Please contribute to ASK 2015 to help fund the costs of the symposium and to support the organizations that are leading workshops during ASK.
These organizations are contributing significantly towards progress
in the movement!
Orange InkOut Now
Deep Abiding Love
Picture the Homeless
Black Trans Media
Voices From Inside
Since
2004, the Lebrón-Wiggins-Pran Cultural Center (CC) has spearheaded the
organizing of the annual ASK for Social Justice program. Through workshops, lectures, film screenings and more, ASK 2015 provides
an intersectional racial justice lens, that aims to create a multitude of
opportunities for participants to question, to challenge, and to confront the
legacy of anti-Blackness that we have inherited and perpetuate. We implore you
to consider the ways in which you may benefit directly or indirectly from
anti-Blackness and/or White Supremacy and how you can contribute the resources
necessary to dismantle it.
Inspired
by Ferguson’s uprising, ASK 2015 recognizes the national call to end anti-Black
racism in the United States. We cannot sit comfortably while Black people are
dying spiritually, emotionally, mentally and physically. This is genocide.
Thus, this year’s theme is “Black Lives Matter: Confronting Anti-Blackness.”
For the first time, ASK is holding a week-long symposium addressing
anti-Blackness as a global phenomenon. At the center of our conference is the
political and ideological intervention: Black Lives Matter, co-founded by
Patrisse Cullors, Alicia Garza and Opal Tometi. Using Black Lives Matter as a
lens, we will understand how White Supremacy is reinforced through the policing
of Black communities, racial profiling, state sanctioned violence, the school
to prison pipeline, the Prison Industrial Complex, classism, sexism, ableism,
homophobia and transphobia. ASK is urging participants to recognize and
counteract the ways in which we contribute to anti-Blackness.
Confronting
anti-Blackness is crucial when working towards social transformation and
community accountability. As hosts of the symposium, we recognize that
Hampshire College is a private, predominantly white, liberal arts institution
in Western Massachusetts. Like all institutions and communities, Hampshire
College is included in the equation of the global White supremacist system. NO
communities are immune; ALL communities must actively do the work to
dismantle anti-Blackness.
If you are unable to contribute towards the funding of ASK, there are plenty of other ways to get involved!