Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Angela Davis and

Marc Lamont Hill on 'Our World'

 

 

Our World with Black Enterprise | May 29, 2011

 

Host Marc Lamont Hill Talks with Activist & Scholar Angela Davis

 

Posted by MAN

http://www.thorntreeproject.org/ Please reblog to show your support and to raise awareness. This image and more are available as prints via our Tumblr online store!! A percentage of profits are donated to the Thorn tree project." />

billykidd:

Samburu Warrior in New York was shot by Billy kidd. 

This is Katelo.

I’ve been spending the last week with Samburu Warriors on their first visit outside of Kenya for the Thorn Tree Project. http://www.thorntreeproject.org/

Please reblog to show your support and to raise awareness.

This image and more are available as prints via our Tumblr online store!! A percentage of profits are donated to the Thorn tree project.

__________________________

THE THORN TREE PROJECT

 The story of the Thorn Tree Project is a story of how, against all odds, the nomadic people of Sereolipi in the northern arid lands of Kenya, through hard work, resourcefulness and with a little help from the outside world, have begun to create significant, meaningful and measurable change by providing education for their children.

The mothers, children and fathers of Sereolipi and Ndonyo Wasin

There are two primary schools in the Sereolipi area – Ndonyo Wasin Primary School and Sereolipi Primary School. In 2001 there were only 130 children attending these two primary schools and this was less than 3% of the children in the area. Yet the people believed that education was a key to their survival in the 21st century. It was the best thing they could do to improve the socio-economic structure in their communities and thereby create significant and lasting change in the lives of their children.

However, Northern Kenya is one of the poorest and most marginalized areas in Africa and the average annual income in the Sereolipi area is less than $250 a year. Even the most basic initiatives are beyond their financial means. In addition, the Samburu community is nomadic and most children live 10 to 40 miles away from these primary schools. The parents themselves had never been to school and had little understanding of what going to school entailed. They were reluctant to send their 6 year olds to a strange school so far away – particularly when they had an important role in looking after the goats and cattle at home.

Their goal was to get as many children of the nomadic families to come to school as possible.

Jane Newman first met the people of Sereolipi when she was driving from Nairobi to Addis Ababa and the car she was in broke down in their village. At that time Jane was working in advertising in New York City. The following year she retired and she returned to stay with them for a month. She realized that their dream was worthy and their ideas were good but they had no chance of making it happen simply because they had no money. She helped them set up Sereolipi Nomadic Education Trust in 2001 and decided to raise funds for them through friends and business associates in the US and Europe.

Preschool students

The first initiative of the project was to establish some preschools in the outlying nomadic communities where the parents could see the benefits of school first hand.

The thorn tree preschools use the largest thorn tree around as the classroom

The preschool classroom is under a thorn tree with a blackboard propped against the tree trunk this is used to teach 25 to 35 tiny children to read, write, add and subtract. The schools are managed by an active committee of men and women elected by the communities. And the school is very much part of the culture.

Learning under the thorn tree

Two preschools were opened in 2003. They proved to be very successful at sending students into the primary schools so more were added and now there are 14 of them. Each preschool is supported by a sponsor in the USA/UK who donates $1,000 a year for the salary of the teacher, food for lunch and a cook to make it as well as blackboards and books to teach with.

Three of the preschool teachersOne of our school committeesJane with the children

As the preschools brought more and more students into the two local primary schools it created the need for dormitories. Almost all the nomadic children have to board at the school because their families live and migrate anywhere from 10 to 40 kilometers from the two schools. The existing dormitories were extremely overcrowded.

The second initiative was to build two dormitories for girls and two for boys in each of the two primary schools. People in America donated enough money for these eight dormitories complete with shower blocks and toilets and fully equipped with new bunk beds, mattresses and sheets. Solar lighting was installed.

Our new dormitories

As well as the dormitories other aspects of the infrastructure needed to be improved to cope with the influx of students. More desks and school uniforms were bought every year for both schools.

Children learning on the floor before we bought 50 new desks

Water was put into Ndonyo Wasin primary school because the students were walking 4 kilometers a day to fetch water from an open well dug in a dry river bed. A large airy computer room with Internet access and a library were added to Sereolipi school. An ambulance and nurse were brought in to look after the health of the students in the primary schools and preschools. Camels were bought to give the students extra nutrition and an evening meal was given to Ndionyo Wasin boarders.

