Introduction

The confusions that arise in young males as they try to reconcile the traditional masculine values of their fathers, for example, with a postfeminist culture that celebrates sensitivity and openness have created a ‘national crisis of boyhood.’  Stephen S. Hall, “The Troubled Life of Boys”, NY Times Magazine, Aug. 15, 1999.

What would you do if someone told you your son would never become a man?  That your nephew would never experience maturity?  That your cousin or grandson would never know manhood, feel from the inside the beating heart of what it really means to be an adult male?  Well, it’s happening right now, in our country, today.  Millions of boys - black, white, Asian, Latino, rich and poor boys, good boys - smart, sensitive, and loving boys, vulnerable and open boys, are not fully growing up, are not accomplishing the transition from adolescence to adulthood.  Without initiation and mentorship, these boys will never know what is sacred about their own masculinity.  They’ll never know their own unique mission in life, they’ll never know what it is to serve family and community rather than self, they’ll never know their place in the order of things, the depths of their own greatness or the true limits of their own reach, and they’ll never know what an empowering gift their own feelings can be – how they can learn to master them through acceptance; how their tears, their shame, their anger and fear can ignite the fires of passion, and can actually set them free.  New American Heroes is going to change all that.

A dramatic two hour documentary, New American Heroes (working title) will complete a trilogy of films on urban teenage boys that began with Hoop Dreams (1994) and was followed by Boys to Men?  (2004)  Research and development have already begun.

The Film

Initiation: A ceremony, ritual, test, or period of instruction with which a new member is admitted to an organization or office or to knowledge.  American Heritage Dictionary

We open on a group of adult men sharing their heart-rending personal stories of growing up with no initiation, no loving mentors in their lives.  It’s horrible enough that some of these men were emotionally and physically abused.  But each knows the deeper loss he suffered when no one was there to introduce him to the practice of conscious adult masculinity. “What does it take to be a loving man?  To do it differently than my father had done to me.  I had no idea,” one man confesses. “I know I took to drugs and alcohol because I was so lost.  I mean, why not?!” shares another.  “It took me three failed marriages and recovery from workaholism to finally realize that what I was looking for was never going to be found in a woman or my work.  What I was looking for was an understanding of who I was as a man and where I belonged in the world.  Where was that place for me?!”  “Yes, my initiation as a man, as late as it came in my life, brought me a profound sense of belonging.  I felt deeply connected for the first time in my life to something outside myself, to the greater flow and mystery of life itself.”  “If only I’d had someone to show me these things at 15 instead of 45…” one man breaks off, lost in sorrow and remorse.  Yes, if only…        

“Get up!  It’s 5:30!  Get up, gentlemen!!!”  Wazn Miller, 15, one of 13 young men - all African-American - in St. Rocco’s Academy, a Newark, New Jersey juvenile detention home, sits up in bed and wipes his eyes.   Tired, perhaps embarrassed to be seen in his underpants by the film crew, he collapses back on his pillow and pulls the covers over his head.   He still has two months to serve on his 6 month sentence for stealing a car.   But today he’ll be getting a visit from his guardian and mentor Derrick, 33.  “I figured it was my job as being an older brother and his not having parents, to be a brother and a father to him,” he tells us.   Their parents died separately of AIDS and drug overdoses when Wazn was just a child.  The respect Wazn has for Derrick is palpable in the boyish manner he adopts and in the way his eyes shine when he’s around Derrick. 

As a divorced single father, Derrick is determined to make a better life for Wazn.  He works hard at a full-time job, goes to school part-time, and is president of his local PTA.  In his comfortable suburban home, next to the bedroom where his two daughters stay part-time, Derrick prepares a bedroom for Wazn.  A devout Muslim drawing tremendous support from his faith, Derrick initiates Wazn into the Islamic tradition.  He teaches him the Koran, emphasizing the values of peace and compassion.  Surrounded by his Muslim brothers, Derrick speaks from experience when he tells Wazn he must stay at Newark’s Gateway Academy for institutionalized teenage boys in order to “avoid the temptations of the streets.”   In every way, Derrick is an ideal mentor for Wazn, ensuring that not only will Wazn resist the wrong ways, he’ll be given the solid footing he needs to recognize and build upon the right ways.  

