Coffee & Colonialism: A Reading Club with the USA Chapter of the SCA
Update June 5, 2020:
Yesterday we announced the Coffee & Colonialism reading club and were blown away by the response. We received so much support and interest from our community, but we also wanted to acknowledge some concerns we have received.
Read the full message from Diana Mnatsakanyan-Sapp below, and view her videos on our Instagram:
THANK YOU for your enthusiasm, interest and willingness to learn. THANK YOU for asking hard questions, being willing to engage in conversations and holding me accountable when I fail to communicate the way I should. I will certainly continue to make mistakes but I promise to do my best to learn, be better, and strive to be the leader y’all deserve.
Please watch the following videos for updates regarding the @sca_us Reading Club, and my intent, the intended audience, and the research being done behind it.
Note that ANYONE is welcome to join, regardless of race or ethnic background! All coffee people can be a part of this group and be a part of this learning journey. But I want to make sure that Black folks are protected from potentially exhausting and/or harming conversations that we’ll be having there so I want to be completely transparent about these things.
If you are a Black person or POC who wants to be a part of a reading club like this but would prefer to not go on this specific journey with this group, let me know! I can connect you to the others that reach out and we can get more of these conversations going, with appropriate leadership and conversation prompts for the audience 💗
The USA Chapter Committee has organized a reading club to dig deep into the coffee industry’s roots – exploring how white supremacy has historically impacted the coffee trade, how that impact continues in our modern-day specialty coffee industry, and what we can do about it as individuals, companies, and organizations in the United States.
We, as the USA Chapter leadership, have a lot to learn, and we are committed to doing so. We believe this reading club is a step in that direction. Learning our history can help inform the steps we take in building a more equitable and prosperous future for ALL in the coffee value chain.
Read the original message below from Diana Mnatsakanyan-Sapp, SCA USA’s South East Regional Coordinator.
First, I’d like to acknowledge my shortcomings. I am a white person who, while afforded a decade of professional experience in the specialty coffee industry, still knows shamefully little about colonialism and how it has affected coffee. I am by no means a subject matter expert, but I am committed to learning so that I can be a better coffee professional, a better leader, and a better human. Please join me!
If there are any non-white folks reading this who are knowledgable about this particular subject matter and who would like to join me in forming the curriculum of this reading club and/or leading our monthly group discussions, please know that I would LOVE to collaborate and share this platform with you. Shoot me a DM [on Instagram] @workingremoatly or email me at [diana.scausa@gmail.com].
This group is open to all coffee professionals, whether you are a dues-paying member of the Specialty Coffee Association or not. Coffee enthusiasts are welcome to join, but please be aware that a lot of the dialogue in our monthly meetings will center on how we can engage in anti-racism work in our cafes, coffee roasteries, green buying practices, etc. as well as within ourselves.
I will not allow finances to be a barrier for anyone in this group. I’m working on securing sponsorship to raise funds for people who would like to participate but lack the resources to afford the books on our reading list. More details to come.
This group and its guidelines, leadership and curriculum is still a work in progress. I am doing my best and I appreciate your grace! I will strive to get an email thread kicked off in the beginning of next week so that we can start this journey together as soon as possible. I’m sincerely looking forward to it!
Love you, coffee fam. Diana.