Imagine Otherwise

What would happen if we designed art exhibitions around social justice community organizing principles? How can collaboration between artists, curators, scholars, and participants generate a radical art making experience? What might an event premised on radical curation look, sound, and feel like? In episode 40 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach interviews curators Kālewa Correa, Lawrence-Minh Bùi Davis, and Adriel Luis, who share their experiences curating the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Museum's innovative 'Ae Kai Culture Lab exhibit in Honolulu, Hawai'i. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/40-correa-davis-luis

What does the rising popularity of the olive mean for global consumers, producers, and resisters? How do our intimate connections with food build memories and notions of place? In episode 39 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach and guest Lila Sharif discuss the role of food in both transnational settler colonialism and resistance to it, how Lila uses the classroom to get students thinking about their own food histories, the complex dynamics of ethical consumerism and where we get our food, and decolonization as an embodied, everyday form of imagining otherwise. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/39-lila-sharif

How does place-making help migrants understand and disrupt racial narratives? What role does mentoring play in academic progression and in everyday life? How can scholars move past monetary definitions of self-worth as academia becomes increasingly corporatized? In episode 38 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach and guest Surbhi Malik discuss the complex place-making practices migrants employ, how she mentors students to consider their whole selves even while in academia, how she went from hosting an American music radio show in India to hosting an Indian music radio show in the US, and how public projects like radio and activism inform all of her scholarly work and taught her how to both identify and resist colonial legacies. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/38-surbhi-malik

How are performance artists in the Burmese diaspora resisting notions of indebtedness and redefining narratives of political oppression and liberation? How can performance art and organic networking interrupt the academic-industrial complex? In episode 37 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach and guest Emily Hue discuss how artists in the Burmese diaspora navigate the intersecting violences in the asylum and refugee process, why graduate students and other academics should explore multiple outlets for their work beyond the academic monograph, what luxury hair markets and oil spill cleanup have to do with one another, and Emily's contribution to the giant wish list we've been compiling on this podcast as guests imagine and create better worlds. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/37-emily-hue

What is metafiction, and how can it serve as a tool for confronting power dynamics? Can incorporating unconventional genres in curriculum teach students critical thinking skills? In episode 36 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach and guest Leah Milne discuss how metafictional narratives by authors of color can provide a pedagogy of discomfort, how comics and graphic novels can spur the "good trouble" of social justice activism, and how she uses the classroom to teach radical empathy. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/36-leah-milne

What do game studies, literary studies, and Asian American studies have in common? How can immersive role play games help us better understand racial formation and resistance? In episode 35 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach and guest Tara Fickle talk about why games and literature are such fruitful sites for understanding racial formation; what it was like for Tara to design and build her own video game about Japanese-American internment during World War II; how emerging scholars can gain the technological skills they need to create public, multimedia work; and how Tara uses cultural forms like tarot and comics in her teaching to get students to imagine different worlds. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/35-tara-fickle

How can poetry translate or disrupt political dialogue? In what way is classroom teaching a performance? In episode 34 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach and guest Karen Jaime discuss the history of queer and trans* Puerto Rican poets in New York City, how professors can use the classroom as both an artistic and activist space, how poets paradoxically use language to bust through language barriers, poetry as consciousness raising, and why queer and trans artists of color turn to multimedia and transdisciplinary work to forge social justice movements. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/34-karen-jaime

To what extent should we embrace our personal connections to our work? How much should we let our audience influence our work? What are the best ways to collaborate in academia and performance? In episode 33 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, Cathy Hannabach interviews E. Patrick Johnson about his creative process, how he translates scholarly ideas into artistic work and vice versa, how Black gay men and women are crafting community-based oral histories, and how artistic and scholarly collaboration is a key way he imagines otherwise. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/33-e-patrick-johnson

How can cultural texts help us make sense of race and (trans)gender together? What role does fashion play in culture, resistance, and academia? How can we build our classrooms into places where we collectively imagine otherwise? In episode 32 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach chats with guest Francisco Galarte about the racialized politics of style for Chicanx queer and transgender subjects, the classroom as a social justice space, and how trans faculty of color can queer the academy. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/32-francisco-galarte

What does truly diverse media representation look like, and how can transmedia help folks contribute? How can scholars, artists, and academics use this political moment to foster dialogue? How does travel and transnationalism expand our artistic vision? In episode 31 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach chats with guest Felami Burgess about queer of color media representation, Felami's multimedia and transnational trajectory, how any class on any topic can be an opportunity to create, and why now more than ever we need to braid art, activism, and academia to build better worlds. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/31-felami-burgess

