53 episodes

A bi-monthly podcast hosted by Canadian American writer and educator Lisa Bush. Episodes feature conversations with writers, poets, educators, activists, artists, and researchers whose work is questioning, disrupting, or altogether transforming how we view ourselves and each other. Stories Within Us explores how our lived experiences - and the process of sharing those stories - has the power to connect, heal, disrupt, challenge and change.

Stories Within Us Lisa Bush

    • Society & Culture
    • 5.0 • 10 Ratings

A bi-monthly podcast hosted by Canadian American writer and educator Lisa Bush. Episodes feature conversations with writers, poets, educators, activists, artists, and researchers whose work is questioning, disrupting, or altogether transforming how we view ourselves and each other. Stories Within Us explores how our lived experiences - and the process of sharing those stories - has the power to connect, heal, disrupt, challenge and change.

    How to be a lifelong artist with Micheline Maylor

    How to be a lifelong artist with Micheline Maylor

    Poet, acquisitions editor, and award winning professor, Micheline Maylor examines the craft of being a lifelong artist. Micheline discusses the importance of paying attention to what we are feeling, cross pollination of ideas, and breaking patterns. We also discuss being brave in your writing. Micheline says, "Bravery in writing is the thing that will take you far."
    Micheline and I dive into her latest work, The Bad Wife, a brave, first-hand account of how to ruin a marriage. To those wanting to spark your creativity, this is the conversation for you.
    About Micheline Maylor
     Poet, Acquisitions editor, Co-founder of the Freefall Literary Society, and award winning professor, Micheline Maylor is the author of five books of poetry - The Raymond Knister Poems, Whirr and Click, Little Wildheart, Drifting Like a Metaphor, and The Bad Wife. In 2016 Micheline was appointed as Calgary's first female poet laureate for a two year term.
    Micheline is the acquisitions editor for Frontenac House Press and is the co-founder of the non-profit Freefall Literary Society where she was the editor in chief from 2006 to the present. She currently edits the Quartet poetry series for which the authors have been shortlisted or have won numerous awards including, The Goldie Award for best Lesbian poetry book in North America; The Gerald Lampert Award for best first book; The Pat Lowther Award for best book by a Canadian woman.
    Micheline was the editor of the award winning This Wound is a World by Billy-Ray Belcourt, which won the 2018 Griffin Poetry Prize, and the Most Significant Book of Poetry in English by an Emerging Indigenous Writer, and the Indigenous Voices Awards (2018). Micheline is a decorated professor specialising in creative writing and contemporary Canadian literature who has inspired countless students to write through the years.
    Micheline Maylor’s newest collection, The Bad Wife, is an intimate, first-hand account of how to ruin a marriage. This is a story of divorce, love, and what should have been, told in a brave and unflinching voice. 
    Connect with Micheline:
    Web: http://michelinemaylor.com
    Publications:
    The Bad Wife
    Drifting Like a Metaphor
    Little Wildheart
    Whirr and Click

    • 53 min
    Changing the world with better stories with Natalie Meisner

    Changing the world with better stories with Natalie Meisner

    When Natalie Meisner started her career in theatre, she was cast for roles that didn't represent the women she knew or the women she wanted to become. So Natalie started writing her own plays. In today's episode, poet, playwright, and professor Natalie Meisner discusses the importance of LGBTQ2S+ representation in all stories. Natalie shares how comedy can be a catalyst for social change and how her book, Double Pregnant: Two Lesbians Make a Family, lifts the veil of silence around fertility and pregnancy while making us laugh at the same time.
    About Dr. Natalie Meisner
    Natalie Meisner is a playwright / poet from Nova Scotia, a full Prof at MRU, and Calgary’s 5th Poet Laureate. Her work deploys the power of comedy for social change.  Baddie One Shoe is a collection of odes to renegade women. Legislating Love: The Everett Klippert Story illuminates the life of the last Canadian jailed for homosexuality. Speed Dating For Sperm Donors was a hit at Lunchbox & Neptune. Double Pregnant: Two Lesbians Make a Family topped non-fiction lists and My Mommy, My Mama, My Brother & Me is about a two-mom biracial family finding community.
    Natalie holds a PhD from the University of Calgary in creative writing, an MFA in Creative Writing form the University of British Columbia. She is the recipient of the Annual Alberta Playwriting Competition, the Canadian National Playwriting Award, and the Lion Award for Advocacy and Awareness for Original Stage Play. Her forthcoming book, It Begins in Salt, is a collection of poems and love letters to those that share the tides of life. It urges us to love harder and give homage to those loved.
    Natalie's Books: 
    Baddie One Shoe (Frontenac House) 
    Speed Dating For Sperm Donors (Playwright's Canada Press)
    Legislating Love: The Everett Klippert Story (University of Calgary Press)
    My Mommy, My Mama, My Brother & Me (Nimbus Publishing)
    Double Pregnant: Two Lesbians Make a Family (Fernwood Publishing)
    It Begins in Salt (Frontenac House) 

