In this very first episode of Momentum: A Race Forward Podcast, get to know co-hosts Hiba and Chevon as they record from the new Race Forward offices in midtown Manhattan, sipping on Big Freedia wine! Chevon and Hiba discuss how they came to understand and become committed to racial justice work. Chevon talks about learning about systemic racism from an early age, and how it showed up in different ways throughout her life. Hiba talks about her Sudanese Muslim background, her work with the National Urban League, and her work coordinating convenings at Race Forward. Leave a 5-star review, and subscribe for more episodes of Momentum: A Race Forward Podcast every other week! About Race Forward: Race Forward catalyzes movement building for racial justice. In partnership with communities, organizations, and sectors, we build strategies to advance racial justice in our policies, institutions, and culture. Race Forward imagines a just, multiracial, democratic society, free from oppression and exploitation, in which people of color thrive with power and purpose. Follow Race Forward on Facebook: www.facebook.com/raceforward Follow Race Forward on Twitter: www.twitter.com/raceforward Follow Race Forward on Instagram: www.instagram.com/raceforward Subscribe to Race Forward's newsletter: www.raceforward.org/subscribe Save The Date for Facing Race 2020: http://bit.ly/FR2020-SaveTheDate Executive Producers: Hendel Leiva and Melissa Franqui
In this very first episode of Momentum: A Race Forward Podcast, get to know co-hosts Hiba and Chevon as they record from the new Race Forward offices in midtown Manhattan, sipping on Big Freedia wine!
Chevon and Hiba discuss how they came to understand and become committed to racial justice work. Chevon talks about learning about systemic racism from an early age, and how it showed up in different ways throughout her life. Hiba talks about her Sudanese Muslim background, her work with the National Urban League, and her work coordinating convenings at Race Forward.
Leave a 5-star review, and subscribe for more episodes of Momentum: A Race Forward Podcast every other week!
About Race Forward:
Race Forward catalyzes movement building for racial justice. In partnership with communities, organizations, and sectors, we build strategies to advance racial justice in our policies, institutions, and culture. Race Forward imagines a just, multiracial, democratic society, free from oppression and exploitation, in which people of color thrive with power and purpose.
Follow Race Forward on Facebook:
Follow Race Forward on Twitter:
Follow Race Forward on Instagram:
Subscribe to Race Forward's newsletter:
Save The Date for Facing Race 2020:
http://bit.ly/FR2020-SaveTheDate
Executive Producers: Hendel Leiva and Melissa Franqui
Intro:
I'm Hiba Elyass, and I'm Chevon Drew, and welcome to Momentum: A Race Forward Podcast, where we explore how racial justice work is showing up everywhere around us.
Intro Music
Hiba:
Hey Chevon.
Chevon: Hey Hiba,
Hiba:
How are you?
Chevon:
I'm well, thank you. How are you?
Hiba:
I'm good. I can't complain. Happy to be here with you on our first episode for Momentum.
Chevon:
I'm so excited and I feel like you're perfectly attired. I feel like you have on some very like, I don't know, it's almost like a Garvey-esque, Dapper Dan-esque leisure suit.
Hiba:
I knew you were coming into the office today, so I knew I had to look cute for you Chevon.
Chevon:
Always appreciate it.
Hiba:
How's everything going?
Chevon:
It's going well. Um, I feel like this being our first episode, I have so much energy to bring to this podcast episode today. I'm glad to be with you. Our producer is lit, so I'm ready.
Hiba:
Shoutouts to Hendel.
Chevon:
Exactly.
Hiba:
We're actually in a new office space, which is a big, big step. We've come from the Financial District. We've moved up to the Midtown area of Manhattan. Office looks amazing.
Hiba:
What do you think of it?
Chevon:
New office, new podcast.
Hiba: Hello.
Chevon:
Um, there are a lot of things going on in this office. It's kind of an open floor plan, so you get to see who's around you.
Chevon:
There's apparently Big Frida wine in here.
Hiba:
Shoutouts to our co-worker Rosana who sent it all the way from NOLA.
Chevon:
Thank you. They always send us great gifts from NOLA. So you know, I feel like we're, christening might not be the word, but I think we're kind of like breaking in.
Hiba: Blessing the space.
Chevon:
That's right. We're saging it with Big Frida's wine.
Hiba:
Shoutouts to Big Frida. Cheers.
Hiba:
So Chevon do you want to tell us a little bit about what Momentum is?
Chevon:
Yes. I mean I think we know the definition of it.