How have US imperialism and nationalism informed perceptions of racial identity? What can we gain from strengthening the relationship between scholarship and public engagement? How can we let our political and ethical commitments guide our professional endeavors? In episode 30 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach talks with guest Vince Schleitwiler about liberatory coalitions between Black and Asian communities, how the public humanities have shifted in the context of neoliberalism, and how contemporary activists draw inspiration from what he calls "the geography of the lost Afro-Asian century." Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/30-vince-schleitwiler

How have colonialism and empire contributed to modern-day science and medicine? How can work from women of color feminisms and healing justice movements inform how we practice wellness in our daily lives? Is there room for a holistic approach to productivity within academia? In episode 29 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach talks with guest Tala Khanmalek about how academics can incorporate healing justice and disability justice into academic workflows, how a holistic approach to graduate school enabled Tala to create social justice projects, and what a healing justice and disability justice-based world would look like. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/29-tala-khanmalek

How is the digital landscape changing, and what does this mean for academia? How can digital technologies transform how we teach and how we think about sharing the information we produce? In episode 28 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach talks with guest Zach McDowell about the relationship between the open access movement and other social justice movements, how decreasing the “digital divide” isn’t the only thing needed for true media justice, and what it really means when people say “information wants to be free.” Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/28-zach-mcdowell

How are digital technologies, including open access publishing, transforming higher education? In episode 27 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach chats with guests Jessie Daniels and Polly Thistlethwaite, founders of JustPublics@365 project about the impact of digital technologies in higher education, why so many scholars who are interested in open access publishing are also social justice activists, and how those scholars and activists can expand public access to scholarship. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/27-jessie-daniels-polly-thistlethwaite

What does wellness and unwellness look like in the context of Asian America? In the context of academia? How can we transform our spaces to allow for more interpretations of healing practices? What role can students play in reforming how we discuss mental health in the academy? In episode 26 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach chats with guests Mimi Khúc and Lawrence-Minh Bùi Davis about how academia can better address parenting, mental health, and wellness, as well as the forthcoming special issue of the Asian American Literary Review. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/26-mimi-khuc-lawrence-minh-bui-davis

What strings are attached to the "gift of freedom" that the United States grants refugees? How can zines, punk, and tarot serve as methods and mediums for social justice work? And what do movie stars and Buddhist nuns have in common? In episode 25 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach chats with Mimi Nguyen about the imperialist US discourse of debt and freedom repeatedly attached to refugees, how Mimi is drawing unexpected artistic encounters between actor Keanu Reeves and Buddhist nun Pema Chödrön, and why communities of color are turning to tarot for activist inspiration and to imagine other ways of being in the world. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/25-mimi-nguyen

How can digital media transform the way we organize, teach, and relate to our bodies and the world? In episode 24 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach chats with guest Amanda Phillips about the politics of video game realism in an era of increasingly visible police violence, why so many marginalized communities have turned to digital media for organizing, how hashtag syllabi have transformed what it means to teach about current events, and how teachers and students can together use the classroom as a space in which we teach each other how to imagine and create the kind of worlds we want. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/24-amanda-phillips

How can trans people of color own their own stories? What's the right balance between depicting the systemic violence a community faces and representing the joy, pleasure, hope, and love that community produces? In episode 23 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach chats with guest André Pérez about his approach to multimedia projects, why he focuses on work that empowers marginalized communities, and how storytelling helps us imagine otherwise. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/23-andre-perez

How can we tell a story that is ours but also belongs to millions of others? How can documentary film and engaged scholarship portray the realities of war? In episode 22 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach interviews filmmaker Wazhmah Osman about the politics of memoir, what the trauma of war does to archival research, and Wazhmah's critically acclaimed documentary film, Postcards from Tora Bora, which recounts Wazhmah's return to her childhood home of Kabul, Afghanistan nearly 20 years after her family fled Cold War violence. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/22-wazhmah-osman

How is war felt through the body? Why are so many long-time antiwar and anticolonial activists turning to healing and body-based practices like acupuncture, traditional Chinese medicine, and somatics? And how can academics integrate decolonial feminist healing justice lessons into our classrooms and work spaces? In episode 21 of the Imagine Otherwise podcast, host Cathy Hannabach talks with guest Ronak Kapadia about how Middle East, Arab, and South Asian artists are using visual culture to critique US empire and the global war on terror, the relationship between social justice activism and ethnic studies/women's studies scholarship, and self-care and community care as disability/healing justice ways to imagine otherwise. Transcript and show notes: https://ideasonfire.net/21-ronak-kapadia