Blacks were not Cowards during Slavery

“His mistake is also a thorough misrepresentation of the fortitude — the mental toughness and will to survive — required to survive slavery, individually and collectively, for centuries.” – By Blair L.M. Kelley I’m not understanding how people can say, “slaves were cowards” or what #Kanye said, about how “slaves were enslaved as if it were a…

Rethinking Work-Life Balance for Women of Color – And how white women got it in the first place…by #KimberlyAllers

This article spoke to me in all types of ways.  This is true gospel and how women of color have been framed and feeling for years.  This is a must read!!!   Rethinking Work-Life Balance for Women of Color And how white women got it in the first place by Kimberly Seal Allers   “White…

LEADers on Inequality, Race, Ethnic Politics, and African American History

Special treat for African American History Month Netflix will stream 22 hard to find films from Black Cinema’s Earliest Pioneers. In 2015, Kino Lorber released a treasure trove from American history in a DVD box set, Pioneers of African-American Cinema. Hours upon hours of feature-length and short films spanning the 1910s to the 1940s were…

September/October 2016: African American Mentions, News, and Articles of Interest

  Jean Genet knew how to speak his heart without pity or condescension. Now, we have learned how not to mistake solidarity feelings for feelings of pity among the representatives of the ruling culture. Genet, he already knew how to distinguish them. In his Yale speech, on the Mayday Speech day, he even goes so far as to advocate the…

National Read A Book Day on September 6, 2016

September 6, 2016: National Read a Book Day Highlighted Book of the Month The Adventures of Tume The Tug Boat: Tume Visits New York City with his new friend Speed by Monique Brown, ISBN: 978-1534980655: Tume’s Tug Boat Adventures series was created for children of all ages and will help readers understand other cultures, develop an…

July/August 2016: African American Mentions, News, and Articles of Interest

Malcolm X was invited back to London by the African Society to address a large audience in the Old Theatre at the London School of Economics. In both addresses, Malcolm X moved the political discourse from civil rights to human rights and stated clearly and unequivocally that the Black liberation struggle had to be internationalized rather than ghettoized….

June 2016: African American Mentions, News, and Highlights

In Native Son, Wright writes: “Goddammit, look! We live here and they live there. We black and they white. They got things and we ain’t. They do things and we can’t. It’s just like living in jail.” Vince Staples reminds us that the inner city still imprisons many. We should never forget that for some…

May 2016: African American News, Highlights, and Mentions

Chesler found that 70 percent of fathers who fight for custody win, regardless of the father’s character or even if he’s an active part of the child’s life. The perception of mothers who retain custody of their children is flawed. They don’t all have their children because the courts decided that they were the better…

No Longer 3/5ths of a Person: a’n’t I a woman?

Harriet Tubman was a great woman and she deserves every honor we can get for her accomplishments, trials, tribulations, and love for her people.  She was born a slave in America and decided to free slaves during a time when she would have been hung, raped, and murdered just like Mary Turner.  Sojourner Truth said,…

Become Political “Gladflys”: African American Votes are Political Currency

#NOAMCHOMSKY: Well, before answering that, let me just make one comment on elections: They’re important. It does matter who sits in the White House, who’s—who appoints Supreme Court justices, who makes decisions about war and peace, about environment and so on. Matters who’s in Congress, matters who’s in the state legislatures and so on. It…

Black Girls are Angry too….and Politically Invisible

Why you gonna take me seriously if I don’t show you that I’m in charge of myself? That I’m no joke. You ain’t gonna respect me until you know that what I say is for real. —Samantha, a 14-year-old girl There ain’t nothing more convincing than a good punch. —Lakeesha, a 16-year-old girl This girl…

Journal Article: Battered Women “Compelled to Crime”

Gender Entrapment Theory Melanie – The lesson Melanie learned was that “Black men live a life that is more difficult than Black women, and that part of their family’s commitment to the community was to understand the pressures on the Black man and to forgive him for not making it in the world.” The women in…