Session 5 – Radically Reimagining Our Future

In this session we talked about the results of the November 3 election and what the current political moment means for our future. We heard from social justice leaders and organizers about their work to create visionary alternatives to the world as it is towards a world where all of us can thrive.

The State of Asian Minnesotans Series takes a critical look at the state and progress of Asian/Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in Minnesota, and consider what else we can do to tap into the assets of, and ensure inclusion of this community. We invite subject experts, researchers, community members, and thought leaders that increase audience knowledge, challenge and allow audiences to dive deeper in their understandings of this population, and provide new thinking and tools for audiences to consider as they work with Asian Minnesotan communities.

FEATURED SPEAKERS

Nausheena Hussain, Executive Director of Reviving the Islamic Sisterhood for Empowerment (RISE)

Nausheena is the co-founder and Executive Director of Reviving the Islamic Sisterhood for Empowerment. She is currently pursuing her M.A. in Philanthropic Studies at IUPUI and holds an MBA from the University of Minnesota. Hussain demonstrates her dedication to leadership development, increasing community engagement, and creating a philanthropic legacy for change through her numerous and impressive civic and social engagements.

As the Executive Director and founder of Reviving the Islamic Sisterhood for Empowerment, Nausheena Hussain is a social justice activist here to amplify the voice and power of Muslim sisters. She is creating gender equity through sisterhood, storytelling and public policy.

Ananya Chatterjea, Artistic Director, Ananya Dance Theatre

Ananya Chatterjea’s work as choreographer, dancer, and thinker brings together Contemporary Dance, social justice choreography, and a philosophy of #occupydance. She is artistic director of Ananya Dance Theatre, a Twin Cities-based professional dance company of BIPOC women, womxn, & femme artists, and co-founder of the Shawngrām Institute for Performance and Social Justice. Her “people powered dances of transformation” proceed through concert performances and participatory performances in non-traditional spaces where audiences become co-creators of movement explorations. Ananya received a 2011 Guggenheim Choreography Fellowship, 2012 McKnight Choreography Fellowship, 2015 Sage Outstanding Dance Educator Award, 2016 Joyce Foundation Award, 2018 Urban Bush Women Choreographic Fellowship, and a 2019 Dance/USA Artist Fellowship. Her second book, Heat and Alterity in Contemporary Dance: South-South Choreographies, re-framing understandings of Contemporary Dance from the perspective of choreographers from South-South communities is being published this fall with Palgrave MacMillan.

Scot Nakagawa, Senior Partner at ChangeLab

Scot is a community organizer, activist, cultural worker, and political writer. He has spent the last four decades exploring questions of racial injustice and racial formation and effective forms of resistance and strategies for change through community campaigns, cultural organizing, popular education, writing, and direct political advocacy. Scot’s primary work has been in the fight against vigilante white supremacist groups, white nationalism, Nativism, and authoritarian evangelical political movements. In this work, he has served as a strategist, organizer, and social movement analyst. Scot is a past Alston/Bannerman Fellow and the Association of Asian American Studies 2017 Community Leader. He is busy at work on a number of projects, including writing a playbook for anti-fascists, and a primer on race and power. His writings have been included in Race, Gender, and Class in the United States: An Integrated Study, 9th Edition; Killing Trayvons: An Anthology of American Violence; and Eyes Right!: Challenging the Right Wing Backlash.