Speaker 1: Congratulations, You've been accepted into the inaugural class of Therapy
Speaker 1: for Black Girls University. Whether packing for a new year
Speaker 1: on campus, thinking through your gap year and rolling in
Speaker 1: a community college, or grabbing your souls for graduation, tbgu
Speaker 1: is here to help you thrive at this stage of
Speaker 1: your life and beyond.
Speaker 2: Hi.
Speaker 3: I'm SORRYA Taylor, and I'm the TBG podcast production intern.
Speaker 3: We'll return to Jana. Right after the break.
Speaker 1: Last year, videos of a flooding at Clarkalana University went viral.
Speaker 1: I know I'm not the only one who sees videos
Speaker 1: like these and wonders how the climate crisis will continues
Speaker 1: to impact me and my friends who are in college.
Speaker 1: To help mitigate some of the anxiety I'm sure we
Speaker 1: all have around the climate crisis, I'm joined today by
Speaker 1: gen Z Climate Activists. Wuahwah Gathiu Wawa is the founder
Speaker 1: and executive director of Black Girl Environmentalists, the largest national
Speaker 1: organization dedicated to empowering Black girls and women in the
Speaker 1: climate movement. She has been recognized as a Glamour College
Speaker 1: Woman of the Year, a Forbes thirty Under Thirty recipient,
Speaker 1: and was featured on the January twenty twenty three cover
Speaker 1: of Vogue alongside Billie Eilish and seven other climate activists.
Speaker 1: In our conversation today, Blahwah breaks down some key terms
Speaker 1: relevant to the climate crisis, ways we can get involved
Speaker 1: with the environmental justice movement on our campuses, and why
Speaker 1: it's important for college students in particular to care about
Speaker 1: climate change. Here's our conversation. Thank you, mama for being
Speaker 1: with us today. You are a climate storyteller and founder
Speaker 1: a Black girl environmentalist.
Speaker 4: I would love to hear the story behind the birth.
Speaker 1: Of black girl environmentalists and how your journey into the
Speaker 1: world of climate actually began.
Speaker 4: Could you walk us through that?
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. First, thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 5: I'm so excited to share more about my story and
Speaker 5: to share about black girl environmentalist. The story and the
Speaker 5: seed idea for VGE started when I joined the climate movement.
Speaker 5: So I joined climate when I was fifteen years old.
Speaker 5: I had a really pivotal environmental science teacher who had
Speaker 5: added a chapter on environmental justice, which essentially meant it
Speaker 5: introduced me to this long tradition of particularly matriarchs of
Speaker 5: color that have been across a diaspora. Essentially at the
Speaker 5: forefront of earth advocacy, and I was also learning that
Speaker 5: the climate crisis was partially impacting black and brown people
Speaker 5: around the world, yet we were the least represented in
Speaker 5: leadership or in the narratives that we were hearing. So
Speaker 5: very early in my journey, I started joining climate organizations
Speaker 5: where I was from, in the state of Connecticut, and
Speaker 5: I quickly realized that the climate movement that I was
Speaker 5: coming accustomed to did not have any space for black
Speaker 5: women or black youth in general. I was the youngest
Speaker 5: person by at least twenty years. In every space that
Speaker 5: I was in, I was the only person of color,
Speaker 5: always the only black person in Hartford. So there were
Speaker 5: all these discrepancies that I was seeing while I was
Speaker 5: also learning about how black women in particular are experiencing
Speaker 5: the brunt of environmental degradation in the climate crisis, and
Speaker 5: getting honestly really frustrated and angry at the lack of
Speaker 5: space for us to be resource and empowered. So I
Speaker 5: remained in the climate space. You know, at fifteen, now
Speaker 5: I'm twenty four, and all these years, every year I
Speaker 5: was like, I wish there was a space for us.
Speaker 5: And so in twenty twenty I made an Instagram account
Speaker 5: called Blackgrown Environmentalist and the rest is history.
Speaker 2: Now we're a nonprofit.
Speaker 1: I love that and thank you for explaining your process.
Speaker 1: What is the significance of establishing a dedicated space for
Speaker 1: black women and non binary individuals within environmentalism?
Speaker 5: So the process has been a really interesting one. I
Speaker 5: think what's different about BEGE from a lot of other
Speaker 5: nonprofits is that the concept of the organization came after
Speaker 5: the community. So, like I said, I started an Instagram
Speaker 5: page in the summer of twenty twenty. I was just
Speaker 5: really frustrated at the lack of space for black women
Speaker 5: and black gender expansive people to talk about our unique
Speaker 5: experiences in the climate movement. At the same time, I
Speaker 5: wrote an article for Vice essentially the titles it's time
Speaker 5: for environmental study to own up to like erasing black
Speaker 5: people or something like that, and it went really really
Speaker 5: viral in the climate space, and the number one audience
Speaker 5: that was reaching out to me were black women and
Speaker 5: black girls in particular, other early career people that were like,
Speaker 5: I'm having the same exact experience, and that was the
Speaker 5: first time that they knew that there was someone else
Speaker 5: out there going through the very same things, but staying
Speaker 5: because the climate crisis is impacting our community, so we
Speaker 5: need to be in those spaces. So what was cool
Speaker 5: is that I took the step of taking this Instagram
Speaker 5: page and transforming it into a nonprofit. Because the community
Speaker 5: continued to grow and remain strong three years after that
Speaker 5: was a huge aspect. And then also even though I
Speaker 5: am myself very early career, I've been in the climate
Speaker 5: movement for ten years now, and all these experiences that
Speaker 5: we're seeding this idea for BGE, they were not and
Speaker 5: are not unique experiences. There are black women and black
Speaker 5: girls and black gender expansive folks that are experiencing the
Speaker 5: very same thing. So when it came down to really
Speaker 5: getting our mission solid, which is addressing the pathway and
Speaker 5: retention issue in the climate sector, for BGES, it was
Speaker 5: a process that honestly was just affirming the experiences that
Speaker 5: we know that we've been having and coming together to
Speaker 5: create really solid resources to address them in ways that
Speaker 5: actually center us and.
