2024 Edition: The Books, Shows, Music, and Moments That Carried Us Through

As we step into 2025, HIP staff take a moment to look back at the stories, art, media, and more that carried us through 2024

HIP staff emote in a meme from our 2024 All Staff Retreat

Four years ago, HIP began a tradition of gathering together at the last staff meeting of the year to compile and share the messages, readings, images, and more that energized us over the past year (check out our 2023 edition here). This year-end practice reminds us of the small but powerful things that help us stay grounded — whether it’s a gripping book, a hilarious TV show, or a moment of connection that makes the world feel a little more expansive.

Amidst many challenges, 2024 brought moments of joy, resilience, and clarity that fueled our work and gave us hope for what’s possible. As we gear up for the work ahead, we hope sharing these sparks of inspiration will sustain moments of discovery and strength to help propel you forward, too. Here’s what moved and inspired HIP staff in 2024.

Political actions, wins, & communities

• Mutual aid responses to the devastating Los Angeles fires — We’re feeling tremendous grief for our beloved Los Angeles-based staff, friends, family, and communities who have experienced unimaginable tragedy and loss this week. If you’re looking for ways to contribute to relief efforts, we encourage you to explore Mutual Aid Los Angeles’s Resource List, and the Displaced Black Families Altadena & Pasadena Mutual Aid Directory.
• Hundreds march on Capitol in Sacramento to protest Trump’s mass deportation plan — After the election, Ice out of California and Dignity not Detention were ready to take action and organize the People’s March and Rally to Stop Mass Deportations on December 2nd. I was inspired by the love, commitment, solidarity, music, tamales, art and fierceness of the people.
• Workers’ Bill of Rights, Step Up Louisiana — Our partners continue to inspire! In the midst of an awful election season, our partner Step Up Louisiana has been putting in the work that resulted in a landslide ballot initiative victory in New Orleans to add a Workers’ Bill of Rights to the City Charter.
• HIP’s Abolitionist Public Health Student Network! — All of the students in the Abolitionist Public Health Network move me with how they hold space together and learn from each other.
• Jackie Fielder elected to San Francisco Board of Supervisors — I was so excited, energized, and inspired by the sweeping victory of Jackie Fielder to the Board of Supervisors in my home city San Francisco! She’s a progressive Indigenous Latina, deeply in the community, and the only democratic socialist on the Board, and she ran a powerful grassroots campaign on creating a public bank, expanding tenants rights, taxing the city’s wealthiest residents, prioritizing affordable housing, and protecting undocumented immigrants in the wake of Trump’s election (image below).

Jackie Fielder elected to San Francisco Board of Supervisors — via Clara Liang

• Ysabel Jurado elected to city council in LA — an “unabashedly progressive” eviction defense attorney and self-described abolitionist who was born and raised in the community she now represents won over an incumbent city council member with a sordid past of not standing for the people.
• Dr. Flo Cofer runs for Mayor of Sacramento California! — Watching my dear sister-friend run for Mayor of Sacramento, a people-led grassroots campaign was incredible. Flo is a powerful force and an inspiration to people of all ages; it was an honor to witness her greatness up close.

View — images, demonstrations, photos, graphics, art, the sky

• Student encampments in solidarity with Palestine — In the midst of a year of ongoing genocide in Palestine, I spent a few days at the student Palestine solidarity encampment at Harvard. This beautiful note from a 6 year old in solidarity with the movement was on a community bulletin board at the encampment. I drew so much inspiration from this widespread movement across the world, where students were really creating a third space at their universities in alignment with the values of abolition, liberation, and solidarity that we are trying to build in the world (image below).