    • 56 min
    Parenting in the age of AI with Leslie Salgado

    Parenting in the age of AI with Leslie Salgado

    In the second episode of our two-part series, journalist, photographer, and AI researcher Leslie Salgado guides me step by step through AI ethics, ChatGPT, and parenting in the age of AI. Leslie explains, "Their world is going to be heavily influenced by AI… For me it's not about prohibiting or denying that reality. It's about educating them and educating ourselves." 
    Leslie explores the need for ethics-driven AI, explaining,  "We need to go a step back and think of what triggers the innovation. What triggers those people to create a new tool, to create a new technology… Why are we creating this? For which purpose? Is it for sustainability? Is it for profitability?"

    About Leslie Salgado

    Journalist, photographer, and AI researcher Leslie Salgado is a Doctoral Student at the University of Calgary. Her current area of research includes Human-Centred AI, intersections between communication and AI ethical values, Online Trust and Safety, and Technology and Democracy. She is a former Public Communication Officer for UNESCO as well as a Broadcast Journalist for Canal Habana. Leslie worked as Professor at the Faculty of Communication at the University of Havana. Her recent solo photography exhibition entitled, Emotions Allowed, explores the range of human emotions. 

    Connect with Leslie:

    IG: @lesliebayamesa
    Linkedin: Leslie Salgado Arzuaga

    Resources: 

    Globe and Mail, Opinion - ChatGPT has convinced users that it thinks like a person. Unlike humans, it has no sense of the real world:
    https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-chatgpt-is-a-reverse-mechanical-turk/?login=true

    Algorithmic Justice League - Unmasking AI harms and biases:
    https://www.ajl.org

    Algorithmic Justice League - How well do IBM, Microsoft, and Face++ AI services guess the gender of a face?
    http://gendershades.org

    PEW Research Center, 6 facts about America’s STEM workforce and those training for it:
    https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/04/14/6-facts-about-americas-stem-workforce-and-those-training-for-it/

    Statista, Software developer gender distribution worldwide as of 2022:
    https://www.statista.com/statistics/1126823/worldwide-developer-gender/

    • 34 min
    Healthy expression of emotions with Leslie Salgado

    Healthy expression of emotions with Leslie Salgado

    In the first episode of our two-part series, journalist, photographer, and AI researcher Leslie Salgado and I dive deep into the world of emotions. Leslie shares the importance of releasing our emotions and trusting what our emotions tell us. Leslie speaks to her solo exhibit, Emotions Allowed, and explains how the inspiration came to on her morning commute.
    About Leslie Salgado
    Journalist, photographer, and AI researcher Leslie Salgado is a Doctoral Student at the University of Calgary. Her current area of research includes Human-Centred AI, intersections between communication and AI ethical values, Online Trust and Safety, and Technology and Democracy. She is a former Public Communication Officer for UNESCO as well as a Broadcast Journalist for Canal Habana. Leslie worked as Professor at the Faculty of Communication at the University of Havana. Her recent solo photography exhibition entitled, Emotions Allowed, explores the range of human emotions. 
    Connect with Leslie:
    IG: @lesliebayamesa
    Linkedin: Leslie Salgado Arzuaga

    • 31 min
    The art of living wild with Heidi Barr

    The art of living wild with Heidi Barr

    Author Heidi Barr shares how to live with intention and the importance of ceremony, rewilding spirituality, and contemplating the wild silence. Heidi explains, "Being in relationship with the outdoor world is the foundation of my writing."  We discuss her newly published book, Collisions of Earth and Sky: Connecting with Nature for Nourishment, Reflection, and Transformation. This is the perfect conversation for those who are feeling the novelty of the New Year subside, are battling with the montoney of February, or just need a moment to check in with yourself.

