9th Wonder & Mark Anthony Neal Shine
It’s a blessing when two of your heroes are also your colleagues. Check out this CBS piece on Grammy-winner 9th Wonder and Duke Professor Mark Anthony Neal. I’m so proud of what these two have accomplished. They are an inspiration for artists/academicians in general, and for Durhamites/North Carolinians in particular. Shine on, brothers.
Post A Comment. Filed under academia, black culture, music, history, Hip-Hip.
Remembering Malcolm X
Forty Seven years ago today, Malcolm X was assassinated. Activist, Journalist and Durham resident Lamont Lilly reflects on Malcolm’s enduring legacy in this piece, entitled: We are Malcolm X - This in Remembrance.
“It is incorrect to classify the revolt of the Negro as simply a racial conflict of black against white, or as a purely American problem. Rather, we are today seeing a global rebellion of the oppressed against the oppressor, the exploited against the exploiter.” - El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz, 1964
Brief, yet exhaustive, this passage best represents the Malcolm X America doesn’t want you and I to know—the more complete post-Mecca Malcolm who could once again ignite an entire nation if only he were properly revisited. It seems like just yesterday, the life and times of Malcolm Little were resurrected through Spike Lee’s 1992 cinematic production, Malcolm X. Bold, vivid and vulgar, Spike’s production wasn’t only a history book for the hood; it was the artistic catalyst of a new cool: the infamous black “X” hat. It was also an introduction to Malcolm as a martyr of resistance.
1 Comment. Filed under black culture, history, education.
Beat Making Lab in UNC Music Department
I’ve taught courses at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill since 2009, but until this semester all of my courses have been in the Department of African and African American Studies. This semester I have the privilege of developing a new class just a few buildings down from Battle Hall in the Music Department. The course is a Beat Making Lab founded by music professor and budding DJ Dr. Mark Katz and internationally renown beat battle champion Apple Juice Kid. The curriculum covers three areas: practical beat making, a history of beat making, and entrepreneurship in the music industry. Students will learn how to use the open-source software Audacity, Reason 6 and Abelton Live, as well as engage career producers, beat makers and music industry professionals. If you’re interested in keeping up with the class, “like” us on facebook and follow me on twitter (@durhamite). Should be an interesting semester.
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Unemployment Down… Unless You’re Black.
For those of you who tweet I highly recommend you follow Dr. Mark Anthony Neal (@newblackman) and Dr. Sandy Darity (@sandydarity). You’ll learn things like this: “@NewBlackMan: Unemployment Rises For Blacks As It Falls For Everyone Else @SandyDarity”. Dr. Neal linked a News One article, but I found another article via CNN, which doesn’t force you to click through an advertisement first.
Oh yeah, and don’t forget to follow me - @durhamite!
Post A Comment. Filed under racism, economy.
The Black Candle Soundtrack
I wrote the title track to MK Asante Jr’s award-winning documentary narrated by Maya Angelou, The Black Candle. Produced by Derrick Hodge with Robert Glasper on piano and Chris Dave on drums. HAPPY KWANZAA YALL!
Post A Comment. Filed under black culture, music, art.
Greetings From Ghana Part 1
[Blackademics founder Pierce Freelon writes from West Africa]
Greetings from Accra, Ghana - my home for the next two weeks.
I’ve decided to submit “My View” from West Africa, to give you a glimpse into my experience on the road. I’m here shooting a documentary about black cultural production and migration throughout the African diaspora. I hope to premiere the film for several Hillside High School students at Movement of Youth’s sixth annual Hip Hop Symposium during Black History Month.
Movement of Youth (MOY) is an awesome Durham-based nonprofit, founded by UNC graduate Atrayus Goode. We collaborate every Black History month on a Hip Hop Symposium, and this year’s event promises to be exciting for Durham teens. I am privileged to be able to travel for my work, and feel a responsibility to bring my experience back to Durham.
I left town a few days ago and it’s been fun re-adjusting to Ghanaian cuisine. I had a belly full of Banh’s Cuisine’s spicy chicken wings, fried tofu and sticky rice when I hit the road. Now I’m getting used to Waakye (rice and black-eyed-peas), Red Red, plantains, Fufu (pounded cassava and yam) and fish. Not “fish,” as in a nicely-cut, seasoned tilapia filet from Whole Foods - I’m talking about a whole fish with 10,000 little bones that was swimming in the Atlantic ocean yesterday, now looking up at me with crusty fried eyeballs in a bowl of stew. Pure deliciousness.
Post A Comment. Filed under diaspora, healing.
