Us with Dr. Crystallee Crain - Critical Conversations On The Challenges & Opportunities Of Our Time

About Us with Dr. Crystallee Crain - Critical Conversations On The Challenges & Opportunities Of Our Time

Real change takes root in our values and actions. I encourage my guests and listeners to lean into what it means to be stewards of justice, hope and liberation. Rooted in on the promise of self determination your host, Dr Crystallee Crain engages in questions about human rights, spiritual and political problems, and the ever present need to protect our planet. Choose liberation with your host, Dr. Crystallee Crain, and unite together so that we can learn from one another and respect each other as experts of our own realities.

Publisher

US with Dr Crystallee Crain

Category

society & culture

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

23 Feb 2022

Latest episode

15 Jul 2026

Latest episodes

35 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   15 Jul 2026

   Sudan Is Not a Footnote — The War the World Keeps Looking Away From

   Fourteen million people displaced. Two out of every five people facing hunger. The largest humanitarian catastrophe on Earth — and barely a headline. In this episode, Dr. Crystallee Crain (https://www.crystalleecrain.org) turns toward the war the world keeps looking away from: the civil war in Sudan, now grinding through its fourth year. True to form, she starts at the roots, not the wreckage — tracing the conflict from colonial rule and the Darfur genocide, through the stolen revolution of 2019, to the two generals now tearing the country in half. She walks through where the war stands in the summer of 2026: the massacre at El Fasher, the siege of El Obeid, the drone war killing civilians by the hundreds, and the famine being used as a weapon. Then she follows the money — the gold, the arms, and the foreign powers profiting while humanitarian appeals go unfunded — and closes with what prevention, accountability, and everyday solidarity actually look like from where we sit. Content note: This episode includes descriptions of violence, famine, and sexual violence. Please listen with care. Take action: Support the World Food Programme, UNICEF, the International Rescue Committee, Doctors Without Borders, and Sudanese-led emergency response rooms — and call your representatives and ask one question: What are you doing about Sudan? References FAO / WFP / UNICEF joint alert, "Risk of Famine persists as nearly 19.5 million people face acute food insecurity in Sudan," May 15, 2026 — unicef.org/press-releases UN News, "Sudan hunger crisis deepens as UN warns millions face acute food shortages," May 2026 — news.un.org Al Jazeera, "Tracking Sudan's humanitarian crisis: By the numbers," December 15, 2025 — aljazeera.com Al Jazeera, El Obeid siege coverage and UN warnings of mass atrocities, June 29–July 1, 2026 — aljazeera.com/where/sudan Human Rights Watch, World Report 2026: Sudan — hrw.org/world-report/2026/country-chapters/sudan Amnesty International, report on El Fasher (crimes against humanity / ethnic cleansing), via The Guardian, July 1, 2026 Council on Foreign Relations, Global Conflict Tracker: "Civil War in Sudan" (updated 2026) — cfr.org Health Policy Watch, "Sudan's Catastrophic Civil War Enters Fourth Year," April 15, 2026 — healthpolicy-watch.news International Rescue Committee, "Crisis in Sudan: What is happening and how to help," July 2026 — rescue.org World Food Programme, "Risk of Famine in Sudan" emergency page — wfp.org/emergencies/sudan UNHCR, Sudan Situation Operational Data Portal — data.unhcr.org/en/situations/sudansituation UNICEF, Humanitarian Situation Report No. 39 & 2026 Humanitarian Action for Children: Sudan — unicef.org/appeals/sudan Reuters, reporting on Ethiopia-based RSF training camp, February 2026 AP News, UN human rights chief on drone casualties (1,000+ civilians, Jan–May 2026); UAE / Colombian mercenary allegations, May 2026 ACLED (Armed Conflict Location & Event Data), Sudan country analysis, incl. "Can the RSF seize El Obeid?", July 6, 2026 — acleddata.com/country/sudan Sudan Tribune and Radio Dabanga, ongoing frontline reporting, 2026 Mo Ibrahim, op-ed in the Financial Times, April 2026 (via Health Policy Watch) Music: Epidemic Sound Jungle Rumble, Andreas Dahlback Leaving No One Behind, Christian Anderson

2. 

