The Resistant Communiqués Collective is incredibly honored to present Season II, Episode II, with Award-Winning New York Times Best-Selling Author and movement worker, Ijeoma Oluo, entitled, “Resistant Communiqués: General Strikes, Abolition & Building Community Power to Resist State Repression with Ijeoma Oluo”.

The term “General strike” has surged in prominence in 2026, particularly in the wake of the ICE occupation of Minneapolis and the general strike and walkout on January 23 this year. But it’s also a widely misused term because of the difficulty of organizing and coordinating such a widespread labor action. How do you coordinate among so many different groups? It’s not something that you can immediately leap into, especially when people are often so disconnected even from their neighbors.

Our guest this month, Ijeoma Oluo, offers valuable insights into the history of labor actions and strategies for making a General Strike feasible. To make mass labor activism possible, we must effectively organize multiracial coalitions in a society where systemic racism, patriarchy, ableism, queerphobia, and more are the norm. This means learning about solidarity and how to practice it. It also necessitates adopting a truly abolitionist perspective: encouraging communities to move beyond carceral approaches, behaviors, and logics. It ensures communities can move beyond relying on carceral entities, while also offering grace, support, and understanding to people as they learn and grow.

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Ijeoma Oluo is a Seattle-based Writer, Speaker, and Internet Yeller.

Her work on social issues such as race and gender has been published in The Guardian, Esquire, Washington Post, ELLE Magazine, New York Times, and more. She has been featured on programs like The Daily Show, All Things Considered, and BBC News. She is the author of three bestselling books: So You Want To Talk About Race, MEDIOCRE: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America, and Be A Revolution: How Everyday People Are Fighting Oppression and Changing the World – and How You Can Too.

Ijeoma was named one of The Root’s 100 Most Influential African Americans in 2017 & 2018, and is the recipient of the Feminist Humanist Award 2018 by the American Humanist Association, the Harvard Humanist of the year 2020, the Media Justice Award by the Gender Justice League, the 2018 Aubrey Davis Visionary Leadership Award by the Equal Opportunity Institute and was named to the TIME100 Next list in 2020.

Resistant Communiqués is a grassroots project, self-funded by the Resistant Communiqués Collective and funded in part by our listeners and co-learners, like you. Your support helps foster an accessible, independent podcast focusing on People’s and Resistance History. You can help support and sustain this grassroots project by becoming a paid subscriber today.

Here is our interviewwith Ijeoma Oluo…

Listen, share, and study with us using the multimedia syllabus below.

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Resistant Commuiqués is a grassroots project, self-funded by the Resistant Communiqués Collective and funded in part by our listeners and co-learners, like you. Your support helps foster an accessible, independent podcast focusing on People’s and Resistance History. You can help support and sustain this grassroots project by becoming a paid subscriber today.

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Multimedia Syllabus

Note: This is not an exhaustive bibliography; it serves as a starting point for further research.

Please note: Due to Substack’s interface, some of the bibliography items below are directly linked to the items instead of being correctly formatted with a hyperlink. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Abolitionist Organizing

Critical Resistance. (2025, August 13). Critical Resistance. Critical Resistance. https://criticalresistance.org

Davis, A. Y., Dent, G., Meiners, E. R., & Richie, B. E. (2022). Abolition. Feminism. Now. Haymarket Books.

Hayes, K., & Kaba, M. (2023). Let this radicalize you: Organizing and the revolution of reciprocal care. Haymarket Books.

Kaba, M., & Nopper, T. K. (2021). We do this ’til we free us: Abolitionist organizing and transforming justice. Haymarket Books.

Anti-ICE & Community Defense Organizing

Defend and Recruit (D&R). (n.d.). ✊ D&R Community Defense Resource Hub. Google Docs. Retrieved from https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ov-O3EGMmaBh-SELgtmYopVCo1mfJUZFWNOHfLa5ADc/edit?tab=t.0&usp=embed_facebook

Lekas Miller, A. (2026, February 9). A Guide to Meaningful Action Against ICE. Truthdig. https://www.truthdig.com/articles/a-guide-to-taking-meaningful-action/

Mutual Aid Disaster Relief. (2022). Beginner’s Guide & Interactive Workbook. Mutual Aid Disaster Relief. https://mutualaiddisasterrelief.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/Community-Defense.pdf

Newman, L. H., Varner, M., & Burgess, M. (2026, January 13). What to Do if ICE Invades Your Neighborhood. Wired. https://www.wired.com/story/what-to-do-if-ice-invades-your-neighborhood/

Red-Winged Blackbird collective. (2026). “Dispatch, Please Advise!” Tactics for fighting the federal occupation of Minnesota by ICE: “Let the world know that when the fascists come to town, we will run them out.” [Zine]. Antidote Zine. https://antidotezine.com/2026/01/27/dispatch-please-advise/

Building to General Strikes

Demby, et al. (Host). (2024, January 17). The women who masterminded the Montgomery Bus Boycott. [Audio podcast episode]. In CodeSwitch. National Public Radio (NPR). https://www.npr.org/2024/01/17/1197954608/the-women-who-masterminded-the-montgomery-bus-boycott

