Operationalizing Love
Operationalizing Love
Session Description
Session Description
Love within the US context is often defined in overly individualistic, anemic, and depoliticized ways. It is discussed almost exclusively in the context of romance and its familial dimensions. Why? What of love and its role in social transformation? Grounded in Black liberation theology and Black feminist thought, this session will interrogate the Westernized construction of love. It will analyze the ways in which the everyday notion of love operates as a tool of oppression and perpetuates white supremacist ideology to shape our social realities, desirability, and diminishes our possibilities for social transformation. Instead, this session will offer us all an opportunity to interrogate what love is, how we have been socialized by it, and how it shapes our capacity to lead change and hold each other with loving accountability within the moment. Ultimately, this session is about reconceptualizing love in ways that help us resist erasure and dehumanization, and defining it in ways that helps us heal. We will explore a Critical Theory of Love framework to interrogate our own social justice practices to ensure that we are not perpetuating oppression, but instead helping ourselves and others discover their power and heal.
Participants will leave with:
1.An Operational Definition of Love That Is Based In Healing Justice
2. A Framework For Applying A Critical Theory of Love To Our Social Justice Work
1.An Operational Definition of Love That Is Based In Healing Justice
2. A Framework For Applying A Critical Theory of Love To Our Social Justice Work
3. Principles & Practices of Love To Help Us All Heal From The Effects of Systemic Oppression
A Pathway for Healing, Education, & Social Justice
A Pathway for Healing, Education, & Social Justice
"If love is going to be the transformative intervention we need in this moment, then love must be operationalized in ways that ensures our individual and collective healing and wholeness"--Dr. Durryle Brooks
This unique and original session was researched, created, and designed by Dr. Durryle Brooks in 2017. Based on the findings in his dissertation that explored the role of love in social transformation work, he has spent the last 5 years refining and sharpening this unique contribution to the progressive movement.
He has facilitated and/or will be facilitating this session at various national conferences including National Conference on Race and Ethnicity in 2022 and 2023, the Facing Race Conference 2022, Creating Change Conference 2023, the White Privilege Conference 2023, and the National Education Association Racial Justice Summit in 2019 and the upcoming 2023 conference.
Workshop Length: 1.5 hours - 6 hours
Operationalizing Love In Organizations- 1 day - 5 days
Operationalizing Love In Organizations- 1 day - 5 days
If you are interested in experiencing this unique and transformative offering, please contact us.
Quotes from Participants
2023
Quotes from Participants
2023
2023
"Thank you for sharing your story and wisdom! I left your talk feeling seen and inspired."
"Your presentation was invigorating, inspiring and nourishing."
"Touching in so many ways!! You were and are amazing!"
"I am so thankful that I got to hear your words and feel your love (even through Zoom)! Here's to defying the norms taught to us and LOVING each other with all our hearts and might."
"This was amazing. We were so glad to have you."
"This was transformative. Been thinking about it often since. Thank you so much!"
"Your words were calm for our world, Dr. Brooks. We'll be talking about your keynote from this point forward and operational love daily."
"You're brilliant and this talk was life-changing. Thank you!"