Note from a six year old in solidarity with Free Palestine posted on a community bulletin board at the Harvard University encampment — via Christine Mitchell

• Dance as Resistance! — This year my family joined the Karameh and Sumud Debka Troupes, learning and performing the traditional folk dance that is a symbol of Palestinian resistance to colonial erasure. We’ve performed at protests, rallies and cultural and community events, even physically reclaiming public space from aggressive zionist agitators. To be a social movement we are learning how to move together through dance.
• The work of artist Wangechi Mutu — Mutu is a contemporary visual artist that I had the thrill of seeing during our PPH in-person gathering in New Orleans this year. She has a huge range, from mixed media collage, painting, sculpture, film, and performance art. Her work is visually stunning, complex, and unique, and explores the intersections of race, gender, colonialism, and human relationships with nature. I got lost in time looking at her pieces, transformed and transfixed as only art can do for me.
• Plant Kween @plantkween — Plant Kween brings me so much joy! They are, by far, the best part of my IG feed. Plants, fashion, color, nature, beauty, inspiration, words of the day, and lewks on lewks — they’ve got it all and more!
• This is a painting my 4-year-old son did of a Parrot — and it fills me with joy. He is an incredibly active kid until he sits down with some paints and experiences stillness and focus. It reminds me of the importance of art in our lives (image below).

Kiddo’s parrot painting bringing joy — via Jessi Corcoran

• Northern lights visible in California skies — The fact that we could see the northern lights in California. It felt like a treat.
• The work of artist Lara Aburamadan — Bay Area-based Palestinian artist Lara Aburamadan’s photographs of Palestine are heartbreakingly beautiful. Her work meditates on memory, grief, life, and home. Her photographs of Palestinian life in the Gaza strip in particular are a testament and memorial to the overwhelming life and beauty that has been destroyed by the ongoing genocide.
• The memes, poems, and art that fill my social media feed with fortifying wisdom — This year I especially looked for any semblance of grounding and guidance after the election results, but also amidst the ongoing genocide(s) and climate crisis. They help remind me to stay grounded in histories of resilience in our communities and our natural world.
• Free Palestine — Seeing a free Palestine banner hanging over a Mardi Gras parade route was a beautiful illustration of both solidarity and of how oppression cannot and will not rob us of our joy and celebration (image below).

A Free Palestine banner hangs over a Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans, LA — via Khalil Hall

Read — articles, blogs, books, posts, prayers

• “Everything for Everyone: An Oral History of the New York Commune, 2052–2072,” by M.E. O’Brien and Eman Abelhadi — Reading this book of speculative fiction post-election felt hopeful in a small way. It takes place in the near future, after decades of fascism, destruction, war, and loss in the US and around the world. But it tells the story of what is being built after that period and the new ways of living and being in relationship that people are creating in a post-capitalist reality
• Freedom’s Revival: Research from the Headwaters of Liberation — Authoritarian movements have almost totally captured the idea of “freedom” as freedom to exploit, oppress, and terrorize; as freedom from collective responsibility, care, compassion, and trust. This amazing exploration, grounded in conversations with movement leaders, helps us think through how we can contest this idea, and build a freedom that is collective, radical, and truly liberatory.
• Building Our Future: Grassroots Reflections on Social Housing — This report provides grassroots reflections and examples of campaigns across the country to win social housing– homes that are permanently affordable and community-controlled. I like that it presents a bold vision, and then gives concrete examples of the steps that movements are taking towards this vision.
• “Martyr!” by Kaveh Akbar — This was a book that I couldn’t put down once I started reading. Kaveh Akbar’s debut novel is entertaining, meditative, obsessive, and deeply familiar culturally and generationally. Per one review, it “brilliantly explores addiction, grief, guilt, sexuality, racism, martyrdom, biculturalism, the compulsion to create something that matters, and our endless quest for purpose in a world that can often be cruel and uncaring.” I loved it and cried when it ended — in the end, we all want our one precious life to matter in some way, and the story gave voice to that truth in a profound way.
• “The Seed Keeper,” by Diane Wilson — This was the first book I read in 2024, and I’m still feeling it. It follows a Dakota woman in Minnesota working to reconnect with her roots, community, traditional practices, Indigenous identity, and reckon with generational trauma of colonization. It’s a beautiful and heart-wrenching story, and has been an important part of my continued learning about the Indigenous communities in Minnesota.
• “The Future is Disabled,” by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha — “Disabled wisdom is the key to our survival and expansion.”
• Radical Public Health zine — Some of the alumni from HIP’s Abolitionist Public Health Network created this zine together. The first issue includes truly beautiful student reflections and art from their experience in the network!
• Memoirs and poetry that got me through the year — Including “Braiding Sweetgrass,” by Robin Wall Kimmerer; “Be Water, My Friend: The Teachings of Bruce Lee,” by Shannon Lee; and “Black Liturgies,” by Cole Arthur Riley. These readings kept me grounded and anchored through bearing witness to (and being an active participant of) some hard moments.
• “Aye and Gomorrah,” by Samuel Delany — Delany has long been one of my favorite sci-fi authors; his work touches on queer Black identity, future building, and always with an extremely nuanced depiction of power dynamics in relationship. This collection of short stories helped me “escape,” while giving me a new perspective on our current reality — something I think sci-fi writing is particularly brilliant at doing!