Shvangiradze, T. (2023, November 7). Les Soixante-Huitards: The French Student Demonstrations of May 1968. The Collector. https://www.thecollector.com/may-1968-french-student-protests/

Winslow, C. (2019, July 3). When Workers Stopped Seattle. Jacobin. Jacobin. https://jacobin.com/2019/07/seattle-general-strike-1919-union-organizing

Mapping

Seattle General Strike Project. (2009). Mapping the General Strike. Civil Rights and Labor History Consortium, University of Washington. Seattle General Strike Project. https://depts.washington.edu/labhist/strike/map.shtml

Multiracial Coalitions & Organizing

Fowler, R. (2017, January 26). My Time at Standing Rock Taught Me What We Need to Do to Resist | Dame Magazine. https://www.damemagazine.com/2017/01/26/my-time-standing-rock-taught-me-what-we-need-do-resist/

Isaacs, E. (2018, August 5). THE BATTLE OF BLAIR MOUNTAIN: LABOR STRUGGLES AND THE BOSSES’ STATE. The Multiracial Unity Blog. https://multiracialunity.org/2018/08/05/the-battle-of-blair-mountain-labor-struggles-and-the-bosses-state/

The Valley Labor Report. (2024, March 1). How Black and White Alabama Coal Miners Organized in the Depths of Jim Crow [Video]. YouTube.

ZinnEdProject. (2024, February 8). Everyday Solidarity Interracial Organizing Stories from “The Sum of Us” [Video]. YouTube.

U.S. Union Solidarity Models

Cole, P. (2024, November 24). How American Dockworkers Fought Apartheid in South Africa. Jacobin. Jacobin. https://jacobin.com/2024/11/ilwu-apartheid-south-africa-boycott

Prescod, P. (2023, October 23). How the UAW Broke Ford’s Stranglehold Over Black Detroit. Jacobin. Jacobin. https://jacobin.com/2023/10/united-autoworker-ford-black-detroit-race-labor

Press, A. N. (2024, July 8). We’re in a Class War. Jane McAlevey Actually Acted Like It. Jacobin. Jacobin. https://jacobin.com/2024/07/jane-mcalevey-labor-movement-obituary

Additional Works and Themes Discussed in the Episode

Civil Rights and Labor History Consortium. (2009). Segregated Seattle: Home—Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project. University of Washington. Seattle Civil Rights and Labor History Project, University of Washington. Retrieved https://depts.washington.edu/civilr/segregated.htm

Horton, K. (2022, March 14). A look back at how white supremacists sowed seeds of hate in Oregon in the 20th century—OPB. Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB). Oregon Public Broadcasting (OPB). https://www.opb.org/article/2022/03/14/rise-of-klan-white-nationalism-hate-racism-oregon/

Kelley, R. D. G. (1996). Race Rebels: Culture, Politics, and the Black Working Class. Free Press.

Oluo, I. (2019). So you want to talk about race (First trade paperback edition). Seal Press.

Oluo, I. (2020). Mediocre: The dangerous legacy of white male power. Basic Books.

Oluo, I. (2024). Be a Revolution: How everyday people are fighting oppression and changing the world – and how you can, too (First edition). HarperOne, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

Listen to the Music of the movement, Guest’s choice:

POW from POW by Gabriel Teodros

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Episode Credits

In this episode of the Resistant Communiqués Podcast:

Podcast Coordinators: Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

Project Co-Coordinators: Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

Production

Production Coordinator: Jamila Hammami

Co-Producers: Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

Recording: Zeb Larson

Post-Production: Jamila Hammami

Editing: Jamila Hammami

Sound Design/Mixing: Jamila Hammami

Mastering: Jamila Hammami

Transcript Cleaning: Justin Fowler

Writers: Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

Script Development: Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

Researchers: Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

Fact-Check: Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

Podcast Multimedia Syllabus Development:

Jamila Hammami & Zeb Larson

Episode Featuring:

Resistant Communiqués Podcast Guest: Ijeoma Oluo

Resistant Communiqués Podcast Co-Hosts: Jamila Hammami & Justin Fowler

Resistant Communiqués Podcast Introduction: Jamila Hammami

Resistant Communiqués Podcast Episode Introduction: Jamila Hammami

Resistant Communiqués Podcast Outro: Zeb Larson

Communications:

Communications Coordinator: Jamila Hammami

Designer: Jamila Hammami & pxld Creative

Video & Content Clipping: Justin Fowler & Zeb Larson

Video Editing: Jamila Hammami

Content Creation: Jamila Hammami

Content Copy: Zeb Larson

Resistant Communiqués Podcast (and Collective) Administrative Coordinator: Justin Fowler

MUSIC CREDITS

Royalty-Free Music for the Podcast and Episode:

Music Clipping: Zeb Larson

Music Editing & Mixing: Jamila Hammami

Royalty-Free Music Artists/ Composers:

Podcast Intro Music: Cheel – Soft Feeling

Episode Intro Music: Wayne Jones – Connection

Episode Music: Karl Casey – New Dawn

Episode Outro Music: Cheel – Soft Feeling

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