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Dr. Bernard LaFayette and Jonathan Lewis of the Positive Peace Warrior
Network (PPWN) Lead Kingian Nonviolence Training in Philadelphia
~by Dr. Joan May Cordova ( Joanie)

Dr. Bernard LaFayette leads Aint Nobody Gonna Turn Me Around at Asian Americans United (AAU)s
movie night at FACTS School on February 7, 2013. Megna Chandra and Ellen Somekawa join the singing.
~photo by Wei Chen, AAU staff

Nonviolence is aggressive and assertive to changing the institutionalized polices, practices and
conditions that deny people their full dignity as human beings Nonviolence resists; it
challenges the peaceful nature of unjust conditions.
~The Leaders Manual on Kingian Nonviolence

Senior Trainer Jonathan Lewis, founding director of major sponsor PPWN - the Positive Peace Warrior
Network and Doc Bernard LaFayette co-lead the two-day orientation to Kingian Nonviolence at the Friends
Center in Philadelphia, PA.
~photos by Friends Center staff

Through the generous support of the Positive Peace Warrior Network (PPWN), the
Rev. / Dr. Bernard LaFayette - original Freedom Rider, co-founder of the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee (SNCC), Selma organizer, national coordinator for the 1968 Poor Peoples
Campaign, current Chair of the Southern Christian Leadership Conferenc (SCLC) led a two-day
orientation to Kingian Nonviolence in Philadelphia last February 8-9, 2013. Jonathan Lewis, senior
trainer and founding director of the Positive Peace Warrior Network (PPWN), joined Doc LaFayette
as a co-trainer for the Philadelphia training.
While both Doc LaFayette and Jonathan Lewis have led international Kingian Nonviolence
institutes and workshops throughout the globe, the 2013 event was the first two-day training theyd
ever conducted in Philadelphia. Co-sponsored by the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC),
the orientation to Kingian Nonviolence was well-received by the students, activists and community
leaders who gathered at the Martin Luther King room of the Friends Center. Through story-telling,
interactive large and small group work, reading and reflection, trainers introduced the community
participants to Kingian nonviolence philosophy and the ways Kingian nonviolence, as espoused by Dr.
Martin L. King, Jr., might be utilized to work with community leadership in nonviolent conflict
reconciliation.

The intergenerational group who braved the snow to attend Kingian nonviolence training
included long-time activists and community leaders whod been involved in numerous campaigns for
justice, staff of AFSC and other organizations, students from the University of Pennsylvania whod
been involved in Occupy Philly as well as the youngest participants fifth grade students from the
Jubilee School accompanied by their teacher and principal. During introductions to the group, some of
the young students announced: Im here at this workshop because I want to be a leader. Im here
because we have a campaign for childrens rights.

Jonathan Lewis works with fifth grade students from Jubilee School as they plan a skit to
illustrate nonviolence.
~photo by Joan May Cordova

After attending a full day of Kingian nonviolence training with Dr. LaFayette and Jonathan
Lewis, Jubilee School students expressed the significance of Dr. LaFayettes life and work in a thankyou email to him, written with love and respect from your friends at Jubilee School:
We loved that you told us more facts about our history. You were courageous from the
beginning to the end of the Civil Rights Movement. To us, you are one of the amazing people in
our lives. We will treasure you forever. We will tell your stories to our children and our
children's children. You are one of the people who helped us get our rights.

Jubilee School principal Karen Falcon and presents Dr. LaFayette with the video documentary
produced by her former students and Scribe Video Center. Diane Williams shares The La
Mott Community Garden documentary (also co-produced with http://scribe.org ) and tshirts with all trainers.
~photos by Joan May Cordova

Even highly experienced activists found the two-day orientation to Kingian nonviolence to be
significant. Diane Williams, acting president of the La Mott Community Garden Group, wrote:
Dr. LaFayette and Jonathan Lewis gave me material I can use immediately. Meeting
and talking one-on-one with Dr. Bernard LaFayette, Jr. was indeed a privilegeI had the
opportunity to speak of the La Mott GardenTemple University conflict. I have since removed
the personalities and can see the issue more clearly. A committee is next. Because of the
training program I am open to and will suggest alternative solutions for reconciliation of the
issues. I remain hopeful.
I was introduced to and shared with thinkers and doers. Thank you for every kindness
and all generosity. The training program was great!
For activists of Asian Americans United (AAU), a 29-year old social justice organization with a
record of building community leadership and institutions while fighting oppression http://aaunited.org ,
Kingian nonviolence became particularly meaningful. Neeta Patel, who continues to serve on AAUs
board, was the first staff member AAU ever hired. During the groups discussion of satyagraha as
cited by Dr. Martin Luther King in his Pilgrimage to Nonviolence, Neeta spoke of how her familys
ancestral home in India is in the same region as Mohandas Gandhis. Weeks later, she shared these
reflections:

I came into the training prepared to explore, learn, and consider the practice of Kingian
nonviolence as it applies to my life and work; I thought it was a particularly opportune time to
think about these things as I had lately been disheartened and discouraged about the value and
impact of the social justice work that I had been committed to doing for the past twenty years.
As a woman of color who has continually struggled with being silenced and finding voice, I
usually approach new groups with trepidation wondering how much stereotypical attitudes I
have to work through to be heard as myself. This experience was different -- the training
answered questions for me that I didnt even know that I was asking. Learning from the
experiences of our fellow participants, hearing first-hand the stories of Dr. LaFayette, being in
a room that embodied what a beloved community could be was deeply inspiring, hopeful,
moving and precious to me. My thanks to all of the trainers for creating the opportunity for this
diverse group to come together to study, consider, and actualize the principles of nonviolence.

