Here at the Peace & Justice Center, we aren’t afraid to dream big, but the large scope of our work and mission compels us to focus on four concrete action currents. Peace-building education, assisting in regular public assemblies, participating in community action, and leading collective rituals all strengthen our ability to take meaningful action for the protection & regeneration of a living anti-racist culture, and in doing so move us closer to realizing our vision of a peace and just world.
The Four Currents of Our Work
We believe that our greatest social problems cannot be solved unless our communities feel free to speak out, speak up, and advocate for themselves and their neighbors. To this end, we often co-sponsor demonstrations and actions fighting for greater civil rights, an expansion of peace and human rights, and freedom for all people. We can often be seen in coalition with other local Vermont organizations advocating for peace and justice. We have been active participants in immigration rights rallies, healthcare justice rallies, anti-nuclear proliferation rallies, and so much more.
The Peace & Justice Center also offers activist support to our community in unique and material ways. These include:
- Our Library of Things, which has many materials grassroots activists might require to plan an effective demonstration. We offer free use of our megaphones, tables, speakers, microphones, and other supplies to all groups and actions aligning with our mission promoting peace and human rights
- We often host poster-making parties to support folks going to a demonstration, with all the supplies needed provided for free. We have in the past also hosted deescalation training for people starting to get involved in grassroots action
- Our community space is available to grassroots organizations for either free or low-cost rental, and this can be used for planning sessions
At the Peace & Justice Center, we try to creative collective moments of liberation, joy, and healing. We try and offer support to the grieving, a balm to the suffering, and a path forward for all of us. In the United States, we have often lost access to the commons, but here at the Peace & Justice Center, we are constantly trying to rebuild that communal world and re-enchant the commons through collective ritual.
Ritual can be as simple as creating places for people to freely gather and have a meal, rest, or just be. As collective ritual, we currently offer many different activities on a monthly rotating schedule, including:
- A Radical Folk Song series, where we teach people the history of American folk music and its use in protests throughout time. We also give out free songbooks to all attendees, and encourage participants to collectively write a song together.
- Prison Letter Writing, where we teach people how to write letters to our incarcerated neighbors. We have written 100+ letters, holiday cards, and greeting cards to people incarcerated all across the United States, focusing particularly on our neighbors incarcerated in South Burlington, VT at the Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility
- Zines + Button Making, where we teach people the history of autonomous media creation and encourage free creativity. At this event, all people can see their creations come to life as 1.5″ pin-on buttons, and all people can spread their ideas through zine making
At the core of the Peace & Justice Center, and something that we have held as our central means for achieving our mission of a peace and just world, is peace-building education. As Murray Bookchin said, “Every revolutionary project is, above all, an educational one.” We currently live in a society that is becoming more militarized daily. We live in a war economy, which means it is difficult to extricate any part of our lives from complicity in war. Those of us who go through mainstream schooling spend our formative years learning about the history of war and almost nothing about the history of peace. We seek to change that! The Peace & Justice Center offers lectures, discussions, activities, and workshops with peace-building intentions on a variety of different topics. Currently we offer:
- Rad History Series: A series of lectures focused on activist movements and ideas from the past that can inform our current work. Examples include lectures on figures like Emma Goldman, events like the Haymarket Affair, and ideas like environmentalism
- Study Peace Reading Group: A reading group where we read through a book together and discuss how it can help us live a more peaceful life in the here and now. An example of a recent book we have read together is Peace is Every Step by Thich Nhat Hanh
- Cooperative Storytelling Game Night: We come together once every two weeks to play a cooperative game that encourages us to dream of how the world might be better, and how we can contribute to making it better now. Games have included Solarpunk Futures and others.
We love the communities we live in here in Vermont. The Peace & Justice center has a 46-year legacy of acting for the sake of nuclear disarmament, racial justice, and a livable wage, to name a few of the issues that have had our focus. This work almost always happens in coalition, meaning that we are mobilizing & organizing with other individuals and groups across the state for the sake of a common goal. One way we can support many organizations across the whole of Vermont is by offering fiscal sponsorship – allowing grassroots organizations to apply for grants and use our financial support and expertise to get them off the ground.
We currently fiscally sponsor over 20 groups, including groups like The People’s Farmstand, the Rutland NAACP, and the Waterbury Area Anti-Racism Committee. If you or your group is interested in fiscal sponsorship, please email Kason (kason@pjcvt.org), our Director of Operations, to discuss next steps. You can also find more info about our Allied Groups by clicking on the button below.