Ginhawa: /ɡinˈhawa/ [ɡɪn̪ˈha.wɐ] (Baybayin spelling ᜄᜒᜈ᜔ᜑᜏ)
According to the Center for Babaylan Studies, “Ginhawa is a Filipino concept originates from the Visayan language that signifies breath, life, ease, and well-being, encompassing physical, social, emotional, and spiritual aspects”. While there is no direct English translation for Ginhawa, it is described and embodied by Filipinx peoples as the ease of breathing, wholeness, wellness, prosperity, peace, comfort, freedom, and life itself (Salazar). Towards ginhawa, a series of gatherings will be organized for bodymind reprieve to recuperate from the demands of capitalism. Events will be offered when funding and facilitators are available, so may fluctuate over time. Please visit this page for details on upcoming offerings.
Making sacred: Practices of story-telling and story-listening
Monday, March 31, 2025
EXP 1686 | 1:00 p.m. – 3:30 p.m.
Need a breather?
Celebrate International Poetry Month in community, engaged in a relaxed practice of storying. Join Shelly Grace, Toronto-based spoken word poet, for a session on practices of free story-writing, story-telling, and story-listening. Participants will practice free-writing and listening-to-listen, not respond. Giana Tomas, a PhD Candidate in Recreation and Leisure Studies, will open our session with a description of the Filipin* talk-story method of Kuwentuhan to welcome and invite different cultural textures to our discussion of storying practices.
Sharing is optional. No experience with poetry or preparation is needed. All comrades welcome. Light refreshments will be available.
About Shelly Grace:
Shelly Grace is a Toronto-based spoken word poet, photographer, and arts educator. She uses her art for community building and healing and focuses on the experiences of women and the Black community. In 2022, she was named Toronto’s Breakthrough Artist by the Toronto Arts Foundation, and JAYU's Emerging Artist of the Year.
In 2019, she won the Canadian Festival of Spoken Word while on the Up From The Roots slam team, becoming a National Spoken Word Champion. She has competed internationally as well, representing Canada in three American competitions.
Shelly has contributed significantly to Toronto's arts and culture scene through various professional and artistic roles. She has performed and worked for groups such as Toronto Poetry Slam (TPS), Toronto Public Library (TPL), Toronto Transit Commission (TTC), Toronto District School Board (TDSB), and more, sharing her voice across the city.
Shelly continues to be unapologetically Black, loud, giving, and a force.
Art-full restoration amidst uncertainty and disruption
Tuesday, April 8, 2025
EXP 1686 | 1:00 p.m. – 3:30 p.m.
Need a breather?
Join us for collaging a postcard keepsake focused on grounding, rest, and community care. Disruption, injustice, and information overload can become overwhelming and, at times, immobilizing. This session aims to earmark time and space to reflect, create, and connect with one another.
For the session, participants are asked to choose an anchor word (e.g., love, joy, liberation, life, care, community, justice) and bring a photo that reminds them of this word. Facilitator Jasmine Vanstone, a multidisciplinary artist and art facilitator, will guide us through the stylistics and technique of collage and creative writing to create a postcard keepsake as a reminder of our collective strength amidst uncertainty.
About Jasmine Vanstone:
Jasmine Vanstone is a Jamaican-Canadian multidisciplinary artist and arts facilitator who inspires, impacts, and amplifies marginalized voices through arts mentorship, community arts programming, and public art. Through her artistic practice, she experiments in various mediums -primarily collage, public art, and paper crafts- to share visual reflections of identity, wellness, and the natural environment.
Jasmine’s artistic journey began with a BFA in Visual Art and a Certificate in Cultural and Artistic Practice for Social and Environmental Justice from York University. After interning at North York Arts, she pursued Arts Management at Centennial College. Her talent, along with the power of mentorship, has earned her awards and features at Nuit Blanche, TOAF, KUUMBA, DesignTO, YZD, Finch Station, and Pearson Airport. Most recently, Jasmine was awarded the JAYU Arts For Human Rights Award and co-founded Verse & Visual Expressions to amplify equity-deserving artists in their interdisciplinary creative collaborations across poetry and visual art.
Body mapping for radical healing
May 22, 2025
Conrad Grebel University College for Radical Healing: Re-Storying Trauma, Resilience and Justice by Dr. Johonna McCants-Turner
Dr. Kimberly Lopez, Body Mapping Facilitator
"Thank you for inviting us back into our bodies, their stories, and their power..."
"The body map was a challenging and important activity to me."
"The exercise was very liberating...."
For two weeks, students gathered in the Kindred Credit Union Centre for Peace Advancement at Conrad Grebel University College for deep listening, personal reflection, collective storytelling, and healing. They came to participate in a new Master of Peace and Conflict Studies course called Radical Healing: Re-storying Trauma, Resilience and Justice, which was taught by Dr. Johonna McCants-Turner, Associate Professor of Peace and Conflict Studies and a Centre for Peace Advancement Research Fellow.
The course explored frameworks of radical healing that challenge dominant narratives of trauma and resilience. Rather than individualizing trauma or viewing resilience as mere survival, students engaged with frameworks that emphasized collective resilience, cultural and structural sources of trauma, and hope, imagination, and resistance as necessary pathways to wholeness. Through Black feminist pedagogy, Indigenous relational storytelling, and arts-based methods, students were invited to ask: What does it mean to heal together? What does justice require from us, not only politically but personally?
Throughout the course, students engaged with visual art, poetry, and narrative practices. They reflected not only on trauma, but on healing through the body, through storytelling, and through community.
Guest speakers brought powerful insights and diverse perspectives into the classroom. Dr. Kimberly Lopez led a body mapping workshop, guiding students through a narrative and arts-based research method she uses in her advocacy with personal support workers.
Writing possibility
Friday, June 6, 2025 | EXP 1686 | 10:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.
Join Dr. Markus Harwood-Jones (@Markusbones onTikTok) for an interactive workshop on storytelling as a strategy for survival, resistance, and radical joy—particularly among 2SLGBTQ+ communities.Connecting personal experience with trans literary history, Markus will encourage participants to reflect on the genre of their own lives and to craft the stories only they can tell. The session will also include a hands-on zine-making activity and live reading from his book, The Haunting of Adrian Yates.
Come ready to cut, fold, write, and reimagine the possible!
Supported by:
Faculty of Health Dean’s Advisory Committee on EDI-AR and GinhawA: Gatherings for refuge, relief, and rest.
La Torre, Joanna C., Lalaine Sevillano, Lisa Reyes Mason, Alma M. Ouanesisouk Trinidad, and Cora deLeon. 2024. Weaving Our Kuwentos (Stories) toward Ginhawa (Aliveness): Pilipinx American SocialWork MotherScholars Enacting Praxes of Survival and Thrivance in the Academy. Genealogy 8: 127. https://doi.org/10.3390/genealogy8040127
Strobel, L. (2021). URL: https://lenystrobel.medium.com/ginhawa-breath-wholeness-and-wellness-in-the-filipino%C2%B9-and-filipino-american-experience-e4346b2164f8