The new ambulance Clean, running water!

Primary School Students 2001-2010

The number of children attending primary school has increased from just 132 students in 2001 the year before we started to 780 in 2010. In addition there are over 400 students attending the 14 preschools so we have about 1,200 students in total at school.

Pre school teachers with the students they taught who are now at primary school

The third initiative was begun in 2006 and its goal was to set up a scholarship program for students graduating from the primary schools. Secondary school is not free in Kenya and the cost of school fees, supplies and transport to send a student to secondary school was nearly three times the parent’s annual income and it was simply impossible for the parents to pay. The program looks for individual sponsors in the US/Europe who are interested in helping one of these bright students to realize their dream and the sponsor pays $1,000 a year to send the student to one of the best secondary schools in the country. We now have 90 students in the scholarship program.

For more information on the scholarship program go to thorntreescholarship.org

Some of our scholarship students with their families and at school

The fourth initiative was started last year in Ndonyo Wasin Primary School which has 240 students enrolled (up from only 32 in 2001). Its goal was to improve the quality of education the students were receiving so that more and more of them would qualify for the scholarship program which required a pass mark of 300 out of 500 in the primary school exams.

In rural schools in Kenya the government provides less than 45% of what is needed to run a basic school capable of delivering adequate academic standards. In our schools the situation was even worse. For example, in 2007 the Kenyan government gave Ndonyo Wasin Primary School only 30% of what the school needed to function at a basic academic level. The school had only 3 teachers when there were 8 classes from Standard 1 to 8. The government supplied only basic food of corn and cow peas for lunch even though the school is 100% boarding and the students need breakfast and dinner as well as lunch. The government only supplies enough money for text books for one subject text book to be shared by 3 to 4 students and no English or Kiswahili reading books. Not surprisingly, and in spite of all the efforts of the head teacher, the school was not doing well.

Old classrooms New classrooms

In 2008, it was agreed that we would supply the other 70% Ndonyo Wasin Primary School needed for one year to see if it would help increase grades. We added 8 teachers, bought Unimix (a nutritionally balanced porridge) for breakfast and ugali and beans for dinner. We built a new kitchen with energy efficient stoves and also a new library that has about 2,500 reading books in it. And we have added 3 new large, light classrooms. Our stated goal was to make sure that all the students achieved 60% or more in all their 5 subjects.

The new library

The results were excellent – a 20 to 30% increase in grades across all classes in Ndonyo Wasin. There was still lots of room for improvement but it was good enough to continue in Ndonyo Wasin Primary School and to extend the program to Sereolipi Primary school in 2009. We also agreed to add in a third school in our area called Lerata Primary School that had 130 students enrolled in it.

In 2009 the exam results were outstanding with a further 30% increase in Ndonyo Wasin, a 35% increase in Sereolipi and a 32% increase in Lerata. The increases continued into 2010 and the three schools are well on their way to being some of the best schools in the country. As a result of this, the number of students entering the scholarship program has doubled between 2009 and 2011

Through all of these activities Jane Newman works closely with the community, teachers, head teachers, and school committees to ensure the project is well managed and that each activity has clear objectives and is fully evaluated on an annual basis. Jane travels to Sereolipi, Ndonyo Wasin and Lerata and visits the primary schools and pre-schools at least twice a year.

None of this would have been achieved without the generous support of all the people who have donated money to the project over the past 8 years. It has been amazing what has been accomplished and the Samburu people are extremely grateful and so very appretiative. They send blessings to all who have helped them.

New school uniforms Camels give 8 times more milk than cows

Urban Africa: Pan-African View

David Adjaye, one of the leading architects from his generation, living between London and New York, returned to Lisbon. ‘Urban Africa - A Photographic Journey’ was the reason why. This exhibition, recently launched at the Black Pavilion of Lisbon City Hall Museum, is a photographic tour but also a retrospective of memories from an architect who never left Africa.

Born in 1966, in Tanzania, from a family of diplomats, he was soon forced to understand the inevitability of travelling, the need to readapt and redefine oneself. Nevertheless, the nomad lifestyle didn’t break his strong relation with the African continent. His work confirms his deep relationship with its landscapes and its places. In Urban Africa (and also in this conversation) David shares his panoramic view of this vast territory and his – spoken – will to live there again.

Cortesia de Adjaye Associates / Courtesy Adjaye Associates

 

Lisbon again.