Speaker 2: Are actually being led by people closest to the.
Speaker 5: Circumstance, because right now, a lot of the pathway and
Speaker 5: retention programming or initiatives in climate are not led by
Speaker 5: young people, and they're also not being led by black
Speaker 5: or Indigenous people, yet we are the demographics that are
Speaker 5: disproportionally impacted by the climate crisis. The mission itself was
Speaker 5: a community effort, and I've been really lucky to have
Speaker 5: just such a great network honestly of mentors that I've
Speaker 5: gone throughout the years, other veges that have been like
Speaker 5: mentoring laterally and horizontally in this journey of navigating a
Speaker 5: nonprofit as a young person, because it's been very difficult.
Speaker 1: Well, thank you for walking us through that. I'm just personally,
Speaker 1: I'm touched by the work that you do with BGE.
Speaker 1: I wanted to be an environmentalist as a little girl.
Speaker 1: I remember in my car seeing like the emissions and
Speaker 1: the fumes and the fires and be like, we need
Speaker 1: to put it into this justice. But it's inspiring to
Speaker 1: hear that you were doing the work as a fourteen
Speaker 1: year old. So I want to get into more of
Speaker 1: a definition esque part, just because the jargon of some
Speaker 1: of these words are confusing. So we often hear the
Speaker 1: phrase of climate change stone around, but some don't know
Speaker 1: the true definition. Can you define the following terms for us?
Speaker 1: So we'll start off with climate change.
Speaker 5: So also I want to first affirm you and say
Speaker 5: that if you care about clean air, clean water, and
Speaker 5: support your community, then you're an environmentalist. I think that
Speaker 5: the movement has done a really poor job around actually
Speaker 5: having a definition that people can relate to and that
Speaker 5: is relevant to all of us, and that has been
Speaker 5: a losing strategy because it really comes down to addressing
Speaker 5: the scale and scope of this circumstance we're in. We're
Speaker 5: experiencing ecological breakdown that's tied to human activity, and not everybody.
Speaker 5: It's not like we all cause the climate crisis. The
Speaker 5: climate crisis was caused by the fossil fuel industry. As
Speaker 5: for the climate crisis, I like to call it the
Speaker 5: climate crisis. Obviously climate change is a technical term, but
Speaker 5: using the term crisis I feel like really is doing
Speaker 5: a more intentional job by fossil fuel interests and was
Speaker 5: paid for from blood money from chattel slavery. So I
Speaker 5: think what's really interesting is if you take a climate
Speaker 5: science class or even look up on Google like what
Speaker 5: caused the climate crisis, You're going to see greenhouse gas
Speaker 5: emissions that can be tied to the Industrial Revolution and
Speaker 5: the influx of greenhouse gases that came about with our
Speaker 5: global economy being shifted in that way. But the Industrial
Speaker 5: Revolution didn't come about randomly. It's not the father of
Speaker 5: the climate crisis because it didn't pay for itself, it
Speaker 5: didn't raise itself. It was subsidized with blood money from
Speaker 5: chattel slavery and validated by manifest destiny. If we look
Speaker 5: back to I don't know, like eighteen sixty for example,
Speaker 5: enslaved people represented the largest single financial asset in the
Speaker 5: entire economy, like worth more than manufacturing and railroads combined.
Speaker 5: And that doesn't even include the crops that they produced,
Speaker 5: right like the sugar, the tobacco, and of course cotton.
Speaker 5: So we already know that enslaved people subsidize the entirety
Speaker 5: of American life. We know that the US economy was
Speaker 5: built off of that wealth. So in the face of
Speaker 5: the abolishment of chattel slavery, the US launched itself into
Speaker 5: a new economic system paid for by the same family,
Speaker 5: same generational wealth. The Industrial Revolution where we went from
Speaker 5: extracting from the backs of enslaved Africans and the extraction
Speaker 5: of the land to a new type of extraction, which
Speaker 5: is the grounding of the climate crisis. So I think
Speaker 5: it's really important to acknowledge those connections because when it
Speaker 5: comes to thus solving the climate crisis, it requires us
Speaker 5: getting to the roots of how we got here and
Speaker 5: understanding that climate solutions require addressing systemic racism, addressing the
Speaker 5: historic and continue the impacts of colonialism and imperialism, the
Speaker 5: same systems that cause the climate crisis in the first place.
Speaker 4: Okay, so what about environmentalism?
Speaker 5: Yeah, So, like I said before, I think the definition
Speaker 5: for environmentalism is pretty simple. It's value based rights. Do
Speaker 5: you care about clean air? Do you care about clean water?
Speaker 5: Do you believe that we all deserve access to these
Speaker 5: basic human rights? Do you care about our ecosystems being
Speaker 5: able to continue to exist? Do we care about a
Speaker 5: future for ourselves, our aging parents, our future bloodlines if
Speaker 5: we choose to have them or not. The answer is
Speaker 5: yes to any of these questions, then you are an
Speaker 5: environmentalist because you have have a set of values that
Speaker 5: are around caring for yourself and our holistic ecosystems.
Speaker 1: And you definitely just affirmed little Jana, So I appreciate that.
Speaker 1: And lastly, environmental justice.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so, basically, environmental justice asserts that all people deserve
Speaker 5: access to a clean and healthy environment, regardless of their race,
Speaker 5: socioeconomic status.
Speaker 2: Their ethnicity, their country of origin.
Speaker 5: Just requires that we all have equitable access and pathways
Speaker 5: into experiences that allow us.
Speaker 2: Also to self determine what a healthy environment is.
Speaker 5: And the reality is is that all of our relationships
Speaker 5: with the environment are not all ones that are equal,
Speaker 5: and are not ones that allow us to have a
Speaker 5: healthy environment. And oftentimes it is, especially in the context
Speaker 5: of the United States, it's race that determine our relationship
Speaker 5: to the environment as well as our proximity to environmental hazards.
