OUR WORK

Black women have been telling white women to unlearn their racism so that all women could unite and stand together since Black women in the United States first began organizing for women’s rights nearly 200 years ago. 

Today, women remain divided along racial lines, even in organizations and employee resource groups dedicated to advancing women’s interests.

The Interracial Sisterhood Coalition works to change these dynamics.

We create safe, generative spaces for women of all ethnicities to listen to each other's stories and truths, get to know each other, change our beliefs about ourselves and each other, change how we interact with each other, and imagine together the society we want for ourselves and future generations. Together we co-create interracial sisterhood and solidarity in our workplaces and communities, drawing on our differences as strengths, and building Beloved Community among women of all ethnicities.

We believe that relationships are crucial for organizing. 

We counteract hundreds of years of "divide and conquer" by guiding women to love ourselves and see, hear, respect and celebrate our differences and our common humanity.

OUR FOUNDER

Hi, I’m Karen Fleshman, antiracism educator, single soccer and sewing mom, founder of Racy Conversations and the Interracial Sisterhood Coalition.

For a GenX white woman named Karen, I’ve had an unusual life. After growing up in a small, almost entirely white community that had been a Sundown Town, I attended Mount Holyoke College, where I first experienced interracial sisterhood. 

Throughout my career, I worked for organizations where white people were the minority, I made many mistakes and caused harm to my coworkers, team members, and the people we served.

Fortunately, I worked for women of the Global Majority, great role models and mentors who gave me feedback on how to show up better.  As a youth workforce development worker, I mentored many young adults of color as they began corporate careers, and they gave me feedback, too. My mentees became some of my best mentors. 

In 2014, I was deeply impacted by Black Lives Matter protestors standing up to tear gas in Ferguson. I decided to stand up too, left an abusive marriage and joined the Black Lives Matter protests. Listening to young Black women’s stories of workplace harm - often by women who look like me- made me stop preparing young adults of color for the workplace and start preparing the workplace for young adults of color. I founded Racy Conversations, and facilitate antiracism workshops at workplaces throughout the country.

I study racism, reading books, listening to scholars, and have experienced the greatest growth and transformation listening to my friends across difference. The more I learn about the history of white supremacy and patriarchy in the United States, the more inspired I am to heal racial divides among women so we can break cycles. 

I live in the Bay Area, a majority global majority region in a global majority state, yet social circles remain racially segregated. Nine times out of 10, when a white friend invites me to something, almost all of the people there are white, and when a Black friend invites me to something, I am one of maybe two white people who are there. 

To heal racial divides among women, I believe it is important for us to share space and listen to each other’s stories. I began organizing interracial sisterhood events all over the country. At these events, women of all ethnicities are welcome. Speakers share their stories and ask questions that all participants answer in one-on-one conversations, switching conversation partners several times. The outcome is greater self-awareness and shared understanding of our lived experiences across difference.

During the pandemic, we moved to online conversations and cohorts for ongoing learning and conversation. The feedback was very positive, and we consistently heard “we need more time” so in December 2023, we organized the first Interracial Sisterhood Retreat in Miami.

It was a big success at building community, and now we are organizing the second Interracial Sisterhood Retreat in San Francisco July 18-20 2024.

The Interracial Sisterhood Retreat is a space for celebration, reflection, appreciation, and much-needed grounding to envision the future we want for ourselves and future generations, where all beings thrive.

This space is ours to define, it's ours to heal, it's ours to build together. Re-center love. Re-center our humanity. Co-create a space where we can be ourselves and experience liberation, joy and peace together.