   30 Jun 2026

   HER 250 - We Are the Blueprint: Building an Intersectional Future

   HER 250, Episode 3: From Bearing Witness to Building Power The final episode of HER 250 turns from history to the present — and to what comes next. Dr. Crystallee Crain opens with an unflinching look at where the gaps from Episodes One and Two still show up today. The wage gap remains stark and racially specific: Native American women are paid 53 cents, Latinas 54 cents, and Black women 63 cents for every dollar paid to white, non-Hispanic men. Maternal health disparities persist even across education levels — Black women with a college degree have higher pregnancy-related mortality rates than white women without a high school diploma, evidence that the gap is about racism, not income. But this episode is also a celebration of what's being built right now. Dr. Crain highlights Deb Haaland, the first Native American Cabinet secretary in U.S. history, who used her position as Secretary of the Interior to launch the federal investigation into Indian boarding schools discussed in Episode One. She points to Stacey Abrams, whose work with Fair Fight Action after Georgia's contested 2018 governor's race helped register hundreds of thousands of new voters. From there, Dr. Crain lays out a concrete vision for an intersectional future — disaggregated public health data, redistributive philanthropy, real community governance, and culture as a vehicle for healing — drawing directly from her own work building the Michigan Prevention Data Atlas. The series closes on a personal note: a reflection on the women of Flint, Michigan, who Dr. Crain calls "the infrastructure of this country," and a charge to listeners that the next 250 years belong to all of us. Episode 3 Citations [1] Wage gap figures are sourced from the National Partnership for Women and Families, "America's Women and the Wage Gap" (nationalpartnership.org), based on U.S. Census Bureau, Current Population Survey, Annual Social and Economic Supplement, 2025 (reporting 2024 data), and corroborated by the AAUW Equal Pay Day Calendar (aauw.org, 2026). [2] Maternal health disparities by education level are documented by KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation), "Racial Disparities in Maternal and Infant Health: Current Status and Key Issues" (kff.org). [3] Deb Haaland's historic confirmation as the first Native American Cabinet secretary and her launch of the Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative are documented by the U.S. Department of the Interior (doi.gov, press release, May 11, 2022). [4] Stacey Abrams's voter registration work through Fair Fight Action following the 2018 Georgia governor's race is documented by Fair Fight Action (fairfight.com) and corroborated by reporting from NPR, the New York Times, and the Washington Post. See also: Abrams, Stacey. Our Time Is Now: Power, Purpose, and the Fight for a Fair America. Henry Holt, 2020. Sound Epidemic Sound Osoku Title:Wanderlust

3. 

   30 Jun 2026

   HER 250 - Race, Erasure, and the Women Who Were Told to Wait Their Turn

   HER 250, Episode 2: Race, Erasure, and the Women Who Were Told to Wait Their Turn In 1913, more than five thousand women marched on Washington to demand the vote — and Black women were told to march at the back. Ida B. Wells refused. In Episode Two of HER 250, Dr. Crystallee Crain pulls apart the suffrage movement's celebrated history to show what it cost the women it left behind. She names what's usually left out of the textbooks: Elizabeth Cady Stanton's documented opposition to Black men receiving the vote before "educated" white women,and Susan B. Anthony's strategic distancing of the movement from Black suffragists to preserve support among white Southern women. Then she turns to the women who built power anyway. Ida B. Wells, born into slavery in 1862, founded the first Black women's suffrage club in Chicago and stepped back into a segregated march rather than accept the back of the line. Mary Church Terrell co-founded the National Association of Colored Women in 1896, building national infrastructure for Black women's civic power at a time when white-led organizations shut the door. And Fannie Lou Hamer — sharecropper, organizer, and survivor of a forced sterilization she later named the "Mississippi appendectomy" — delivered 1964 Democratic National Convention testimony so powerful that President Lyndon Johnson called an emergency press conference just to keep it off live television. It aired anyway. The episode closes with Dr. Crain connecting this history to Kimberlé Crenshaw's 1989 framework of intersectionality — naming what Black women had been living and organizing around for a century before it had a name. References [1] The scale and date of the 1913 Woman Suffrage Procession is documented by the Brennan Center for Justice, "The 19th Amendment, Explained" (brennancenter.org). [2] The order for Black women to march at the back of the 1913 procession is documented by the National Park Service, "A Noble Endeavor: Ida B. Wells-Barnett and Suffrage" (nps.gov). [3] Elizabeth Cady Stanton's documented opposition to Black men's enfranchisement ahead of white women is sourced from the National Women's History Museum, "Votes for Women Means Votes for Black Women" (womenshistory.org), and corroborated by the Brennan Center for Justice. [4] Susan B. Anthony's strategic distancing from Black suffragists is documented in Paula J. Giddings, Ida: A Sword Among Lions: Ida B. Wells and the Campaign Against Lynching (Amistad/HarperCollins, 2008), as referenced by the National Park Service and American Heritage magazine. [5] Ida B. Wells's founding of the Alpha Suffrage Club (January 1913) and her defiance of the segregation order at the Washington march are documented by AAUW (aauw.org), WTTW Chicago, and the National Park Service. [6] Mary Church Terrell's 1896 founding of the National Association of Colored Women is documented by the Brennan Center for Justice and the National Women's History Museum. [7] Fannie Lou Hamer's 1961 forced sterilization, her coining of the term "Mississippi appendectomy," and her August 22, 1964 DNC testimony are documented by PBS American Experience (pbs.org), the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture (nmaahc.si.edu), and the Center for Constitutional Rights (ccrjustice.org). [8] Kimberlé Crenshaw's introduction of "intersectionality" is sourced from her foundational paper, "Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine, Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics," University of Chicago Legal Forum, 1989. Sound Epidemic Sound Seaview Title: Sulu

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Apple Podcasts (US)

5.0 / 5

1 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 13 / 100

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Quality

27

Social presence

0

YouTube

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Contact Us with Dr. Crystallee Crain - Critical Conversations On The Challenges & Opportunities Of Our Time

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