Programming is power. Use it on the voices not being heard.

principle — attributed to Laurie Kirby

The people who get the keynote shape the field's sense of who counts. That is a real power, and the discipline is to use it on the people doing the work who haven't been given the room — the Native American woman building a forward-looking arts festival, the West African founder with a global playbook, the women holding entire ecosystems together in plain sight. Not everyone will like the choices. Not everyone has to come. The room is curated, which means the curator gets to decide.

For program chairs and festival directors building speaker lineups in a contested moment.

programming, leadership, platform, curation