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  • Author, Researcher, Professor – Angela Marino

    Angela Marino’s research focuses on contemporary Venezuela and political cultures of the Southwest, Caribbean, and Latin America.

  • International Criminal Law Expert – Olga Kavran

    Olga Kavran is a Fellow at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel completing a PhD on the topic of international criminal courts’ obligation to provide information to the public, and the Founding Director of IUSTICOM, established in 2021 as the first non-governmental organisation dedicated to communicating justice.

  • s4e2 Zakiyyah Modeste, Sound System Culture, Genny Lim

    Zakiyyah Modeste, a spoken word artist, actress and athlete based in Harlem, is our special guest in the audio garden. We also listen to new music from Sound System Culture at Smalls Live, new poetry and Genny Lim, ninth poet laureate of San Francisco.

  • Sista Zock – Zock Solid: Where the Stem Meets the Root

    Existing in the liminal space of sound of spoken word and music, Sista Zock introduces a unique Afro Jazz Fusion Sound with a touch of Hip-hop. Her latest project, Zock Solid, Where the Stem Meets the Root, features a collaboration with Abiodun of The Last Poets, adding depth and resonance to her musical journey.

  • s4e1 Azúcar!, Sarah Sophie Flicker, SistaZock

    Azucar, poet, therapist and open mic host, is Martha’s guest in the audio garden. Also featured, a hidden track from Groove Collective, Sarah Sophie Flicker talks about the Mamdani Campaign, and Zakiyyah Modeste, aka SistaZock, on her training in theater and track.

  • Simone “Azúcar” Nikkole – Sidepiece Sanctifications

    Sidepiece Sanctifications is the second poetry chapbook of work written by Simone “Azúcar” Nikkole. In Sidepiece Sanctifications, Simone “Azúcar” Nikkole documents the journey of love, infatuation and three-way relationships. She explores the experience of “the other woman” or “sidepiece” in a romantic relationship and how the woman returns to herself in recognizing her true self…

  • Zakiyyah Modeste

    Zakiyyah’s creative journey began as a child when, at the age of three, she won her school’s Valentine’s Day Poetry Contest. Early exposure to the arts through Mount Vernon’s Creative Arts Program allowed her to act in plays alongside talented peers, including saxophonist Michael Philips. Outside the program, she trained under Tina Satin—who also taught…

  • Simone “Azúcar” Nikkole

    Simone “Azúcar” Nikkole is a songwriter, screenwriter, author, Spoken Word poet, and Sí.Nik Productions and L.A. Sugar Factory founder. Her work is featured in Silver Tongue Devil Anthology (Amazon), Poets Without Limits IncarNATION Anthology, Mo’ Joe Anthology along with The Voices Project, Learn to Love and Enhance Online Magazines.

  • Beyond Borders – s2e1 – From the Women’s March on Washington to Mamdani

    …starting with when she met Judy Talaugon in San Francisco, as the teen flame of Metallica star Kirk Hammett. We continue all the way to being a mother of three in Brooklyn and an organizer of the Women’s March on Washington. Reflecting on the relevance, or lack thereof, of pussy hats, and millions of enthusiastic…

  • Resistance Revival Chorus – This Joy

    The Resistance Revival Chorus, a collective of more than 70 women and non-binary singers have announced their debut album This Joy to be released on October 16th via Righteous Babe Records. The album features original compositions along with protest classics and was recorded in New York City with GRAMMY-nominated producer Tiffany Gouché. The album is 100% created by women, non-binary artists and…

  • Cultural Activist, Aerialist Sarah Sophie Flicker

    Sarah Sophie is an activist, producer, writer, filmmaker, cultural organizer, creative director, and aerialist. Founder and Creative Director of celebrated political cabaret group, The Citizens Band, she is the Editor-At-Large for Violet Book. Her writing can be found at Hello Giggles, Rookie Magazine, W Magazine, Vogue, Refinery29, The Cut, Cosmo.com, Violet Book, Stylist, Rizzoli’s publication…

  • s3e37 Rewind – Remix Volume 8

    Please enjoy this last episode of 2025, into the first week of 2026… We will be back on January 7, with fresh poetry, fresh new guests, fresh conversations and new music that you won’t hear anywhere else.

  • From Me to You 2025

    We are the Network. We create, communicate, reach out to each other in the street, across oceans, and, in our communal dreams. We are nurturing archetypes, together, and they are growing and changing as we all reach for something better. We choose to break bread, together, make music and poetry and art, together, remember each…

  • s3e37 Remix Volume 8

    Happy Holidays Remix Volume 8 features the collaborations of Martha Cinader and Hernan Ramiro (Jay) Rodriguez Sierra, reflections on the past year, and announcements about the new parent non-profit of L&BH Network, Sound System Culture, upcoming appearances, internships and more…

  • Beyond Borders – Rewind – Episode 10 – Talking about Home Insecurity

    Our Season 2 begins in January, 2026. Please enjoy this rewind during our production break. Nilsa Rivera, in Florida, brings her professional and personal experience of home insecurity to a conversation with Judy Talaugon, in California, and Martha Cinader, in New York. The conversation covers housing policies, motherhood, experiencing houselesness and other forms of housing…

  • s3e35 Rewind – Remix Volume 6

    Please enjoy this rewind during our holiday production break. Remix Volume 6 by Jay Rodriguez Sierra features Q.R. Hand jr., Martha Cinader, Genny Lim, Meredith Leigh, Donna Janell Bowman, Dorsía Smith Silva, Mary Oishi, Kellie Richardson, Eileen Tabios, Ozier Muhammad, Tony Robles, Megan Marshall, Kim McMillon and Alice Walker reads Zora Neal Hurston.