Hiba:
Yes we do. Let's talk about why we're here.
Chevon:
Momentum: A Race Forward Podcast features movement voices, stories, and strategies, for racial justice.
Chevon:
So the co-host Hiba and myself Chevon, we give our unique takes on race and pop culture, and uplift narratives of hope, struggle and joy, as we continue to build the momentum needed to advance racial justice in our policies, our institutions, and our culture. So you can build on your racial justice lens, you can deepen your racial justice lens, and get inspired to drive action, by learning from all of the different guests that we'll have on the show.
Hiba:
Amazing. I'm so excited for this. This has been a long time coming. Four years ago, when I initially started, I always had, I always had an interest in media, but I realized that there was no consistent podcast relations or relationships, or platform for us to interact or to share our content with our following. So I'm actually happy and glad that this is actually taking place. I see big things happening with this podcast. And I'm actually really excited to work alongside you, Chevon.
Chevon:
Oh, that's so sweet. Oh my God. I paid her to say that.
Hiba:
You definitely did. Got like $10 for that.
Chevon:
I'm on a budget. I think it's really great that we have this opportunity to, you know, create media that's also going to connect with our staff as well, internally because there are so many fantastic stories that our staff has. They're doing all of this work out in the field and they have their personal projects as well, like they are about this life y'all.
Chevon:
And I'm not even playing, I get resources from them and everything when I'm on my own time. Like, Hey, I need a racial justice resource for this or that. So really I'm just as excited as you, you know, I wanted to work with you.
Hiba: Hello.
Chevon:
So I'm happy to be here.
Hiba:
Let the people know.
Chevon:
Yes. So I'm really excited that we get to share this first episode with everyone. Looking forward to inspiring folks and please stay tuned. We'll be right back.
Segment Music
Hiba:
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Chevon:
So we're back.
Hiba: We are.
Chevon:
And I think now's a great time to do a little introduction. Tell folks a little bit about who we are. So that we're not strangers in the night, that type of thing. You know.
Hiba:
We're about to be a family.
Chevon:
Alright. You pushing it.
Hiba:
I'm dragging it.
Chevon:
You pushing and pulling and dragging.
Hiba:
I'm reaching.
Chevon:
But yes, let's take a moment to let folks know who we are, and what we're about, and how we came to this work.
Hiba:
Yeah. Chevon.
Chevon:
Yeah. Yeah. Hiba would you like to kick us off with your story?
Hiba:
No, I want you to kick us off. Set the tone.
Chevon:
What does the producer think? Because before you get cut up in here.
Chevon:
Oh. Oh, schnapp it looks like I can't pay attention to an agenda. Why is there sugar in here? Because that's what throws me off. So, a little about Chevon. So how did I come to this work?
Chevon:
I would say, from the time I was young, systemic racism, it showed up early. You know, I had family that used to explain pieces and parts of systemic racism and how it would affect, you know, parts of my childhood. So for example, you know, being potentially red lined of my school district, I remember that. And I remember, you know, my grandmothers explaining it to me and I was like, "oh no". She was like, exactly.
Hiba:
It was a very common thing, right? And it still is.
Chevon:
She says, you need to go ahead and make some signs. I'm like, what? She's like those artistic skills you have. And this is the key, cause my grandmother was, she had her own feels about, you know, art, you know, so she, she said, use those artistic skills you have, and create some signs that talk about how you feel now that you understand that they're trying. To red line you out. And I was very little. I'm talking elementary, so I did it. We went to City Hall. There were other families with the kids there and everything. And we actually did win. I think partially it was because sometimes the strongest argument is coming from those who are most affected. Right? Sometimes that's kids and sometimes they don't get to be heard. But this was a point at which I and many other kids got to be heard, you know? So we definitely beat that red lining situation, but it stuck with me, you know, and then just kind of like as a young adult moving through, you know, college and your, you know, your, your employment, and all of that. I don't know. I got messages from the media that made me think that maybe racism was not going to be a thing by the time I'm of a certain age.
Chevon:
You know what I mean? Like when I'm an adult, like, it's not going to be here. Clearly that's not true. Right. And I've worked with a lot of different people, of different ages where I'm like, this is not disappearing just because we're young, because young people are also at work, espousing racist ideology to my South Asian coworker or my East Asian coworker. Right? And of course to the one black person in the office has to deal with all types of BS. So I kind of felt like there's still an opportunity to confront this thing. And the more I saw it in action in terms of how it can affect you systemically as you're coming up, whether it's that they're going to skip people of color for their reviews, skip them for their promotions, or try to peg them at a salary that was artificially low, that they came from.