The footage above has already been shot.  Originally filmed as part of Boys to Men? Wazn’s story is 2/3 complete.  Once finished, it will comprise one of the six stories filmed for New American Heroes, to be shot, like Boys to Men? over a period of 12 months.  Like Boys to Men? each story will center on a 15 year old boy.  But in New American Heroes, each boy will have (and be filmed with) a mentor, whether that mentor is his actual father or a father-figure.  The boys selected will range socio-economically across race, class, and domestic situation (e.g., some with fathers, some without).  They will also differ in location (coming from different cities across the U.S.) and initiating paradigm.  In addition, each boy will be given a mini-DV camera so he can shoot, and tell, some of his own story himself. 

Four different stories, four different initiation processes will be filmed.  Though some initiations will be “faith-based,” some will be secular.  One will be Native American, steeped in thousands of years of tribal cultural tradition.  One will be Christian, church-based, created relatively recently.  One will be centered in a public school, designed especially for ‘at-risk youth.’  Another will be similarly non-sectarian, but structured somewhat like a New Age self-improvement workshop.  Some will take place in 48 hours over a weekend, while others will require regular processes over a period of months. 

New American Heroes will begin in the everyday life of each youngster. We’ll meet his family and friends, glimpse his family dynamic and socio-economic background.   We’ll delineate a specific conflict in his story, and get a strong foretaste of his challenges to come.  Like Spencer in Boys to Men? one boy may fantasize about enacting his rage in sensational violence.  Like Al-Tran, another boy may withdraw into depression because of unexpressed fears.  Like Cisco, a third boy might succumb to the domination and manipulation of his mother.  But unlike the boys in Boys to Men? each boy in New American Heroes will experience a ritual initiation into manhood, and he’ll do it accompanied by a conscious, loving mentor.  And unlike that same film, these boys will come out on top.

But New American Heroes will not end in the inevitable “high” that follows each boy’s initiation.  That would be too easy - a form of dramatic cheating.  Only after a number of ensuing months, when normalcy returns and the “daily grind” reasserts itself, can New American Heroes measure the true impact of the initiations. Only then can we know if these boys will meet the challenges of coming adulthood with greater fortitude and integrity than the non-initiated youngsters in Boys to Men? 

So we’ll journey beyond the initiation process into its profound aftermath with each boy.  We’ll see how, when, and if each boy’s primary conflict has shifted.  If drugs were his problem is he now resisting their lure?   If he was irresponsible on the job or acting out with a girlfriend is he now being accountable and behaving with integrity?  If he was misbehaving in school is he now getting along better with teachers and fellow students?  Are his grades picking up?  If one youngster was shrinking from addressing a painful issue is he now stepping into his fear and asserting himself around adults?  Perhaps most importantly and contrary to the macho model of masculinity, we will see if these boys can now tough out difficult situations without denying their feelings.

If the film is to have lasting merit, we must see the boys’ lives altered in the everyday.  They must succeed where the previous boys failed.  Each boy must look into the face of his personal dragon and, in his own way, stare that dragon down.  By virtue of their initiation experience, under the loving but tough guidance of their mentors, it is expected that they will meet these challenges.  Each boy’s success will become apparent when a self-created image of responsible manhood emerges.  Along with their family and friends, the audience will rejoice in the arrival of these emergent men.   But there are never any guarantees, especially with open-ended, observational style filmmaking.  At the end of shooting, if there are one or more stories of failure, ala Boys to Men? they will be told too.  Positioned next to the success stories, ultimately, these stories of failure may prove even more instructive.

But if we’re ever going to turn around the destructiveness and self-destructiveness of teenage boys, initiation and mentoring is what it’s going to take.  The success stories of the boys in this film will stand in for the millions of other boys across the country waiting for their chance.  New American Heroes will point the way back to them.   By showcasing culturally different models of initiation, viewers will appreciate that an array of spiritual and religious options exist.  By profiling mentors with different kinds of ties to the boys’ families, viewers will understand that mentors can and do come from a variety of sources.  By presenting varied family structures, viewers will realize that youngsters can come from any family unit and succeed, no matter how untraditional.  By telling the stories of boys from different cities, of different races and classes, parents of all backgrounds will understand that this can and will work for their own children.  

Unlike Hoop Dreams which ends with a mixed message carefully poised between optimism and pessimism, and Boys to Men? which has a decidedly downbeat ending, New American Heroes will be uplifting and optimistic.  Having seen these boys slay their personal dragons, having seen their mentors tested but unfailing and true, that uplift will be well-earned. New American Heroes will end in celebration and joy, with a profound sense of hope that we can and will change our future as a society through initiation and mentorship.  In fact, we must.  The ramifications for society as a whole are too grim to contemplate. 