Yes, nice to be back.

This time to attend the opening of Urban Africa. Is this photographic voyage a kind of solitary return to your childhood memories? Why now?

Undoubtedly, that’s how it started, innocently, without premeditated agenda. A quest to fill in the gaps of certain memories. But then… within ten, twelve countries, it became very clear to me that when showing it to other people, people that I thought would know about the subject… that actually there was very little knowledge about urbanism in the continent. I ended up doing a show in Harvard, in 2003, literally a third of the way through the project, I was asked to show my work, but I said - How about showing some research that I’ve been doing? And Toshiko Mori was the director and she said - Absolutely, what do you want to show? I said - I want to show you twelve African cities… I’d only been to fifteen then, I’d show twelve and the research on it, and we’d see the reaction o the public. We displayed it in the main hall at Harvard, and it was a huge revelation to a lot of people… literally, it was off the radar, and what was chocking for people was that they didn’t realize that the discourse of modernity, the discourse of post-modernity, the discourse of post-development also has it’s residue in Africa, and it’s sort of surprising to me that people didn’t think that, but there it was… all the ideas that were being discussed, nobody had systematically sought to understand the relationship of these ideas… in the context of this continent.

You grew up all over the world and then stopped in Britain, yet you carry Africa more strongly with you than if you had lived there. Where does this come from?

 I blame my mum! (laughs) because we travelled so much, my parents were very sensitive to the idea that we came from a certain culture and a certain identity. So that was always very clear at home. At home we were ghanaian kids as the others… we spoke the language, we had the food… That was the stability, this identity. So, in a weird way, event though I don’t spend that much time in Ghana, I know a lot through my parents and family, who always surrounded me. We were able to go out into the world but always know that we could retreat into the safety of our family unity and identity. It wasn’t a case of dissolving into the world. 

Abidjan, Costa do Marfim. fotografia de David Adjaye

 

Bamako, Mali. fotografia de David Adjaye

 

Is architecture different in Africa? How do you think that architecture is perceived?

I don’t think that the built fact is different, necessarily. But I do think that the inhabitation and the translation are completely different. I think that this is the thing to understand in Africa. There is built fact… in the way in which we understand empirically hot to put together a building, but the use of the building, and the way in which people understand the meaning of the building are very different. And society and context play very heavily in that… because there is a residue of a kind of image of architecture, which is deposited in Africa, which people think means there’s a certain lifestyle that goes with that territory… but it’s not necessarily. There’s a very ambiguous lived life, and I argue very strongly to be determined through understanding climate and region. Because the climatic conditions are so extreme, these are not moderate temperatures, harsh. Even the savannah of the Sahel, which is less than the desert, is still really intense. The savannah is incredible, it’s this incredible horizontal plain, with this incredible vegetation…. really a culture of fields, not really of settlements, but you see places like Nairobi, which is fascinating, flat mass… and then you see the heart of the continent is the tropical forest, the deep, west and central African belt, and in a way that it the luscious part of the continent, because that’s were the rivers really are…

It makes all the difference…

Totally! That’s also were the cultures are very strong, because the rivers and agriculture make a strong cultural… voilà! It becomes very obvious when go through it like an anthropologist, it’s very straight… The place still influences the object. You have to really understand the sensitivity and then you start to understand what these images mean… this was not trying to talk about architecture as the emphatic object, but to try talk of architecture as fragments within the composition of the city. Architecture that is only understood by understanding what the place is. You get hints in the photographs, but you don’t fully know, you’re being asked to enquire, I want you to inquire more: - Why does this look familiar but is not?

Tunis, Tunísia. fotografia de David Adjaye

 

Antananarivo, Madagascar. fotografia de David Adjaye

 

In more detail, what do you think you have brought from Africa into the western architecture world?

I think that I have a very different discourse about the notion of habitation and the notion of publicness. I think that, even without me realising it, during my research I’ve become very conscious of my own practices, I realise that I always have a desire to express a certain kind of publicness… an overt publicness, even when it’s not there, and I think that’s a very African sensibility, this idea of the open, public…  to see. Not to hide, to see! I think that that’s present in my work. Also – maybe this is African, I’m not sure – I have a certain delight in the potential of material… there are lots of sensibilities of that, but I think … when I look at certain shantytowns, I’m chocked at the delight of materiality, it blows me away… that everything is possible, in a new configuration, to make a new composition… it’s powerful to me. Really, really powerful to me. It is a kind of sensibility about the opportunity of material which maybe comes from the continent: a desire to find something in every potential material.