Chevon:
You know what I mean? Ask them what it was just so you can give them like a tiny bit more and not really what they're worth. I was like, wow, this can affect everyone systemically because later on, those are the same people where they say, oh, there's a wealth gap. Oh, people of color don't have retirement.
Chevon:
You know what I mean? But where is it starting? It's a big, it's a big systemic issue. So I feel like that's how I came to this work, was just wanting to step away from the for-profit world, that wasn't really tackling some of these issues. And also seeing the intersections of it, like seeing people of different genders, seeing people of different races, but all people of color, and how it intersected to make things worse for certain groups of people.
Hiba:
I had a question for you, before we actually started recording. You mentioned, you know, the images that you would see in the media, and you comparing different news articles, which kind of shifted you to stop watching the news. Why? Explain to everyone why that was a thing for you?
Chevon:
Well, the schools that I attended when I was really young, media literacy was part of the curriculum there. So bringing in newspapers and comparing the same story two, three times, over.
Hiba:
And what would you see? What are examples that what you would see?
Chevon:
I mean, I would see, let's say it's a story about someone who's stole baby formula. So it's a short clip in the crime section. Okay. I don't, for me, I would read different versions of it, and think why are we even reporting on A? So I'm not even interested in the angles anymore. I'm interested in why do all of these newspapers run by mostly white people feel it's important to report on someone who stole milk but not important to report on why in the world would someone steal milk for the baby?
Chevon:
Why are we even living in a situation like that? This is such a wealthy country, right? So same thing with the television news. You know, I have parents that used to watch and my family used to watch it and tell me it's very important to watch the news and be informed.
Hiba:
(about what's going on around you)
Chevon:
And by the time I was an adolescent, I'm like, um, they consistently like showing Black and Latino, like Black and Latinx people, as these people who are, I don't know, less than. Right? So, and then they switched to like, here's what's next up, Friends. You know what I mean? I'm not into it. So I stopped watching that, you know? And I think that it helped me to see that systemic racism is aided and abetted.
Chevon:
By media, and you know, it can be the arts, it can be any institution. Your school, I already had experienced that. Where you go to work, right. So what I found interesting about Race Forward is that they took into account the intersections and it was so bold in terms of the mission statement, including like kind of the queering of their mission statement, like pulling in that they, they kind of, for me, when I was browsing about Race Forward, I saw that they had queer people upfront. You know what I mean? Trans people to the front. Like not just, hey, liberation is only for straight people of color, cis people of color. That was important to me. I don't have to tell you how various groups, like everyone has their own thoughts about LGBTQ people and that community, but to want to take away their rights is a different thing. Right?
Hiba:
That's a whole other conversation.
Chevon:
Systemically, again. I'm like, think what you want, please don't touch people's rights.
Chevon:
Thank you. Right? Or maybe even keep it to yourself, and don't touch people's rights. That was part of what really brought me to this work would be the intersections that were important to the way that Race Forward does its work.
Hiba:
Amazing. I have another question for you before we actually transition. What brings you fulfillment in your role?
Chevon:
Oh my gosh. Seeing your outfits. We talked about this. You think I'm playing, I know you know where I went to -- listen. I also feel like in my personal role, what brings me fulfillment is using my skill set that I told you was honed young. I was really a -- you didn't want to watch TV with me as a kid.
Hiba:
Where you the type of person that kinda just analyzed everything. I love it.
Chevon:
Nobody wanted it. My mom would be like, please be quiet.
Hiba:
I love it.
Chevon:
I'm like, but the way, there's only light-skinned black people on here.
Chevon:
That's not how all black people look. Why? Why are they being casted -- only these mixed black people actually only like, come on. She's like, please pipe down. You're ruining the storyline.
Hiba:
"I'm not here for this". But -- we are here for this, right?
Chevon:
That kind of media literacy. And you know, the ability to implement a marketing and communications plan in service of, right? Bringing people to an event, that Race Forward is putting on, or letting them be aware of it even if they can't make it so that they promote it to their friends. Promoting all of our resources, and tools, and reports, I feel fulfilled by bringing to bear my skillset around digital communications and marketing to do that. Because nonprofits sometimes struggle in that area. Right? To be able to find people that can leverage, not that they're not out there, but sometimes nonprofits, you know, we are beholden to, you know, there's a budget to be considered.
