About The SiteSite Goals
The creation of ThePhoenixCrows website was inspired by two foundational elements: therapeutic counseling and activism. When brought together, the merging point was life coaching. This take on life coaching works with individuals on a personal level and also with the greater community towards collective healing and strengthening. The intention of this site’s structure is to encompass the conversations that are established separately by each perspective and explore them individually and collectively. Organization This site is split into two different pages: one that is focused on blog posts exploring life coaching and social change and the other that takes the weekly posts and explores them in a podcast. Each of these perspectives offer unique spaces for conversation and dialogue to be expounded upon and explored (seen in the categories below). Life Coaching categories include- - Coached (General Life Coaching) - Outside>In (Organizational Therapy) - The Healing Post (Stories of Overcoming)* - Together Earth (Spiritual/Meditational Thoughts)* Social Change categories include- - New World Summit (Theories of Social Change) - The Lens (Social Media Commentary) - The Appreciation Station (Recognizing Community Members)* - The Unspoken Word (Socially Conscious Spoken-Word Poetry) Each month has a theme which will be split into four segments with a weekly podcast that will be published separately from the blogs. Each podcast will reference the blog posts of that week, leaving the blog posts to be reference sources for further discussion. Each week’s posts which will be appropriately tagged and referenced. Where You Come In ThePhoenixCrows uses the word conversation a lot and here's why: this site wasn't put in place just to speak to the air, it was created to establish a dialogue, to cultivate a collective thinking, to build a community perspective. This means that the words shouldn't stop at the end of a blog post - that should be the beginning. Where you come in is with your comments, your thoughts, your agreements, your additions, your constructive arguments, your ulterior opinions. This site engages in the right to free speech, and that right includes both sides of the communication, either support or critique. Currently, the site offers space for comments on posts and a direct connect option to speak directly with the author - there are hopes that with a strong enough contribution, we can open up a forum for group discussion. You are encouraged to comment as you see fit or to contact the site author with questions, concerns, ideas or more. It is the hope that eventually the community involvement will include blog responses written by readers, posed forum questions, or maybe even side-blogs written by committed co-authors who want to offer their voices here. That being said, all response-traffic is monitored under basic criteria to ensure productive and constructive conversation! The site monitor has the authority to delete comments if they don't comply to the guidelines for commenting listed below. Site Guidelines 1) Direct attacks of character will not be tolerated - you have every right to comment and argue your point against the author or other commentators but not at the expense of character attacks. 2) Trolling won't fly - the authors of blogs should be willing to accept critique on their points of view, but critique should be framed as constructive criticism and not vulgarity and insult. Those comments will be removed. 3) Language and Trigger Warnings - to keep a positive, constructive and safe environment, comments should consider their language and content. Within forums and blogs written by the community, if there is content or language that may be offensive, they should have a warning for people to be able to discern if they wish to continue reading. Site creator can block posts that don't do this if the author refuses to add them. Public comments can be removed if they don't comply. *Indicates pages that aren't yet running regularly |
About ThePhoenixCrowsThePhoenixCrows has a very specific mission: to inspire a dialogue and to provoke creative thinking. This means breaking silences, offering the abstract, inspiring revolutions, unhinging shackles, journeying from our desk-chairs, and collaboratively creating something brand new. My Intention with this site is to encourage thought, to get us using our sociological imagination, critical minds, and our mass empathy in order to diagnose our ailing world and from the ashes of our rebellion, build something new in its stead.
It should be specifically iterated that the posts here are not intended to be looked at as news articles or research journals. ThePhoenixCrows isn't a news site or a analytical journal and it doesn't pretend to be. Consider this an extension of a diary, a think-tank, a place to explore thought and to establish conversation. The mythology of the phoenix: It was a bird known to have several powers. Depending on the cultural interpretation, these powers include tears that could heal wounds, the capacity to carry extreme weight, a cry that would strike courage into those who were good and worthy and fear into those who were evil and unworthy, and most famously, resurrection from it's own ashes. Many ancient cultures and civilizations idolized the phoenix for its powers and how it was representational of characteristics they stood for and sought to see in themselves. Healing. Strength. Wisdom. Resilience through resurrection - that is what ThePhoenixCrows stands for and why it is here. About The AuthorXinef Afriam (23) is a performance artist, activist, and educator from Western Mass. His primary focuses are drama and art therapy, socio-theoretical change, and youth education. He studied theater, psychology/sociology, peace & social concerns, and social work at Greenfield Community College. He has worked with several social justice groups and theater/arts groups and has also pursued his own projects and programs within his local community in similar fields.
Currently, Xinef works at his family's church as the choir director and the arts/inspirations leader, with Multi-Arts, a local children's arts camp teaching writing, theater, and music, and with the New England Quaker Community’s young adult program while he pursues a self-designed major studying life coaching, social activism, and organizational therapy. |