Social Justice and Anti-Racism Resources

Member Resources > Social Justice and Anti-Racism Resources

If you have any questions about the resources we've provided, please contact deia@televisionacademy.com.

Volunteering

NEW Did you know that volunteering your time to help others can provide not just a sense of purpose - but also deliver amazing health benefits? This very comprehensive guide lays out how your health can be improved and where you can volunteer acts of kindness that can benefit everyone involved! 

Stay Safe when supporting Black Lives Matter online

As a supporter of Black rights, learn simple tools and safeguards to employ as you make your voice heard, participate in social media, support a business or charity, or in the other ways you engage online in support of BLM.

We all know it is important to stay safe online to avoid hackers and scams, but by putting these steps into action, you add layers of security anytime you support BLM online.

Support Black-owned Businesses

Show your support by patronizing a Black-owned business. With over 450 listings, you will find a wide range of products and services - and you will help provide support and stability to these business owners. 

• Support Black-owned bookstores — here is a list that includes 12 stores currently taking online orders, along with great recommendations from owners and staffers.
• Bring dinner in from these Black-owned restaurants in Los Angeles or New York.
• Glamour magazine suggests 39 Black-owned businesses you can learn about and support.
• The L.A. Times list of 200 Black-owned food businesses in Los Angeles.

Black Mental Health Matters: Find Support

There are many mental health issues facing the Black community. Sunshine Behavioral Health has compiled information and resources to assist those looking for access or treatment. Beyond that, you can find information about the stress of racism and other challenges facing the Black community.

Mental wellness is crucial and so is challenging its stigma. Here are some tools and places to get help.

• Mindful — Foster mental health and practice healing
• NAMI'S Black/African American Mental Health site — HelpLine can be reached Monday through Friday, 10 am–6 pm, ET. 1-800-950-NAMI (6264) or info@nami.org.
• Lee Thompson Young Foundation — erasing stigmas and advancing holistic health rherapy resources for People of Color - find therapists who specialize in supporting BIPOC and queer folks
• Be Scene - Be Heard — 24/7 anonymous peer-to-peer chat app for entertainment professionals.
• Calm — free tools to help you take better care of yourself
• Mental Health resources to follow on Instagram
• Good Housekeeping offers 15 Mindfulness Activities to Reduce Stress and Increase Calm. Practice simple techniques and exercises to help improve mental clarity and curb anxiety.

Make Your Voice Heard

We want to use our platform to amplify your voice.

We invite you to share your story.

We welcome your words, perspective, and thoughts on the role and responsibility of our membership in understanding systemic racism, racial injustice, and the action that must be taken to create lasting change within our attitudes and institutions.

• BE HEARD! Reach out to your representatives and legislators by phone, letter or email. 
• Tips on how to best present yourself while making your voice heard on this video from Amnesty International
• People's Budget L.A. - Understand L.A. city's budget and make sure it reflects the values of the citizens.

Take Action

• 65 Resources for Racial and Health Equity: Individuals, groups and policymakers can find articles, toolkits, research pieces and other materials about issues facing Black Americans, Indigenous communities and other minority groups, and offer strategies for taking action to advance racial equity across society—particularly in healthcare. Learn how to approach and promote racial equality in communities, schools, healthcare systems and other areas.
• In this Rolling Stone article, Jon Blisten covers Alicia Keys' campaign demanding justice for Breonna Taylor. It also highlights her new Until Freedom video and offers ways to join the campaign and show your support.
• Women in Film has launched Hire Her Back, an initiative to call on entertainment companies to continue to seek gender and racial equality as the industry looks to return to film and TV production after the COVID-19 shutdown. Find ways you can help and support.
• M4BL (Movement for Black Lives) Week of Action: Five Demands — An opportunity to uplift and fight alongside those turning up in the streets and online.
• Ways You Can Stand in Solidarity with the Black Community — An ongoing list of ways you can help as we collectively fight against systemic racism and violence.
• Support the Black Lives Matter Movement — A list of petitions to sign, funds and charities to donate to, and resources for educating yourself and those around you.
• Black Lives Matter can help you educate yourself on myriad issues and ways to help.
• VolunteerMatch — Helps people find opportunities to volunteer in their community, based on their area of interest and the time they have available to contribute.
• Black Visions Collective — A Black, Queer, and trans-led Minnesota nonprofit committed to creating a community where all Black lives not only matter, but also thrive. They have organized campaigns to cut police budgets, invest in community-driven safety strategies, and train activists.
• UNLV created a non-partisan guide aimed at their academic community — useful for addressing anti-oppression, diversity, inclusion, and social justice.
• Know Your Rights Camp — Aims to advance the liberation and well-being of Black and Brown communities through education, self-empowerment, mass-mobilization and the creation of new systems that elevate the next generation of change leaders.

