Reclamation &
cultivation
2024 fellows
Throughout the country, these BADASS changemakers are drawing connections across culture and time through art and action to drive their communities forward. Whether centering food justice or reclaiming ancestral tradition, each of the 2024 Fellows are making the world better in the here and now.
ABDIEL
GUZMAN
BRITTNEY SHELBY
SESSOMS
Katya
ABAZAJIAN
MECHIYA
JAMISON
MEGAN
GOURD
PAULA X.
ROJAS
THANH
TRAN
VICTOR
VALENCIA
Learn more about the future they're creating.
ABDIEL GUZMAN (HE/HIM)
SAMAR | Arcahic Territory
“Combatting colonial history, healing people & lands.”
Abdiel seeks to create environmental awareness to acknowledge the need to reverse the damage caused to the marine ecosystems by 60 years of U.S. Navy military practices, unsustainable and extractive fishing, unsustainable tourism, gentrification, and displacement of local communities. SAMAR’s mission is for youth to become stewards and create conscious connections with the sea through a sense of belonging.
BRITTNEY SHELBY SESSOMS (SHE/HER)
Black Urban Homesteads | Chickasaw Territory
“Growing food, folks, & fortune for all."
Brittney imagines a vibrant community where members hold on to cultural importance to revitalize themselves, their familial lineage, their communities, and their environment. Black Urban Homesteaders sow seeds of sovereignty in the food system by reconnecting Black and Indigenous lives and communities with the land. We prioritize the use of the land for nutrition, health, and wellness in the fight against disparities.
KATYA ABAZAJIAN (THEY/SHE)
Local Data Futures Initiative | Akokisa Territory
“New insights daily, Pisces keeps flowing.”
Katya believes in communities’ right to control access to their personal and community data, fighting extractive capitalist and carceral systems that prevent this ownership. The Local Data Futures Initiative empowers residents to use data to shape local policy by building data-sharing systems for residents, organizers, and advocates. LDFI aims to trasnform cooperative governance models and launch a community advisory board to become a community-based data resource.
MECHIYA JAMISON (SHE/HER)
Nourish | Kaskaskia Territory
“Passion, peace, & purpose; freedom is imminent.”
Mechiya creates interactive, educational spaces to name extractive systems and uplift community solutions. Her third exhibit is Nourish : A rejection and analysis of our food system. She seeks to start a collective conversation that denormalizes the extractive mechanisms of mass-produced food by unpacking their environmental and socioeconomic impact. This will be held in collaboration with food justice organizations, and BlPOC-owned farms across the Midwest.
MEGAN GOURD (SHE/HER)
Indigenously Different | Caddo Territory
“Motivated, enthusiastic, resourceful, innovative, reliable, sad.”
Megan is on a quest to validate the learned experiences from Indigenous elders, community, and culture. Indigenously Different offers an opportunity to empower traditional teaching environments through a convenient homeschool tracking app by categorizing learning within traditional knowledge. Indigenously Different will create a safe place for shared experiences and an evolution of learning by reclaiming action-based education.
PAULA X. ROJAS (SHE/HER/ELLA)
Building a Just and Loving World | Tonkawa Territory
“Relentlessly optimistic, patient, fiercely loving.”
Paula is reframing how we understand the social justice protracted path, defining where we will need a level of inner stamina and collective strength that we may not yet imagine but of which we are capable. Birthing a Just and Loving World is a workbook and impact campaign that builds a strong bridge across two social and racial justice movements: Birthing Justice (an arm of Reproductive Justice) with the Police and Prison Abolition movement.
THANH TRAN (HE/HIM)
Finding Má Film | Ohlone Territory
“I laugh to save my tears.”
Thanh is a filmmaker, sharing a personal story in hopes of enacting broad change across global communities. Finding Má is about his bi-racial family shattered by the foster care and prison systems reuniting after 20 years of separation to heal and rebuild – starting with finding our estranged and unhoused mother in the streets of Sacramento. The film will be a launching pad for an impact campaign to promote new narratives about foster youth and formerly incarcerated communities.
VICTOR VALENCIA (HE/HIM)
Building Out Safer Spaces | Pascua Yaqui Territory
“Victoria told no, Victor opening doors.”
Victor models the liberated world by curating community spaces free from toxic masculinity, ableism, and white supremacy culture. Building Out Safer Spaces is a trades community and educational model that is anti-racist and Trans and Queer-centric, starting with volunteer-and-learn builds for queer and trans housing non-profits. He is now creating a dedicated makerspace and workshop where Women, Queer, Trans, and Femme of Center folks can learn, share, design, and develop skills.