Tag: african

Journalism

As An African American Woman, I’m Your Most Unlikely Homesteader

Slavery forced a wedge between Black people and the land. But now the garden feels more like church—a place for my spirit to be renewed. On a crisp March 2015 day, in a D.C. suburb, my family and I stood in a fenced-in community garden, nestled behind a church, looking at a grassy, weeded over, 10-foot-by-20-foot rectangular plot, daring us to tame it. The overcast sky hung over us, and our shoes grew damp from the dewy grass. “What are we supposed to do with this?” This was not what I imagined when I signed up at my friend’s suggestion to join a community garden. I envisioned rich dark soil, in neatly arranged rows, waiting for us to sow vegetable seeds and water them with cute silver watering cans. But we dug in, and that day marked not just the beginning of my healing,...
IN OTHER NEWS

The 20 most influential African-American chefs in the South today

It's safe to say that the work of chefs Tunde Wey, BJ Dennis and Michael Twitty has changed the way we talk about Southern cooking, and that New Orleans cuisine wouldn't be the same without Leah Chase. These chefs are only a few of the most influential African American chefs cooking in the South today. We've picked 20 of the most outstanding and influential African-American chefs across the South who we think have had the greatest influence on what we eat today. Some have dedicated their careers to teaching, others are television stars and still more are changing our culinary scene from behind the line. Tunde Wey, New Orleans Nigerian chef Tunde Wey has, until very recently, been traveling around the country serving pop-up meals as part of a series called "Blackness in America." Over ...
South African government wants to know why Trump thinks its people are ‘undesirable’ immigrants
Journalism

South African government wants to know why Trump thinks its people are ‘undesirable’ immigrants

South Africa is among a growing number of countries taking action against President Donald Trump’s remarks last week that Haiti, El Salvador and African nations are “s---hole countries” whose inhabitants are not desirable for U.S. immigration. South Africa’s government called for a meeting Monday with acting U.S. Ambassador Jessye Lapenn in Pretoria as part of a diplomatic protest of Trump’s “disturbing” comments, the Department of International Relations said in a statement Sunday. While officials acknowledged Trump’s denial of the exact language used, they said the president’s denial was “categorical, referring only to Haiti and not addressing the entirety of the statement attributed to him.” Trump in a tweet Friday appeared to deny using the term “s---hole” to refer to those countrie...
“Contradictions of African American Males”
Journalism

“Contradictions of African American Males”

The Washington Post has published a very important survey on "Being a Black Man." This is fascinating, detailed and thoughtful enough an article to pass as a Master's Thesis in many sociology departments around the nation. Here are some basic contradictions underscored by the Post survey conducted on a random sample of 2.864 adults nationwide: 1) 56% of black men believe the SYSTEM is to blame for their economic difficulties. However 59% also acknowledge that there were things they have failed to do that would have made a difference in the outcome. 2) 79% of the black men surveyed were OPTIMISTIC about their own personal future. Yet 34% said, as a GROUP, black men were facing a worse future and 36% said the future would be the same. Only 29% said a better future was awaiting black men a...
Ann Petry: First African American Woman to Sell Over One Million Books
Journalism

Ann Petry: First African American Woman to Sell Over One Million Books

Ann Petry, the first African American female author to sell over one million copies of her book. Petry was born in 1911 in Old Saybrook, Connecticut, where her father and grandfather ran a drugstore. Petry loved to read and from the age of fourteen she knew she wanted to be a writer. She wrote poetry and short plays in high school, but after graduation she chose the safe route and enrolled in the pharmacy program at the University of Connecticut where she earned her PhG degree. Ann worked in the family business until she married in 1938 and moved to New York. The direction of Ann's life changed when she took her first job in the advertising department of an African American newspaper, The Amsterdam News. She later became a reporter and editor for the People's Voice, a weekly newspaper, w...
Toni Morrison the Most Enduring Literary Feminine and African American Voice
Journalism

Toni Morrison the Most Enduring Literary Feminine and African American Voice

Toni Morrison was born Chloe Ardelia ( Anthony) Wofford  on February 18, 1931 in Lorain, Ohio, where her parents, migrants from the South, had moved to, to escape the problems of southern racism. Morrison is the second of four children, to, Ramah Willis and George Wofford,  migrant sharecroppers on both sides, both of whom came from sharecropping families who had moved North in pursuit of better living conditions in the early 1900s.  Her father's family, in particular, had faced a great deal of discrimination. Due to these bitter memories and the racial troubles he endured during his childhood, he maintained a strong distrust of whites throughout his lifetime. Morrison's parents instilled in her the value of group loyalty, which they believed was essential to surviving the harsh realitie...
Langston Hughes – The Life, Times, Works as Well as Impact of a Versatile African-American Writer
Journalism

Langston Hughes – The Life, Times, Works as Well as Impact of a Versatile African-American Writer

Langston Hughes stands as a literary and cultural translation of the political resistance and campaign of black consciousness leaders such as Martin Luther King to restore the rights of the black citizenry thus fulfilling the ethos of the American dream, which is celebrated universally every year around February to April. Hughes' overriding sense of a social and cultural purpose tied to his sense of the past, the present and the future of black America commends his life and works as having much to learn from to inspire us to move forward and to inform and guide our steps as we move forward to create a great future. Hughes is also significant since he seems to have conveniently spanned the genres: poetry, drama, novel and criticism leaving an indelible stamp on each. At 21 years of age he...
Journalism

Inhumane Practices Involving Young African Children

Pedophilia and Crimes Against Humanity A child abused by men unable tot control their sexual urges is horrendous and many women and children are viciously raped worldwide. The consequences can be disastrous as we saw recently in the case of the medical student raped on a bus in India. But children as young as a few months old are being used for sex by adult men and this type of crime is shown to be common in many societies. In some African societies, such as in Ethiopia, young girls are traded as brides for older men. They are usually very young and some are reportedly only 8 years old. In that case they are cared for by his family until she reaches puberty or near that time. They are then married and the girl is raped repeatedly. She may become pregnant even before her first period. Alo...
Alice Walker Breaks Out As One of the Leading Female Voices in African American Literature
Journalism

Alice Walker Breaks Out As One of the Leading Female Voices in African American Literature

An African American writer and activist Alice Walker began publishing her fiction and poetry during the latter years of the Black Arts movement in the 1960's. Born in 1944 in Eatonton, Georgia, to sharecropper parents,  she knew racism and poverty only too well and with works expressing the need for the tackling of such issues she has become one of the best-known and most highly respected writers from the U.S. along with such writers as Toni Morrison and Gloria Naylor , commonly associated with the post-1970s surge in African American women's literature. Her activism started after being educated at Spelman College and Sarah Lawrence College, where Walker, in a commencement speech spoke out against the silence of that institution's curriculum to African-American culture and history. Active...