Tag: 2023

ASWM Conference May 5-6, Syracuse NY

Registration Links and Conference information here

Guadalupe Urbina is a Costa Rican singer-songwriter, poet, and activist who champions and celebrates Indigenous peoples and women. She is a folk musician whose compositions reflect the oral tradition of Guanacaste, her birthplace. She has performed in both Europe and the United States and has won various awards for her work domestically and internationally. She researched the oral tradition of Guanacaste starting in 198,4 during which she collected hundreds of songs, with grants from ACAM and the Spanish Cultural Center. She then published the song book Sones de mi Tierra Caliente, which contains unpublished and anonymous songs of the Guanacaste province, and she performed these songs at a concert at the National Theatre of Costa Rica. Her creative work includes numerous albums and three books, most recently Palabras de Larga Noche.. Guadalupe is the subject of the 2019 documentary film Los caminos del amor, which covers her life and work.

THE SACRED FEMENINE IN THE WATERS OF ABYA YALA

Abya Yala is the oldest name so far known referring to the Americas as a territory. It means “land in full maturity” or “land of vital blood”, in the Dulegaya language spoken by the Guna ethnic group that inhabits Panama and Colombia. In the visions of people whose center of life is water as a vital and sacred element, the Mother Water (original grandmother) is the Origin and renewal of the life.

The work of Marija Gimbutas opened an immense door for the knowledge of the sacred feminine. Although her research was carried out far from our continent, we discovered between the lines a hermeneutic that made it easier for us to read our archaeological discoveries and our myths. And it is with these tools that I have been studying the deities and magical beings of the waters in Abya Yala. There have always been the founding tales that validate human existence, the terrifying urban legends that give credence to our deepest fears, and these legends are strongly linked to nature and wildlife. One of the most crucial protagonists of these legends is the woman in her most elemental form.

In addition to her panel presentation, Guadalupe will also share her music with us in our Saturday evening showcase, Celebration of the Waters.

 

ASWM Conference May 5-6, Syracuse NY

Registration Links and Conference information here

A dancer, drummer, and independent researcher, Tahya is a woman of central European and Irish descent.  As a little girl, she was inspired by her mother’s reading the Thousand and One Nights and, later,  by the music of Rimsky-Korsakov. Upon hearing the intoxicating melodies and hypnotic rhythms of Egyptian music, she found herself “swept away on a magic carpet ride” that led her to study and teach the “movements and rhythms of the ancient dance of the Goddess, traditionally handed down from one from one generation to the next, grandmother to granddaughter.” She learned dance and percussion from her honored teachers, Susheela, Jamila Salimpour, Mimi Janislawski, and Layne Redmond. These experiences have led her to her work to revive interest in women’s playing the systrum, the instrument of the Egyptian goddesses.

Workshop and Panel Presentation

 Ancient Egyptian Waters of Life & the Goddess Hathor

In ancient Egypt ‘the Water of Life’ sustaining all flora, fauna and human population was the Nile River. Dotting the landscape along the river’s route are temples dedicated to deities of the ancient Egyptian pantheon. Situated on the Nile’s west bank is the temple complex at Dendera, with its main temple dedicated to the Goddess Hathor and an adjacent shrine to Isis oriented to the heliacal rising of Sirius, which corresponds with the annual flooding of the Nile, essential to fertilizing crops. This presentation focuses on Hathor, the ” Mistress of the River,” as goddess of fertility, motherhood, music and dance, plus additional attributes. I also introduce participants to the rhythm of the systrum ~ Hathor’s sacred instrument and ritual iinstrument. In the tradition of her priestesses, we will “shimmer” the systrum to invoke blessings to heal and protect the waters.

 

ASWM Conference May 5-6, Syracuse NY

Registration Links and Conference information here

Tona Ina: Literary Creation of a Matriarchal Archetype to Tell Narratives about Feminist Paradigm Shift

This presentation is about my experience of creating a literary character, Tona Ina (Sea Light in Yorba) as an archetypal character to tell the untold stories of the Ocean, its fresh waterways and the sacredness of women. . I created a character who would tell the stories of our communal archeological scuba diving, which is contributing to the recovery of the untold history of the afro-descendant population on the coast of Costa Rica.  Tona Ina features literary stores in diverse voices about present day challenges that affirm women’s tenacity.