    About Heidi Barr:
    Heidi Barr lives in eastern Minnesota (Mni Sota Makoce in Dakota) near the St. Croix River — on ancestral and contemporary lands of the Wahpekute (Dakota), a place that also holds significance for Ojibwe and Ho Chunk people — with her family where they tend a large organic vegetable garden, explore nature and do their best to live simply.  
    As a mother, spouse, gardener, wellness coach, and writer, she is committed to cultivating ways of being that are life-giving and sustainable for people, communities and the planet. Hiking through forests and across prairies, wading in streams, digging in the soil and surrounding herself with natural wonder helps her stay grounded in reality.  
    Author of Slouching toward Radiance, 12 Tiny Things, Cold Spring Hallelujah, What Comes Next, Woodland Manitou: To Be on Earth, and Prairie Grown: Stories and Recipes from a South Dakota Hillside, she is also the editor of The Mindful Kitchen, a wellness column in The Wayfarer Magazine. Every now and then she coordinates with yoga teachers and organic farms to offer retreat experiences and always makes really good scones.  Her next book, Collisions of Earth and Sky: Connecting with Nature for Nourishment, Reflection, and Transformation comes out in January 2023.
    In 2022, Heidi was a Poet of Place, a group of five regional poets who are advocates and ambassadors for poetry and creativity in the lower St. Croix Valley.
    Connect with Heidi:
    Web: https://heidibarr.com
    IG: @heidicbarr
    FB: Heidi Barr
    Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidi-barr-3884107/

    • 52 min
    Writing and healing with with Wakefield Brewster

    Writing and healing with with Wakefield Brewster

    Calgary's Poet Laureate, Wakefield Brewster, explains the intersection of art and healing. Wakefield and I discuss unlearning, why communication is essential, and how art has the potential to soften the blow of heavy messages. Wakefield speaks about getting our thoughts out on paper—even the darker ones. 
    Finally, Wakefield shares his early experience as a classically trained musician and how that shaped his future with poetry.
    About Wakefield Brewster:
    Wakefield Brewster is one of Canada’s most popular and prolific Performance Poets. He is the Current Poet Laureate of Calgary, and 3-Time Calgary Poetry Slam Champion & Team Captain. He was the Inaugural Poet Of Honour at the People’s Poetry Festival, and was appointed as the First Resident Poet & Spoken Word Artist of The Grand Theatre in Calgary, Alberta. Wakefield sits on the Board of Directors of the E.A.R. Society —Emergency Artist’s Relief — which provides emergency relief funding and affordable Health Care for Artists.
    As the founder of Page2Stage Productions, Wakefield has been bringing Poetry to students for over 21 years by building communities and engaging in volunteering, leadership and mentorship for youth, through the arts. He is also an advocate for Healing Arts & Alternative Medicine; Mental Wellness & Recovery. He holds a Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do, and is the Lead Therapist, owner and operator of WakeFull Wellness Massage Therapy and HealingSpace.
    Connect with Wakefield Brewster: 
    Web: https://wakefieldbrewster.com
    IG: @wakefield_brewster
    FB: @Wakefield Brewster aka da lyrical pitbull
    Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wakefield-brewster-91658a23/
    Twitter: @lyricalpitbull

    • 41 min

Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5
10 Ratings

10 Ratings

Mare78Hare ,

Great show

What a great find this podcast has been. The guests that Lisa interviews are all fascinating and her interview style is engaging and well place. Looking forward to future shows

chrisshaddock ,

A lucky find

Immediately engaging! Fun! So so good! If you’re not listening to this podcast you are missing out.

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