Both Neeta and AAUs executive director (1986-2014) Ellen Somekawa quietly assumed
additional behind-the-scenes responsibilities for this training. Ellen wrote:
I wanted to thank you for coming to Philadelphia to conduct your training. It must be so much
easier and more convenient for you to do your trainings at your home base. It was so good to go
through this experience with others from our own city. The training helped us create (or
deepen) connections here locally. And because we were all outside of our own issues or
communities and just taking time to learn, it helped us to get to know each other in an
extraordinary way.

Every day, and many times a day, I think about what I learned in those two days. I find myself
thinking about how I might do the politics of my community group in a different way. I think
about how I might respond to every day interactions in a different way. I muse about past
campaigns and wonder if I knew then what I have a glimmer of knowing now, what would I
have done differently.
Thank you both for sharing your insights, stories, and life experiences. I even appreciated your
homework assignment. It got me wanting to learn more about the philosophy of non-violence
and to stop settling for the shallow references to tactics of nonviolence that are common in
movements today.
Thank you, too, for sharing your presence, wisdom, and spirit with Asian Americans United
folks at our movie night event. It was a powerful and memorable moment for all of us there.

Dr. Bernard LaFayette and Jonathan Lewis attend Asian American Uniteds (AAU) movie night on February 7,
2012 held at Folk Arts Cultural Treasures School (FACTS co-founded by Philadelphia Folklore Project and
AAU in 2005). Photo includes AAU staff Ellen Somekawa, Xu Lin, Wei Chen; AAU board members Neeta
Patel, Betty Lui, Helen Gym, Joan May Cordova; Philadelphia Folklore Project (PFP) Executive Director
Debora Kodish; Asian American Legal Defense Fund (AALDEF) staff Chi-Ser Tran.

Having been trained by both Doc LaFayette and Jonathan Lewis, learning about Kingian nonviolence
became transformative for me. After years of teaching conflict resolution in the context of Peaceable Schools,
nonviolence became the overarching philosophy for years of previous work in this field. While various
organizations and individuals in the Greater Philadelphia region also conduct nonviolence training, I wanted
Asian Americans United, plus community allies and friends to also learn nonviolence from Doc LaFayette and

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Jonathan Lewis. At the same time, I thought it would be mutually beneficial for our Philadelphia communities
to learn about Kingian nonviolence -- and for Doc and Jonathan to learn more about the positive organizing
Philadelphia communities (especially Asian Americans United and allies) were doing, particularly in relation to
the immigrant communities. Our nonviolence networks have yet to work deeply Asian American immigrant
communities.

I scheduled the 2013 nonviolence training in Philadelphia to allow all to visit the Philadelphia Folklore
Project (PFP) to see We Cannot Keep Silent AAUs exhibit on intergenerational organizing of a student
boycott in response to bias violence attacks at S. Philadelphia High School (in 2009). In this set of photos, Dr.
Bernard LaFayette meets with former student boycott leaders Wei Chen and Duong Ly; AAUs executive
director Ellen Somekawa and Tom McNeil, former parent ombudsman at S. Philadelphia High School. Below,
Wei Chen presents Dr. LaFayette with mementos from the Asian Student Association of Philadelphia (ASAP)
including a bracelet that says: We have the power to make change.

Dr. LaFayette often remembers Dr. Martin Luther Kings last words to him in Memphis on April 4,
1968: Dr. King said to me: Bernard, the next thing were going to do is to institutionalize and
internationalize nonviolence. The Positive Peace Warrior Network continues to fulfill this goal of
promoting Kingian Nonviolence.
"[A] powerful history of struggle, commitment, and hope. No
one, but no one, who lived through the creation and
development of the movement for voting rights in Selma is
better prepared to tell this story than Bernard LaFayette
himself." -- from the foreword by John Robert Lewis,
Representative, United States House of Representatives
"Bernard Lafayette has lived through half a century of
nonviolent activism. From Nashville to New York, from sit-ins
to Selma. Bernard has been at the center of thought and
action that attempts to free the world of violence and
hatred. From California and Chicago to Colombia and
Nigeria he has braved the threats and intimidation to
witness for the power of non-violent action. You must read
this book and he must write the next one soon; there are so
few of us left who lived to tell the story of how we've
overcome." -- Andrew Young, U.S. Ambassador to the United
Nations, 19771979
--published by the University Press of Kentucky, 2013