Sharing voices about alternative ways of being in the planet through storytelling by Tona Ina is best done when we dive deep into women’s alternative experience to overcome  mainstream paradigms of patriarchy and capitalism. Tona Ina is the extension of the gift of voice and choice in today’s world, as part of the maternal gift economy and an ecofeminist paradigm of symbiotic interaction of the human species as part of nature.

María Suárez Toro is a PHD in Pedagogical Mediation of Holistic Paradigms, currently, a community underwater archelogy graduate, a feminist journalist, an activist in defense of human rights, an educator, a fisherwoman and scuba diver and writer. She was born in Puerto Rico and has been a resident of San José, Costa Rica for close to 50 years.

She is currently coordinator of a youth community diving Center Ambassadors of the Sea in Costa Rica’s Southern Caribbean. She was a co-director of the Feminist International Radio Endeavor (FIRE) from 1991 to 2011, of which she is a co-founder. She worked as an educator in literacy in many countries in Central America during the 1970s and 1980s. Between 1998 – 2017 she was an Associate Professor of Communication at the University of Denver.

 

“Nipiih and the sacred mekinawewin (Water and the sacred act of giving)”

Registration Links and Conference information here

Since time immemorial, as with our ancestors, we have come to know that Water is alive, and she is a living Being responsive to the nurturing of all else living upon and within Earth Mother. Our bond with her is reflected in ceremonies, rituals, honourings, teachings and healings; and these bonds are found in the narratives we tell one another.

Here four Indigenous women share their stories of sacred relationships with Water. In the telling of our histories, we’ve embodied our ancestral teachings and gained an understanding of who we are as Mi’kmaq, Basque and Michif women. As we reveal the nurturing life force of place, through Water’s connectivity and the notion of healing, we hold the hope for the protection of those yet to come. In these stories, we honour the sacred Water of our collective and intertwined nations, and women everywhere who protect Sacred Water.

Miigam’agan shares her relationship with Apaqtu’g—the ocean water where the sun rises—and where the ceremonies that signify healing and vitality within Water are held among those of the Wabanaki nation.

Natasha Simon shares her notion of Plujug’jqamati through the eyes of her Mi’kmaq ancestors, and the stories left to her through her grandmother’s lifework.

Idoia Arana-Beobide describes Basque teachings embodying Water that are found at the sacred mountain of Amboto, where the spirit force of goddess MARI and the Christian “Lady of the Remedies” (who are one and the same) resides.

Margaret Kress-White presents kisiskâciwanisîpiy (fast flowing river) of Treaty Six as the traditional gathering place for many Indigenous peoples. Here Water or Nipiih is intricate to all that is living – and to the healing medicines found along the river bank.

 

ASWM Conference May 5-6, Syracuse NY

Registration Links and Conference information here

Lisa Levart is an award winning visual artist/photographer whose interests lie at the intersection between fine arts and social engagement. Her subjects are women and how our stories connect us to one another. Lisa’s work blends several mediums, including collage, film, multi media, dance and photography. Her process is collaborative, making space for personal agency, and the radical act of declaring, “See me.” Lisa’s Goddess on Earth ORACLE, with portraits of real women portraying the Divine Feminine, won a 2022 Nautical Book Award (Books for a Better World).

WORKSHOP: Ignite Your Intuition and Step Into the Rivers of Creativity with ORACLE CARDS   You don’t have to be steeped in the magical world of tarot and oracle cards to use them to gain personal insight or build community. This workshop will be an introduction on using Oracle cards to help readers get out of their comfort zone and allow hidden connections to flower. We will explore the language of images and symbols, the power of stories and stimulate one’s intuition to gain new perspectives on each readers personal journey. After learning the basic elements of the Goddess on Earth ORACLE deck, we will jump into individual readings…with each other as partners. Even perfect strangers and novice readers will find themselves opening up to new ways of communicating. Interacting with the divination cards and learning to trust your intuitive response is a vibrant exercise that will deepen your personal knowledge and strengthen your connection with others.

See also Lisa’s conference presentation, with Myles Aronowitz and Grandmother Clara Soaring Hawk, “The Creation of Women of the Ramapough Lenape Nation.”