Speaker 1: Well, thank you for breaking those terms down. I'm curious,
Speaker 1: why is it important for college students to care about
Speaker 1: climate change?
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh my gosh, I love that question. It's important.
Speaker 5: Like if we were to do like a large umbrella,
Speaker 5: everybody in it, we are all going to experience the
Speaker 5: impacts of the climate crisis, and.
Speaker 2: Most of us already have.
Speaker 5: It's just as a matter of whether or not we
Speaker 5: have the language to make those connections or not, which
Speaker 5: is why I'm really adamant about talking about how the
Speaker 5: climate crisis isn't just an ecological crisis, it's also a
Speaker 5: narrative crisis.
Speaker 2: We don't know how to talk about it.
Speaker 5: We don't know how to name these experiences that we
Speaker 5: all are having and recognize this as being climate related.
Speaker 5: And so for college students, the average college student is
Speaker 5: a young person that is in college attempting to gain
Speaker 5: the skills and resources to be able to be young
Speaker 5: change makers. The climate crisis is the biggest threat of
Speaker 5: all time because not only does it create new problems,
Speaker 5: but it exacerbates and intensifies all existing social ills. So
Speaker 5: the climate crisis is this thing that we can either
Speaker 5: experience the impacts of or decide to be a part
Speaker 5: of the solutions that can ultimately allow.
Speaker 2: Us to, in my opinion, love a better world into existence.
Speaker 4: Well, thank you for explaining that.
Speaker 1: So a big part of your work is making climate
Speaker 1: issues accessible. Could you break down some of today's urgent
Speaker 1: climate issues.
Speaker 2: I can talk about extreme heat.
Speaker 5: So that's an example where I think we all experienced
Speaker 5: and solve the impacts of the heat waves and the
Speaker 5: extreme heat that happened this summer and last summer. But
Speaker 5: this past July was actually the hottest month ever recorded
Speaker 5: in history.
Speaker 2: And that's not by accident.
Speaker 5: That is tied to the climate crisis, and oftentimes people
Speaker 5: might be confused as to how that circumstance, for example,
Speaker 5: showcases the ways in which the.
Speaker 2: Climate crisis doesn't impact us all the same.
Speaker 5: There's this saying that I like to say, which is,
Speaker 5: we're all experiencing the same storm, which is the climate crisis,
Speaker 5: but we're all not in the same boat. So we
Speaker 5: look at demographics that have been disproportionately impacted by extreme heat.
Speaker 5: An obvious example would be the house's populations, but also
Speaker 5: black communities in general. So we think about black communities
Speaker 5: and where we are, particularly in our cities. The reality
Speaker 5: is is that there has been a ton of research
Speaker 5: that showcases that previously redlined communities are actually hotter by
Speaker 5: five to thirteen degrees hotter than neighborhoods that weren't previously
Speaker 5: redlined and that are predominantly white. Why well, when we
Speaker 5: think about redlining the discriminatory lending practices in the nineteen twenties,
Speaker 5: those areas were also disproportionately chosen and selected for the
Speaker 5: placement of highways, the placement of warehouses, the placement of
Speaker 5: essentially infrastructure with impervious surfaces that absorb heat, making them
Speaker 5: actually hotter from the concrete in addition to the fact
Speaker 5: that these very same communities don't have the same amount
Speaker 5: of canopy cover or green space, which also supports with
Speaker 5: mitigating extreme heat. So that's an example in which while
Speaker 5: extreme heat was something we all experienced, whether it was
Speaker 5: like not being able to go to I don't know
Speaker 5: if festival because it messed up the energy forcing or
Speaker 5: just being uncomfortable going outside, or even sometimes the infrastructure
Speaker 5: of the buildings we're in aren't actually created for this
Speaker 5: type of heat.
Speaker 2: Black communities were actually hotter, and.
Speaker 5: So that's a very clear example of how this is
Speaker 5: like an issue that we're all experiencing. But because of
Speaker 5: things like redlining, discriminatory lending practices, and the history of
Speaker 5: Jim Crow, we are seeing how, for example, infrastructure can
Speaker 5: lead to worse outcomes and health outcomes for black communities
Speaker 5: and black college age students as well.
Speaker 1: Wow, that is I would never think about July being
Speaker 1: so hot in that way. So that's definitely something I
Speaker 1: think we should all look into more closely as we're
Speaker 1: transitioning into warmer temperatures just on average with the climate crisis.
Speaker 3: Right, Hi, I'm Sorria Taylor and I'm the TBG podcast
Speaker 3: production intern. We'll return to Jana right after the break.
Speaker 1: So what other ways do climate issues affect the black community?
Speaker 5: The fact that black youth are actually experiencing eco anxiety
Speaker 5: climate anxiety at very high rates. My hot take, and
Speaker 5: which isn't really a hot take, is that I think
Speaker 5: eco anxiety is an environmental justice issue and that it
Speaker 5: disproportionately impacts black youth in the spaces that I'm in,
Speaker 5: I hear eco anxiety and climate grief all the time,
Speaker 5: but I realized that that terminology might not be talked
Speaker 5: about in other spaces. So eco anxietyological grief is defined
Speaker 5: by the American Psychological Association as quote a chronic fear
Speaker 5: of environmental doom, which may include feelings of worry, fear, guilt,
Speaker 5: or shame, and even hope. This is just something that
Speaker 5: young people in general are experiencing, however, because like I
Speaker 5: said before, the climate crisis doesn't impact all people in
Speaker 5: communities equally, neither does ecological grief. Right, The nature of
Speaker 5: a person's eco anxiety often is dependent upon how immediate
Speaker 5: the impacts of climate change are on their lives, and
Speaker 5: that immediacly often depends on privilege. I just gave you
Speaker 5: an example on how extreme heat looks different in different communities.
