Conjuring Cultural Transformation

Mia Birdsong is a pathfinder and futurist who reconnects us with our forgotten wisdom and practices of
our collective liberation.

Mia Birdsong is rewriting what it means to get free. Blending scholarship, journalism, and cultural meaning-making, she does critical work to reconnect us with forgotten wisdom and train our attention on the ideas and practices we need to live in the world we know is possible. With her eyes on the future, Mia has spent decades interrogating false ideas and proposing new visions of who and how we can be with each other.

Mia’s Values

  • Kinship is the root of our interconnection. Our capacity and need to be in relationship with other people, non-human animals, and the natural world is paramount. Being able to make family with all of these bodies and elements is where we find belonging, love, care, contentment, and rich networks of support.

  • We can only be free together. I am committed to solidarity practices that support the liberation and wellbeing of oppressed peoples both because I care about all of us and because it personally impacts me. Learn more about interconnected freedom.

  • I believe in the possibility of us. I believe in the future we dream about and in a world beyond the limitations of what we currently know and assume.

  • I want to know! The world we inhabit is endlessly fascinating to me. I am in awe on a regular basis. For me, curiosity is part of refusing to accept the world as it is and continues to open up a window to loving people, things, and experiences.

Current Projects

Past Projects

Frank Talk on
Freedom’s Revival

TED Talk Interview on
the Story of Poverty

TED Talk Interview with
BLM Founders

More Than Enough

Mia in the Media

Mia and her work have been featured in:

Mia’s Lineage

Mia’s thinking and doing is shaped by a long lineage of movements and leaders who have come before her. 

  • BLACK FEMINISM

  • ABOLITION

  • DISABILITY JUSTICE MOVEMENT

  • OCTAVIA BUTLER

  • NANNY OF THE MAROONS

Who Mia Learns From

Mia’s work is part of a much larger community of practices and practitioners who are living into the future we want now. Here is an incomplete and evolving list of people who grow Mia’s imagination.