Audience and Funding

The primary reason for making this film is to help young people.  They desperately need to know that someone is thinking about their long-term welfare, their transition into adulthood.   That there are adults who want them to succeed, who want them to realize their fullest potential and contribute to making the world a better place, who want them to live fulfilled, happy lives.  The primary target audience for New American Heroes are teenage boys and girls. The greatest value of Hoop Dreams, Boys to Men? and Higher Goals comes from young people getting a chance to see complex, frank, and sympathetic media representations of themselves.  They’re not idealized and made “correct,” nor villified and made “wrong” - the two ways most media usually represent them. New American Heroes will do the same.  Boys will benefit from seeing some of their common hurdles presented frankly and sympathetically.  They will dramatically benefit from the understanding that there are solutions to the problems they face.  They will be encouraged (and directed) to seek their own initiation and mentoring. Girls too will gain a deeper understanding and empathy for the trials of their male counterparts.  Some will also come to similar understandings of their own need for initiation and mentoring.

A crucial secondary audience for New American Heroes are adults – those in a position to most dramatically improve the lives of teens.  Adults are the people who most need to understand how young people are suffering.  New American Heroes will interest and be of value to all those who work with teens, including: parents, teachers, social workers, psychologists, doctors, counselors, coaches, employers, and social policy makers.  They are the parties who need to understand successful mentoring and they are the ones who can best implement needed initiation and mentorship programs.  They are the ones who can find mentors for the kids in their lives and secure needed initiations for them.    Perhaps even more than the teens themselves, they are the ones who can most dramatically improve the prospects for teens in the shortest possible time.

Like Hoop Dreams, New American Heroes is designed to be a “real-life drama,” a work of art.  The film should play well in international film festivals and, with luck, in limited theatrical distribution.  It will be released in both commercial and educational markets, digitally and on video.  To reach teens, the film needs a different prime-time domestic broadcast partner – one with experience and credibility reaching this demographic.  Since discussions have already begun with them about this project, one strong possibility is the MTV network.  To reach parents, teachers, social policy makers, et al, PBS is an ideal broadcast outlet, though they certainly are not the only possibility. 

New American Heroes will not be inexpensive.  Following ongoing stories in different cities will require hiring separate local crews and a lot of producer/director travel.  The editing alone will take a year.   The $760,000 estimated cost is a lot of money to raise for a documentary these days.  Though it’s roughly what Hoop Dreams cost, the funding climate for documentaries was much better ten years ago.  Nonetheless, along with largely “for profit” television partners like MTV, HBO, Discovery, PBS (CPB), BBC, and Channel 4 –  where I know the relevant parties - I’m also seeking major funding from the non-profit sector: the MacArthur Foundation (a major funder of Hoop Dreams), the Ford and Rockefeller Foundations, and the major funders of Boys to Men? including: the Village, Victoria, Mazer, and Fleishhacker foundations, the NEA, and wealthy individuals.

Given today’s funding climate, traditional marketplace options must also be explored.   Therefore, a companion book will be written.  Following Hoop Dreams success I have experience working with a number of high profile book publishers - first through the sale of book rights, subsequently in the writing, packaging, and release of two different books.  I will also requisition an original soundtrack; consequently, a professional CD will be produced and sold.  Lastly, product tie-ins and other forms of commercial exploitation will be secured as long as they don’t in any way impede the film’s editorial integrity.

Eventually, much of the funding may need to come from individual donors.  Toward that end, solicitations will go out to the over 35,000 men worldwide who are fellow members of the men’s initiation organization The ManKind Project, hundreds of whom are already personal acquaintances, many of whom are men of means.  Solicitations will also go to numerous arts patrons I’ve met over the years. By providing contact information for fiscal sponsor Film Arts Foundation in San Francisco, the project web site will make it easy and convenient for donors to contribute.  Through the hyperlink to FAF donors can also make contributions via ATM or credit card.   

The New American Heroes website will be modeled along lines similar to the Boys to Men? site and will be housed at www.fmarxfilm.com.  It will contain the full project proposal, a project timeline, a “further readings” section, biographies of the key production personnel, hyperlinks to project partners and funders, the Outreach Proposal, descriptions and hyperlinks to initiation and mentoring organizations nationwide, pictures of the on-going project, sample footage, and a guestbook.  Besides being the central hub of project production, the website will provide the first link in the national Outreach Plan.  

