designed for people who identify as white. This is not to take the place of multiracial dialogue and action, but to supplement it and create greater capacity for cross-racial solidarity. The impetus for white people to do their own work with one another often comes directly from people of color who have requested that white people take responsibility for educating ourselves about racism and engaging in the work of educating our communities. For more understanding about all white space READ THIS

I have been facilitating conversations with groups of white people for the last 6 years through the YWCA’s Witnessing Whiteness Program. I have been through several trainings including Crossroads Antiracism/Antibias training, Non-Violent Communication and Empathy Training and St. Louis’ first annual Racial Equity Summit (fall of 2019). I am by no means an expert, but I have actively committed to an antiracism practice and hope to continue to learn and share through this process of connecting my Feldenkrais work with my antiracism work.

I am much more aware of my white privilege. A door has been opened. I think I thought of racists as individuals. I know see that systems in society and laws keep racism going.

Ceci P., student from 2020 course

This course helped me think more carefully about my own interactions. I recommend it for its thought provoking content in helping to facilitate deeper conversations. Adding the Feldenkrais Awareness Through Movement lessons helped to embody my ideas; I saw my thoughts and my thinking patterns. M.M., student from 2020 course.

PRICING
60% of the registration fees will go to INPOWER Institute or Jamaa Birth Village, both St. Louis based Black women owned organizations working to overcome the trauma and inequities of systemic racism.

The fee scale is based on your self-determined access to privilege, social capital and resources. In your self-determination, please consider your position of privilege based on aspects of your personhood that do or do not grant you access to social capital e.g. race, gender, sexual identity, socio-economic status, educational background, able-bodiedness, number of people who rely on your resources, etc.

YOUR INVESTMENT
Abundant Access to Resources: $128 online $125 cash/check
Sufficient Access to Resources: $103 online $100 cash/check
Limited Access to Resources: $82 online $80 cash/check 

INTERNET/OTHER NEEDS
You will need access to wifi so you can access ZOOM. This can be on any electronic device with video capacity. A place to lie down on the floor. Multiple people from the same household can participate but will need to be on separate devices. 

CANCELLATION POLICY 
Cancellations made prior to OCT 25, 2020 will be refunded minus a 10% administration fee. There will be no refunds after OCT. 25, 2020

INTEREST FORM for FUTURE COURSES

To pay by check please make payment to
FMA-STL and mail to:
Kelly Feder
3228 Ivanhoe Ave.
St. Louis, MO. 63139

Pay by credit card HERE