Broaden Your Knowledge

• Anguish and Action — The Obama Foundation's resources on how to create a more just and equitable world.
• Uncomfortable Conversations With A Black Man — A conversation with Emmanuel Acho about race that many white people have never been able to have. Via his website you will be able to learn more about race and find interesting conversations. 
• Talking About Race — The Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture's online portal, designed to help talk about racism, racial identity and the way these forces shape every aspect of society, from the economy and politics to the broader American culture.
• Harvard's Project Implicit — A series of tests to see where you might have unconscious biases.
• Understanding the historical context behind this moment can help crystallize the complex forces at play. Yale offers a free online course on African-American history, from 1863 to 2010.
• Courtney Yahn Instagram — A breakdown of the basics of what "white privilege" means.
• Anti-Racism Resources — Wake-Up Call - Understanding begins with all of us looking inward, reflecting on our own attitudes, and of course, having difficult conversations with family and friends. Includes kid-friendly resources.
• Five Artists for This Moment — These esteemed Black American creators make work that responds to violence against the Black body.

Resources

• Southern Poverty Law Center's Ten Ways to Fight Hate Resource Guide — Suggestions for what you can do to stop the hate in America.
• Rachel E. Cargle is an academic, writer, and lecturer. Her site provides resources that explore the intersection of race and womanhood. Visit her IG @rachel.cargle where she’s building an intellectual legacy through teaching, storytelling & critical discourse.
• Ibram X. Kendi's books How to Be an Antiracist, Stamped From the Beginning, as well as his article for the New York Times, An Antiracist Reading List, can help America learn about and transcend its racist heritage.
• Racial Equality Resource Guide prepared by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation — A shared tool for building a community of connected, informed and engaged practitioners.

Viewing Suggestions

#BlackStoriesMatter: TV Programs and Films You Can Stream Now

Television has the ability to inspire lasting change, bring awareness and motivate audiences. Here are just a few programs that you can watch or binge now.

• Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise: view clips from this documentary that focus on the untold aspects of her life through never-before-seen footage, rare archival photographs, videos, and her own words. 
• Lorraine Hansberry: Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart: clips from the documentary about the author of Raisin In The Sun (the first-ever Black woman to author a play performed on Broadway) exploring her complex life and influences that shaped her childhood, future art, and activism.
• View clips from the documentary Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am (or watch the entire program if you have a PBS account)
• In 1959, Miles Davis was unlawfully assaulted and arrested by two New York police officers outside a jazz club he was performing in. PBS subscribers can watch clips from Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool. 

Here are some more viewing suggesitons:

• 13TH (Netflix)
• 16 Shots (Showtime)
• American Son (Netflix)
• Burn MotherF*cker, Burn! (Paramount Plus with Showtime)
• The Black Power Mixtape: 1967-1975 (PBS and AMC+)
• Clemency (Amazon Prime rental)
• The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson (Netflix)
• Dear White People (Netflix, all four seasons of the television series. You can also view the feature on Max.)
• Fruitvale Station (Max)
• The Hate U Give (Amazon rental)
• I Am Not Your Negro (Tubi)
• If Beale Street Could Talk (Amazon)
• Just Mercy (Amazon rental)
• King in the Wilderness (Max)
• Selma (Amazon)
• Time: The Kalief Browder Story (Netflix)
• When They See Us (Netflix) [Learning Companion — Provides a learning companion and field study lesson, intended to be a catalyst for conversation and change.]
• A series of videos on race (New York Times)
• Netflix has launched a collection of film and TV content for U.S. subscribers which highlights "powerful and complex narratives about the black experience."

