Liberating Dharma: Transforming the Suffering of Racism Together
Medicine Buddha
Liberating Dharma Course Overview
The course will meet 7-9 PM on these dates (4th Tuesday with some exceptions due to holidays):
September 29, 2020 – Creating a Container and Building Trust and Common Ground
October 27, 2020 - Exploring White Privilege/Supremacy as Structure and Experience
November 17, 2020 - Exploring Indigeneity, Settler Colonialism and Decolonization
January 26, 2021 - Exploring Anti-Black Racism as Structure and Experience
February 23, 2021 - Talking About It
March 30, 2021 - Exploring Latinx Identities and Experiences
April 27, 2021 - Exploring Asian American Identities and Experiences
May 25, 2021 - Exploring Intersectionality
June 29, 2021 - Anti-Racism as Daily Practice, as Zen Practice
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As Zen Buddhists, we are asked to take the Bodhisattva vow to liberate all beings. But how can we liberate all beings when we don’t understand the structural conditions of racism and how it impacts each of us differently? When we recognize this, how can we walk the eight-fold path of the Dharma in a way that leads to concrete actions that relieve suffering?
Course Description:
Appamada offers this new 9-month course which starts on September 29, 2020. The course includes monthly meetings, readings, teachings, and practices led by a team of facilitators from the sangha. Together, we will learn, feel, share, and listen in order to move closer to transforming the suffering of racism into engaged Buddhist action.
The course is designed and will be facilitated by Appamada students Circe Sturm with Sandra Medina Bocangel, Robin Bradford and Tasha Monroe.
Each 2-hour class will include brief required readings, a short sitting period, lecture and discussion, group work and/or dharma activities. Most classes will take place 7-9 PM on the 4th Tuesday of the month. See below for specific dates as two dates are shifted due to holidays. The course will be offered on Zoom and, when possible, in person (with a Zoom option to ensure accessibility).
There is no registration fee for the course. Donations are welcome. Donate to Appamada or give dana (generosity) to the teachers
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About the Facilitators
Circe Sturm, Ph.D.
Circe is a practicing anthropologist; she has spent her career trying to better understand how race shapes lived experiences of social belonging and political citizenship. Most of her research has been in collaboration with Native and African American communities.
She is the author of two award winning books, Blood Politics (2002) and Becoming Indian (2011), and editor of Blackness and Indigeneity in the Light of Settler Colonial Theory (2020). Her work has been profiled in the New York Times and on various local and syndicated NPR programs.
She has lectured in a range of public and university venues, including for the US Forest Service, New York Public Library, and Indigenous Law and Policy Center. As a public intellectual with a deep commitment to ethics, social justice, and community engagement, her work has been read, debated, and cited by scholars, tribal citizens, lawyers, judges, and a broader reading public.
She has taught about race and racism in the US for nearly 25 years, first at the University of Oklahoma and now at the University of Texas at Austin, where she is Professor of Anthropology.
Circe has practiced at Appamada since 2017, taking the Precepts in 2018. She currently serves on Council 4.
Sandra Medina Bocangel, L.Ac, MAcOM, MD (Mexico)
Sandra was born in Perú and grew up in Perú and México. She earned her medical degree in Mexico and completed her residency in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation. She practiced medicine for over 14 years in Mexico City and conducted clinical trial research for over 3 years. After finishing her residency she became interested in alternative medicine and started studying energy medicine.
Sandra moved to the United States and continued to work in research and public health, finishing a master program in Oriental Medicine in Austin. She has had a private practice since 2015 in San Antonio, where she integrates Western and Chinese Medicine.
She practices and teaches Qi gong and Tai chi. She has practiced meditation since 1997 and has been part of the Appamada community since 2012 where she serves on Council 2 and leads the Spanish Meditation Saturday mornings.
Robin Bradford
Robin has worked in nonprofit fundraising and communications for 30 years. Raising more than $25 million, she helped create homes for people who were homeless and produced status reports on women and Latino families. She began in-depth learning about race and the disproportionate number of Black and Hispanic families in crisis at CASA of Travis County.
After working at UT’s Ransom Center, Foundation Communities and Austin Community Foundation, she became a consultant for nonprofits in 2017. Clients include Conspirare, Todos Juntos Learning Center and Six Square: Austin’s Black Cultural District.
As president of the local Association of Fundraising Professionals in 2019, she led sweeping changes thatfor the first time honored philanthropists that reflect the diversity of Central Texas.
Raised in Oklahoma, Robin has an MFA in Creative Writing from Brown University. She has published widely and won a Dobie Paisano Fellowship for Texas Writers and O. Henry Short Story Award.
Robin has practiced at Appamada since 2007, completing Boddhisattva Initiation in 2016, and serving as head student in 2018. She has co-taught the Meditation and Writing Intensive with Judy Myers since 2016 and serves on Council 2.
Tasha Monroe
Tasha is a writer, realtor, and current affairs enthusiast. But to pay the bills she works as a Sr. Product Analyst for Whole Foods Market. As a native Austinite Tasha descends from a family of farmers and sharecroppers who have deeply shaped her values, spiritual development, and love for community, public service, and mission work.
From a young age, having been raised in a devout Southern Baptist and Non-Denominational blended home, she was nurtured in a household where faith and spiritual curiosity were strongly encouraged. This insatiable seeking nature ultimately led her to missionary work starting at the age of 14, and eventually evolved into a genuine passion for studying various philosophies, cultures, and religious doctrines at university and throughout her life.
She holds a BA from University of Texas at Arlington in Literature and Creative Writing with a focus innRussian literature and German philosophy. Tasha began her personal journey into the study and practice of Zen and meditation in the Spring of 2016. She has practiced at Appamada since 2019.