“Signifiers and an Emerging Paradigm – – Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum & Kindred Spirits” A Roundtable Discussion at the 2018 ASWM Conference
Stimulated by the opening chapter of Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum’s latest manuscript, Blackbird and a Pear Tree, (excerpted below) co-participants will be encouraged to share their signifiers. Lucia will bring to light the events, beliefs, people, and ideas that have contributed to her deep story, encouraging us to find our own submerged signifiers along the way. Participants will include Mary Beth Moser, Laura Zegel,Marion Dumont, Annette Williams, and Chickie Ferella, all of whom have been influenced by Lucia’s work. All kindred spirits are welcome to the discussion and to contribute their ideas and visions for a better future.
I began writing Black bird and a pear tree after my husband Wally passed September 4, 2014 numb with grief touching Wally’s and my deep story in our genetic unconscious~ preconscious submerged historical experience ~while consciously trying to keeping heart and eyes open
Because transparence is necessary for truth in a deceitful time, my political convictions are explicit on front cover, my deep beliefs suggested in front matter. Mary Saracino’s poem dives into my deep story, persecuted sister’s subterranean rage at historic violent power-over killing and subordinating dark others, including women.
Louisa Calio’s Italian American jazz poem, Signifying Woman, goes to the personal geographic/ethnic/spiritual /feminist context of this book. Renate Sadrozinski, feminist kindred spirit from a different cultural context, states her synthesis of shared feminist beliefs. Mary, Louisa, Renate inspire me to find my particular signifiers for my deep story. . . hoping this will stimulate you to find your own signifiers. 2 steps backward uncovering our deep stories may give us the energy to bound forward. . . encountering one another. . . creating energy that may transform ourselves and renew the world.
Lucia Chiavola Birnbaum, Professor Emerita, Women’s Spirituality, CIIS, great grandmother, feminist cultural historian, and nonviolent revolutionary. Internationally recognized author of several award-winning books including dark mother, Black Madonnas, and the future has an ancient heart. Lucia’s current manuscript, black bird and a pear tree, is a memoir that suggests convergence of values of primordial migrants out of Africa learning how to survive by caring, sharing, and healing. Lucia is the recipient of the ASWM 2016 Demeter Award for Leadership in Women’s Spirituality, awarded in recognition of “decades of visionary scholarship.”
Marion Gail Dumont: I was born in Verdun, in the Alsace-Lorraine region of France, and hold a Ph.D. in Philosophy and Religion with a specialty in Women’s Spirituality from the California Institute of Integral Studies. As a registered nurse, mother, and grandmother, the focus of my work over the years has been women’s health and well-being. Today, this focus has shifted from the physical care of others toward the spiritual, with an emphasis on women’s mysteries, sacred arts and healing.
Chickie Farella is a multimedia artist/writer in Women’s Spirituality, native of Chicago, Illinois who has been transplanted to the southern California desert. She is the recipient of the 1981 Chicago International Film Festival Video Music award and the 1982 Athens Film festival video Music Award and a contributing writer to several Italian American anthologies. Her essay “I Love You Mom: Do Me A Favor. . . Don’t Tell Nobody” is published in She Is Everywhere: Volume 3. www.Godthemother.com
Mary Beth Mosér holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy and Religion with a specialty in Women’s Spirituality from the California Institute of Integral Studies. Mary Beth’s dissertation, “The Everyday Spirituality of Women in the Italian Alps,” recipient of the 2014 Kore Award, reflects her passion for her ancestral homeland. An excerpt, “Wild Women of the Waters” is published in Myths: Shattered and Restored. Mary Beth lives on an island in the Salish Sea in the Northwest US and serves as president of the Seattle Trentino Club. See more of her writings on www.AncestralConnections.net and www.DeaMadre.net.
Annette Lyn Williams, Ph.D. is chair and core faculty in the Women’s Spirituality program at the California Institute of Integral Studies. She holds a doctorate in Philosophy and Religion with specialization in Women’s Spirituality. Research interests have centered on soul healing from sexual trauma, and the theme of women’s spiritual power and agency within the Yorùbá Ifá tradition, with specific reference to the primordial feminine authority of àjẹ́. She collaborated with Lucia Birnbaum and Karen Villanueva on the compilation of She is Everywhere! An Anthology of Writing in Womanist/Feminist Spirituality Vol. 2 and is currently co-editing a Motherline anthology.
Laura M. Zegel, LCSW received her M.S.W. from Columbia University and her M.Div. from Yale University. In private psychotherapy practice for adults and adolescents since 1994, currently in Rockland, Maine, she has consulted for public schools, local agencies and hospitals, providing inpatient and outpatient psychotherapy. With a deep interest in women’s and adolescent girl’s psychology, she has presented workshops and presentations on these subjects for the NASW Maine Chapter, the C.G. Jung Center, Brunswick, Maine, ASWM 2014 Conference in San Antonio, TX, and the Motherhood Initiative for Research and Community Involvement’s 2015 Conference in Rome, Italy.
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