Meet our new associate director: Júlia Martins Rodrigues
Thanks to a generous grant from the Siegel Family Endowment, MEDLab has hired our first full-time associate director: Júlia Martins Rodrigues, PhD, who has been a longtime community fellow at the lab.
Júlia serves as a governor-appointed commissioner on Employee Ownership at the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade. Her areas of expertise include cooperative law, multi-stakeholder cooperative networks, shared ownership and collective governance. Júlia earned her PhD in Legal and Social Sciences from the Università Degli Studi di Camerino, Italy. She also holds a Master of Law in Human Rights and Innovation from the Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora, Brazil, where she received her Juris Doctor and served as an Assistant Professor of Law. Additionally, she has obtained a professional certificate as a "Third Sector Operator: Serving Nonprofit Causes & Communities" from the Bottega del Terzo Settore in Ascoli Piceno, Italy. As a Latin woman born and raised in Brazil, she is dedicated to advancing economic democracy and social justice, viewing both as essential pathways to achieving shared prosperity and sustainability.
Welcome, Júlia!
Denver book launch: Beautiful Solutions
May 1, 2025
6-8 p.m. Mountain Time
The Shop at MATTER
Our problems are global and interconnected, and our solutions must be too. The stories featured in this new anthology amplify ancestral and community wisdom to help us all imagine a different way of doing things. With over 70 contributors, this toolbox of collective wisdom and know-how shows us that another world is not only possible, it’s already under construction.
Co-editor Nathan Schneider, a professor of media studies at CU Boulder, will introduce the book. He'll be joined by leaders in the Colorado solidarity economy, who will talk about their work and how you can get involved in building a more just and sustainable economy:
- Sandra Baca of the Rocky Mountain Farmers Union
- Fatuma Emmad of Frontline Farming
Goodies from Frontline Farming will be available for sale.
We encourage everyone to prepurchase their books before the event as we cannot guarantee book availability without prepurchase. If you prefer to RSVP without purchasing the book, use the promo code "NOBOOK" when checking out. Please reach out to events@morematter.com with any questions.
RSVP on the event page.
Project showcase on alternative social networks
May 7, 2025
5-7 p.m. Mountain Time
CMCI Studio, 1301 Walnut St., Boulder
Come celebrate and learn from the graduates of CU Boulder's MA program in Media and Public and Engagement. The speakers this year include two MEDLab research fellows who have been building projects related to the governance of social media:
Refreshments provided. Details on the event page.
Open call: Counter-Media Residency
Our friends at CU Boulder's Center for Media, Religion, and Culture are offering an opportunity for a $25,000 residency for media-makers exploring intersections of religion and social change.
Media makers will join us for a year-long residency as part of our ongoing Religion in Emergent Media Spaces project. With support from the Henry Luce Foundation, this project is enabling a new wave of media research and production around religious imaginations, particularly through the exploration of what we call “counter-media.” Residents will join a vibrant, multi-disciplinary community at CU Boulder to develop their media practice and collaborate with other practitioners and visiting research fellows.
Learn more and apply at the CMRC website.
Radio: Are our health apps negatively impacting us?
MEDLab's radio show, Looks Like New, comes out the fourth Thursday of every month on KGNU, 88.5 FM, or online as a podcast. Last month's episode is now available:
In the digital age, it’s hard to resist free conveniences—but are they really free? So much of our data is constantly being bought and sold without our knowledge, making it crucial to find safe alternatives to keep our private information truly private.
On this month’s episode of Looks Like New, hosted by MEDlab fellow Stephanie Abdalla, Anna Muller joins us all the way from Brazil to discuss the importance of data control, especially for individuals with uteruses.
Anna Muller brings a wealth of knowledge to the conversation. She is a biomedical specialist in neuroscience and behavior, a health instructor focused on fertility, perception, and hormonal health, as well as a speaker and content producer specializing in menstrual education. Together, Stephanie Abdalla and Anna Muller dive into the world of fertility tracking apps, the risks and realities of data control, and possible safer alternatives—drawing from history, academic discourse, and personal insight.
Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or directly through our website. You can also follow the show on Instagram, Mastodon, and X.
