In this five-part interview, Malcolm Ryder talks to Kakoli Mitra about his community organizing in the part of Huchiun now known as West Oakland, California, his adopted home. This area has witnessed centuries of land appropriation, ecological devastation, and human exploitation, violence, and displacement by missionaries and mercantilists. It began in 1769 with the European colonizers — the Spanish, Mexicans, and Americans. In 1848, speculators, profit-makers, and squatters arrived. Then, in 1869, industrialists and transportation magnates took over the area, making it the terminus of the transcontinental railroad. And the 1950s brought in the federal government, misguided city planners, and developers who together undermined the safety, integrity, health, and livelihoods of entire neighborhoods. Malcolm speaks about the complex economic, political, cultural, and legal factors underlying, first, the rise of a property-owning African-American middle class in the early 1900s and, subsequently, its decimation. Through institutionalized racism and other forms of exploitation, the community’s self-reliance was systemically destroyed. This meant destroying the community’s ability to be rooted to land (e.g., through private property ownership), be food secure, and to creatively express its identity, e.g., through innovation in music (jazz and hip-hop) and self-determination (Black Panther Party). Malcolm talks about the Black Panther Party and its dedication to community self-reliance, including its creation of a successful children’s education program. And he describes how he uses his art — photography — not only to portray the marginalized members and neighborhoods of West Oakland in positive ways but to help reinvigorate the community’s creative energy — and therefore — resilience.