Speaker 5: But when we also think about the existing resources that
Speaker 5: are and largely are not there, especially for black youth
Speaker 5: in regards to mental health services and access to those spaces,
Speaker 5: Black youth are already more at risk of depression, anxiety,
Speaker 5: and stress, and I believe black girls right now have
Speaker 5: the highest rising suicide rate in the country. So those
Speaker 5: are the existing circumstances and the baseline of where we're
Speaker 5: in when you bring climate, natural disasters, and all of
Speaker 5: these circumstances in which climate is intensifying existing circumstances, creating
Speaker 5: new problems, displacing people, and we know it's this imminent
Speaker 5: threat that's getting worse. Why is it that when you
Speaker 5: type in eco anxiety, you will never hear a nuanced
Speaker 5: conversation of how it impacts particularly Black and Indigenous people
Speaker 5: and Black and Indigenous youth. That we're in this situation
Speaker 5: where we're kind of like we didn't lead to these dynamics.
Speaker 2: Our grandparents didn't do it.
Speaker 5: Like our grandparents were of the people seeding the money
Speaker 5: for the Industrial Revolution.
Speaker 2: We definitely weren't.
Speaker 5: The ones that were behind childel slavery. So there is
Speaker 5: a huge narrative issue, and that narrative issue actually informs
Speaker 5: the resources that exist around eco anxiety because I think
Speaker 5: that a lot of us are rightfully very fearful and
Speaker 5: don't know where to go about all these really complex
Speaker 5: emotions that we're feeling about climate and unfortunately, right now,
Speaker 5: the mainstream space has really embraced this color blind perspective.
Speaker 2: On eco anxiety.
Speaker 5: And I think that it's a missed opportunity as well,
Speaker 5: because I think that all of these complex things that
Speaker 5: we're experiencing and emotions can actually be pushed towards action.
Speaker 2: I get really angry when I think about the climate crisis.
Speaker 2: There's like a lot of.
Speaker 5: Anger that I have and finding sustainable pathways communities like BGE,
Speaker 5: where you get to be in community with other people
Speaker 5: that are experiencing the same things, have a space to
Speaker 5: talk about them upfront, even if it's uncomfortable, and then
Speaker 5: have avenues to contribute it towards advocacy and action that
Speaker 5: is supporting our communities very directly and very intentionally. All
Speaker 5: of those things are to me pathways for us to
Speaker 5: begin addressing this.
Speaker 1: Like you said, with so much distressing news about the
Speaker 1: climate crisis, some people feel overwhelmed and disheartened, leading them
Speaker 1: to withdraw or lose motivation to care. So what are
Speaker 1: some words of advice or encouragement that you would share
Speaker 1: with someone grappling with these emotions or even climate anxiety.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I feel like it's always an interesting line to tow.
Speaker 5: I feel like when I'm specifically like talking to like
Speaker 5: black women around addressing climate because everything inside of me,
Speaker 5: I know for a fact that we will solve the
Speaker 5: climate crisis.
Speaker 2: When black women are in leadership period, Like black.
Speaker 5: Women are the first in line of defense with bascism
Speaker 5: in this country. We literally hold up democracy on our backs.
Speaker 5: And I also don't want us to be martyrs. So
Speaker 5: it's this balancing act. Generally, I'd say, like, here's the thing,
Speaker 5: when I'm talking to like other black people, I don't
Speaker 5: need any convincing of whether or not people should act
Speaker 5: like social advocacy activism is our generational birthright, point blank period.
Speaker 5: We think about examples of youth organizing in the climate
Speaker 5: space in the past decade, for example, like the Sunrise
Speaker 5: movement that was largely behind this recent announcement around the
Speaker 5: Climate Core, which we'll be providing climate jobs for twenty
Speaker 5: thousand young Americans. Sunrise movement quite literally, and they are
Speaker 5: known for like acknowledging this, they're organizing platforms and strategy
Speaker 5: literally comes from the textbooks of the civil rights movement.
Speaker 5: So I feel like in this there is this unique opportunity,
Speaker 5: particularly from so many.
Speaker 2: Aspects of our community. Whether we're talking about.
Speaker 5: How to navigate hope in a time of despair, literally
Speaker 5: look no further than the Black Church, like an institution
Speaker 5: that has been able to support folks in the midst
Speaker 5: of so much. You literally don't have to look any
Speaker 5: further than you know, civil rights leaders and activists, many
Speaker 5: of folks that are still alive, that have children, that
Speaker 5: have been able.
Speaker 2: To remain leaders in our communities.
Speaker 5: So much of what the climate movement is looking for,
Speaker 5: I believe exists.
Speaker 2: In our communities.
Speaker 5: So it's just a matter of integrating, like i'd say,
Speaker 5: like a climate lens into existing work, because I don't
Speaker 5: necessarily believe that you necessarily have to go outside of
Speaker 5: what's going on for it to be climate adjacent. But
Speaker 5: that's also i'd say, like carving out spaces for us
Speaker 5: to be able to intentionally address the way that climate
Speaker 5: is impacting us.
Speaker 2: And that's why I always give the pitch to people.
Speaker 5: If you're looking for a community of other black women
Speaker 5: and black gender expansive folks, especially if you're like gen Z,
Speaker 5: you should follow Black grown Environmentalists.
Speaker 2: Join one of our hubs.
Speaker 5: We have ten hubs across the US. We're in everywhere
Speaker 5: from New Orleans, Los Angeles, New York City, Chicago, Miami.
Speaker 5: I'm on the spot, so I'm like, what about DC, Philly,
Speaker 5: We're in the Bay, We're in Houston, We're in Atlanta.
Speaker 2: And we do bi.
Speaker 5: Monthly engagements in each of these cities and have already
Speaker 5: cultivated really beautiful community spaces for us to essentially engage
Speaker 5: in climate action and advocacy, but also rest like our
Speaker 5: spaces can be anything from going to like a town
Speaker 5: hall together, or going to a march together, to meeting
Speaker 5: up with a black bee keeper and getting to see
Speaker 5: that process, or all having like a self care day
Speaker 5: or like going to a happy hour. I think there
Speaker 5: are ways for us to come together and rest and
Speaker 5: heal and have spaces of resilience.