  • s3e36 Remix Volume 7

    Remix Volume 7 features Barbara Tran, Candelario Obeso, Eileen Tabios, Vi Khi Nao, Freda Epum, Martha Cinader, Hazel Smith, Megan Marshall, Monica Maconsantos, Mary Oishi, Vida Cruz Borja, Tony Robles, Olivia Eggena, Joseph Jason Santiago Lacour, Trinh Mai, Brian Kimmel, Cal Hoffman, Henry Dumas, Caroline Cabading, Blagovesta Momchedjikova, Pying Threadgill and Mosab Abu Toha

  • Beyond Borders – Rewind – Episode 6 – with Special Guests Russell Frederick, Anderson Zaca and Ozier Muhammad

    Martha Cinader, Judy Talaugon and Jay Rodriguez Sierra are joined by darkroom masters Russell Frederick, Anderson Zaca and Ozier Muhammad to talk about Season One of the Darkroom MCs, the making of it, and the photographers who are featured.

  • s3e35 Remix Volume 6

    Remix Volume 6 by Jay Rodriguez Sierra features Q.R. Hand jr., Martha Cinader, Genny Lim, Meredith Leigh, Donna Janell Bowman, Dorsía Smith Silva, Mary Oishi, Kellie Richardson, Eileen Tabios, Ozier Muhammad, Tony Robles, Megan Marshall, Kim McMillon and Alice Walker reads Zora Neal Hurston.

  • s3e19 Rewind Culture from the Kitchen – Monica Macansantos

    This week we take the opportunity to revisit this illuminating conversation between Monica Maconsantos and Tony Robles, originally aired on June 26, 2025. Our featured guest is essayist, Monica Macansantos, author of Returning to My Father’s Kitchen, interviewed by Tony Robles Our featured poet is Elizabeth Perlman. New music by Billy Harper, sung by Judy…

  • Beyond Borders – Rewind – Episode 4 – with Special Guest Arnoldo García

    Martha Cinader, Judy Talaugon and Jay Rodriguez Sierra are joined by Arnoldo García, community-based poet, musician, visual artist, human rights organizer and dedicated restorative justice practitioner/trainer. The conversation begins with a comparison between west coast and east coast activism. It progresses from there to land based activism, and the difference between the idea of an…

  • s3e34 Remix Volume 5

    Remix Volume 5: featuring our guests from Seasons 3 reading their poetry and stories. Deepika Singh, C.L. Willis, Billy Mills, Brett Cook, Andrew Lam, Zora Neale Hurston, Alejandro Murgía, Jonathan Thirkield, Dorsía Smith Silva, Suzette Clarke Bradshaw, Martha Cinader, Donna Janelle Bowman, Jay Rodriguez Sierra, Tony Robles, Elizabeth Perlman, Dao Strom, Judy Talaugon, The Cipher…

  • s3e4 Rewind – American Anthropology – African and Asian American History, Sung and Told

    This week we take the opportunity to revisit this illuminating conversation between Brian Kimmel and Martha Cinader, originally aired on February 13, 2025. Martha talks with Brian Kimmel about Blue Skies, Troubled Waters, a World War II account of an Indonesian American girl. We listen to Zora Neale Hurston sing and Tony visits her hometown…

  • Beyond Borders – Rewind – Episode 3 – with award winning photojournalist Ozier Muhammad

    We are taking the opportunity during the holiday months to highlight some of our favorite episodes from the first season of Beyond Borders, while we work on Season 2 just for you, beginning January 17, 2026. Martha Cinader, Judy Talaugon, Jay Rodriguez Sierra and Tony Robles are joined by award winning photo journalist Ozier Muhammad.

  • s3e13 – Rewind – Vida Cruz-Borja on Speculative Fiction and the Inactive Protagonist

    Tony Robles welcomes Vida Cruz-Borja to talk about Philippine speculative fiction, the inactive protagonist, and where stories begin. Poetry by Martha Cinader, Lena Norris Ramen on writing for self compassion, Richard Clements on the legacy of Barry Harris, new music from Jay Rodriguez Sierra, and a visit to 1992 Columbus Day protests at San Francisco…

  • s3e33 Pat Cotter, Mahreen Sohail, Laura Jean McKay, Laura Cassidy, Mary O’Donnell, Chucho Valdez

    Tony Robles speaks with participants in the Cork International Short Story Festival, part 2. We listen to an Irish poem and fairytale. Jay Rodriguez Sierra plays with Chucho Valdez in a rare live recording. New poetry from Martha Cinader.