Explore — websites, spaces, reports, orgs, etc

• The Nap Ministry by Tricia Hersey — The need to center rest and practice rest as a form of resistance was important for my wellbeing this year and will probably be even more critical to protecting my peace for the years to come.
• Museo Anahuacalli in Mexico City — Museo Anahuacalli has an exhibit on the long fight against nuclear weapons that’s really powerful. I always appreciate opportunities to re-contextualize global power struggles and resituate my perspective in much larger timelines (image below).

Image from Museo Anahuacalli, Mexico City, Mexico — via Khalil Hall

• My consulting firm, Pure Jeanius Consulting, is supporting First 5 Sacramento in launching its first-ever Participatory Grantmaking initiative! — Being part of transformative systems change like this has been my passion and life’s work. I’m honored that First 5 believes in this vision to fundamentally shift how it funds BIPOC-led and serving organizations and communities.
• The Facing Race conference in St. Louis was incredible! — The event, which was just a few weeks post-election, was grounding, mobilizing, and invigorating. I also loved how the event incorporated the arts, wellness, and centered local St. Louis performers, community members, organizers, and organizations!
• Black women and their continued resilience across multiple arenas — from sports (Sha’Carri Richardson, Coco Gauff, Simone Biles, A’ja Wilson, I can name so many), politics (Kamala Harris, Joy-Ann Reid), culture/media (Jaimee Swift, Ziwe, Issa Rae), and music (Samara Joy, Doechii, Beyonce). Black women deserve to be seen, celebrated, and uplifted all the time (photo collage below).

Black women and their continued resilience across multiple arenas — image collage by Victoria A. Davis

Listen — podcasts, radio, music, meditations

• “The beautiful thing about the truth is that it’s easy” — This interview with Ta-Nehisi Coates on Makdisi Street — a podcast by the nephews of Edward Said about the history, politics, and culture of Palestine — was a really beautiful exploration of writing, art, narrative, and the parallels and differences between oppression in America, particularly of Black Americans, and the Palestinian experience. All the episodes in the podcast are really deep in the good tension: thought-provoking, nuanced, and moving.
• The Practical Radicals podcast — (and book!) brought together so many threads for me this year. The hosts, Deepak Bhargava and Stephanie Luce, dive into the strategies and stories behind transformative social change. Episodes explore topics like strategic planning, power-building, disruptive movements, narrative shifts, and lessons from history, featuring influential guests such as Maurice Mitchell, Frances Fox Piven, Ilyse Hogue, and Manisha Sinha. Each episode connects these strategies to practical examples, from labor movements and electoral politics to community organizing and climate justice.
• Conjuring Worlds with Maurice Mitchell, on Becoming the People Podcast with Prentis Hemphill — This episode of Prentis Hemphill’s podcast with Maurice Mitchell as guest was very affirming.
• Vibe Check podcast — Vibe Check has kept me informed, feeling, and a little more in touch with pop culture this year. As usual, I’m late to the party (2 years late! Ha!) but I have been listening every week since I learned of this podcast and I love them so much. Including poems! And the interview with Chase Strangio!

