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Welcome to the New Mount Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church, where we meet Reverend Marshall Hatch Jr. He leads The MAAFA Redemption Project, a faith-based program that supports young men in West Garfield Park on the West Side of Chicago. Marshall tells Dwayne how he’s working to build a space where young men resist despair, become agents of change in their city, and move forward with a deep understanding of the American past.
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Learn more about our guest, [Marshall Hatch Jr.](https://www.maafachicago.org/home "MAAFA Chicago")

In the new season of *Almost There*, poet, activist, and lawyer Dwayne Betts explores how a person’s home—their geography, their community, their place—can be a source of power and inspiration. He talks to local leaders who are trying to change their communities for the better: A faith leader in Chicago fighting gun violence and disinvestment. A bookstore owner in Salt Lake City ensuring that everyone can find the one book that will change their life. A farmer and longtime food access activist in upstate New York helping farmers earn a living by providing food for neighborhoods in need in New York City. 

Karen Washington never imagined herself as a farmer. But after decades in New York City, she found her calling, establishing community gardens that brought fresh food – and life-affirming beauty – to her neighborhood in the Bronx. Today, she lives on a farm in upstate New York where she grows fresh, healthy produce that she believes belongs on everybody’s plates. 
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[Learn more](https://www.karenthefarmer.com/about "Learn more Karen Washington") about our guest, Karen Washington.  


A Place of Gratitude

As a kid growing up below the poverty line on the west side of Salt Lake City, Calvin Crosby found immense pleasure and freedom in books. Years later, after a journey that took him to San Francisco and into a leadership role at the California Independent Booksellers Alliance, he bought the bookstore that first changed his life – The King’s English – and moved back home to Utah to run it.
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[Learn more](https://www.kingsenglish.com/ "Learn more") more about our guest, Calvin Crosby, and The King’s English. 
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Books mentioned in this episode: 
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Tales of the City by Armistead Maupin
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Ramona the Pest by Beverly Cleary 
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Three Junes by Julia Glass 


The First Place I Felt Safe

If you think dance is just movement set to music, you’re missing something big. Award-winning director and choreographer Camille A. Brown argues that dance is the act of using physical gesture to manifest story—stories about ourselves, the lives we’ve lived, and where we’re from. Camille, whose work celebrates Black culture, helps Dwayne see the ways he’s moved through prison and his work with Freedom Reads as a liberatory dance for his community. 
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Learn more about our guest, [Camille A. Brown](https://www.camilleabrown.org/ "Learn more about our guest, Camille A Brown").

Dance Is Story

Born and raised in the Rio Grande Valley in Texas, Abel Acuña has been a mariachi musician for three decades. Now, he teaches mariachi at Edinburg North High School, the very same school he himself attended. He tells Dwayne how he uses the power of music to foster confidence and pride in his students—and explains why competitive mariachi is a perfect way for young people to find their place in the world. Don’t miss Abel and his students in the Sundance documentary hit, Going Varsity in Mariachi, now on Netflix. 


Mariachi Became Home

Do you have to be born in a place to feel like you are of that place? The conductor Teddy Abrams has been asking himself that question for the last decade. Originally from San Francisco, he has earned recognition as one of today’s youngest and most dynamic conductors while serving as music director of the Louisville Orchestra. For Teddy, music is a bridge across Kentucky, a magical force that binds him to the state’s hills and hollers, bluegrass and bourbon—and, of course, its people. 
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Learn more about th work of our guest, [Teddy Abrams](https://www.louisvilleorchestra.org/about/conductors/teddy-abrams-music-director/ "Louisville Orchestra - Teddy Abrams").
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Music featured in this episode courtesy Louisville Orchestra.


My New Kentucky Home

For documentary filmmaker Davis Guggenheim, place is as much about emotion and history as it is about a geographic location. Guided by the ways he’s used place in his documentary work – including An Inconvenient Truth, He Named Me Malala, and most recently, Deaf President Now! – Davis turns the tables on Dwayne, asking him about his relationship to the places he has lived, from growing up in PG County, Maryland to serving time in prison as a young man, and how they have shaped his poetry.
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Learn more about the work of our guest, [Davis Guggenheim](https://concordia.studio/ "Concordia - A Home For Stories").


A Place Outside Geography

A podcast about the original thinkers and unexpected ideas that could remake our world.
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Season 2 of Almost There is coming soon. This season, we’re talking to inspiring local leaders with big dreams for the places they call home. We’ll travel across America to meet these leaders: a high school mariachi teacher in the Rio Grande Valley, a book seller in Salt Lake City, a farmer in upstate New York, a reverend on the West Side of Chicago, and others. Learn what motivates their dedication to their community, and gain insight into how you can create change in the place you call home, too.

Season 2 Trailer: The Power of Place

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