Speaker 2: That's building collective power. So when we need to show up.
Speaker 5: We already have that community that we can come together
Speaker 5: and do the things.
Speaker 1: I love that BG has that while you were in college,
Speaker 1: how did you balance your studies with your climate activism
Speaker 1: and running the organization.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so I'll like quickly clarify, I mostly was navigating
Speaker 5: BGE and school work in grad school, so like I
Speaker 5: graduated undergrad May of twenty twenty, but I still was
Speaker 5: doing this balancing act of being a climate activist in
Speaker 5: school and it was really difficult.
Speaker 2: But something that really really helped.
Speaker 5: Me was having mentors within the school system that supported
Speaker 5: me and knew what I was doing was really important,
Speaker 5: and finding ways to have allies in this system. I
Speaker 5: think for me, like my I did a degree in
Speaker 5: like environmental studies, so our program was already very very small.
Speaker 5: I had the privilege of getting really close with a
Speaker 5: lot of my professors, so like they kind of got it.
Speaker 5: So I was able to, like in a lot of ways,
Speaker 5: sometimes finesse credit for things I was doing outside of
Speaker 5: the classroom.
Speaker 2: And those things started because I was asking. I was like,
Speaker 2: is there.
Speaker 5: Any way we could do like an independent study for
Speaker 5: this project or this internship. And it was interesting because
Speaker 5: when I was able to have a very clear ask
Speaker 5: and deliverable that.
Speaker 2: Would come out of this independent study.
Speaker 5: For example, most times people were willing to work with me,
Speaker 5: and I understand that it was like a huge, huge privilege.
Speaker 5: And looking back, and when I tell people that, they're like, wait, what,
Speaker 5: but I think it begins with asking.
Speaker 2: I think a lot of people aren't asking. So there.
Speaker 5: I'd also say, looking back, there's a lot of things
Speaker 5: that I wouldn't do again. And I did a really
Speaker 5: bad job at balancing. I wouldn't necessarily change the way
Speaker 5: I did college. But looking back, I was perpetually burned out.
Speaker 5: I was taking at least twenty credits a semester and
Speaker 5: working at least thirty hours outside of class, which meant
Speaker 5: I was barely sleeping. And the reason why I was
Speaker 5: doing all this is because I was like climate crisis
Speaker 5: so urgent. I'm not spending all this time doing this.
Speaker 5: What am I doing?
Speaker 2: YadA YadA, YadA, YadA YadA.
Speaker 5: And looking back, I wish that I was able to like,
Speaker 5: really fully appreciate the community is that I was organizing
Speaker 5: alongside with. Because no successful movement allows for folks to
Speaker 5: perpetually burn out, we should feel comfortable to take a
Speaker 5: step back and to take care of our mental health,
Speaker 5: to take care of our soul, like our personal relationships,
Speaker 5: to just have time to be a young person, being young,
Speaker 5: doing fun sometimes stupid stuff, you.
Speaker 2: Know what I mean.
Speaker 5: And the only wish I'd have for my younger self
Speaker 5: is that I wish that I had the wisdom I
Speaker 5: have now or had someone in my life like look
Speaker 5: me in the eye and be like, Wowa, the climate crisis,
Speaker 5: it's here, it's not going anywhere.
Speaker 2: You Deciding to not take.
Speaker 5: This job or not take this internship for a semester
Speaker 5: or even a year isn't going to make you any
Speaker 5: less qualified or isn't going to make you, know what
Speaker 5: I mean. There are opportunities looking back that I'm like,
Speaker 5: I definitely could have taken a step back.
Speaker 2: I could have done a lot better with my health.
Speaker 5: And so I would say, just like being honest with oneself,
Speaker 5: I feel like there's a lot of pressure when you're
Speaker 5: in college to do it all and be all the
Speaker 5: things to all the people in your life, and the
Speaker 5: reality is is that it's a journey.
Speaker 2: It's a journey.
Speaker 5: Once you're done with that, and then you're going to
Speaker 5: be post brad and that's another that's another journey. So
Speaker 5: the best thing is just like to pace yourself like
Speaker 5: these problems unfortunately they're not going away. But when we
Speaker 5: are working towards finding sustainable pathways for us to contribute,
Speaker 5: that actually is better for the movement.
Speaker 2: As a whole.
Speaker 5: Right because at the end of the day, the way
Speaker 5: that I think about the environment and our holistic ecosystems,
Speaker 5: our bodies are a part of that. When people are like,
Speaker 5: your body's a temple, your body is a part of
Speaker 5: our ecosystem. So taking care of yourself is a form
Speaker 5: of environmental action to me and in the communities that
Speaker 5: I'm building alongside, And if someone in my community is
Speaker 5: burnt out, they're not even useful for themselves to be
Speaker 5: able to actually experience the world that we're seeking to
Speaker 5: save and love into even a better iteration. So I
Speaker 5: think that framing of being like we should have time
Speaker 5: to experience all the things that we are trying to
Speaker 5: save and trying to love on.
Speaker 4: I love that so much. You mentioned some good important
Speaker 4: tips to call.
Speaker 1: Students right now to know the signs of burnout and
Speaker 1: to know that you're not going to be able to
Speaker 1: conquer it all right here, right now, and today, and
Speaker 1: also to honor yourself because to your point, you are
Speaker 1: a part of this ecosystem. So I love that that's
Speaker 1: super powerful. What guidance or tips which you offer to
Speaker 1: black women activists both within and outside of climate activism
Speaker 1: when discovering and asserting their voices.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I have a couple tips, i'd say.
Speaker 5: Also, the first thing I'd want to say and something
Speaker 5: that I'm I'm navigating all these things still now, but
Speaker 5: one of the first things is you aren't your work,
Speaker 5: you aren't your output. That's quite literally like a symptom
Speaker 5: of the sixth system that we're in, which is capitalist
Speaker 5: system that quite literally places our value and our work
Speaker 5: on the output of work that we're putting out there,
Speaker 5: and on the external validation of people telling.