The Outreach Plan will focus first on reaching teens.  It will follow the structure devised for Boys to Men?  A single city will be selected to implement the prototype program.  Since the model is already in place Newark, NJ is being targeted.  First, I will work for a week in the summer with a teen leadership group, like the North Ward’s Youth Leadership Council, to develop the teen outreach curriculum.  Later, during a one day seminar in early Fall, those 7-8 teens will train ~100 of their peers.  Working with mentors themselves, those 100 teens will then take the film and curriculum into their individual institutions (public schools, private and charter schools, community and neighborhood groups, boys and girls clubs, etc.) and bring the film’s messages directly to the eventual ‘end-user’ audience of over 9,000 other teens.  The Fund for New Jersey, and the Victoria, Dodge, Turrell, and Schumann Foundations are logical Newark area funders.  In San Francisco, The Creative Work Fund and the Fleishhacker Foundation are two targeted funders. 

Following the single city prototype program, the Outreach will then be rolled out to cities nationwide.  National foundations will fund the nationwide Outreach.  The logical targets for this funding phase include those national foundations particularly interested in family health and youth development, including Annie E. Casey, Waite Family, and Charles and Helen Schwab Foundations, and the National Fatherhood Initiative. 

Conclusion
           
Our world today is in dire circumstances.  Much of the exploitation, environmental destruction, racism, sexism, and warfare is a function of uninitiated men acting out their suspended adolescence, especially men in positions of leadership. This kind of leadership is about domination.  This domination, this dysfunctional leadership, is leadership from those, the uninitiated, who unconsciously act out their own fears, projecting all evil onto “the other.”  We need leaders who understand that real leadership is about service.  Real leadership is about conscious stewarding of the planet for the good of humanity.  Real leadership is heart-full mentorship.  It is not domination.  Ultimately, New American Heroes is about creating this new kind of leadership – where all are leaders, servant-leaders, who steward the planet for the good of all. 

The hope is that the film will jumpstart a broad, nationwide discussion on the need to resurrect conscious teenage initiation.  Like Hoop Dreams has done, New American Heroes might spark similar films by women about women and girls, and might come to spearhead a national movement to initiate teens of both genders.  If so, then the possibilities for positive social change will truly be limitless.   Either way, the world will have a potent and rich new documentary film to ponder for years to come.  And when viewed together, this film trilogy may come to represent the definitive body of work on urban teenage boys at the crossroads of the millennium, not only telling us what’s wrong in the society in which they’re raised, but telling us what we can do differently - revealing vast new possibilities. 

Appendix 1

Personal Statement

As a filmmaker with a long history of social engagement, working with teenage boys is one of my passions.  All the films I’ve made with and about young people, including Higher Goals,have made clear to me that boys are not receiving adequate mentoring and guidance.  Too many life-altering decisions are left for them to make alone.  Worse, too many adults are only too happy to use them for their own ends.  Boys to Men? is simply the most recent expression of that understanding.
           
I also personally relate to the plight of teenage boys.  I myself was a confused and "difficult" teenager, struggling with drug abuse and delinquency, living in a fatherless household and a mentorless social world.    Simply put, all these films are the logical products of my professional and personal work to understand my own adolescent life and others'.

My filmmaking style is also ideally suited to this subject.  I am a story-teller, not a journalist or polemicist.  I use the deep complexities and occasional contradictory realities of my subjects' lives to frame social issues, not the other way round.  In my view, using real people as fodder for an intellectual or social agenda is ethically questionable, no matter how commendable the intention.  Through careful research and pre-production I choose my subjects based on their most likely story trajectories. Then I work in a modified "cinema verite" style, following subjects in their daily lives, shooting scenes I've pre-selected for thematic reasons, but letting the dramatic action flow from their usual activities.  Through extensive interviews, I then afford each subject the opportunity to narrate his/her own story.  In this way, I'm able to present social issues of importance while fully respecting the idiosyncracies and happenstance of everyday life, along with the uniqueness of each individual's point of view.

Appendix 2

Background

90 percent of the violent crime committed by people younger than 18 is committed by boys. What we have is not just a crisis of violence, but a crisis of violence among young males. 
-- Marjorie Williams, Washington Post, 4/28/00.

It’s boys who are doing this, because of this code about what they can say and can’t say, how they feel about their body self, how they feel about their self-image, how they feel about themselves in school. 
--William S. Pollack, Real Boys.

As adolescence ends – if there is no effective initiation or mentorship – a sad thing happens.  The fire of thinking, the flaring up of creativity, the bonfires of tenderness, all begin to go out.             
-- Robert Bly.

