Bridgit Antoinette Evans: Dreaming of Positive Obsessions

Dreaming in Color

Welcome to Dreaming in Color, a show hosted by Darren Isom, a partner with The Bridgespan Group, that provides a space for social change leaders of color to reflect on how their life experiences, personal and professional, have prepared them to lead and drive the impact we all seek.

In this episode, we welcome Bridgit Antoinette Evans, a decorated artist, philanthropic executive, and thought leader in the field of narrative change. Through her ingenious use of pop culture techniques and narrative systems methodology, Bridgit has been at the forefront of promoting social justice. Since 2017, Bridgit has served as CEO of the Pop Culture Collaborative, the philanthropic resource and funder learning community working to transform the narrative landscape around people of color, immigrants, refugees, Muslims, and Indigenous peoples in America, especially those who are women, queer, trans, and disabled.

She has dedicated her career to the relentless investigation of the potential of artists and stories to drive change in society through Fuel We Power Change, the creative and strategic consultancy she founded in 2008, Bridgit's design and tested long-term culture change strategies in partnership with many of the nation's leading movement organizations, including the Save Darfur Coalition, Girls Are Not For Sale campaign, National Domestic Workers Alliance came across generation, ACLU and the Make It Work campaign.

Join this conversation as Bridgit takes us on a journey of how starting in theater at a young age helped to ignite her passion for storytelling and how it has enabled her to become a trailblazer in driving narrative change.

Jump straight into:

(0:28) Introducing Bridgit Antoinette Evans: CEO of the Pop Culture Collaborative.

(1:34) Bridgit shares an invocation from her imaginary mentor, Octavia Butler.

(4:23) Bridgit tells us of her family’s impressive legacy and contributions to the Civil Rights Movement.

(7:37) Bridigit explains how participating in theater at a young age helped her develop her voice and spark a curiosity for storytelling.

(11:56) Bridgit remembers her first role in New York, Lady in Red in For Colored Girls.

(18:57) Surviving American Culture

Episode Resources

• Connect with Bridgit through LinkedIn
• Learn more about Bridgit’s work at the Pop Culture Collaborative
• Read Octavia Butler’s “Positive Obsession”
• Check out Bridgit’s article with the Nonprofit Quarterly on BIPOC-led narrative change, “The Vital Connection: BIPOC-Led Narrative Change and Pluralist Democracy”
• Listen to Bridgit’s conversation with the Ford Foundation’s Hilary Pennington on empowering communities and connecting people from diverse backgrounds