Nivea: Racist Advertizement or Racist Civilization?
Have you seen this advertisement from the skin care company Nivea?
The ad depicts a young clean cut brother chucking his curly counterpart - a beheaded doppelganger with full-blown afro and beard - into the distance. The caption reads, “LOOK like you GIVE a damn: RE-CIVILIZE YOURSELF.” Nivea is a German global skin and body care brand, whose name is derived from the Latin word niveus/nivea/niveum, meaning “snow-white”. Perfect.
Amid tremendous criticism and backlash about the ad, Nivea quickly issued a reconciliatory statement:
“We are deeply sorry to anyone who may take offense to this specific local advertisement. After realizing that this ad is misleading, it was immediately withdrawn.”
But is the advertisement misleading?
Efforts to “civilize” Africans through enslavement and colonization were justified by the likes of Englishman Rudyard Kipling (in his poem White Man’s Burden) as a necessary obligation. Several European nations, Germany included, embarked on campaigns to forcefully assimilate African people into what they professed to be advanced stages of social, cultural and moral development. This included coercing people into adopting and worshiping European religious beliefs, governmental structures and aspirations, while attempting to obliterate indigenous social, cultural and political mores. “Civilizing” missions also involved launching the decapitated heads of those who did not wish to assimilate into oblivion, as is depicted in this ad.
Beyond this historical correlation, the advertisement depicts a modern example of how an African man can go about civilizing himself. Nivea takes Kipling’s role by providing specific guidelines ushering black folk towards assimilation and modernization. Looking “like you give a damn,” presumably about your image, career or life is actually great advice, which is reinforced and institutionalized in schools, offices and police stations across America.
After all, 11-year-olds still get kicked out of school for wearing their hair in cornrows. Having a black-sounding name (or, indeed, being black) makes it harder to get a job and easier to get arrested. This is not Nivea’s doing. Their advertisement, simply provides a reality check - that looking, sounding, acting, or being black is a liability in the civilized world.
Nivea legitimately asserts that if you want to graduate, get a job, stay out of prison and be a productive member of this civilization - you should start by trimming your afro/braids/curls/locs into a clean-cut caesar (ladies get a perm), indicating to other civilized members of society that you give a damn about yourself. Furthermore, you should discard your former self by throwing his/her decapitated head into the snow-white abyss. To quote Charles Barkley, and to place this ridiculous ad in its proper historical context, “anything less would be uncivilized“.
10 Comments. Filed under racism, ridiculousness, mainstream culture.
Poetic Justice: A Documentary on Durham, Hip Hop and Spoken Word
I’m working on a documentary about an after-school program I’m involved with called Poetic Justice. Check out this poem from one of our students and peep an article I wrote about the program below:
North Carolina is emerging as one of the hotbeds of the international spoken word and slam poetry scene, with several nationally ranked slam poets residing right here in the Bull City.
I had the honor of conducting an after-school program with one of the area’s most talented poets, Durham native Kane “Novakane” Smego. A founding member of the Chapel Hill youth poetry organization Sacrificial Poets, Kane is simply one of the dopest poets and human beings I’ve ever met. His lyrical prowess and compelling delivery is exemplary, but it is the vulnerable authenticity of his stories that has made him one of the most respected, and feared, poets in the world.
The program we run together, Poetic Justice, combines two curricula: a series of spoken-word workshops that Kane designed for Sacrificial Poets called YouTh ink and a hip hop curriculum I developed in graduate school called Blackademics. The result is a new hybrid curriculum we’ve been conducting in the Durham Public Schools system for the past 30 weeks. The results have been stunning.
2 Comments. Filed under education, Hip-Hip, spoken word.
Gil Scott Heron
Gil Scott Heron performed at the Carolina Theatre here in Durham last year. I had the honor and privilege of sitting down with him after the show. He was one of my biggest inspirations and he will be dearly missed.
4 Comments. Filed under interviews.
Guru Legacy
The legendary Keith Elam, also known as Guru, passed away last April. In addition to being half of the world renown Hip Hop duo Gangstarr, Guru is also known for pioneering in the fusion of jazz and Hip Hop through his Jazzmatazz franchise. In honor of the late Guru Hip Hop and jazz quartet, The Beast collaborated with progressive jazz-blog, Revivalist to release the Guru Legacy EP - a 6-song libation to Guru, featuring John Robinson, Silent Knight, Jocelyn Ellis, D. Noble (a blackademics contributor) and several others. Check it out on the front page of Okayplayer!
*UPDATE: read the Daily Tar Heel Review
Post A Comment. Filed under music.