Hoop Dreams (1994) follows two young African-American men and their families over a period of 4½ years, as they navigate their way through high school while pursuing the elusive dream of playing professional basketball.  The film shows how a complex web of issues – pressure to perform well on the court and in the classroom from coaches, family, and friends, economic troubles at home, exploitation and potential racism – all contribute to a young man’s difficulties in successfully transitioning into at a mature state of adulthood.  The two “stars,” Arthur and William, are often left on their own to decide huge, life-altering decisions put to them by parents, teachers, coaches, and friends, with little or no support from those same forces.  The basketball dream that drives these young men is a double-edged sword: it sustains them during times of extreme duress, giving them a positive focus, but due to misplaced priorities it also sets them up for manipulation.  The film also implicitly asks questions about what kind of family structure and practice best contributes to a young man’s emergence.  How necessary are fathers in their sons’ development?   Can coaches effectively substitute as father-figures, as role models and mentors?  Can single parent families raise boys effectively?   How does the popular culture impact a boy’s emergent masculinity?

The just completed documentary Boys to Men? (2004) zeroes in further on subjects similar to Hoop Dreams.  The film begins with a montage of news stories about teenage boys committing violence.  National experts cry out: “It’s a bad time to be a boy in America,” (Christina Hoff Sommers); “We’re having a crisis of the boy next door,” (Dr. William Pollock).  The montage ends with an excerpt from a Bill Clinton speech:  “Why do some teenagers who don’t appear to have trouble at home pick up guns and open fire on their classmates?  What is at the bottom of this and what can we really do?”  What follows are the stories of three 15 year-old boys over a period of one year.   Again, their families, friends, coaches, and schools are all included.  The youngsters are all different across race, class, culture, and family structure.  Their stories are also contextualized with statistics about boys nationwide:

• Boys succeed at suicide at 5 times the rate of girls. 
• Young white males commit suicide at double the national average.
• Boys express less confidence than girls in achieving a Higher Education, and are more likely to endure disciplinary problems, be suspended, or drop out of school.

• Boys are diagnosed as emotionally disturbed at 4 times the rate of girls.
• Boys are labeled learning disabled at 2 times the rate of girls.
• Boys are diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder at 6 times the rate of girls.

What emerges is a composite story of teenage boys today.  A story that is not a happy one, showing us how average boys, in every sense “good” boys - intelligent, sensitive, caring, vulnerable, and articulate – are not meeting the coming challenges of adulthood.  Sadly, they are imploding in rage, anxiety, confusion, and fear.  

Like Hoop Dreams, the boys in Boys to Men? have dreams too.  Like Hoop Dreams, the dreams that drive them also damage them.  Like the film Hoop Dreams, the film Boys to Men? elicits questions about which family practices and family structures are ideal for raising boys.  In the absence of other role models, what does idolizing professional wrestlers and hip hop artists augur for these boys?  If the standard nuclear family is essential, why is Spencer, with a father in the home, still so angry that he fantasizes continually about violence?  If succeeding at first steps is essential to realizing a dream, why does Al-Tran shrink back in fear from an acting career that appears within reach?  If Cisco wants nothing more than a profession nurturing children, why is his persistent nurturing of his mother and grandfather only delaying his maturation?  Like Hoop Dreams, the stories of the three boys in Boys to Men? merge into one.  It ends with each boy, uncertain, fearful and angry, changing schools or dropping out altogether. 

Boys to Men? is meant as a wake up call.  It lays bare a two-prong problem: male teenagers today are inundated with a culture that promotes corrupt values, perpetuating destructive models of masculinity, and they are not being consciously initiated and mentored by loving men into responsible, emotionally literate adulthood. 

New American Heroes will pick up where Boys to Men? leaves off.   It is the logical sequel.  Unlike those two previous works that raise all these issues, that leave off at presenting social problems, New American Heroes will offer solutions.