From your words, concerning also this exhibition - far from a mere selection of photographs - you get a sense that you’ve channelled a great deal of energy into it…

A ton!

Almost as if it were an architecture project… Is it true?

It is an architecture project! Because in a way, my architecture, more and more… I realise that it’s relationship is predicated on the understanding of the city, wherever the city may be. To understand my projects you have to understand where they are, otherwise you’re just saying - Huuummm… it’s ok! I’m not interested in the fetichisation of the object autonomous to the context. Some people are, it’s fine… but it’s not the thing that predicates me. The moves that I make and the strategies require an ability to be part of the place. Not just to pass through. If you pass through my buildings you might miss them! But if you use my buildings within a city you will…

I see you as a ‘perfectionist’… your work speaks for itself. Exhaustive research labs for houses, and more recently, for public buildings… I recognise a great quality in this attitude. To seek knowledge and control to then be able to play. Did you also have fun during these African incursions?

Completely! And the irony of it is… I had so many friends ho said - Can I come with you??! -  And I said no! It was like… a space for me, and… I was actually a little bit sad, when I finished… - Oh my God, I’ve done it!… I’ve been to every single one.

You also remind me of Niemeyer, who you’ve actually interviewed a few years ago, for BBC…

He’s a hero.

In his reflection on the importance of drawing, when he says that architects must know how to draw, to loosen and untangle their hand to be able to work. Looking around in the exhibition, is it correct to establish a parallel between the digital camera and the sketchbook that Niemeyer is talking about?

Absolutely. I think you can make that assumption, because in a way these are sketches, these are very much sketches, and the composition it sets up is sketch. I love the digital camera for that, I think that it is the pencil of the XXI century, it is a kind of ability to re-look and look again, to zoom in and zoom out, study again… and to be free, with things that sometimes you would not want to look at. I think the digital camera is great like that, it forces you to take a look at it, even when it’s not personally what you like… and think about it!

Gaborone, Botswana. fotografia de David Adjaye

These photographs are full of life, people, more than only architecture, which I find very interesting.

Yes, in fact.

Somewhere I read that taxi drivers were your great allies!

They were my biggest fans! When I started going to Africa, in the first few times I got a guide, I very quickly realised that the guides were really narrow-minded, they had a picture of their city that they wanted to present to you, not the reality of the city. They had an image and they anted to curate you through that image, and then let you go home. It was too much for me, I couldn’t stand that way of curation, it was too authored for me. And also, I’m not interested in the propaganda, I wasn’t there to be spelled … that Africa is some beautiful place for anyone. I know some Africans were shocked… that I was visiting… poor housing. I do not make any judgements because I see a poor house; I can see a poor house in San Francisco. It’s not the point. I found taxi drivers to be completely not interested, or not able to be so emphatic… especially normal taxi drivers, I would go to their houses, have soup with them…

Is it a surprising informality as well?

Exactly. Beautifully said. The start with them would always be  - Where do you want to go?… there was always this little moment, like a little love affair… I’d chose one, go for two minutes, see if we can make basic communication understanding, and I’d say - Put the clock on, I want you to show me every part of the city, every part that you know, the full… to the place where nothing happens, to the place that’s most dangerous, every place.  I don’t car how long it takes; you can take a day, two days, three days, one hour… as you wish. And it’s amazing, once you do that, first they start to whiz you around, then they start taking you, and before you know, you’ve done the patterns of city. You what they do with tourists, the patterns for the people they take form work to work, then the weekend journeys… you do the patterns that are inherited in the city, you can almost map them in your mind. He goes through his methods, his routes, and before you know it, naturally it comes to its exhausted end, because you start to see everything again. Then he starts going round and round and you go - So I guess that’s the city, then! After that I say I want to go back to this area and I photograph the area, and I rarely come outside, I don’t like to stand outside either, I don’t like to compose too much. We’d stop at the places and just shoot. If it were difficult, then I’d go out and shoot. But I try to people not to see me photographing.

Nouakchott, Mauritânia. fotografia de David Adjaye

I understand. ‘Present’ without interfering…

I wanted the life to be just going on, and for me to be really discreet with that. Because whenever you stand outside, the place change… everything changes, it’s like… reality changes. So, they were great, it allowed me a certain informality and a certain distance. Because, in a way, clearly I am the author, but I wanted to feel un-authored… de-authored… somehow, matter, like some kind of molecule.

