Encounter without Borders: Weaving Solidarity - September 1st, Casa Latina (Seattle)

Invitation to a series of gatherings for organizing community resistance

We invite all the communities (Latinx and non-Latinx) that live in the Seattle area to participate in a cultural day to kick off a process of meetings, workshops, and cultural exchanges, with the aim of knitting solidarity networks, sharing experiences and building common grounds around urgent issues that affect our communities.

Our first gathering will be held on Sunday, September 1st, from 10.30 am to 5 pm at Casa Latina (317 17th Ave S, Seattle, WA 98144), after which we will meet at 7 pm, at the Hillman City Collaboratory (5623 Rainier Ave S, Seattle, WA 98118) to celebrate and dance with Mare & Valentina's concert of conscious music.

We, the ones behind the organization of the event, position ourselves from a shared understanding that rejects the current management of migration and border policy, as well as the neo-colonial and biased positions with which information about this issue is being presented. We also understand that the communities most affected by these policies are experiencing weariness as a result of the many calls to action they’ve received in the past; as well as distrust and suspicion that may stem from the same cause. Based on this, we feel the need to propose spaces to build a politics of communities without borders, conceived and designed by the communities and for the communities, that will allow us to assume collective forms of resistance against the migratory policies that are being enforced upon us.

Our activity on September 1st will begin at Casa Latina with a ceremony of blessing of the meeting space and recognition of the lands which we inhabit, followed by a musical opening with Bailadores de Bronce. We will share a community lunch, and at the same time, we also hope to discuss the importance of good nutrition and self-care as a process of resistance. Then, we will conduct open-ended conversations in a participatory workshop framework. Finally, we will move to the Hillman City Collaboratory to enjoy Mare & Valentina's conscious music concert, both musicians and activists from Oaxaca and Chile.

From this first gathering, we intend to establish working groups around issues such as the housing crisis, community resistance to " La Migra", climate justice, community feminism, development of artistic abilities among our communities, gun control, and other issues that are of interest to the attendees, considering the needs of the communities most affected by the current policies.

We also hope to organize future activities in places where the communities we want to reach have been displaced, and not only focus on the Seattle area.