Food Fight! Makani Themba, ED, The Praxis Project, advocacy to advance health justice.

Makani Themba is executive director of The Praxis Project, a nonprofit organization helping communities use media and policy advocacy to advance health justice. Under her leadership, The Praxis Project has raised more than $20 million for advocacy organizations working in communities of color nationwide.

Makani was previously director of the Transnational Racial Justice Initiative (TRJI), an international project to build capacity among advocates to more effectively address structural racism and leverage tools and best practices from around the world. While at TRJI, she co-authored and edited a “shadow report” on institutional racism and white privilege – the first of its kind.

Makani has published numerous articles and case studies on race, class, media, policy advocacy and public health. She is author of Making Policy, Making Change, and co-author of Media Advocacy and Public Health: Power for Prevention, a contributor to the volumes Community Based Participatory Research for Health, Prevention is Primary: Strategies for Community well Being, We the Media along with many other edited book projects. Her publications have helped set the standard for policy advocacy work and contributed significantly to the field’s current emphasis on media and policy advocacy to address health problems. She has also co-authored with Hunter Cutting is Talking the Walk: Communications Guide for Racial Justice. Her latest book, a collaboration under The Praxis Project with contributions from Malkia Cyril and others, is Fair Game: A Strategy Guide for Racial Justice Communications in the Obama Era.
About The Praxis Project

The Praxis Project is a nonprofit movement support intermediary and an institution of color that supports organizing and change work at local, regional and national levels. Focused on movement building for fundamental change, our mission is to build healthy communities by changing the power relationships between people of color and the institutional structures that affect their lives.

Local to Global Advocates for Justice. Healing what really makes us sick. It is no secret that across nearly every indicator of health status, low income people and people of color are more likely to be sick, injured, or die prematurely. Social determinants – where we live, our race and gender, our employment and income status, even our access to democratic participation are critical factors in our health status. Improving health status will require addressing these root causes through sustained action for change that transforms the current systems of neglect, bias, and privilege into systems – policies, practices, institutions – into a social contract that truly supports health for all.

Our internationally recognized staff employ their broad experience in training, advocacy, policy development, media relations and technical assistance to support local organizations as they work to advance their vision of a healthy, just community.
Maria Whittaker, Program Director
Local to Global Advocates for Justice
KC Food Justice
3156 Wood View Ridge Drive
Suite 206
Kansas City, KS 66103
913 945 1333

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