This looks like it will be an excellent event, and I should have had its information up days ago (when Joan Kelly, who has a blog now, yay! told me about it) but circumstances intervened.

Here is part of what Joan says:

"The artist/photographer is a former professor of mine and he is a pretty cool activist fellow.

I first (and so far have only) heard about Black Mexico from Professor Wilkins, when he was describing some of the work he does in public schools around the L.A. area, much like the workshop mentioned in the flyer. He impressed upon me the role that suppression/erasure of history plays in disenfranchising populations of people. All of the histories that Professor Wilkins brings to light are important and beautiful on their own, and especially the issue of what he calls a Black-Brown alliance is relevant to Angelenos with some of our recent violence between Black and Brown residents."

The workshop is being put on by the 2nd City Council Art Gallery and Performance space, on Alamitos Ave. in Long Beach, CA and runs from January 26 thru February 28 (so there is still time, even if I am late with the info!)

You can get more information by calling (562) 901-0997. Drop in, if you're in the area. And bring back stories and pictures!

Spence was back on the air this week

Now that the semester is over, I’m back at the Barbershop. In this episode, me, Jimi Izrael, Reuben Navarette, and Roland Martin talk about among other things the increasing rate babies born to single mothers. It got pretty heated, as this is something I feel pretty strong about. Hopefully they’ll offer the extended version on the web, because we kicked this topic around for at least 20-25 minutes….

It was interesting, not least because, though Michel Martin couldn't walk past the discussion it didn't make the blurb on NPR's website.

I caught this recent article in the Washington Post via Jack and Jill Politics and Prometheus 6, and it's so wonderful. Using historical context and excellent analysis of social phenomena, Khalil Muhammad outlines the movement to transform larger social ills that affect all Americans into a cryptic pathology that targets poor black Americans for their incapabilities to Get Over Racism And Do Something Productive In Society (GORADSPIS). The main way this pathology continues for African-Americans and many other communities of color is maintaining the invisibility of whiteness and tacitly accepting "white values" as the gold standard of living well in

I have a new woman to look up to, and she's 7 years old. Lives in Detroit, MI.

A 7-year-old-girl is being hailed as an “angel from heaven” and a hero for jumping in front of an enraged gunman, who pumped six bullets into the child as she used her body as a shield to save her mother’s life.

Alexis Goggins, a first-grader at Campbell Elementary School, is in stable condition at Children’s Hospital in Detroit recovering from gunshot wounds to the eye, left temple, chin, cheek, chest and right arm.

“She is an angel from heaven,” said Aisha Ford, a family friend for 15 years who also was caught up in the evening of terror.

William Saletan is closing out his series on Race, Intelligence and Genes. It is a disappointment.

from: William Saletan
All God's Children
Posted Tuesday, Nov. 20, 2007, at 7:54 AM ET

Why write about this topic? Why hurt people's feelings? Why gratify bigots?

Because truth matters. Because the truth isn't as bad as our ignorant, half-formed fears and suspicions about it. And because you can't solve a problem till you understand it.

Two days ago, I said we could fight the evidence of racial differences in IQ, or we could accept it. Yesterday I outlined the difficulty of fighting it. What happens if we accept it? Can we still believe in equality?

Mr. Saletan feels he's done a good thing here. There's a number of comment threads at Slate that question that assumption, as do I.

Many great POC bloggers recently received a shout-out in the Boston Globe for their phenomenal anti-oppression coverage, specifically in the area of race relations:

These intellectual challenges to mainstream and other viewpoints are some of the opinions Latino, Asian/Pacific Islander-American, and black bloggers are exposing on a growing number of sites focused on social, political, and cultural issues. The sometimes facetiously named blogs range from Angry Asian Man to The Angry Black Woman. Readers can find Latino viewpoints at Guanabee, The Unapologetic Mexican, or Latino Pundit. Those interested in information from an Asian angle head to Ultrabrown, Zuky, or Sepia Mutiny. Sites created by blacks include The Field Negro, Too Sense, and Resist Racism.

The article also gives extensive coverage to Baratunde Thurston, also known as Jack Turner of Jack and Jill Politics, and Carmen Van Kerckhove, who runs the anti-racism training company New Demographic and heads up the pop culture blog Racialicious. I’m proud of all of them, and when Nezua of The Unapologetic Mexican shared the shout-out on his blog, commenter Will noted the compliment the author of this article extended:

But often these bloggers discard the handcuffs of their ethnic origins to tackle subjects affecting a range of racial or ethnic groups.

There was a brief pause in the congratulatory air after reading that sentence. (But trust me, the celebration continues!) However, what exactly does this statement imply about critical race analysis of media exposure and social phenomena? Specifically, is there a danger in choosing to focus on one’s own race rather than taking a more racially inclusive approach to fighting oppression? Can a person be handcuffed by their ethnic origins, resulting in a limited view of that person’s social environment? 

And this comes as a surprise to anyone? I think not. I don't see how anyone could even pretend anymore. Though they no doubt will try....

"Who cares if the affluent get the lion's share of help!? Class warfare! The poor have bootstraps, what more do they want? HANDOUTS!?"

 

NYTIMES -

GULFPORT, Miss., Nov. 14 — Like the other Gulf Coast states battered by Hurricane Katrina, Mississippi was required by Congress to spend half of its billions in federal grant money to help low-income citizens trying to recover from the storm.

Come On People: On The Path From Victims To Victors by Dr. Bill Cosby and Dr. Alvin F. Poussaint has two distinct aspects: parental pedagogy and political polemic.

The child rearing book is typical of self-help books. There's a statement of principle, a quote from someone who applies the principle and the rules by which the principle is applied. It's a useful pattern; I even see it at work in computer books. And I see little bad advice in the book as a set of theoretical advice on dealing with your child. Black folks have to prioritize our children higher than society as a whole does.

 

The excellent analysis of current events that has been posted this week here at IntraPoltics? Just in case, here's a reminder:

"It's the beginning of an authoritarian system in Somalia.". Upheaval in the Somalian government. Who's running the show behind the scenes?
Class-ic complications - a neat summary of the effect of the class divide -
California, Louisiana, and the Right to Return. Are the policies undertaken by law enforcement and developers in some natural disasters part of a general scheme to displace the poor and minority property owners and renters?
Drs. Cosby and Poussaint on Meet the Press. A 4 part series dissecting the good doctors' appearance on Meet the Press -
Jena Tries to get its story straight. Again. Correcting the myths about the myths.

Those are the highlights, here. What's going on on your site? Don't be shy, promote yourself!

For instance, there is a debate going on now and through the weekend at Maxambit.com, between Michael Fisher of Assault on Black Sanity, and Michael Cobb Bowen of Cobb. It should be interesting, drop in and see!

... A new cottage industry? Where did they all come from? Is there special Spiritual Adviser to Bigots (who get caught) training?

At the rate they are being needed they may as well set up a "1-800 I R RACIST -- But I really didn't mean it!" hotline and just roll whatever advice it is they give these folks off assembly line style.

You'll see why, when I got to this paragraph of the apology, I just had to laugh.

Chapman said he is meeting with his spiritual adviser, Rev. Tim Storey, who is black, and hope to meet with other black leaders, "so they can see who I really am and teach me the right thing to do to make things right, again."

via Shake's Sis.

There is no "read more", but it will say that anyway, I think