Speaker 2: You that your work is valuable. That is, lack of
Speaker 2: a better word, bullshit.
Speaker 5: You are valuable and precious regardless of what you do.
Speaker 5: And I think that this is something that I'm definitely
Speaker 5: navigating now. Of Wawa as Wawa me like my full
Speaker 5: name is with Jiggo, so not even Waba like, Butko
Speaker 5: is beautiful outside of the work that I do and
Speaker 5: outside of what people might assume I am or who
Speaker 5: I am, and I'd say a part of that and
Speaker 5: setting yourself up for success just in general, is having
Speaker 5: people in your life that value you. Outside of that,
Speaker 5: I think that unfortunately, ego can come in when you're
Speaker 5: doing activist work, being able to like stay true to
Speaker 5: the things that got us into the space, and sometimes
Speaker 5: we need people in our lives that can be like, hey,
Speaker 5: let me check yourself. Like the movements about the movement,
Speaker 5: the movement isn't about me as an individual, you as
Speaker 5: an individual.
Speaker 2: We are trying to.
Speaker 5: Collectively empower and better our communities and being reminded of
Speaker 5: that and being in environments that are constantly reminding you
Speaker 5: that is so so important and something that I'm in
Speaker 5: the midst of like making sure that I'm holding myself
Speaker 5: accountable to those things. I'd also say that it's completely
Speaker 5: fine to change your mind, change your ideas. We're young,
Speaker 5: we're growing, and I think in this public facing activist space,
Speaker 5: there is this tendency for people to be pigeonholed and
Speaker 5: want to pigeonhole themselves around exactly what they're working on
Speaker 5: or how they're saying things.
Speaker 2: And honestly, it's normal to change your mind.
Speaker 5: It's healthy. It actually is what we should be doing.
Speaker 5: Like I look back to what I not necessarily because
Speaker 5: it was wrong. I just grew an experience and perspective,
Speaker 5: and so while I might have had a different perspective
Speaker 5: on X thing at eighteen, now in twenty four and
Speaker 5: I'm like, oh, well, I actually don't believe that necessary.
Speaker 5: And I think that it's actually a great sign for
Speaker 5: yourself if you're able to like address that head on.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I actually don't.
Speaker 5: Agree with myself five years ago. That's totally fine because
Speaker 5: also other people need to hear that so that they.
Speaker 2: Feel like it's okay.
Speaker 5: And then lastly, another piece of advice that I have
Speaker 5: is just around wellness and wellbeing because like so many
Speaker 5: of the people that I know that are like activists,
Speaker 5: because the work that we do.
Speaker 2: Is so urgent and feel so urgent because.
Speaker 5: It is we do really put oftentimes like we'll taking
Speaker 5: care of ourselves on the back burner. I recently started
Speaker 5: trying to work out more regularly just because I really
Speaker 5: needed those endorphins, and the difference has been like great.
Speaker 5: But sometimes that's taking a little hot girl walk outside.
Speaker 5: Sometimes it is just going outside. There's tons of research
Speaker 5: that shows that even like five to ten minutes out
Speaker 5: side can like really really impact your mental health.
Speaker 2: For example, the outdoors and nature does have a lot.
Speaker 5: Of antidotes to what circumstances that we are experiencing.
Speaker 2: And sometimes it is.
Speaker 5: Like I needed to take a walk, and now I
Speaker 5: feel a lot better. Ball side, take a walk, move
Speaker 5: your body and know that again, like taking care of
Speaker 5: yourself because we're a part of this collective ecosystem is
Speaker 5: a part of ecosystem help. So like understanding ourselves and
Speaker 5: connection to others and our planet is so so important.
Speaker 5: And I think that perspective is really good when we
Speaker 5: think about community care.
Speaker 1: I love that for our black women activists, our sisters
Speaker 1: doing the work, it's really important to remember that and
Speaker 1: it's really hard, I can imagine, to remember that while
Speaker 1: you're doing the work every day.
Speaker 3: Hi, I'm SORRYA Taylor, and I'm the TBG podcast production intern.
Speaker 3: We'll return to Jana right after the break.
Speaker 1: What are three things a college shouldn't could do on
Speaker 1: their campus to contribute to climate activism and be prepared
Speaker 1: for potential climate disasters on their campuses.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that question.
Speaker 5: So I would say the first thing is and this
Speaker 5: is so different because I feel like I did know
Speaker 5: this in college, but knowing your neighbors is so important.
Speaker 5: At least know their names, say hi, build like some
Speaker 5: sort of community, especially where you're living. Why because in
Speaker 5: the face of honestly, in the face of climate disaster
Speaker 5: or any type of emergency, your immediate community who is
Speaker 5: living near you, that is your lifeline.
Speaker 2: The second thing is there's a.
Speaker 5: Lot of colleges these days that have sustainability offices, but
Speaker 5: a lot of colleges that don't. I think that most
Speaker 5: HBCUs don't have like a sustainability office. And usually in
Speaker 5: the sustainability offices is where like folks are working on
Speaker 5: like climate action plans that can be accessible to students
Speaker 5: in the midst of, for example, a power outage or
Speaker 5: a storm or a flood or something like that. So
Speaker 5: if there is that type of institutional entity that is
Speaker 5: working on sustainability, reaching out to see if they have
Speaker 5: those resources, and if not, maybe seeing if there's like
Speaker 5: an internship opportunity to help support and develop those things,
Speaker 5: or maybe that can be like a thesis project or
Speaker 5: an independent study situation. And then the other thing I'd
Speaker 5: say is there's not necessarily this need to, like, for example,
Speaker 5: on college.
Speaker 2: Campus, create a whole new climate club.
Speaker 5: They usually are like environmental or climate clubs out there,
Speaker 5: depending on your campus.
