Youngest Publisher in American History

Anaya Lee Willabus, a 9-year-old girl from Brooklyn, recently wrote and published her own book. She's the youngest person to publish a chapter book in U.S. history.

Willabus, joined by her parents, talked more about the book, "The Day Mohan Found His Confidence," and what inspired her to write it. ~Pix 11

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Constricted

When it is exclusive it is limited culturally, intellectually, and spiritually. The instant it becomes elite, it becomes irrelevant.

The second sentence is an adaptation of a quote by some bright person whose name I can't recall at the moment.

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The High Priestess of Soul: Nina Simone

Nina Simone

Simone was and remains an incredibly powerful figure for black social justice and is a personal heroine of mine. She *is* the High Priestess of Soul to millions of black people.

So, what must be done with a film about Simone in the zeitgeist of unapologetic blackness?!

It must be watered down, her appearance questionable to those whose lives her work is a soundtrack to, simultaneously made palatable for consumption outside her circle of influence.

The selection of actress Zoe Saldana and promotion decisions were careful and suggests what this film will offer upon release on March 31. The actress in black face adds a separate layer to the conversation.

Any erasure of the intensity of Simone's radicalism functions to buttresses the structural policies and systemic practices that support and perpetuate anti-blackness.

The affect of this "biopic" on generations of black youth unacquainted with Simone's oeuvre, activism, and love of blackness could prove crippling.

#NinaSimome #BioPic #ZoeSaldana #DavidOyelowo #EalingStudiosEnterprisesLimited

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Black History Month 2016

Three words: Mavis is real!

First and last sentence of book.

I've lived a lot of Black History Months, each one experienced in mostly side-eye mode.

Blacks treated as February's flavor never set well with me. It never harmonized with Carter G. Woodson and the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History's "Negro History Week," which was observed the second week of February starting in 1926. Their purpose was to encourage teaching the history of black Americans in our nation's public schools.

The teaching of black American history in U.S. public schools is beyond the scope of this thread, but ....

My thinking is there are countless American blacks whose history needs to be recounted in *addition to* MLK and the few others who get coverage in February. I have always felt that Black History Month has been co-opted, bastardized, and re-packaged for easy digestion and mass consumption for, mostly, people who are not black.

The present-day Black History Month project seems to *not* be about connecting the black diaspora with its rich past. Let's be clear, it's not.

But this February 2016 I feel I've experienced the blackest Black History Month ever because ... Sankofa!

We, the black diaspora, are choosing to fetch and not wait, hands stretched out, to be reconnected with what of ours had been lost.

Ashe!

#Formation #KendrickLamar #MelissaHarrisPerry (keep on keepin' it real, MHP, endings are new beginnings) #MavisStaples #WEBDuBois

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MHP Exits MSNBC

If we step away from personal feelings, Nerdlandener to not-so-much, toward Dr. Melissa Harris Perry (for the record I like her) the larger picture comes into view.

It's plain. It's uncomplicated: "The master's tools [finish the sentence] will ...." ~Audre Lorde

Let's be clear, I don't claim to be clairvoyant where Perry's career at MSNBC is concerned. Our "seeing it coming" is not the important issue here.

It is vital that we step up to support and rebuild our black institutions, and create new ones that are platforms for the unapologetic black voice.

Otherwise, we are merely working Massa's plantation no matter if it's by choice (plantation guard) or necessity (sharecropper).

No judgement. This is the reality and the choices we face.

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