Race-based Affinity Groups (BIPoC and white) (January)

ABOUT

***This is the second in a series of six proposed affinity group sessions. The first session took place on 16 November. The participants who attended this first session agreed that, in order to build continuity and safety within the groups, the cut-off point for joining the process is this upcoming second session, on 25 January 2025. Anyone wanting to join after this second session will need to attend a one-on-one briefing with Zed or Sam (depending on which group they are joining) in order to be briefed on what has already transpired within the group.

What?

An Affinity Group is a group formed around a shared characteristic, experience, interest or goal.

It is a space created solely for those who identify as members of that particular group.

Affinity Groups offer a range of benefits:

• Opportunities to examine issues that are specific to our particular group without the pressure of being heard and observed by (or “under the gaze” of) other groups
• Confidential spaces to examine the conditioning related to our lived experiences
• Support for our unique identities, lived experiences, interests and needs
• A sense of belonging to a community

For Affinity Groups based on race:

While the goal is to bridge divides and come together, society has not prepared us to do so in ways that are constructive.  

Moreover, there are aspects of the race-based work that are specific to our positions within the system, and that we need to explore without the fear of making mistakes and hurting the 'other'.

Dr Tina Opie talks about DIGGING and BRIDGING: Before we are ready to build viable bridges across what separates us, we need to dig into ourselves and gain some skills and awareness.

In this spirit, we invite you to join our online Race-based Affinity Groups: working together and apart in service of a just society, which started on 16 November 2024.

We have two Affinity Groups - one for BIPoC and one for white people - with the objectives to:

• Engage in inner work
• Learn in community
• Hold each other accountable

How?

We are using a 'togther-apart-together' approach, where we come together at particular touch-points in the process and break into our race-based groups to do our own digging at others.

When?

We anticipate a series of six 2-hour sessions that take place monthly, however, this may be extended or shortened, depending on what emerges during the process!

The cost for each session (up to the 6th session) is: R750 for participants located in Africa; and R1200 for participants located outside Africa (approx. €63/$66, depending on the exchange rate at the time of purchase).

Who?

These Affinity Groups are designed for BIPoC and white people who are committed to doing the work of examining our racial conditioning and our particular positions in the system of racial oppression.

While the facilitators (Zed and Sam) are based in South Africa, we invite participants from all over the world.

The maximum number of spaces available in each Affinity Group is 10.

*Important Note: Prerequisite for Joining the Affinity Groups

Before participating in the Affinity Groups, you must have attended a Module 1 workshop in our online DEI Training of Trainers (ToT) programme. This ensures that you are familiar with us and our style; and that we have a solid foundation to start from, including a common understanding of the importance of doing this work and a clear set of group agreements in place.

About the Facilitators

NtombiZandile (Zed) Xaba is an independent consultant, and a highly experienced trainer and facilitator with 32 years of facilitation experience. She consults to national and multi-national business organizations, as well as to government and the non-government sectors. Her work includes diversity, leadership, team effectiveness, conflict-coaching, mediation, personal mastery, education and youth development. 

Zed holds a Masters in Conflict Facilitation and Organizational Change from the Process Work Institute, Portland, USA and has facilitated numerous small and large group processes around the issues of race and diversity in South Africa. She has been involved in facilitating the World Work seminars at the international Process Work conference in Switzerland, Poland, America and Greece. 

She facilitated a programme called Reconciliation thru Remembrance, for a racially diverse group of South Africans in Johannesburg on a journey of dialogue and reconciliation. This process was made into a documentary that Zed has shown at various international conferences, WorldWork, Mediation Beyond Borders and the Summit of Courageous Conversations about Race.

Zed is a TEDx speaker. Her TED talk on Internalised Oppression - Internalised Oppression; naming and peeling away the layers of shame - is available online. 

Samantha (Sam) Stern is a facilitator, trainer and coach with twenty-five years of experience working in the areas of organisational development, team effectiveness, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI), leadership development, personal empowerment and psychosocial wellness.

Sam grew up in the UK and then lived, studied and worked in the USA before moving to South Africa in 1998.  

Sam holds a Bachelor’s degree in Social Science with a concentration in Psychology and a Master’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University in Washington, DC. She is a certified Facilitator and Assessor (with the ETDP SETA) and she has trained in a range of approaches for managing social change and working with complex systems. This includes Theory-U, Deep Democracy, Systems Thinking, Organisation and Relationship Systems Coaching (ORSC) and Process Work.

Sam is the founder and lead facilitator of Journeys to Remember, which designs and facilitates transformative learning experiences for individuals, affinity groups, teams and organisations. She also serves as an Associate for a number of consultancies including the Centre for Mental Wellness and Leadership (CMWL), Mandate Molefi, Nurturing Growth Trading, Tara Transform, The Nexus Experience and The SEVA Collective. In these roles, Sam has facilitated hundreds of DEI workshops, leadership development trainings, team coaching processes and psychosocial wellness sessions with corporate companies, government departments, NGOs, universities, schools and affinity groups. Sam is also engaged in several communities of practice in order to support her own ongoing growth in these areas.