Complexified
For too long we have avoided talking about religion and politics. But the truth is, religion and politics are about daily life. When we avoid the hard topics connected to religion and politics, we become stuck in the status quo. On Complexified we dive into the places where religion and politics collide with real-life, so we can get unstuck- so we can make real change. We dive into our most entrenched problems to better understand the hidden histories and experiences of real people on the front lines. We look at the ways religion has shaped our systems - and the ways we see ourselves and others– from there, we work together to imagine new paths forward.
Episodes
In this episode, Amanda Henderson talks to Dr. Kristina Lizardy-Hajbi, a biracial scholar and professor at the Iliff School of Theology. They explore the American dream through the lens of personal experiences and the stories of ancestors, especially focusing on the immigrant journey.
Dr. Lizardy-Hajbi shares tales of her grandparents from Italy and Puerto Rico, revealing the challenges they had to overcome to settle in America and ...
In this episode, Amanda Henderson interviews Dr. Albert Hernández - a Cuban-American academic with a unique perspective on the American Dream. Dr. Hernández discusses the challenges faced by those who exist in-between cultures, feeling a lack of belonging to either.
He shares historical perspectives on the experience of immigration to the U.S, particularly from Cuba, and explores how global political conflicts can drive individuals...
In this episode, Amanda Henderson talks to Nga Vương-Sandoval, a refugee from Việt Nam and United States Refugee Advisory Board Project Manager. The conversation explores the transformation of the American Dream, immigration histories and policies, and the experiences of refugees.
Vương-Sandoval shares her insights on the true meaning of the American Dream, which she believes should not be drowned by materialism but rather focused ...
Last month, we had our first live audience recording of Complexified! Amanda Henderson and Lex Dunbar welcomed Denver Drag Performers Juiccy Misdemeanor and Dixie Krystals for a provocative conversation confronting the efforts across the U.S. to ban drag performances. We laughed, we cried, we learned, and we laughed some more!
00:02 Introduction and Welcome
00:27 The Complexified Live Episode: Why Ban Drag?
01:38 Introducing the Drag...
In this episode, recorded before the attacks by Hamas on Israel and the devastating response by the Israeli Military in Gaza, Colorado State Representative Iman Jodeh shares her family story of leaving Palestine in the late 1960s seeking refuge from daily discrimination and violence. Making a way meant teaching Americans about Islam and building bridges of understanding and awareness. Rep. Jodeh shares how the legacy of her parents...
In this episode, recorded before the attacks by Hamas on Israel and the devastating response by the Israeli Military in Gaza, Rabbi Joe, from Temple Emanuel in Denver, Colorado, shares his family story. His father’s family fled persecution in the late 19th century to find safety in the U.S.
After the terror of Kristallnacht, the night of the broken glass, his mother’s family fled to the U.S. Rabbi Joe shares how the legacy of seeki...
Why is homeownership such an integral part of the American Dream? Why have some been systematically excluded from homeownership while others have been incentivized and subsidized to own their home? In this episode, Dr. Ben Sanders shares his family story of ownership and belonging from an experience as a Black American, as we continue to peel apart the myth of the American Dream.
Guest Bio
Ben Sanders, Ph.D is the Chief Equity Off...
One afternoon, her clothes, hair, language, name, and even her parents were taken from her. In this episode, Navajo woman Bessie Smith, who survived the Indian Boarding Schools, shares her story of losing everything and then reclaiming the traditions she learned as a child to find healing.
Join us in this episode as we go to Bessie's home in Denver, Colorado, and hear about the day her parents were forced to hand her over to the U...
As debates rage in state legislatures and school boards about history curriculums or critical race theory or the impact of slavery, we know that how we imagine our future has everything to do with how we remember our past. In this episode, we begin our series pulling apart the stories we have been told about the American Dream through our own multiple, honest, complicated stories of Dreaming America. We begin with our host, Amanda ...
The American Dream… is complicated. It always has been.
For some - this dream has been a nightmare
… a mirage in a forsaken desert.
A myth.
For others, it’s been an oasis from hardship, oppression, violence.
… a vision realized through physical freedom and material success.
This season on Complexified, we’re asking:
Where did the myth of the American dream come from?
What’s it got to do with religion and politics?
And how is it shaping our...
Denise is an award-winning Latina filmmaker and cultural storyteller. Denise is the American-born daughter of first-generation immigrants from Puerto Rico, growing up first in the Bronx and then in a mostly white community further upstate in New York. She never felt like she belonged anywhere. not white enough and American enough for the suburban community around her. Nor fluent enough in Spanish to feel completely Latina. She was...
Dr. Butler is the founder of the seekr project, a distinctively black conversational artificial intelligence with mental health capacities, and is partner director of the Iliff School of Theology's AI Institute, where he works to change how computers see people.
For more information about Dr. De La Torre, visit his website and check out all 42 of his books!
"All that you touch, you change. All that you change changes you. The only lasting truth is change. God is change. " Octavia E. Buter
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