Race and Climate Justice Collective - Solidarity with Abya Yala

Dear Activists and organisers!

We have a very special session this month! We are to welcome in our midst one, two special guests, who hail from Brazil and Colombia and who embody wisdoms of the Earth and who champion community activism and anti-colonialism in their respective fields.

Our topic this month is:

What is colonialism and Coloniality in the context of Climate justice- Learning from the south Part 1: Abya Yala (Americas): Brazil and Colombia

Our speakers are:

Camile is a Brazilian, Black lesbian activist with an undergraduate degree in communication and multimedia, and a masters degree in communication, society and culture. Camile’s activism started in Maringá-PR defending public education in 2011 and then founding the feminist collective Maria Lacerda de Moura. In 2015, while taking her master's course in Juiz de Fora, Camile joined the PretAção collective, founded by black young women to encourage and supervise the application of federal law 10.639 which makes the teaching of african history and culture mandatory. PretAção collective condemns racism in the city and supports its victims. Camile now lives in Niterói, near Rio de Janeiro, and has worked as a communicator for ELAS Fund, Articuladas and also in the electoral campaign for the Rio's city council of the black activist Monica Cunha.

Mamma senchina (santiago Zarabato) is a wise elder from the Kogi community from the snowy peaks of Santa Marta, Colombia . He was one of the lucky elders to survive the strike of a deadly lightning which motivated him even more to preserve his culture. After his near death experience he travelled to many regions in Colombia making offerings in mountains and lagunes and teaching the legacy passed down to him from the Kogi-wiwa tradition of his father in law. The knowledge that Mamma senchina represents comes from the Gonawindua, the horal practice that was born in the sacred mountains of snowy peaks of the region. Through song, storytelling, danze he works to preserve the sacredness of the coca leaf, the tobacco and the care of sacred indigenous tools. He leads regenerative and humane dialogues that aim the resolution of conflict in a land inflicted by systemic and racist systems. Through his expertise he teaches people to grow food, health and care for our precious planet.

During this session we will hear from the wisdom of the Global South through those who are having a daily and direct experience of the legacies of colonialism and whose perspectives on what is internationalism and solidarity arises out of a direct experience of these matters.

We will depart slightly from the usual format, but you will still be able to ask questions and make comments engaging our speakers and learn from the gathering more about how to practically and meaningfully apply the 13th Recommendation thinking and doing Framework.

We look forward to your presence. If you haven’t been in attendance recently, try to make this session! Let us be really present, as never before, to engage closely with the wisdom and knowledge, experience and insight from ‘the South’.

If you have attended the previous session it will be the same link as before.

We look forward to welcoming you into this auspicious space:

Bienvenidos!

Asé

Race and Climate Justice Collective