Speaker 4: Thank you for that, OA. So I'm curious to know, WAWA,
Speaker 4: what is your vision for BEG in.
Speaker 5: The future, Black Grown Environmentalist I already shared our mission.
Speaker 5: Our mission is to address the path or and retention
Speaker 5: issue in the climate sector for bges right, with a
Speaker 5: particular focus on early career folks gen Z and hopefully
Speaker 5: like this new generation Jen Alpha.
Speaker 2: But ultimately we're.
Speaker 5: Here to provide community and resources to black women and
Speaker 5: black gender expansive folks with this focus on particularly young people.
Speaker 5: And I just want people to know that BEGE is
Speaker 5: a space for them to come to define community and
Speaker 5: it is also a space that's for you. Even if
Speaker 5: you hear the term environmentalists and you're kind of like,
Speaker 5: I'm not really sure if that's something that I'm about.
Speaker 5: I already shared the way that I see environmentalism that
Speaker 5: I feel like is shared.
Speaker 2: Honestly across the movement.
Speaker 5: And so if you're even just looking for a space
Speaker 5: to meet other like black women and like black gender
Speaker 5: expensive folks in your community, obviously, if you're in one
Speaker 5: of the hub cities come out to an event. It's
Speaker 5: a great way to meet other folks, to even network,
Speaker 5: especially like latterly, which is really important. I think a
Speaker 5: goal for me in general for the organization is that
Speaker 5: I'd like to see, especially from like black cultural spaces,
Speaker 5: is sustainability and climate being more upfront. I'm not going
Speaker 5: to name names because it's everybody and I totally get it,
Speaker 5: but like we have all these types of like conferences
Speaker 5: or gatherings that are really really for us, Like those
Speaker 5: are the spaces that we want to go to and
Speaker 5: that we're flying out to and whatever it might be.
Speaker 5: And there is literally no programming around climate and it
Speaker 5: is like the biggest like mind boggling thing to me
Speaker 5: because I'm like, we'd literally experiencing the climate crisis first
Speaker 5: and worse. And to be honest, I started BGE and
Speaker 5: the space that we're cultivating in BG largely is due
Speaker 5: to the fact that I don't trust the mainstream climate
Speaker 5: movement to create spaces for us in which like we're
Speaker 5: actually being resourced from the early career into senior leadership
Speaker 5: and realizing our full potential in climate leadership. I don't
Speaker 5: see those spaces as necessarily having the resources or even
Speaker 5: having the purviews. You know that that's something that they
Speaker 5: should be doing if they're actually equity focused. So like
Speaker 5: we have to be focusing on building within our own communities,
Speaker 5: and what I would like BGE to do and helping
Speaker 5: to bridge those gaps is to help show up in
Speaker 5: those spaces to go to the essen's best and the
Speaker 5: culture cons I guess i'll name drop, so the manifesting
Speaker 5: being able to connect bges that are already leading in
Speaker 5: climate because trust me, there are black women that are
Speaker 5: out here doctor Beverly Wright, who is like one of
Speaker 5: the foremost environmental justice scholars in the country, in the world,
Speaker 5: who is a black woman that started as a professor
Speaker 5: at Dillard University at the age of twenty seven in
Speaker 5: the Deep South and has been doing this work for decades,
Speaker 5: that should be platformed in these spaces that should be
Speaker 5: out here in the non climate black spaces, so that
Speaker 5: we can better make these narrative connections so that we
Speaker 5: are well prepared in the face of a climate disaster,
Speaker 5: flooding storm, whatever it might be, and that we have
Speaker 5: the resources to know how to.
Speaker 2: Navigate those things.
Speaker 5: In a perfect world, I like to see every institution,
Speaker 5: whether it's like a church, whether it's a school, whether
Speaker 5: it's whatever type of gathering space, for example, having.
Speaker 2: A climate action plan. We should and we don't.
Speaker 5: It's not something that we oftentize other resources to know
Speaker 5: how to navigate. And so I see BGE as being
Speaker 5: a space in which people can see themselves reflected in
Speaker 5: the space in this movement, and one that can connect
Speaker 5: people to the climate sector as a way for folks
Speaker 5: to build generational wealth from their career, but then also
Speaker 5: be able to do work that is supporting the vitality
Speaker 5: and health and wellbeing of our communities because climate connects
Speaker 5: with everything, and so any opportunity that BGE could continue
Speaker 5: to bring those conversations, bring resources, particularly to black women
Speaker 5: and black gender expansive folks, We're going to do it.
Speaker 5: And so like a goal of mine would be that
Speaker 5: we are in by next year twenty cities that we
Speaker 5: have twenty hubs that were able to have like a
Speaker 5: national summit every single year where bgs from around the
Speaker 5: country can come and network and build community, build collective power.
Speaker 5: I'd love for us to have a podcast like y'all
Speaker 5: one Day to be able to explore these conversations, and
Speaker 5: I'm going to put a quick plug. We are launching
Speaker 5: our Hazel and Johnson Fellowship next summer, named after the
Speaker 5: mother of environment justice, Hazel and Johnson, look her up.
Speaker 2: And we will be placing twelve to fifteen early career bges.
Speaker 5: College students actually at ten week climate internships, and those
Speaker 5: internships are across disciplines, so some of the placements actually,
Speaker 5: for example, we're going to have an intern or two
Speaker 5: at coach Topia, which is the sub brand of Coach
Speaker 5: who is actually one of our leading funders for this
Speaker 5: bellowship program. Or folks are going to be able to
Speaker 5: be at the forefront of the circular economy that's happening
Speaker 5: within the fashion industry and be able to learn from
Speaker 5: experts that are quite literally leading that from like a
Speaker 5: luxury brand perspective. We're also going to have folks that
Speaker 5: are interning at grassroots environmental justice organizations, Folks that are
Speaker 5: going to be working at the intersection of ESG and finance.