Chevon:
There's funding to be considered, right. So sometimes that's where, you know, cuts will be made where it's like maybe we can pull back on how we market and promote ourselves for now and let's just get the core work done. The thing is, is you want to do the core work, but you want people to know about it. So that's what's really fulfilling for me is to have all of these fantastic colleagues, I can't name them all, the work they are doing is amazing. And every time I get to uplift that work, I literally feel like, yeah, like I had a cape on, you know?
Hiba:
Yes, yes. I'm here for it.
Chevon:
Thank you. I want to know more about you because when I joined Race Forward, I didn't work with you on media and events and things like that.
Hiba:
That's because I was in a completely different department that didn't allow for us to work together, which was very sad. But I'm glad that my new position does allow for it. So a little background information about me. I started here at Race Forward four years ago within the Finance Department.
Chevon:
Oh, so it's not that you weren't allowed, it's just a whole different role.
Hiba:
It's a whole different world. We did touch bases on certain things, but not --
Chevon:
You chasing me for an expense report?
Hiba:
Or you know, you submitting an invoice for work that was done by a freelancer. So, yeah, I had transitioned over from the National Urban League and I started here at Race Forward four years ago within the Finance Department. And then I realized that my job didn't really, not necessarily allow, but I didn't have the opportunity to really engage with my coworkers, and really understand the work that we were doing, because I was crunching numbers behind the screen all day.
Hiba:
And not to belittle that job. But I realized that that job wasn't necessarily for me, being that I was such a personable person, I wanted to interact with my colleagues. I wanted to know what we were doing. I wanted to, you know, go to work events. I wanted to do all the things that, Race Forward produced.
Hiba:
So there was an opening within the Conferences and Convenings Department and I am now the Conference and Convenings coordinator. So I assist in producing all of our major conferences, convenings, cohorts, across the nation. And that work brings me much joy, because I'm able to convene all the racial justice, movement shakers, all the artists, all the people on the forefront fighting this fight. And I'm able to, generate content and hold conversations with these people, which is highly important. So our work actually coincides with one another.
Hiba:
So without, without you, no one would know about these events that we're producing.
Chevon:
Thank you. And I'm always excited to promote and kind of just, get all of the info out there about what you're working on, because y'all are so intentional about the way that you put together convenings, really intentional about making space, and making space for people to feel welcome, included, right?
Hiba:
And also be able to highlight the work that they're doing on the grounds too. For example, our Facing Race conference is coming up in November of 2020. We're going to be able to give opportunity to many presenters so they can highlight the work that they're doing on the ground. And also educate people that may not know about the things that are happening nationwide. So that brings me joy.
Chevon:
That is amazing. You're making me remember -- Didn't we have a conversation about this? Like when you wanted to transition out of your role and you were like.
Hiba:
I put that into the universe.
Chevon: Yeah.
Hiba:
And look, look at it. Look, we are here.
Chevon:
So you are now in Conferences and Convenings. You started out in Finance at Race Forward, but what would you say brought you to Race Forward, and working at a racial justice nonprofit in the first place?
Hiba:
So I come from a Sudanese Muslim household.
Chevon: Assalamualaikum.
Hiba:
Mualaikumsalam, and growing up, I've experienced a lot of discrimination. Most of my experiences came when I was, you know, hand in hand with my mother walking at a store, in a cab. My mother is a Muslim woman who wears her hijab very proudly. Shoutouts to my mama. And most of those experiences were very traumatizing. But for me, they occurred mostly after the 9/11 attack.
Hiba:
So I believe from that moment I knew that there was injustice in the world, but I didn't know how to go about it or how I can be a part of fighting within the movement. It wasn't until I got to college and I started Africana studies and I actually wanted to major in it, but I'm like, I just want to be educated on this, you know, um, I actually wanted to be a news broadcaster.
Chevon: Me too.
Hiba:
So look at that. We have so much in common that we didn't even know about. And look where we are.
Chevon: I love it.
Hiba:
We're here on the podcast. So, yeah. So I didn't intentionally know that I wanted to work for a racial justice organization, until I was given the opportunity to work for the Urban League. And it was then that I knew that my worlds can actually collide.
Hiba:
So my nine to five can actually be in relation to my core beliefs in my morals and my values. Now I'm able to produce events that convene people to have these discussions about the discrimination that were held against them, not only as you know, youth, but as adults. Cause things are, you know, it's evident that things are still happening today.
Chevon:
And you're a part of the solution.
Hiba:
And I'm very proud of that. I'm very happy, and I don't see myself working within another sector.
Chevon:
That's deep, Hiba.
