Before We Were White
ancestral recovery for collective liberation
an online course & learning community for people of European descent
Facilitated by: Eleanor Hancock
with Guest teachers: Chris Crass, Bonnie Duran, Katrina Browne, Rune Rasmussen, Katrina Messenger and Marybeth Bonfiglio
Identity Caucus Facilitators: Jen Kiok, Llywelyn Jones and Deana Graffeo Weeks
New this year: a Community Art Processing space will held by Maya Kosover
“This is the missing piece for my engagement with racial justice work.”
“This course provides both deep spiritual grounding and a profound socio-spiritual-historical education.”
“My heart was opened in a way I had not expected.”
-Before We Were White participant testimonials
Before We Were White is a core piece of curriculum that Comrades Education (formerly known as White Awake) has offered annually for the past eight years. The program offers an ancestral recovery experience for people with European descent (whether you are white or multiracial) that is explicitly antiracist and decolonial.
The work of the course centers historical analysis, family history, reflective & spiritual processes, nature connection and an active contribution to the struggle for collective liberation.
If you are a person with European ancestry who would like to commit yourself to the work of collective liberation with increased capacity and wholeness … join us!
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Each of us belongs to a collective body of people with a story (or stories) that reach before us and after us in time. Before they were ever classified as “white” our European and pre-European ancestors were distinct peoples with their own unique cultures and relationships to place. What happened to them? How did they come to be considered “white”, and what was lost along the way? How do we reconcile ourselves to the legacies of oppression, violence and genocide our ancestors may have participated in? Who resisted, and what parts of our personal and collective legacy can we draw upon for strength & clarity today?
This course is designed to help you consider these questions as you:
Foster an understanding of white supremacy, capitalism, and settler-colonialism in the context of European ancestry
Place your family stories within a larger historical and political framework
Open pathways for discharging inherited harm or confusion that can arise from our connection to ancestors who have perpetrated or participated in oppression, exploitation, or genocide
Open pathways for greater connection and relationship with ancestors of blood and/or adoption, social location, or chosen lineage who can support contemporary work for positive social change
Build resilience, an integrated sense of self, and a stronger sense of purpose in your work for collective liberation
You can refer to our Course Structure document to learn more about how the course is being held.
Comrades Education is a US-based organization. We love having folks join us from outside the US, and have had many non-US-based folks join Before We Were White over the years, but you will need to do some translating between the work of this course and its application to your location.
Course Details
Six online sessions:
Jan 18 & 25, Feb 8 & 15, March 1 & 8
4:00-6:30pm ET • 1-3:30pm PT
PLUS: Two Community Art Processing sessions, facilitated by Maya Kosover, held February 1st & 22nd
Live attendance is not mandatory.
Sessions will be recorded.
Suggested registration fee: $125-325*
No one turned away for lack of funds.
WHO IS THIS COURSE FOR? Live sessions of Before We Were White are being held as a caucus for people with European ancestry (white and/or multiracial) who want to bring their attention to this ancestral line as a means of bringing greater emotional resilience to their work for collective liberation. More details about identity based caucusing within the course, and how the program is structured overall, can be found in the Course Structure document.
To learn more about participant expectations and how this program will be held, please view our Participant Agreements & Ground Rules document.
Guest Teachers
BONNIE DURAN Dr.PH (mixed race Opelousas – Coushatta) is a Professor Emeritus at the University of Washington in Seattle. She is a Buddhist minister & on the guiding teacher council at Spirit Rock. Teach retreats at Spirit Rock & Insight Meditation Society. She has worked in public health research, evaluation, and education for Tribes, Native Organizations, and other communities of color. You can view some of Bonnie’s publications here.
KATRINA MESSENGER is a radical feminist of African, Cherokee & Celtic descent, and a refugee from the communist, labor, feminist, and black nationalist movements of old. With over fifty years of experience as a grassroots activist and community leader, Katrina is a full time Wiccan mystic, an ordained minister, and the founder of Two Rivers Sanctuary, Reflections Mystery School and Connect DC.
CHRIS CRASS is one of the leading voices in the U.S. calling for and supporting white people to work for racial justice. He works with community groups, schools and faith communities to develop leadership and momentum for social justice action. He was a founder of the anti-racist movement building center, the Catalyst Project, and helped launch the national white anti-racist network, Showing Up for Racial Justice. He is the author of Towards Collective Liberation and Towards the “Other America”.
