Detroit Community Podcast Lab

^{Detroit Podcast Lab participants. Top row (right to left): Saundra Little, Reda Taleb, Nezaa Bandele, and Eladio Niño. Bottom row (right to left): Catalina Rios, David Rudolph, Bryce Detroit, and Arlyssa Heard. (Photo credit: Erik Paul Howard)}

Partnering with WDET, Futuro Media brings the Community Podcast Lab to Detroit, helping to capture the untold stories from the neighborhoods of the city. For the past four months, Nezaa Bandele, Bryce Detroit, Saundra Little, Arlyssa Heard, Eladio Niño, Catalina Rios, David Rudolph, and Reda Taleb have immersed themselves in the Detroit Community Podcast Lab to learn how to tell their stories through podcasting.

Meet the Detroit Community Lab Participants & Their Podcast Projects

“Your Wellness Journey” by Nezaa Bandele
From millennials to baby boomers who have made the choice to eat healthy, deciding what to eat can sometimes be difficult. “Your Wellness Journey” will offer solutions by examining how to make healthy versions of familiar foods and explore traditional and trending diets from keto to Dr. Sebi’s alkaline suggestions. As a chef and community health educator, Chef Nezaa will also unpack how culture and other factors can thwart our willingness to make necessary changes to our lifestyles.

“Culture by Design” by Bryce Detroit
A multidimensional music-centric variety show beaming live and direct from Detroit Afrika! Created and hosted by acclaimed Afrofuturist artist, storyteller, and designer Bryce Detroit, “Culture by Design,” creates thought-provoking and dynamic conversation spaces, featuring the 21st century’s leading social & cultural innovators, disruptors, and organic intellectuals from the worlds of social, climate, and economic justice!

“Have You Heard?” by Arlyssa Heard
Education is so much more than academics and the individual student. I believe that when a student enrolls into a school, although it may be that one student’s name on the registration form, it is also that student’s family that is enrolled and now a part of the journey forward. What happens or does not happen in that family, in that HH impacts that student’s education. We will take a look at all aspects of education, and how what is going on with and around our children can and will make a difference, not just in the classroom, but in their lives! Have you heard??

“Hidden in Plain (Site)” by Saundra Little
In a city that is 80 percent Black, we lack the history and storytelling of Detroit Black architects. As a practicing African American architect, I am in disbelief by the large number of Detroit architecture lovers that do not know the significant body of work that is designed by Black architects in our great city.

We will take a storytelling journey of hidden in plain sight gems of these overlooked creative giants. Our aim is to highlight the past buildings and to tear down the barriers to a career in architecture for the future generations of people of color.

A Noir Design Parti Project

“Real Everyday People” by Eladio Niño
This podcast was created and intended to be a healing circle for real everyday people from urban communities to share their life stories. With these stories, we will have discussions about real-life trauma that has plagued our communities. We will discuss ways to break those vicious cycles of drug abuse, alcoholism, domestic violence, gang violence, sexual abuse, and impoverished thinking.

These behaviors have become social norms in our community. So many people are quick to judge one another and their situations without knowing one’s background or the challenges that one has faced. The format of the discussion is past, present and future. The good, the bad and the ugly. We are all human. We all come from different walks of life. It is our responsibility as a society to uplift one another, hear each other out with an open mind and an empathetic heart, and be willing to give each other a second chance.

“Detroit Hustle” by Catalina Rios
A podcast where we honor the stories of hustle by uplifting the culture, creativity, and ingenuity of Detroit and its people! This is a show about putting respect on the hustle by listening to stories from hustlers themselves and their loved ones.

Focused on her father, in Spanish.

“Black Streams of Consciousness” by David Rudolph
This is a podcast for and by Black men who are on a journey to finding their authentic selves by taking an active approach to participating in their mental wellness. Through open discussions, sharing collective wisdom, and pushing beyond the stigma and stereotypes around Black men and mental health, “Black Streams of Consciousness” is an honest talk forum with regular men balancing everyday problems, sharing stories and solutions toward their journey for improved mental well-being.

“Tahrir wa al Hurriyah / Reimagining the Struggle for Collective Liberation” by Reda Taleb
In Arabic, Tahrir means liberation and Hurriyah means freedom. Using the power of storytelling, we will embark on a journey to cultivate a brave space for sharing our lived experiences. This podcast will amplify the impact of mass incarceration, the carceral state, and CVE policies on Arab-Americans and Muslims, while centering Islamophobia in the US.

Snapshots from the Detroit Community Podcast Lab Listening Party

^{Detroit Podcast Lab participants talking about their podcasts}

^{Podcast participants with family and friends}

Detroit is the fourth location to be selected by Futuro Media for a community podcast lab. The program was first held in Boston, Massachusetts, followed by Hartford, Connecticut and Akron, Ohio.

The podcasts are set to be featured on Latino Rebels Radio, tentatively from late June through the fall.

About the Lab

Futuro’s Community Media Lab Project stands apart from other incubators in the depth of tutorials, information and skills acquired, duration of the course, the engagement of dedicated personnel and community organizations, and its attendance-based stipend for participants to ensure our course is accessible to all. We will select people with little to no prior experience in media from the diverse and underrepresented neighborhoods of Detroit. We will provide participants with the access, skills, and tools necessary to produce and broadcast their own stories and to contribute meaningful pieces of history and culture from the perspective of people of color to the rich narrative of Detroit life.

Why Detroit?

Detroit has the highest percentage of Black residents in any large city in the U.S. The city in which Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech for the first time and former home of Malcom X. It has a rich history in the civil rights movement, which continues to drive activism in the city today. From Motown to techno and everything in between, it is a cultural hub for Black creativity.

Metro Detroit includes large Latino, Southeast Asian and Middle Eastern communities. Dearborn, MI has the highest percentage of Arab Americans in the U.S. Storytelling and creative entrepreneurship are built into the region’s cultural fabric, but opportunities for training and working in podcasting and media are limited, especially for communities of color.

For the Detroit Podcast Lab, Futuro is partnering with WDET, Detroit’s NPR Station. WDET strives to be the authentic voice of Detroit, and thus, has been dedicated to opening the door to podcasting and public radio through its StoryMakers program, participation in the Detroit Podcast Festival and on-air programming.

Futuro Media is committed to bringing the Community Podcast Lab to Detroit to help capture and broadcast the city’s underserved narratives, and to tell the world what makes the city tick.