Dates/Times: February 9 (1-6pm) and February 10 (9am-5pm)
Location: In Person – Union Theological Seminary
Instructor: Shanté Paradigm Smalls (they/them/theirs)
Registration Deadline: January 26, 2024

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This course offers how we might manifest the qualities of healer, liberator, companion, and visionary for ourselves, others, and the planet? During this course, we will discuss Harriet Tubman’s legacy, the efficacy of using Western bodhisattvas (awakened beings). We will work in small groups and do directed writing. There are typically three main practice components of a Sadhana: a. Mudras (sacred gestures) b. Mantra (sacred speech) c. visualization. Over the course of the weekend, we will begin each session with shamatha meditation (peaceful abiding) and end with simply resting in space (Dzogrim). We will practice the Sadhana practice I have written and read short excerpts from Spring Washam’s The Spririt of Harriet Tubman (Penguin Books, 2023). The weekend will also include small discussion groups, writing exercises, and walks.

Shanté Paradigm Smalls 

Shanté Paradigm Smalls is a scholar, artist, and writer. Their teaching, writing, and research focus on Black popular culture in music, film, visual art, genre fiction, and other aesthetic forms. Dr. Smalls’ first book, Hip Hop Heresies: Queer Aesthetics in New York City, published by NYU Press in June 2022, won the 2016 CLAGS Fellowship Award for best manuscript in LGBTQ Studies, the 2022-2023 New York City Book Award from the New York Society Library, and was awarded Special (Honorable) Mention for the 2023 IASPM (International Association for the Study of Popular Music) International Book Prize. The book was also short-listed for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s Gleason Book Prize. Smalls is an Associate Professor in the Department of Art & Public Policy at NYU. Smalls has held fellowships from the University of Rochester Humanities Center, the Andrew Mellon Foundation, The Institute for Citizens & Scholars (formerly Woodrow Wilson Foundation), and the James Weldon Johnson Fellowship at Emory University. They are a Series Editor of Critical Race, Indigeneity, and Relationality at Temple University Press