KATRINA BROWNE produced and directed the Emmy-nominated Traces of the Trade: A Story from the Deep North, a documentary about her slave-trading ancestors. She currently works with the Episcopal Church as part of their Becoming Beloved Community racial justice and healing initiatives, for which she developed Sacred Ground.
RUNE HJARNØ RASMUSSEN is a Danish anthropologist of religion with a Ph.D. from the University of Uppsala. He is dedicated to supporting those of us who are white in reconnecting with aspects of our cultural heritage in responsible ways. Rune’s work focuses on Nordic animism and the animist culture of Euro-descendants more broadly that was rejected during modernization.
MARYBETH BONFIGLIO is a writer, mother, and ancestral arts catalyst. A 2nd generation Sicilian and Italian American, MaryBeth grew up in a cultural enclave in which traditional food, superstition, generosity, passion, oracle, the Madonna, and fantastic curse words were impressed upon her development. These experiences, and her innate desire to gather people together to remember their ancestral wisdom, have informed all of Marybeth’s work, including Radici Siciliana: an ancestral immersion and pilgrimage to the magical, mysterious, radically beautiful island of Sicily.
Host & program facilitator
ELEANOR HANCOCK is the founder & director of Comrades Education, with formative experiences in The Work that Reconnects and informal animist, pagan practice. Drawing on over 25 years of experience in activism & social justice organizing, Eleanor built Comrades Education (formerly White Awake) from a small website in 2013 to an organization of national significance today. For more on how Eleanor frames her antiracism work, you can listen to this 2023 interview on Upstream Podcast.
Identity Based Caucus Facilitation
Queer Caucus facilitation:
Llywelyn Jones
Llywelyn is a queer, gender-complicated, autistic, animist witch of Welsh, Québecois, and Ashkenazi descent, living on unceded Pennacook Abenaki land in the Nashua River watershed. She is the creator of our Building Relations with Land & Sky program (based on her own practices coming out of an earlier Before We Were White course.) Llywelyn holds a B.A. in philosophy and linguistics from Bard College. Her début novel Tiresias (2013) was a Lambda Literary Award finalist for Transgender Fiction.
Jewish Caucus Facilitation:
Jen Kiok
Jen is a queer white Ashkenazi Jew of Polish and Lithuanian descent who offers spiritual leadership within the context of grassroots community organizing efforts rooted in a commitment to collective liberation. Jen served as ED of Boston Workers Circle, Center for Jewish Culture & Social Justice from 2015-2021. You can learn more about her current, spiritually focused work on her site Tending Sacred Portals.
Italian/Sicilian Caucus facilitation:
Deana Graffeo Weeks
Deana has worked with Comrades Education since 2020, handling logistics and administrative support for numerous organizational courses and currently serving as a member of the board. A content marketer and PR professional by trade, Deana dabbles in family genealogy, tracing both her family’s Sicilian and southern Italian Roots. A wife and mother of two young children, she was drawn to the work of the organization to further her own development and growth and fell in love with the beautiful community aspect of the White Awake / Comrades Education courses.
Multilracial Caucus Facilitation:
Nicole Born-Crow
Nicole is co-founder of Folke Healing, an educational project based out of Cleveland, Ohio that helps participants connect with folk practices and ancient ways for collective healing and liberation. Drawing on her German, Italian, Lebanese, and Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry, Nicole is a politicized healer and activist, intuitive astrologer, Ancestral Lineage Repair practitioner, strega, Hexe and Jewitch.
Community Art Processing Space Facilitation
MAYA KOSOVER is a community facilitator, artist, and educator based in Chicago. She is currently the Creative Weaver of make art, be art, the Director of Learning for Shomeret Shalom, an artist collective member at the Jewish Museum of Chicago, and a facilitator for Studio Pathways. Maya partners with organizations and community groups to facilitate healing arts workshops for teens and adults. To learn more about Maya and her work, her learning lineages and communities, visit www.mayakosover.com.
What participants have said about our courses
This course is actively supported by our Advisory Council Members:
Katrina Messenger
Betty Burkes
Bonnie Duran
"Why do you charge for your work?"
We believe the work that we do is significant, and we want to do it well. To this end, we charge a modest fee for our online programs, and solicit donations from participants and supporters, in order to meet our financial needs. This allows Comrades Education staff and instructors to focus their time and energy on the educational work this project promotes, for the benefit of all.
Comrades Education and our instructors support a transition away from capitalism, imperialism and white supremacy; we support reparations to historically targeted groups, communities and Peoples; and we make our work available to all regardless of financial means.
If you have further questions, please contact: info@comrades.education