  • Laura Cassidy – Writer, Publisher

    Laura Cassidy is publisher and co-editor at the literary journal and small press Banshee, where along with her co-founders she was named a Bookseller Rising Star. Her novels for young adults were published by Penguin Ireland, and she is a recipient of the Cecil Day Lewis Literary Bursary Award and an Arts Council of Ireland…

  • Mahreen Sohail – Writer

    Mahreen Sohail was born in Pakistan. She has an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College where she studied as a Fulbright scholar; and was a Writing Fellow at A Public Space and a Charles Pick Fellow at the University of East Anglia. Her work has appeared in Granta, the Kenyon Review, the Pushcart Prize Anthology (XLII), and elsewhere. She lives in…

  • Laura Jean McKay – Writer

    Laura Jean McKay is the author of The Animals in That Country – winner of the prestigious Arthur C. Clarke Award, the Victorian Prize for Literature, the ABIA Small Publishers Adult Book of the Year and co-winner of the Aurealis Award for Best Science Fiction Novel 2021. Laura is also the author of Holiday in Cambodia and her latest collection…

  • Mary O’Donnell – Writer

    Mary O’Donnell has written award-winning poetry, novels, short fiction collections and dynamic essays. Published fiction includes the novels The Elysium Testament and Where They Lie. In 2023 she received an An Post/Irish Book Award for her political poem ‘Vectors in Kabul’. In 2026 Wake Forest University Press (USA) will publish her ninth poetry collection, Tenderness. In May this year, a…

  • Patrick Cotter – Poet

    Patrick Cotter is an Irish poet, born in Cork City where he still lives and works as a literary festival organiser and editor. His poems have been published in journals such as the Financial Times, The London Review of Books, Poetry and Poetry Review. He is a recipient of the Keats-Shelley Prize for Poetry. His…

  • Mary O’Donnell – Walking Ghosts

    In this masterful collection, Mary O’Donnell explores the subtle fractures and quiet transformations that shape modern life. Her characters navigate a society in flux, where traditional certainties give way to new complexities.

  • Laura Jean McKay – Gunflower

    A family of cat farmers gets the chance to set the felines free. A group of chickens tells it like it is. A female-crewed ship ploughs through the patriarchy. A support group finds solace in a world without men. With her trademark humour, energy, and flair, McKay offers glimpses of places where dreams subsume reality,…

  • Mahreen Sohail – Small Scale Sinners

    In twelve kaleidoscopic stories, Mahreen Sohail shifts our perspective on this question from moment to moment. Two girls observe a group of child soldiers and one reflects: “My sister and I were only small scale sinners.” A chorus of sixth graders unravels a school year they spend obsessed with their twin classmates. A girl cuts…

  • Beyond Borders – Episode 10 – Talking about Home Insecurity

    Nilsa Rivera, in Florida, brings her professional and personal experience of home insecurity to a conversation with Judy Talaugon, in California, and Martha Cinader, in New York. The conversation covers housing policies, motherhood, experiencing houselesness and other forms of housing insecurity, the punitive treatment of mothers and children, land trusts and more.

  • Edited by Judith Talaugon and Angela Marino, Tribunal Rising

    Tribunal Rising commemorates the 1992 International Tribunal movement in the city of San Francisco to dismantle the legacy of Christopher Columbus and the Myth of Discovery. In 1990, “[a]t the culmination of the Special International Tribunal on the Human Rights Violations of Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War in the US, the American Indian Movement…

  • Edited by Anjanette Delgado, Home in Florida Latinx Writers and the Literature of Uprootedness

    This remarkably timely, clear, concise, and pressing intervention is a must read for all organizers and activists fighting for and witnessing the birth of a new world. Shaka A. Shakur’s latest book reaffirms, amplifies, and extends the theory and practice of the New Afrikan Independence Movement while offering an accessible entry point for those unfamiliar…

  • Ni Rivera – Multi-media Storyteller

    Nilsa Rivera “Ni” tells new and multi-media stories about housing, food, and climate insecurity. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Tahoma Review, Hippocampus Magazine, Huffington Post, 50 GS Magazine, Six Hens Literary Journal, Assay: A Journal of Nonfiction Studies, Selkie Literary Magazine, Writing Class Radio, and Turning Dark into Light: A Mental Health Anthology.…

  • s3e32 Mary Morrissy, Vanessa Onwuemezi, Gina Chung, Brett Cook

    Tony Robles speaks with writers, Mary Morrissy, Vanessa Onwuemezi and Gina Chung at The International Short Story Festival in Cork, Ireland. Martha Cinader speaks with artist, Brett Cook about Greg Tate Day in Harlem, New York. Jay Rodriguez Sierra presents new music, Your Sound – featuring Lonnie Plaxico, Pete Drungle and Pheeroan Aklaff. Poetry from…

  • Brett Cook – Interdisciplinary Artist, Educator

    Brett Cook is an interdisciplinary artist and educator who uses storytelling to distill complex ideas and creative practices to transform outer and inner worlds of being. His elaborate installations feature painting, drawing, and photography to tell pluralistic stories with broad representation. His public projects typically involve community workshops featuring arts-integrated pedagogy and contemplative strategies—along with…