Today we’d like to introduce you to Sarah Utley.
Hi Sarah, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
“The purpose of life is to support other life, that’s why we are here.”
Twenty years ago, an indigenous advocate and one of my most important mentors in this work shared that statement with me along with this piece of wisdom that has shaped my worldview professionally and personally to this day; “Remember Sarah, we are the lucky ones, for a survivor to trust us enough to allow us to walk alongside her in this journey is a gift.”
I grew up in the very inner city of Peoria, Illinois. As a little girl, I witnessed the devastating effects of community-based violence, poverty, and addiction on my friends, neighbors, loved ones, and family. The theories around why so many young people in my community turned to gangs and violence intrigued me. Years later in my late teens, it became clear how much the effects of institutionalized racism and white supremacy had on the dark realities of my youth and continued to have on my friends and loved ones who still live there. This realization became rooted in my purpose in everything I did from then on. Although I left Peoria for college and have never returned, the lessons, gifts, love, and hardships from that experience stay with me in everything that I do; and I do it still today for all those in my neighborhood who couldn’t get out or did not survive.
During college, I studied Community Health Education and was especially interested in community-based violence as a public health issue. It was at this time, during college in Wisconsin I began working as a shelter advocate in the local Domestic Violence shelter. Intimately connecting with abuse survivors healed me in ways I never thought I could. As a child sexual abuse survivor and a secondary survivor of domestic violence, witnessing domestic violence with my own parents; it became clear or me that violence wasn’t something that just happened around me, it was also within me, a part of me.
From that time forward, I realized that we cannot heal our communities unless we first heal ourselves and this is what my journey to date has done for me. I have been incredibly blessed to work in every area of domestic and sexual violence work here in Minnesota and in Wisconsin for the past seventeen years. From direct service to training and education, management and program development, and direction; working my purpose has been a blessing.
In 2012, I was invited by a friend from Pakistan to partner on a women’s empowerment project in the Sindh region of Pakistan that was funded by the US State Department in Karachi. For this project, I was able to create a curriculum that taught women in this region how to get involved and be successful in local politics and the decisions that directly governed their own lives. This experience became pivotal in the direction of my work that came after that. I was inspired by these phenomenal women and their stories. And humbled that they allowed me to learn with them. It was clear that it was not only an opportunity but an obligation to share the resources, tools, and information that we in the United States have learned for the past 60 years working to end abuse, intimate partner violence, and sexual assault and abuse of all people. I also learned an important lesson during this time that although we may have the tools, resources, and information from years of experience on this issue, the women I met in Pakistan and those in all countries around the world have the most important insights and knowledge to shape and modify these tools effectively in the ways needed to heal their own communities.
Since 2012, my focus in this work has been partnering with phenomenal immigrant communities here locally and women internationally to expand healing throughout ALL of our communities. It is well known in this work that white women have predominantly monopolized the think tanks, research communities, and inventions in this field. However, over my tenure as an advocate, it has been predominantly women of color who seek services, especially shelter services for reasons simply rooted in white supremacy and access to resources. I began to get exhausted and enraged by this disparity and was consistently shunned and even fired from white women lead agencies for talking about it.
Soon after the murder of George Floyd in my Minneapolis community, I realized that institutionalized racism is built within literally ALL of our systems and structures. Even the domestic violence movement which prides itself on eliminating and ending violence perpetuates it when it refuses to look critically at how its structures feed into a cycle of white supremacy. I had been so incredibly blessed to have worked with and met phenomenal BIPOC and immigrant advocates in this work who were not only pushing to get the services their communities need but also always facing the microaggressions of racism woven within the field they needed to tap into to get the resources they needed.
At the end of 2020, I partnered with a phenomenal partner and advocate in this work, Ifrah Abdalla to form WOVAN. WOVAN stands for “Weaving Opportunities Vocalizing AntiRacist Narratives.” Although it has been incredibly difficult at times and we have had many successes as well as failures so far along the way, WOVAN has taken on a life of its own. WOVAN is a force for truth, transparency, and intentional advocacy centered around AntiRacism and a model for creating solutions by and for a community by the same community it is formed to help. To date WOVAN Minnesota initiatives have helped dozens of women, children and men here in the Twin Cities area move out of homelessness and into safe and affordable housing, in a way that is dignified and human. WOVAN is incredibly fortunate to have the first Female Somali Muslim police officer and Sergeant in the United States as our Board Chair. Kadra Mohamed through her work with HAT (Homeless Action Team) for Metro Transit Police here in the Twin Cities utilizes her connection to WOVAN to help place those she encounters in her work that are homeless to needed housing coordination services with WOVAN.