Speaker 5: For example, finance is a space that has the fastest
Speaker 5: growing jobs in the green economy, but the least amount
Speaker 5: of talent to fit that, so there's tons of potential
Speaker 5: like young Black women to get their bag in that
Speaker 5: space and do go work. So like having more pathways
Speaker 5: for people to get their foot in the door to
Speaker 5: ultimately continue to have a career in climate and whatever
Speaker 5: discipline that you're in. So if that's something that you're
Speaker 5: interested in, definitely make sure to follow so on Instagram,
Speaker 5: follow our website, and be on the lookout in the
Speaker 5: next couple of months for the application, because this program
Speaker 5: is going to be the first that it's kind for
Speaker 5: black women and black tenner or expansive young people to
Speaker 5: be able to actually have black mentorship navigating the climate sector,
Speaker 5: have a foot in the door and a lot of
Speaker 5: these institutions or placements that can be really difficult and
Speaker 5: competitive to get in and have that direct entry in
Speaker 5: a way that's culturally competent and that also allows us
Speaker 5: to create spaces for community to be built amongst the fellows.
Speaker 1: That sounds amazing and I fully believe that BG will
Speaker 1: do so everything you just said in more. Do you
Speaker 1: have any recommended podcasts our social media pages that we
Speaker 1: should look into to deepen our knowledge of climate action?
Speaker 5: I have a ton of suggestions. The first thing I
Speaker 5: want to shout out is a new show. Actually it
Speaker 5: is called Wild Kingdom and it is a show that
Speaker 5: actually ran for over forty years and is coming back
Speaker 5: with a co host by the name of doctor raywnd Grant,
Speaker 5: who is a friend of mine, a black woman that's
Speaker 5: leading in the space of wildlife conservation and she's just
Speaker 5: like the sweetest person, the most intelligent person as well,
Speaker 5: and I'm so excited to be able to celebrate her
Speaker 5: on the big screen because, as we all know, we
Speaker 5: don't often see black women in science communication, let alone
Speaker 5: nature broadcasting.
Speaker 2: So she's quite literally making history.
Speaker 5: So if you have some time to watch it, support
Speaker 5: As far as social media accounts, obviously, I'm going to
Speaker 5: tell you to follow Black Grow Environmentalist.
Speaker 2: We are great.
Speaker 5: We're always posting events that we're doing in person as
Speaker 5: well as just posting educational continent resources that are focused
Speaker 5: particularly for gen z so college aged students as well.
Speaker 5: Other folks that I would suggest to follow are from
Speaker 5: the outdoorsy point of view. There's like High Club, which
Speaker 5: is another incredible organization.
Speaker 2: It's an intersectional high.
Speaker 5: Club for women of color and they are really really great.
Speaker 5: The founder, Evelyn is such a visionary and does so
Speaker 5: much for community color the Trails is also a good organization.
Speaker 5: Peace in the Wild is an incredible organization.
Speaker 2: They are based in Atlanta, Georgia. So if you're in
Speaker 2: the atl and you're looking for community.
Speaker 5: We have a hub in atl too, but I'm gonna
Speaker 5: put them on if you're looking for opportunities to do
Speaker 5: fun outdoor activities. They put on really really incredible outdoor
Speaker 5: experiences for black folks in this state of Georgia.
Speaker 2: And yeah, they're really really cool.
Speaker 5: As far as direct resources, I would really recommend. There's
Speaker 5: this book called Black Earth Wisdom is a collection of
Speaker 5: focal conversations with black environmentalists. It has a pretty intergenerational
Speaker 5: set of experts that are essentially at the beginning, it
Speaker 5: starts with giving a very very clear look into the
Speaker 5: legacy of black women, in particular in our relationship with
Speaker 5: earth advocacy. Everyone from like Harriet Tubman as a naturalist,
Speaker 5: as a wilderness expert, and making sure that we're like
Speaker 5: putting respect on her name, especially in the space of
Speaker 5: wildlife conservation and nature and outdoors knowledge. She's one of
Speaker 5: the ogs and should be understood as such. And this
Speaker 5: book just steps such a good mix of historical accounts
Speaker 5: to really be able to ground ourselves and our ancestry
Speaker 5: in this work, but also just beautiful words and conversations
Speaker 5: from black folks across the diaspora.
Speaker 2: That are incredible and are leading in this space. So
Speaker 2: I would really recommend that book.
Speaker 4: Thank you for sharing all of those. Where can we
Speaker 4: keep up with you? What are your social media handles
Speaker 4: and website?
Speaker 2: Yeah? So I'm on Instagram and TikTok.
Speaker 5: My instagram is huawa underscore getherro, so wa wa underscore
Speaker 5: g A t h E r U and my TikTok
Speaker 5: is that without underscore, So just Wawa get thero and Yeah,
Speaker 5: feel free to follow me there tap in if you're interested,
Speaker 5: and also reach out if you're interested in learning more
Speaker 5: about getting into climate.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much Fawa for meeting with us and
Speaker 1: indulging me in all all the work that you do
Speaker 1: keep going. I'm so proud of the work that you're
Speaker 1: doing and we need we need it so bad. So
Speaker 1: thank you so much again for talking with me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I appreciate you. Thank you for having me out.
Speaker 1: I want to thank wah Wah once again for joining
Speaker 1: us for this episode. Class is over for now, but
Speaker 1: before we dismiss take the following notes from my conversation
Speaker 1: with Wahwah home with you. Find out if your university
Speaker 1: has a stainability office on campus. If not, explore opportunities
Speaker 1: with your professors to create one. Get involved with your
Speaker 1: campus climate club or find a local one in your neighborhood.
Speaker 1: Work with your family, friends, and neighbors to create a
Speaker 1: climate plan in case of an emergency.
Speaker 4: To learn more about the.
Speaker 1: Work Wawah is doing, or to do more research on
Speaker 1: this topic, be sure to visit Baarppoblackgirls dot com, slash
Speaker 1: tvgu This episode was produced by Frieda. Lucas, Elise Ellis,
Speaker 1: and Zaria Taylor. Editing is by Dennison L.
Speaker 3: Bradford