Hiba:
It's real. It's real, I think about leaving racial justice movement work and I'm just like in shambles a little bit. Like why would I ever do that? What else is out there to fight for? There's a lot of fights happening, but this is prominent. This is primary.
Chevon:
This is important to you.
Hiba:
You get what I mean? So yeah, that's, that's my background.
Chevon:
Hiba, I want to thank you for your honesty, and for sharing so thoughtfully about how you came to work at a racial justice nonprofit. I felt really moved by hearing your story, so, thank you for being willing to share it.
Hiba:
Thank you, Chevon. Thank you for being my partner in this podcast. Thank you for sharing your story and your background. I'm actually happy that we have a platform to share our stories, which kind of leads me to my next question for you. Being that we're just getting started, I see a bright future for this podcast. What are some of your hopes and your visions for Momentum?
Chevon:
Oh, wow, that's a good question. Some of my hopes, let me get my Obama hat.
Hiba:
Yes. Get the hat girl.
Chevon:
It's just a ponytail attachment.
Chevon:
I would say some of my hopes for the Momentum: A Race Forward podcast are involved with one of our values, which is joy. And I would say joy, it can be a challenge to bring that to the work sometimes. Because if you think about it, we're at a racial justice nonprofit and we're doing all of this work around that issue. However, we're inhabiting a world and an economic system that does not support racial justice in terms of the way it was founded, right? So sometimes that comes to bear on our work. And I would say that joy sometimes can get lost in the mix. Just like I said, if a company is small and they're struggling, the first thing they want to cut sometimes could be what they think they can hopefully float without. Maybe we'll cut marketing or media, you know what I mean?
Chevon:
And when it comes to budgets, I feel like sometimes the joy is what can get cut out of a nonprofit, right? Because it's not that all joy costs money, but it's that when you're in a business sense, sometimes to convene people to experience that together, sometimes you need to take, right. So for us, you know, the funding landscape can be its own challenge. But I feel like the podcast can be a way to me, a way to bring more joy together to our work and whether that be like all of the staff, who are so eager or excited to share my work and participate, or to the listeners. Because personally, when I listen to you, you know, I derive joy from listening to you as well. I just, you know, I hope other people would feel the same way. Like, you know, you, so you bring a lot of energy to this. So yeah, that's one of my hopes, I would say to live out that value of joy.
Hiba:
And I would just piggyback off of that as well. Again, it's been a long time coming and for us as a, as a nonprofit organization to launch our own podcast, and to put that out into the universe and to be able to share this content with all of our listeners and all of our followers on Instagram, Twitter, all of our partners, all of our, sponsors. I think that brings me happiness, not only joy, but happiness, and also a sense of, pride because that's a, that's a big thing. It's major. And also to be it, to provide a platform for others to join us and hold these conversations is major as well. And working alongside you once again.
Chevon:
That's beautiful. And I hope people can learn something. I'm always learning, from all of the people I interface with while working in the racial justice world. And I'm excited to see if people, you know, come back on social media and tell us, you know, hey, I learned a lot from that episode.
Chevon:
So Hiba, we've come to the end of our inaugural podcast, right? It's Race Forward's, first episode of Momentum. And I want to encourage everyone who's listening to please follow us on social media.
Chevon:
We're at @raceforward and that's on Instagram. That's Twitter, that's Facebook. Um, really easy. You can also sign up for the Race Forward newsletter, and we're at raceforward.org/subscribe, so that's also really easy.
Hiba:
Make sure you sign up to get all of our upcoming information such as the Facing Race conference that's taking place November 12th to the 14th, next year, 2020, we're going to be in Raleigh, North Carolina. Shoutouts to Raleigh.
Chevon:
Yeah, so definitely sign up at raceforward.org/subscribe because you don't want to miss out on those updates. Also, want everyone to subscribe to us on all of the places where you get your podcasts. If it's Apple, hit us up. If it's Google Play, you already know what it is. Spotify, we don't discriminate. Check us out. You can rate us as well. I'm not going to get Jamaican on you but --
Hiba: Tweet us.
Chevon: That's right.
Hiba:
You know.
Chevon:
You're so cute. Tweet us.
Hiba:
Tweet us. Listen, we got to hear. We got to get feedback. We're not, we're not limiting how you can interact with us, so,
Chevon:
That's right. All the negative feedback. Please tweet that at Hiba, personally. She will handle it. Thank you.
Hiba:
I'll take the criticism. I'll take that. I'll take the L for the team.
Chevon:
Yes, I'm too sensitive. Thank you.
Outro Music