Through WOVAN, I have carried along with me my dedication to those beyond our borders and lead our WOVAN International Initiatives. Through connections and friendships with women leaders in Pakistan, WOVAN International has partnered with verified women lead programs in incredibly underserved areas and has cut out the “middleman” and formed successful ways to get resources to the women and girls that need them most. Asma Baloch is a phenomenal young leader in the Lyari area of Pakistan who runs our sister organization Bandeek. Through Bandeek, Asma and other college-age women like herself use embroidery and other fabric arts to create beautiful handmade items that WOVAN is able to get out to our community here in the US through fair trade practices. The income that our partnership creates for Asma not only helps to keep her in college and be able to maintain her independence and care for her family, but it also gives her the resources to pay it forward and assist young girls in her community with the education that they would not have otherwise. WOVAN international continues to grow due to my partnership with Zakir Baloch, who serves on our Board of Directors and has healthy personal and professional ties in the region that WOVAN International programs operate in Pakistan.
My journey to date has been one of continual connection, learning, humility, and honesty. We have to be honest about if what we are doing in our work is actually really helping those that we are dedicated to helping. As I continue to learn daily, I stay open to new ways of thinking, new ideas, and new perspectives. I am a learner. This is what has made me successful so far, my willingness to listen and learn and deeply understand that we ALL are WOVAN.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
No journey is always smooth, in fact, if it is you aren’t doing it right. We must fall to learn, and we must face walls and barriers to learn the tools to get over them. Being intentional in AntiRacism and even saying the truth in this work has gotten me reprimanded and even fired in my field. One of my most valuable mentors told me when I was fired years ago for standing up for a black colleague in my place of employment and addressing white supremacy in this work honestly with leadership, that I would look back on that day and be grateful I didn’t go along with them. I would be grateful to not have belonged within that group of women and within that mindset. And although I was in tears and terrified, she was so right. Integrity is everything in life. Integrity and humility do not make for a life that is easy, but they definitely create a life that is worth it.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
WOVAN stands for “Weaving Opportunities Vocalizing AntiRacist Narratives.” I deeply understand that it’s almost impossible to make changes within a system that was created within a white lens to begin with. With WOVAN we needed to start fresh, do it over, and do it right. My CoDirector and I combined our strengths and skills and became equal leaders of WOVAN. We lead collaboratively and collectively and this model is expanded within all of our work. I am committed through WOVAN and in my personal life to be intentionally AntiRacist and Anti-Hierarchical in everything that I do. WOVAN leadership walks our talk and isn’t afraid to be transparent, honest and intentional; this is what sets us far apart from others. Our Board of Directors mirrors our purpose as well and is composed of an intricate, intentional and diverse group of leaders committed to AntiRacism themselves and committed to change.
Any advice for finding a mentor or networking in general?
I would not have gotten far at all in this work without my mentors over the years. Mentors keep you focused, they keep you centered in your purpose, and they keep you honest and humble. Look for the women and men in the work that you do who inspire you. Reach out to them when you hear them say or act or live in a way that YOU want to live, say and act. Be upfront with it, be intentional about it. Tell them “I want to learn from you, how do you do it? How do you maintain your integrity and purpose? How have you been so successful?” And then truly listen and learn from them when they tell you how. Trust your elders and the trailblazers before you. Stay humble enough to realize that you need help to be successful, and that this is ok. Humility is everything in life. When you have humility and maintain integrity your path will not be easy, but it’s not supposed to be. What is RIGHT is never easy but it makes for such a beautiful and successful journey and in the end that’s all that matters.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.wovan.org/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wovan_mn/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wovanmn/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClRwIVzuQ6tjOJNubFUlCqQ
- Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/sarahutleyminnesota
