The Foundation for Intentional Community has been offering virtual tours of communities. Here’s one of Twin Oaks, Acorn, and Cambia.
Acorn Community
Roots & Resilience
Calling all BIPOC intentional community folks, farmers, land stewards
For BIPOC folks: How does your identity as “BIPOC” exist in intersection with this concept of “intentional community?”
I grieve that when we think of this term “IC”, the image that may come to mind may be majority white spaces. Yet, our diverse ancestors of the global majority have always lived in village. We’ve always lived communally, speaking our languages, upholding our roles of aunties and elders, weavers and medicine people. We were in village before those ways were systemically removed from our way of life, before we were targeted for having daily ceremony with the earth, and the colonizer cosmovision did the savagery that they did and continue to do onto our Native lands.
From our experience at (majority white) spaces like the Twin Oaks Communities Conference, the BIPOC Intentional Community Council felt into the need for a BIPOC-led Intentional Communities gathering. We are making it reality alongside leadership by our friends at Acorn Community!
May 30-June 1, 2025, we will be holding our first ever Roots & Resilience: BIPOC Farmers and Intentional Communities gathering. We will have BIPOC-led workshops on Land Access 101, Legal Structures for Shared Land Ownership, Ancestrally-Relevant Regenerative Food Growing, Farm Finances, etc.
We want to merge the world of farmers and land steward folks with intentional community. We know BIPOC farmers don’t only want to grow food for business. Our dignified relationship to land should not solely depend on productivity. We want to live in intimate, healing relationship with land and create regenerative economies that support our visions.
See below for how to register, and how you can support the work as an ally to this BIPOC-led intentional community vision!
In Community,
Paola Diaz
BIPOC ICC Managing Director
| The land is calling us |
| Acorn, our host site, is a multi-racial, Black-led community. Their economic model as an intentional community is infused with their on-site seed saving cooperative which residents can be members of. This event centers Black, Indigenous, People of Color. Aligned allies accompanied by BIPOC folks are also welcome and are encouraged to donate extra if they are able. At a time of system collapse, let’s learn, vision, and create the alternatives together. The land is calling us! |
The BIPOC ICC and Acorn are thrilled to introduce a powerful group of land stewards, farmers, organizers, and visionaries who will be leading sessions at this year’s gathering.
Whether you’re just beginning your farming journey or deep in the work of community building, there’s something here for you.
🔹 Thelonius Cook – Building Community
🔹 Lauren McCalister – Funding Your Farm
🔹 Langston Kahn – Conflict Resolution in Shared Spaces & Grounding Techniques for Busy Farmers
🔹 Rev Dele – Legal Structures for Shared Land Ownership & Living with Purpose: How to Build Intentional Communities
🔹 Nairobi Hilaire – Land Access 101: Finding and Sharing Land
🔹 Ira Wallace – Seed Saving Basics
🔹 Anthony Harris – Skill Sharing as a Community
🔹 Stephanie Miller – Building a Successful Farm: Planting Strategies for Beginners – A hands-on workshop focused on soil prep, crop rotation, and organic practices.
Interns, Weeds, Snow, and Alpha Farm Visitors
This was a week on Facebook in late March and the statistics were mixed–some posts had lots of viewers and some posts didn’t.
The Twin Oaks Communities Conference was looking for interns to help with preparations and the running of the various summer gatherings.
This did very well on Facebook, with thirteen likes, a comment, and almost two hundred views.
Southern Exposure posted about weeds and since Acorn hasn’t posted anything on their Instagram page, I reposted it on our Facebook feed.
Here’s the full article (which should interest gardeners, at least).
Unfortunately, this didn’t do very well at all on Facebook. While it got four likes, it only got forty views.
East Wind posted about a snow day, with pictures.
While this got seven likes and a love, less than a hundred people saw it.
Finally, East Wind also posted about some visitors from another commune.
This did really well, with eleven likes, three loves, and almost a hundred and ninety views.
Siberia, Seed Racks, and a Name Question
by Raven
Mid-March was one of our better times on Facebook. Although there were only three new posts, all of them did well.
The first one was about how they stored the nutbutters at East Wind.
This post did very well on Facebook with eleven likes, two loves, a haha, a comment, and over a hundred and thirty views.
Southern Exposure posted about their Seed Racks team, which was a nice way of Acorn giving a little credit to Twin Oaks part in their business.
This also did very well on Facebook, with ten likes, five loves, a comment, a share, and almost a hundred and eighty views.
Finally, since it was a slow week as far as communities posting (I used stuff from two older posts on this blog to fill in the gaps), I thought I would end the week with a Facebook question. If I write it well enough, I sometimes get very good viewership–and it was true in this case. I had just republished an old post about folks choosing names in the communes, and I decided to make it personal.
Well, I did get some responses–nine folks let me know what they thought–some with new names for themselves and some with explanations why they wouldn’t need a new name.
And this post did very, very well. I got the kind of response I was looking for with, in addition to the nine comments, five likes, two loves, and a very satisfying two hundred and thirty views.
Cats, Gardens, Snow, and Gatherings
by Raven
This week in early March was not a great week for Facebook statistics, but I think it had some lovely and important posts.
Not important, but cute, was East Wind’s post about their cat.
I enjoyed it and one person loved and two others liked it, but less than sixty people saw it.
Southern Exposure posted about gardens in March.
(Since that’s a pic, I’m posting the link to the frost dates.)
This got six likes and a comment, but less than eighty views.