Reading Suggestions

• "How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America" by Clint Smith offers a powerful exploration of America's history with slavery, challenging readers to confront its legacy and impact across the nation.
• "Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches" by Audre Lorde: her essays touch on issues of race, gender, and sexuality, emphasizing the importance of intersectional perspectives and solidarity.
• "When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir" by Patrisse Khan-Cullors and asha bandele: This memoir offers insight into the Black Lives Matter movement and the experiences of its co-founder, Patrisse Khan-Cullors.
  
• The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America by Richard Rothstein — how federal, state, and local governments gave rise to and reinforced neighborhood segregation.
• Holistic Wealth: 32 Life Lessons To Help You Find Purpose, Prosperity and Happiness by Keisha Blair — addresses wealth inequality and provides positive messages on economic empowerment as well as setbacks, trauma and grief so you can go after all you want!
• There's a growing call to defund the police. Read CNN writer Scottie Andrew's article on what it means.
• The Fire This Time: A New Generation Speaks about Race by Jesmyn Ward — In this bestselling, widely lauded collection, Jesmyn Ward gathers our most original thinkers and writers to speak on contemporary racism and race, including Carol Anderson, Jericho Brown, Edwidge Danticat, Kevin Young, Claudia Rankine, and Honoree Jeffers.
• How We Fight White Supremacy: A Field Guide to Black Resistance by Akiba Solomon and Kenrya Rankin — A celebration of Black resistance, from protests to art to sermons to joy, offers a blueprint for the fight for freedom and justice — and ideas for how each of us can contribute.
• I Can't Breathe: A Killing on Bay Street by Matt Taibbi — Explores the roots and repercussions of the infamous killing of Eric Garner by the New York City police.
• Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson — An idealistic, gifted young lawyer's coming of age, a moving window into the lives of those he has defended, and an inspiring argument for compassion in the pursuit of true justice.
• The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness — by Michelle Alexander, winner of numerous prizes, including the prestigious NAACP Image Award; this book has also spent nearly 250 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. In it, Alexander makes the argument that "we have not ended racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it."
• On the Other Side of Freedom: The Case for Hope by DeRay McKesson — From the internationally recognized civil rights activist/organizer and host of the podcast Pod Save the People, a meditation on resistance, justice, and freedom, and an intimate portrait of a movement from the front lines.
• Racism: A Short History by George M. Fredrickson — The history of Western racism from its emergence in the late Middle Ages to the present.
• So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo — New York Times bestseller offers a hard-hitting but user-friendly examination of race in America.
• They Can't Kill Us Until They Kill Us by Hanif Abdurraqib and Dr. Eve L. Ewing — Essays that use music and culture as a lens through which to view our world, so that we might better understand ourselves.
• We Can't Breathe: On Black Lives, White Lies, and the Art of Survival by Jabari Asim — Insightful and searing essays that celebrate the vibrancy and strength of black history and culture in America.
• White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism by Robin DiAngelo and Michael Eric Dyson — The New York Times best-selling book exploring the counterproductive reactions white people have when their assumptions about race are challenged, and how these reactions maintain racial inequality.
• Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge - Exploring everything from eradicated black history to the inextricable link between class and race in Britain today.
• Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates — Written as a letter to his son, this nonfiction book details the realities of, and author's personal experiences with, being Black in the United States, and how it infiltrates everything from school to the streets.
• The 1619 project — The New York Times Magazine initiative won a Pulitzer Prize for its exploration of how America was built on slavery. Read the essays, then download the audio series hosted by journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones.

For Children:

• If you have young children, here are ideas for books that celebrate diversity and inclusion.
• NICKELODEON has extensive resources available to help families address racism, bias, and actions they can take.        

Organizations That Work to Advance Social Justice

• American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)
• Amnesty International
• Color of Change
• Equal Justice Initiative
• NAACP Legal Defense Fund
• National Action Network
• National Center for Civil and Human Rights
• National Urban League
• Southern Poverty Law Center

updated 9.20.23