Carol Gilligan’s studies, Mary Pipher’s Reviving Ophelia, and a generation of feminist inquiry told us what we already knew about how our daughters were being destroyed by female socialization.  But patriarchy also destroys our sons, and until we can allow our kids to be fully human, liberation is not possible.  We need to study “the One” as much as “the Other.”  Nothing can change until we dismantle the pathologies of oppression  from the “winning side” and show how we all lose out.  Donna Gaines, Teenage Wasteland
                       
Throughout history, across cultures, ethnicities, and religions, men have initiated boys into manhood.  (Of course, women have initiated girls into womanhood too, but the focus of this project is men and boys.  Given all the residual harmful effects of patriarchal culture perpetrated by men and boys, this particular emphasis on males seems appropriate.)  Bar Mitzvahs, Catholic confirmations, Boy Scouts, urban gangs, fraternity hazing, team sports …  all reflect – some for better, some obviously for worse – this need for initiation.  The structural similarities of initiation rituals are inescapable, and usually involve variations on three discrete stages: separation, ordeal, and return.  Separation usually entails the complete disruption of the youngster’s ordinary life, the removal from everyday affairs, surroundings, and support, and the re-placement into an isolated location, usually in nature.  The ordeal usually includes some test of physical stamina that induces a heightened emotional state.  Initiates are instructed to seek an awakening to their life’s purpose or mission, a revelation of their place in the order of things,  an illuminated direction for their lives.  Finally the return, often led by elders, reunites the initiate with family and community.  With reintegration, the initiate’s new-found sense of purpose and his emotional grounding now guides and deepens his connection to family, community and society. 

Appendix 3

Project Advisors

Robert Bly, in his numerous roles as groundbreaking poet, editor, translator, storyteller, and father of what he has called "the expressive men's movement," remains one of the most hotly debated American artists of the past half century.   His work Iron John: A Book About Men is an international bestseller which has been translated into many languages. He frequently does workshops for men with James Hillman and others, and workshops for men and women with Marion Woodman. He and his wife Ruth, along with the storyteller Gioia Timpanelli, frequently conduct seminars on European fairy tales. In the early 90s, with James Hillman and Michael Meade, he edited The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, an anthology of poems from the men's work. Since then he has edited The Darkness Around Us Is Deep: Selected Poems of William Stafford, and The Soul Is Here for Its Own Joy, a collection of sacred poetry from many cultures.

Christina Grof studied with mythologist Joseph Campbell and poet Muriel Rukeyser.  The author of The Thirst for Wholeness: Attachment, Addiction, and the Spiritual Path (Harper San Francisco, 1993), the forthcoming memoir, The Eggshell Landing, she is currently working on a book of her paintings. Her other books, written with Stanislav Grof, M.D., areBeyond Death (Thames and Hudson, 1980), Spiritual Emergency: When Personal Transformation Becomes a Crisis (J.P. Tarcher, 1989), and The Stormy Search for the Self (J.P. Tarcher, 1990). Each of her books has been translated into many languages.

Bill Kauth is the author of A Circle of Men: The Original Manual for Men's Support Groups, Co-founder of the New Warrior Training Adventure of The ManKind Project , the Inner King Training and most recently the Warrior Monk Training-Retreat.

Jack Kornfield is a psychologist, therapist, author and meditation instructor. He has studied meditation and Buddhism intensively, living as a monk in Thailand, Burma and India. Jack is a founder of Spirit Rock Meditation Center, holds a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, and is the author of A Path With Heart and After the Ecstasy, the Laundry.

Louise Carus Mahdi is co-editor of two seminal books on initiation: Betwixt and Between: Patterns of Masculine and Feminine Initiation and Crossroads: the Quest for Contemporary Rites of Passage.  With two partners, she started the Vision Quest at Temagami Ontario in 1979 – a wilderness setting for rites of passage for adults and teens.  Trained at the CG Jung Institute in Zurich she works as an editor at Open Court Publishing and as a psychotherapist.

Michael Meade is a renowned storyteller, author, scholar of mythology and student of ritual in traditional cultures. He has the unusual ability to synthesize these materials and connect them to the stories we are living today. Michael is the founder of Mosaic Multicultural Foundation, author of Men and the Water of Life, and co-editor of The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart and Crossroads: Quest for Contemporary Rites of Passage.

Robert Moore is a Psychoanalyst and Consultant in private practice in Chicago and a Senior Professor of Psychoanalysis, Culture, and Spirituality at the Chicago Theological Seminary. He is an internationally recognized author, lecturer, and workshop leader. Dr. Moore is perhaps most widely known for his work on ritual process and the masculine psyche. His five volume series on masculine psychology and spirituality (co-authored with mythologist Douglas Gillette) is the most influential theory of masculinity in today’s international discussion. The structural psychoanalysis outlined in these books has put him at the forefront of theory in masculine psychology, masculine spirituality, and masculine initiation.   He is widely recognized as the foremost theoretician of the contemporary international men’s movement.