Name: Robert Ashton Winslow
Age: 26
Hometown: Chattanooga
Profession: Videographer, content creator and consultant
Robert Ashton Winslow is a starving artist. He's spent the past few years working two and three jobs in support of his dream. But it's not fame or fortune he seeks. It's answers, and a viable framework for the future.
He's the observationist, untrained new century journalist, learning-through-doing videographer and editor behind Southern Dialogues, a documentary series exploring political polarization through the context of the South: its cities, people and how that ideology is playing out in their lives. The most recent arm of that centers on Chattanooga and focuses on four themes: The Gig and Building an Innovating Economy; Real Estate, Housing and Gentrification; Thrive 2055 and Regional Economic Development; and Public Education.
Tune in
Winslow debuted the first component in his Chattanooga-centric pieces, the one on public education, in February to a standing-room-only crowd. He is planning screenings of the compilations surrounding the other themes in that series throughout this month. To learn more, get involved or offer support, visit southerndialogues.com.
* When I started this it was with the idea that the South is where all these big, open ideas and contentions are; where things are being worked out in people's experience. Then, when taking all that and asking how the South is changing, the predominant theme is the growth of cities. That's where everything going on in Chattanooga is a really spectacular window into these big questions to the future of American life being worked out through robust civic initiatives that are really felt as the life of a city and the life of the broader community.
* It really came from a place of "What does the future look like?" and wanting concrete answers to that, and then so very naively going out and looking for them.
* I pick[ed] my four themes for the program and, as far as I'm concerned, these are the big questions for the American city in the next generation.
* These are problems being actively solved right now. It's not about my documentary.
* When I think of these really big questions, I think of the documentary style of asking really big questions at a small and medium scale.
* There are a lot of questions I ask in these that might not have answers. The point is for the videos to be an opportunity to listen when you might not know how to create these conversations in life, and elevate the dialogue so we can do a better job of meeting each other, especially where we disagree on what the significance of these big questions is.
* [I want this] to give a new perspective and a better sense of own capability to engage with these big questions and be a leader and work together to find ways of building a better future.
* I've been consistently impressed by the thoughtfulness and the candor and open-endedness that comes in all these conversations at this leadership level. The whole question becomes how that translates for people.
* I'm trying to figure out now - and I need as much help as I can - how to make it intuitive for people to take that and run with it so that it can act as a resource for this ongoing conversation.
* I feel like I'm doing this as an artist, as somebody who cares a lot and has these big questions, but I've never had somebody say it's a stretch; I don't get the premise.
* What has been most challenging is trying to pull people not to treat this as a movie.
* As far as I know, nothing like this has ever been done before.
* It was something I felt called to do and needed to try while I had the opportunity, while I was still young enough.
* I want this to be the story of Chattanooga at the turning point and how we as the broader community are shaping our own future.
* If I can get [enough help], there is no reason in my mind not to publish everything - all the events, B-roll, music, video collaboration - and finding ways to index it to make it searchable, to make it interactive.
* I want this to end up being a library of civic media resources for the ongoing initiatives and the community on a continuing basis.
* There's a lot to be proud of for Chattanooga, but you'll never hear me as a cheerleader or as "best town ever." It's not because I don't think that's true or worth being celebrated, it's just because I think it's grossly inappropriate considering the challenges that need to be in the story.
* As we've had this success story of open revitalization and economic diversity, it has come with consistently high and even growing poverty and some of the worst economic mobility in the country and extreme racial disparity.
* What concerns me is not the idea that we can't have a great future on this trajectory with these fundamental problems. What concerns me is the idea that we can.