In this episode of Resilience Unravelled with Dr Russell Thackeray, Antonio Michael Downing discusses growing up in Trinidad and Tobago with his grandmother, who taught him to read from the King James Bible and to sing Anglican hymns, before her death led to his move at age 11 to rural Northern Ontario.

He describes the shock of migration, being renamed “Michael” at school, and how losing familiar culture and language prompted questions about identity, belonging, and the self, shaping a lifelong focus on fluid identity and resilience.

Downing links resilience to flexibility and performance across contexts, from multiple musical personas to a corporate career at BlackBerry, and notes that those who migrate between ages 9–14 often become “a third thing” between cultures.

He connects these themes to his memoir Saga Boy and novel Black Cherokee, explains his creative process as a “visitation,” and shares that Black Cherokee has an Audible audiobook, a paperback coming in August, and that he can be reached on Instagram @antoniomichaeldowning.

00:00 Welcome and Introductions

01:24 Growing Up in Trinidad

02:22 Grandmother’s Gifts

04:26 Move to Canada

07:01 Reinventing Identity

11:17 Neither Here Nor There

13:45 Two Jackets Life

19:08 Resilience Through Fluidity

23:13 Themes in Music and Books

26:24 Toronto and Belonging

28:37 Writing as Visitation

33:35 Books Formats and Where to Find

34:53 Final Thanks and Goodbye

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