On my journey of unlearning and relearning, I’ve been listening to different podcasts as an educational tool. I love podcasts as episodes tend to range from 20 minutes to two hours in length, which is great when you are limited on time. For the past two weeks, I’ve been more intentional in my podcast choices and will continue to be.
Here are a few podcasts I’ve been listening to that tackle themes of anti-black racism:
2 Dope Queens
So I have to be honest, 2 Dope Queens is a podcast I haven’t listened to in the past two weeks, because I’ve already listened to every episode. My favourite podcast of all time, 2 Dope Queens is hosted by comedians Phoebe Robinson and Jessica Williams. Giving space to upcoming BIPOC comedians, Robinson and Williams are intelligent, funny, and socially aware. I relistened to the first episode recently, which is what initially hooked me to them. Robinson and Williams each share their parallel experiences of racism.
1619
1619 is one of the podcasts that I’ve listened to based on the recommendations of many sources on the internet. 1619 was created in 2019 for the 400th year anniversary of enslaved Africans coming over to the colony of Virginia, which is now America. This mini-series is six episodes long and explores the impact of this moment. Episode 3 and 4 are particularly interesting. Episode 3 talks about the birth of music in slavery, and how much of the music was stolen later by colonial Americans. Episode 4 focuses on the history of healthcare in America and how Black Americans were/are denied access to hospitals and doctors.
Good Ancestor Podcast
I discovered the Good Ancestors Podcast as I’ve been getting to know Layla Saad on Instagram and I’m currently doing the 2eight day work-book, Me and White Supremacy. Good Ancestor is an interview series where folks come on and have a conversation with Saad and what it means to be a good ancestor. I haven’t listened to all of the episodes yet, but from the ones I’ve listened to, I highly recommend her episode with Robin DiAngelo, and her episode with Rachel Cargle.
Each day, I try to listen to one episode of a podcast, and I continue to immerse myself in different media forms to unlearn and learn more about the systemic racism in the world. I have only scratched the surface, and will continue to discover other podcasts. Others on my list are NPR’s Code Switch and The Patdown with Ms. Pat. Please comment below any other podcasts I should listen to.
Written by Alana Kaplan, Project Manager for the I Am Resilient Project.
