What’s Shakin’

Everett Company Stage & School, Friday Night Live

Here are two events promoting arts, culture, diversity and racial amity for this weekend, one in Providence, and one in Boston:

Friday, June 6th, 7 pm (Friday Night Live) 8 pm (Open Stage)

Everett Company, Stage & School

9 Duncan Avenue, Providence, RI 

Friday Night Live & Open Stage

Catch this multi-disciplinary art organization’s  last Friday Night Live Improv Show of the season before Everett takes it’s summer break, on Friday at 7 pm, immediately followed by Open Stage, at 8 pm, an open mic forum that features the company’s Case Closed hip-hop dance troupe, as well as local artists/performers.  The headline feature for this months’ Open Stage will be Sokeo Ros, Case Closed’s co-founder and artistic director.  Sokeo will be performing an excerpt of From Refugee Camp To Project, which Everett’s site describes as:

“..a solo show about a young man born in a Thai refugee camp in the aftermath of the Khmer Rouge. In America, he finds himself trapped in a low-income neighborhood filled with poverty and violence, courted by gangs, and at the mercy of the explosive moods of his traumatized parents. Through hip hop, traditional Khmer dance, spoken word, and video, Sokeo shares how self-expression helped him rise above his past and discover the beauty in life.”

Friday Night Live, 7  – 8 pm

Open Stage, 8 – 9:30 pm

$5 per show, or $8 for both–a cultural bargain!

(Everett states on their website that while Friday Night Live is appropriate for all ages, Open Stage may contain more mature content.)

For more on Everett, visit their website at www.everettri.org

To read more WJSS posts on Everett, see:

Highlighting Providence Arts Organization: Everett Company, Stage & School

I Should Tell You About Everett Company, Stage & School (instead of my MJ magazine)

And, if you are looking for something to do on Sunday, head on up to Boston (or maybe you live there already, in which case you can hop on the T) for:

Sunday, June 8, 1 – 5 pm

Metro Boston Race Amity Celebration

Rose Kennedy Greenway

(near Aquarium across Atlantic Avenue)

There will be a blend of jazz, gospel, Celtic, hip-hop and Caribbean music, foods from around the world, game tents, prizes, and more family fun, all for the sake of promoting the National Center for Race Amity’s mission which has the cultivation of race amity as its key tool as well as its end goal in advancing access and equity, and unity domestically and internationally.  The Center accomplishes this through K-12 education and higher education programs, a national conference on race, and through creating public discourse on race equity and amity.

Here is a link to the event info, as well as the website for the National Center for Race Amity.

To read about my experience at the 2013 National Center for Race Amity Conference, click here.

What’s Shakin’ Archive:

February 2014

Two Local Events:  Film: Earth, Water, Woman and Book Signing for Waking Up White

I wanted to share two soul-shakin’ cultural events going on this weekend, and Monday.

First off, my friend, Diana Fox, anthropology professor at Bridgewater State University, and Executive Producer of the documentary:  Earth, Water, Woman: Community and Sustainability in Trinidad and Tobago will hold a special local screening this Sunday at the Cable Car Cinema and Cafe in Providence, RI. (Link to their site above to watch a trailer of the film.)

The film is about an inspiring community of Rastafarian environmental activists, who have reforested hillsides and restored their water table. There will be a post-film discussion and refreshments. Invite your friends! Even if you can’t come, you can help spread the word!

Earth, Water, Woman is showing, Sunday, February 2, at the Cable Car Cinema and Cafe, 204 South Main Street, Providence, RI at 11:30 a.m., $10/person

Debby Irving’s book, Waking Up White

Next, I was lucky enough to have a serendipitous meeting with author of the new book, Waking Up White, Debby Irving, at the Grub Street Muse and the Marketplace Writers’ Conference a few years ago.  I remember her talking about the book she was writing on recognizing her lack of awareness of how her upbringing and, in her words, how wanting to help people of color revealed to her how each of these well-intentioned mindsets actually perpetuated her ill-conceived ideas about race.

The book’s publication was this month, and Debby is now launching a book tour–next stop, Monday, February 3rd at friend and Executive Director (I’m so lucky to have such accomplished, artistic friends) Catherine Carr Kelly’s,  Central Square Theater in Cambridge, Mass.

Debby will be interviewed by Executive Director, Shay Stewart-Bouley, of the non-profit racial equity organization, Community Change.  The interview will be followed by a question and answer session.

The event is co-sponsored by and being held Monday, February 3, 2014 at 7pm.at the Central Square Theater (450 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA).  Free. 

Copies of Waking Up White will be available for purchase at $20 and Debby Irving will be available for signing. All proceeds from this night’s book sales will be donated to Community Change.