What Takes Root: Stories of Resistance and Reclamation

Short description: In this episode of What Takes Root , Colombian biologist and community advocate María Clara Botero Zapata shares how growing up in a campesino family surrounded by mountains and forests shaped her understanding of life, care, and resistance. She reflects on her family’s decision to create a natural reserve, restoring land that had already been deeply impacted by deforestation an...

En este episodio de Echando Raíces , la bióloga y gestora comunitaria colombiana María Clara Botero Zapata comparte cómo crecer en una familia campesina, rodeada de montañas y bosques, dio forma a su manera de entender la vida, el cuidado y la resistencia. Reflexiona sobre la decisión de su familia de crear una reserva natural, restaurando un territorio que ya había sido profundamente afectado por...

Growing up in an Adivasi village in Jharkhand, Jacinta Kerketta never imagined she would become a voice for her people. In this episode of What Takes Root , Jacinta recalls how she fled violence in her home and journeyed to the unfamiliar and often hostile world of the city in search of an education. Moving between these two realities, she’s forced to confront caste, gender violence, and the erasu...

In this episode of What Takes Root , Bolivian communicator and sound artist Isapi Rua shares how her journey began in the streets, documenting social and environmental protests that were deeply impacting her community. What started as witnessing and recording quickly became something more, a calling to tell stories through sound. Isapi reflects on a pivotal moment when she realized that many strug...

En este episodio de Echando Raíces , la comunicadora y artista sonora boliviana Isapi Rua comparte cómo su camino comenzó en las calles, documentando protestas sociales y ambientales que impactan profundamente a su comunidad. Lo que empezó como observar y grabar pronto se convirtió en algo más, un llamado a contar historias a través del sonido. Isapi reflexiona sobre un momento clave en el que ent...

In 2015, when political violence erupted in Burundi, Emery Ndayizeye fled with no plan and no destination, eventually landing in a refugee camp in Uganda. For three years, he says, he had “no life.” Then, an entrepreneurship class helped him discover his passion for photography. Today, living in Cameroon, Emery runs an organization he co-founded to help other displaced people learn skills, start b...

Lindsay Nyabereka grew up in Zimbabwe in a school system that prized grades, competition, and clear paths to success. But behind the country’s high literacy rates, she says something vital was missing. Now, as a law student in Harare, Lindsay leads groups for young people focused on mindfulness, emotional resilience, and a philosophy called Ubuntu: I am because we are. In a country where many youn...

In this episode of What Takes Root , Chilean actress and activist Evaluna Valdivieso describes how she came to see herself as both an artist and an activist. She shares the story of her company, Teatro La Crisis, and the projects she’s created about feminist movements, violence against lesbian women, and the unequal impacts of the climate crisis in the Global South. Evaluna also speaks about what...

En este episodio de Echando Raíces, What Takes Root , en inglés, la actriz y activista chilena Evaluna Valdivieso reflexiona sobre el momento en que entendió que ser artista y ser activista no eran caminos separados, sino el mismo camino. Comparte la historia de su compañía, Teatro La Crisis, y las obras que ha creado en torno a los movimientos feministas, la violencia contra mujeres lesbianas y l...

In medical school, Raviraj Shetty was trained to see bodies as problems to fix. Until he met a 14-year-old client who changed everything. What followed was a shift toward narrative practices that treat people not as diagnoses, but as authors of their own lives. Now, working with indigenous communities, Raviraj uses narrative practices as resistance and protest against structural violence For more...

Kenyan artist Mwongela Kamencu, known as Monaja, has spent his life writing music shaped by history, politics and protest. In this episode of What Takes Root , he traces the moments that radicalized him: from his childhood under an authoritarian regime to student uprisings, election violence, and the killing of a classmate. As Kenya’s youth-led protests erupt in 2024, his music moves alongside the...

In 2012, almost on a whim, social justice leader Sabah Khan helped to found a football team for Muslim girls in Mumbra, India’s largest Muslim ghetto. But it wasn’t easy. From fighting for time on Mumbra’s crowded fields to overcoming societal pressures to keep girls indoors, Sabah explains how something as simple as playing a game can be a powerful act of resistance. For more information about OR...

What Takes Root: Stories of Resistance and Reclamation is a first-person podcast featuring changemakers from the Global South. From how Muslim girls learned to play soccer in India, to political music shaped by Kenya’s long history of resistance, to community radio reaching isolated Indigenous communities in Bolivia, these are intimate stories of people reclaiming power, voice, and possibility.