Today we officially start organizing the 2011 Allied Media Conference. It will be here before you know it. Since the Summer, we've been surveying AMC participants and interviewing the coordinators of last AMC's 14 tracks. With everything we learned through that process, we improved the track organizing process and created a comprehensive AMC Tracks Frequently Asked Questions document. This FAQ contains everything you need to know before proposing a track.
Here are some of the reasons to organize a track, as told by the coordinators of some of last AMC’s tracks:
“To take the work you're doing places you can't yet imagine.”
"Our AMC track spring-boarded multiple organizing efforts across the country and provided a strategic moment to embed media justice into our organizing effort for human rights."
“Organizing a track for the AMC was a chance to keep building shared work with our partners across the country and to get a rare opportunity to see each other face-to-face.”
READ THE AMC TRACKS FAQ | CLICK HERE TO PROPOSE A TRACK
There are other exciting things afoot in the land of Allied Media. We have delved deep into our local organizing in Detroit. Read a summary of our work below and help us sustain this work by making a tax-deductible gift to Allied Media Projects.
The Detroit Digital Justice Coalition, which was incubated back at AMC2009 was awarded a $2 Million federal stimulus grant, as part of the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program. This is great news for Detroit because it means that stimulus dollars will be directly supporting grassroots organizing and community-based economic development efforts in the city. One of AMP’s roles within the project will be to channel the best practices in digital media education and transformative media-based organizing from across our national network and bring them into Detroit schools, businesses and community organizations. We will also be hiring. Check alliedmedia.org regularly and follow us on Twitter to stay abreast of job postings as they come out.
As we dive into this huge and exciting project, it is critical that we continue to have unrestricted support for our core projects of the Allied Media Conference and the Allied365 Training & Exchange Bureau. Help us sustain our core projects by making a gift to Allied Media Projects today!
Our ongoing work with the Detroit Digital Justice Coalliton’s includes new projects to proliferate wireless mesh broadband networks across Detroit. This work was initiated through the AMC2010 “DIY Technology” track as participants constructed an experimental wireless mesh network in Detroit’s North Corktown neighborhood. Through the DDJC, we are partnering with our friends at the Open Technology Intiative to expand these community Internet access technologies to other parts of the city. We look forward to sharing the results of these experiments at next year’s AMC!
AMP continues to broaden the base of digital media artists, organizers and educators in Detroit. AMP media education specialists recently led two “Train-The-Trainer” programs. Since the AMC, AMP has trained 18 media trainers, co-produced six videos, and built three media-based organizing curricula with local and national allies. With the Michigan Roundtable for Diversity and Inclusion, we supported youth produced sci-fi pop ed videos that explore the struggle to build community across diverse identities. The youth went on to lead a series of workshops with their videos throughout Detroit, as part of a city-wide youth leadership effort. In partnership with the Ruth Ellis Center in Highland Park, MI, we supported LGBTQ youth to create a mini-documentary Voguing, about the dance art form. The Ruth Ellis Voguing documentary producers are now using their skills to infuse media arts throughout the center’s programing.
In August, AMP partnered with the Youth Noise Network’s national youth media program, Youth Building Healthy Communities. Jon Blount, the first certified graduate of AMP’s Train-The-Trainer program, facilitated Detroit youth to produce two videos about how the lack of recreation centers in Detroit impacts the lives of young people and how this issue should be addressed.
In September, AMP organized a delegation of Detroiters to attend the Prometheus Radio Project barnraising in Hudson, New York. We came home with deeper relationships and stronger skills to apply to local radio projects.
Last weekend, the Detroit Summer Live Arts Media Project hosted a tour and celebration dinner for their city-wide multi-media mural project. This project was launched through a partnership with the Beehive Design Collective and the "Rad Art" track of AMC2010. Read more about the tour here and call 1-888-317-8418 to listen to the audio interview collages that are now embedded in the murals.
The Beehive Collective returns to Detroit in November through a partnership we are facilitating with Detroit environmental justice activists. The Bees will showcase their newly completed “The True Cost of Coal” poster and accompanying popular education workshops. Through this collaboration, we are developing a more holistic understanding of the connections between media justice and environmental justice, and the critical role of art and technology in both movements.
Meanwhile, we are readying our overhaul and relaunch of alliedmedia.org. The AMC portion of our website is anticipated to relaunch by the end of 2010 and you will be able to preregister for the 2011 conference. Also watch out for the soon-to-be launched Allied365 Training & Exchange Bureau online catalog showcasing the training, performance, curriculum and consultation resources of the Allied Media Projects network.