Watch — webinars, clips, Tik Toks, music videos

• MPs perform Maori Haka to protest against a controversial bill — Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke, a Maori member of parliament in New Zealand, tearing up a bill that would undermine the rights for Indigenous people established in the original treaty New Zealand has with the Maori people. Maipi-Clarke led a haka on the Parliament floor to disrupt the vote and it is just a beautiful and badass example of Maori power, culture, and community.
• Wicked — Between Elphaba leading the charge for freedom and the unmistakable gay tension in every Glinda duet, Wicked was the perfect mix of rebellion, fabulousness, and “are-they-or-aren’t-they” energy that I needed this year.
• “ALAA: A Family Trilogy,” by Adam Ashraf Elsayigh — This play powerfully wove together personal sacrifice, intergenerational activism, and the resilience of a family fighting for freedom under immense oppression. Hearing Alaa Abd El-Fattah’s story brought a raw, human depth to the struggles of the Egyptian Revolution, reminding me how bravery and innovation can challenge even the most daunting forces. Our ancestors have done it, so can we.
• @Bewbin’s Tik Tok, on being in “cahoots” — This video (shared with me by a HIP colleague) reminds me of the deep alignment and relationships we have on the HIP Capacity Building team. It is something very special and sacred!
• Megan Thee Stallion: In Her Words — It was really jarring witnessing how Megan was dehumanized and ridiculed after experiencing unimaginable loss and violence. I really appreciated the way she reclaimed her own narrative via this documentary.
• Celebrating Sierra Leone’s banning of child marriage (Tik Tok) — It means so much to me to witness these Salone women celebrating the end of a practice that has plagued many of our communities for centuries — and through music and dance, too. Real hotties!
• The Secret of the River, Netflix series — This fictional series about friendship and living one’s authentic self, set in the Indigenous Zapotec community of Istmo de Tehuantepec, Oaxaca was so moving and powerful. I loved that the story was told by and from the perspective of trans indigenous women and centered the power of platonic friendship over romantic love.
• Union, documentary by Stephen Maing and Brett Story — This film, which was released on black Friday, shows just how hard organizers are working in their fight to unify workers at one of the most powerful companies on the planet. In it, a group of Amazon workers embark on an unprecedented campaign to unionize their warehouse in Staten Island, NY.
• “Mexodus,” a play by Brian Quijada and Nygel D. Robinson — I had the pleasure of seeing Mexodus while in the Bay Area. A good friend from my New York days invited me as a celebration for our birthdays in October. It was so inspiring to watch the performance but also to learn about shared histories. It was an example of the power of art.

The people, places, and practices nearest and dearest to us

• My grandma Nana turning 100! — May everyone and every family have the chance to have that experience.
• Watching plants change over time and collecting seeds in fall to pass on — “Whoever saved the seed loved us before they knew us. And some of them loved us as their world was ending. Our gardens are an archive of that love.” — Ross Gay, Inciting Joy (photo below).

Watching plants grow and bloom — via Solange Gould

• The Bay — Always, every season, being immersed in the cold salt water. This year the mammal encounters have become more frequent (seals touching our toes, swimming with us) which is terrifying and also amazing. This photo is from the morning of December 5th 2024, before the Petrolia earthquake/tsunami warning, “Red sky at morning, sailors take warning” felt accurate (image below)!

Vibrant skies over the East Bay — via Shannon Tracey

• Our new puppy, Sydney! We got a rescue puppy. She adds so much more love, a bit more work, and more getting outside to our family (image below).

Our new puppy, Sydney! — via Christina Medina Martin

• Connecting family, across distance and generations — In addition to the joy of having a baby this year, it was particularly special to travel across the country so that my 98 year old grandma could meet my baby, who was named after her mother. Family is so important to me, and I loved being able to gather with four generations of women (image below)!

Family connecting over four generations — via Sari Bilick

• Taking a national parks trip with our chosen family — It snowed when we were at the Grand Canyon, as if you couldn’t get more breathtaking and awe-inspiring. What an utter gift we got to experience — I can still drop into the physical sensation it created and will cherish that (image below).

A snowy family trip to the Grand Canyon — via Lili Farhang

• Collective art-making! — Year-round I participate in a group collage art project, where five people start a piece of art and trade it five times, adding and layering with each pass along with a shared journal about our process and thoughts during. The process teaches me about control/letting go, creating community in the small moments, welcoming others into your creative (and often private) world, and making something bigger together over the course of time.

As always, we feel so much gratitude and love to be in movement with all of you. And we want to know what’s inspired, moved, and resonated with you over the past year! Share the messages that carried you at info@humanimpact.org, on Bluesky at @hiporg.bsky.social, or tag us on Instagram at @PHAwakened 💚

By the Human Impact Partners staff. Human Impact Partners transforms the field of public health to center equity and builds collective power with social justice movements.