Learning Liberation:
The Ethnic Studies Podcast
Season 1

Find us on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, and Amazon Podcasts!

The first season of our podcast will debut in the Spring of 2024 and will feature episodes on:

Native American & Indigenous Studies

Ethnic Studies in Elementary Schools

Teaching Palestine

Black Lives Matter at Schools

Queering Ethnic Studies

Episode 0:
The Ethnic Studies Movement

To kick off this podcast’s pilot episode, we’re joined by our very own co-host Juana Teresa Tello, as well as Anita Fernández, and Jason Ferreira. In this episode they’ll share more about the origins of the Coalition for Liberated Ethnic Studies, which was established in 2021, but has collaborative origins and lessons that span well beyond this timeline.

We encourage new listeners to to our podcast to start with this episode to help orient you and provide context to our Liberated Ethnic Studies movement.

Episode Resources:

XITO MECA 2022

Interview: Jason Ferreira 1968 – The Strike at San Francisco State

NPR Code Switch: ‘On Strike! Blow It Up!’

KQED: Ethnic Studies: Born in the Bay Area from History’s Biggest Student Strike

San Francisco State College Strike, 1968-1969 – San Francisco State University’s Special Collections and Archives

Rethinking Ethnic Studies: Edited By R. Tolteka Cuauhtin, Miguel Zavala, Christine Sleeter, Wayne Au

Ethnic Studies Pedagogies Journal

Episode 1:
Native American & Indigenous Studies

Our first official episode is dedicated to highlighting Native American & Indigenous Studies. Interviewers, Anita Chikkatur and Sarah Garton, are joined by guests, Nathaniel (Nate) Taylor and Sylvia Fred. All four are situated in the greater Red Lake community, in what is now known as Minnesota, providing texture to the local context that has birthed Endazhi-Nitaawiging Charter School, a community-built school led, and implemented with, culturally relevant, rooted, and responsive Ojibwe curriculum and pedagogy.

We encourage new listeners to to our podcast to start with Episode 0 to help orient you and provide context to our Liberated Ethnic Studies movement.

Episode Resources

Endazhi-Nitaawiging Charter School

Red Lake Ojibwe Immersion Program Pre-School

Red Lake Nation

Throughline podcast episode about the history of Red Lake Nation and Leech Lake Nation

Warrior Nation: A History of the Red Lake Ojibwe by Anton Treuer

Ojibwe in Minnesota by Anton Treuer

Mni Sota Makoce: The Land of the Dakota by Gwen Westerman & Bruce White

NACA Inspired Schools Network

The Youth Group That Launched a Movement at Standing Rock The New York Times

Mni Sóta Maḳoce: The Dakota Homelands curriculum (6th grade)

Episode 2:
Ethnic Studies in Elementary Schools

Welcome back to another school year teaching and learning liberation! This second episode of the season features interviewers Kate Frazier and Dr. Ronnie Gordon, both Co-Assistant Directors at Whole Child, within the Tacoma Washington Public Schools. 

Kate and Ronnie had the opportunity to interview Dena Harris, who is currently teaching 5th Grade Ethnic Studies in North Thurston Public Schools (in Lacey, Washington). Prior to this, she served as a District Instructional Coach and developed and recorded over 150 ELA lessons for elementary teachers to use during remote learning instruction.  All the lessons were aligned with the Social Justice Standards and highlighted diverse cultural perspectives. 

She is also the author of www.teachinghumanity.org, an online resource for curated children’s books, educator resources,  recent book reviews and recommendations, and a guide to choosing anti-racist books that address social justice.

Episode Resources

Teaching Humanity