Join us at the cozy, human-scale Symposia Community Bookstore (one of Hudson County’s last bookstores, and few remaining intellectual pubic spaces) as we continue our project to create a new  cultural, intellectual, and social space to humanize our sound byte-driven, rather shallow media landscape.  We’re currently broadcast on Cable Vision in Hudson County, MNN in Manhattan, and around the world on the Internet.

As is our practive, we will sit in a circle and share–through the ancient but forgotten art of dialgoue–our latest thinking on culture, politics, and the critical issues of our time.  I’m sure many of us will have a thing or two to say about the democratic euphoria new sweeping Egypt, and the joy we’ve seen in Tahrir Square over the past 2 days.  What implications might this have for freedom seekers in other parts of the world, including here in America?

On our panel we’ll be joined by CUNY Professor Costas Panayotakis, whose recent Augusto Boal-style agitprop in a NYC subway car also produced  joy, questions, and even some liberating laughter in the public space.  Costas, some of you may recall, offered a brilliiant analysis of the current political situation on a previous episode of Public Voice Salon, noting how economic inequality itself produces a health danger for millions of uninsured poor Americans.

To enrich our cultural imaginations, we have Farah Tanis and some of her collagues from the Brooklyn theatre group “The Mother Tongue.”  Their social justice-oriented  project empowers women of color, helping them find their voices, through the creation and performance of staged monologues.  

Keep in mind that, since we care about celebrating the joys and possiblities of human dialogue, we don’t necessarily have to start with or follow or be limited by a particular theme.  And, for those who feel unsure about being on a show that doesn’t have a concrete theme spelled out in advance, in effect we really do have a theme: learning how to use our voices, dialogically, in the public sphere.  Along with that, we have an opportunity to say things (in the realm of politics, the arts, or even personal stories) that mainstream corporate media doesn’t deem important–but nevertheless is nourishing for the community.

Finally, if there is an over-arching theme of our show (which is still very much a work in progress, emerging, like democracy itself–according to John Dewey–“in the making.”) it’s to create a rare space for humane public discourse that’s connecting and that builds community.  Shouldn’t this be enough?

Where:  Symposia Community Bookstore, 510 Washington St., Hoboken, NJ
When:  Friday, 2/18, 7:30 pm