Holding Space: A Storytelling Approach to Trampling Diversity and Inclusion: 1 - Softcover

Cairo Ph.D., Aminata

Softcover

ISBN 10: 9083156109 ISBN 13: 9789083156101

Publisher: Aminata Cairo Consultancy, 2021

Synopsis

In Holding Space Aminata Cairo presents her own, unique vision in the promotion of inclusion that far surpasses the standard diversity & inclusion approach. She grounds her work in indigenous knowledge, the blues aesthetics, holy hip hop, and Caribbean and black feminist theories. Hailing from her Surinamese roots, her Native American nurturing, and academic training she uses personal stories to explore the themes and steps on a way to a more inclusive community. She engages her audience utilizing storytelling, with the ultimate goal of creating a new story, collectively. She challenges the audience to take a closer look at themselves and each other, raising the question what it really takes to collectively create an environment of equality and validation. It is about us, all of us, is her message, as she forces us to feel, hear, and own that. This book is not a reading, it is an experience.

Aminata Cairo is an anthropologist, psychologist, educator, storyteller, and “love-worker”. She is an independent consultant “who works with people”. She is the former lector of Inclusive Education at The Hague University of Applied Sciences. She was the first and only research professor of African descent in the Netherlands. Born in the Netherlands to Surinamese parents she left for the US at age 18 where she pursued her academic career. She returned to the Netherlands after 30 years and obtaining two Master's degrees and a Ph.D. In the Netherlands she utilizes her academic, community activist and artist skills to make a difference and has a special affinity for the stories that are overlooked, silenced or marginalized.

About this title

About the Author

Aminata Cairo is an anthropologist, psychologist, educator, storyteller, and "love-worker". She is an independent consultant "who works with people". She is the former lector of Inclusive Education at The Hague University of Applied Sciences. She was the first and only research professor of African descent in the Netherlands. Born in the Netherlands to Surinamese parents she left for the US at age 18 where she pursued her academic career. She returned to the Netherlands after 30 years and obtaining two Master's degrees and a Ph.D. In the Netherlands she utilizes her academic, community activist and artist skills to make a difference and has a special affinity for the stories that are overlooked, silenced or marginalized.

From the Back Cover

In a world in which many are suffering from being alienated from
others, from Earth and from themselves, Aminata Cairo shows us
that it is not only necessary but possible to weave relations across
the dominant differences that keeps us apart, isolated and against
others. She shows us how it is possible in practice to overcome the
seemingly insurmountable divides of race, class and gender; she
also teaches us how to cultivate love within the white walls and
lifeless instrumentality of institutions.

Not very often one has the opportunity to learn how to mentor and
work with young people. In Holding Space, Aminata Cairo holds
us to learn how to intertwine our call as educators and mentors
with our personal stories and those from whom we learned to listen
to that call. In each of the lessons that are shared in this book,
we found ourselves while sensing the sacred space that is held for
us and for the love-work that is required for that. Aminata Cairo
expands and in doing so she invites us to follow her as a teacher,
mentor, storyteller, social activist, and artist... Gran tangi Aminata
Cairo, may this be the path in which many of us converge.

Rosalba Icaza, International Institute of Social Studies
and Rolando Vázquez, University College Roosevelt

Edition details

• Publisher: Aminata Cairo Consultancy
• Publication date: 2021
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 9083156109
• ISBN 13: 9789083156101
• Binding: Paperback
• Illustrator: Studios Dafri
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 328
• Editor: Rumbley Laura