As opposed to Acorn’s spring gardening post, Twin Oaks posted about the snowy winter.
This did a little better, with six likes, three loves, and just under ninety views.
And with spring coming, the Twin Oaks folks are preparing for conferences and gatherings. We reposted announcements for both the Queer Gathering and the Women’s Conference.
The Queer Gathering usually posts about their “Awesomeness”.
Surprisingly, to me at least, since events often don’t do very well at all, this post did the best of the week, which wasn’t great. It only got three likes but it did get just over a hundred views.
You can find more info and register for the Queer Gathering here.
Also, the Women’s Gathering posted. Since I couldn’t think of much to compete with “Awesomeness”, posted some of the variant spellings of “women” from the seventies.
Unfortunately, this didn’t do well at all. While it got four loves and a like, it got less than fifty views.
Again, for more info, here’s the site for the Women’s Gathering.
Chocolate Cake, Farming Book, Snow, and the Conference
by Raven
March did not begin well on Facebook, but I think that these posts were interesting and encouraging.
East Wind started off reporting on a cake that one of their members made for Valentine’s Day.
This post didn’t do badly at all–it got six likes, five loves, a comment, and a hundred and thirty views.
In an intercommunal cooperative effort, Pam from Twin Oaks wrote a book on “Market Farming” that the folks at Acorn (through their business Southern Exposure) are selling.
Unfortunately, although three people loved it, just over fifty people saw it.
East Wind also posted about the snowfall there.
This did okay, with seven likes, two loves, and a bit over a hundred views.
And the Twin Oaks Communities Conference announced they will be back again this year.
Here’s a link to the announcement.
Unfortunately, although this post got eleven likes (including one from the Conference) it got less than ninety views.
Firewood, Barn Cats, Seed Starting, and “Luxury Gay Space Anarcho-Communism”
by Raven
There were some unusual things posted by the communes late in February that we reposted on Facebook.
I suppose that the Twin Oaks post about firewood wasn’t that unusual.
This did fairly well on Facebook, with five likes and a hundred thirty-six views.
However, East Wind posted about their “barn cats”. I’ll admit I never thought about their relationships with cows, but someone at East Wind did.
This also did pretty well with three likes, two loves, and a hundred thirty-seven views.
Okay, Southern Exposure’s post on seed starting was also far from unusual.
This post got five likes, a love, a comment, and a share, but still got just a bit over ninety views.
However, the post that got the most views this week and was certainly the most unusual repost we’ve had for a while, was from Twin Oaks’ new Bluesky account. I don’t know who came up with this phrase, but it certainly stands out.
And it did get attention: six likes, four loves, one comment, and over two hundred and fifty views.
Indigenous Artists, PB Day, Pizza Garden, and Mutual Aid
by Raven
We’re into the Facebook posts for February.
Ericka from Serenity Solidarity is traveling and posted this.
This post did okay, with two likes, two loves, a care, and a hundred and eight views.
East Wind Nutbutters was promoting…
This didn’t do that well. While it got three likes and two loves, it only got thirty-nine views.
Most folks like pizza. Southern Exposure suggests that you grow a garden for it.
This didn’t do that well either. (What? People don’t like peanut butter? People don’t like pizza?) It only got two likes and a love and just eighty-five views.
There wasn’t a lot to post this week so I decided to finish by asking a question and hoping to get comments and views.
I didn’t get a lot of comments–just one, plus my response.
However, it got four likes and two loves and over two hundred and fifty views.
Directory, Seed Growers, Seed Starting, Cows, and Conversion
by Raven
This was an okay week on Facebook, with some posts that did fine and some that didn’t.
Serenity Solidarity passed on a link to a directory of Black families affected by the fires in California.
As important as this information is, it didn’t do well on FB. At least one person cared, but only twenty-nine folks saw it.
Twin Oaks posted about Common Wealth Seed Growers.
Here’s a link to the document Twin Oaks is referring to.
This post just did okay, with five loves (including Twin Oaks Community!) and two likes, but only a hundred views.
East Wind posted about their dedicated dairy crew.
This did the best of a mediocre week, with six likes, a love, and a hundred and thirty-one views.
Southern Exposure (at Acorn Community in Virginia) was excited about starting sprouting seeds.
Maybe no one wants to hear about starting seeds in February but it only got two likes and just fifty-seven views.
Finally, at Twin Oaks, the former hammocks office is being converted.
This also didn’t do too well, with three likes, three loves, and only eighty-nine views.
Workshops, Cows, Bluesky, Deportation, and Cheffing
by Raven
Another week on Facebook, moving toward the end of January.
And Acorn and Southern Exposure were posting once again about what Ira was up to.
Once upon a time on Commune Life, just mentioning Ira guaranteed a high viewing share. That doesn’t seem true anymore. This post got just four likes and a disappointing sixty-three views.
At East Wind, it was all about the cows.
This did pretty well with four likes, three loves, and a hundred and fourteen views.
Twin Oaks was talking about getting a new account on Bluesky. So I asked what seemed to me to be the obvious question.
This got thirteen likes, two loves, four comments (two of which were “Yes” and “yes !”), and an impressive two hundred and twelve views. I’m hoping that we will have a Bluesky account soon.
The deportations are happening, and they are happening to a lot of good folks. Serenity Solidarity wrote about one.
Unfortunately, this didn’t do very well on Facebook with just two likes and sixty-eight views.
Finally, East Wind posted about their chefs, cheffing it up.
This did pretty well with five likes, two loves, and a hundred and thirty-four views.
commune life 