[In-person] Civic Café: A City That Cares

Join us at Civic Café, a space for collectively making sense of and imagining the past, present, and future of the City of Toronto. This time we'll focus on care in the city.

When you find yourself in need of care, where do you go? Who do you go to? What infrastructure, physical, public, cultural, and social exists in Toronto that does the work of care? And where do you find yourself in this infrastructure when someone else needs care?

Join Being and Becoming for our second Civic Café, a series where we engage in a collaborative exploration of civic issues in Toronto. In this event, we’ll explore how the city does, can, could, and should care for us. Show up, meet others, orient yourself in the space, and hang out from 6:30-7pm, event 7-9pm. Stay and hangout after!

In this Civic Café, we will explore what care means to each of us and what infrastructures (e.g., resources, institutions, practices) exist or could exist in Toronto to enable these kinds of care. In the first half, we will ask: what is care? How do we experience it? How do we care for others? With these descriptions in mind, we will map the systems that already exist in the city that enable these forms of care.

In the second half, we imagine what would need to change for Toronto to support a wider range of caring activities. We will ask questions such as: What forms of care doesn’t current infrastructure support or does so unfairly? Are there other cities that perform these forms of care better? In an ideal world, what would have to happen for Toronto to be considered a truly caring city?

Join co-facilitators Sofia Panasiuk and Anna Stonehocker at Society Clubhouse where we will engage in a collaborative exploration about the past, present, and future of care infrastructure in Toronto.

Space is limited! Please obtain a free ticket from Civic Café at this link (click here) to attend this event. You need a ticket to be admitted. Light refreshments will be provided and we encourage participants to support our venue through purchasing drinks.

About the Civic Café Series

At Civic Cafés, supported by the Ontario Trillium Foundation, we’re asking questions that spotlight the structure that shapes our work, leisure, and relationships, and is shaped by us in turn: the city.
Participants may or may not see themselves as civic actors (no “official” background knowledge required!). Through guided discussion prompts and interactive activities, participants will think out loud with others, build bridges, develop a deeper understanding of the city, and feel empowered to make a difference in the city issues that matter most to them.

This series will draw inspiration from our beloved Curiosity Café series, where we spend two hours on Tuesday evenings engaging in collaborative, discussion-based exploration of various topics. Through doing this, we have been building a special, curiosity-oriented community and given our participants some philosophical tools to examine the things they are most curious about. We hope fans of our Curiosity Cafés will find value in our Civic Café series, but no familiarity with our Curiosity Cafés or other offerings will be required!

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This event is brought to you by Being and Becoming, a Toronto based non-profit. We aim to create community around exploring everyday concepts and experiences so that we may live more intentional, thoughtful, and meaningful lives. We use philosophy as a tool with which we can come to a richer understanding of the world around us.

By offering activities, spaces, and other opportunities for conversation and co-exploration, we hope to enable the meeting and fusion of individuals and their ideas. Everyone is welcome, regardless of background: indeed, we believe the journey is best undertaken alongside explorers from a variety of disciplines, cultures, backgrounds, and experiences.

Find out more about Being and Becoming here.