And today… What do you see as your connection to Africa? Purely professional, emotional? Is Africa in your agenda?

My problem is that I can’t resist the continent, it keeps pulling me. So I’m now, after fifteen years of working in the world, I’m finally working in Africa. I’ve finally succumbed! But I’ve had a chance, the economies are growing. Where my family is from, in West Africa, it’s booming. In a way, I feel like there’s an opportunity for me to work in the continent, after finishing this research, which took teen years of my life, I feel like I have a pan-African view, which is a very useful piece of data in my mind. I am now working in West Africa and South Africa, and I hope to have an office there… and who knows, maybe having another home! I live in the world!

Thank you David.

Let me share with you… I am very jealous… this must have been a tremendous experience. How I would have loved to do this exhibition… Congratulations and welcome to Lisbon!

(laughs)

Translation:  Rita Palma

by Rita Palma

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Watch 90-Minute Pilot Episode

Of Queen Latifah-Produced

VH1 Series “Single Ladies”

So… did anyone watch this last night? The 90-minute pilot episode of the new Queen Latifah-produced original scripted VH1 series called Single Ladies that serves as an introduction to what will be a weekly series to follow later, in July.

The dramedy centers on a group of best friends with different philosophies on sex and relationships, set in the world of Atlanta fashion, music, and celebrity, with Lisa Raye & Stacey Dash, Lauren London and others starring.

VH1 already ordered 8 episodes to start, with inevitable comparisons being made to HBO’s Sex In The City.

I didn’t watch it; I don’t have cable; but, luckily, VH1 made the entire 90-minute pilot episode available to view online, for those who missed it last night. I watched about 20 minutes of it, and had to shut it off! Not for me apparently. But I’m sure it has its audience.

I’ll try to watch the whole thing, so that I can critique it armed with info.

Watch it below:

<div>Single Ladies |Christina Carter |Keisha Greene |Valerie Stokes </div>

 

tambay posted to Television, Watch Now at 9:15 am on May 31, 2011

All star ensemble –

‘We are the people,

this is the time –

Stand up, sing out

for Palestine’

 

by annie on May 31, 2011

 

I love this! My heart is pounding the chorus is so beautiful. OneWorld has produced a fantastic hit, all proceeds supporting projects in Palestine. The song features an all star ensemble of musicians from around the world including Randall, Jamie Catto (1 Giant Leap), Maxi Jazz (Faithless), LSK, Harry Collier (Kubb), Andrea Britton, Sudha (Faithless), Andy Treacy (Faithless/Moby/Groove Armada), Attab Haddad and Joelle Barker plus over the top  Durban Gospel Choir and members of the London Community Gospel Choir and comedian Mark Thomas, rapper Lowkey and poet Michael Rosen.

 

Check out Disco Nutter mix by Yasen Velchev and the Drum&Bass mix by Dan Birch WILD!

The songs will be released July 3rd but are available for pre-order now from iTunes and HMVdigital. Let's celebrate this kick off, it's history in the making!

Supported by War on Want, Palestine Solidarity Campaign, Jews for Justice for Palestinians, A Just Peace for Palestine, Friends of Al Aqsa, Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions UK, Stop the War Coalition, Trust Greenbelt and the A.M.Qattan Foundation. Proceeds from the single will go to UK Charity War on Want for projects in Palestine.

Call for Submissions - Speculative Fiction Anthology

 

Announcing The Black Fantastic Anthology 'zine
  

Tales of Space, Romance and Weirdness on the black hand side

Submissions open  thru July 30

• Publication Date: October 2011. Please do not submit your stories before then. 
• DEADLINE: Before July 15, 2011 would be rightgeous!.
• WORD LENGTH: 1,500 to 6,000 words. Preferably around 5,000 words.
• No reprints
• Theme: Speculative Fiction (includes science fiction, fantasy, and horror) from, about, and pertaining to members of the African diaspora. 
• Guidelines 
• Payment: Original fiction - advance payment is $0.025/word, Poetry - $15 per piece; plus contributor copy of the issue.

• Rights: First rights electronic and print - see publishing agreement. No reprints at this time.
• No multiple submissions
  
  

  

Art Submissions needed for full color cover work and interior. Queries with samples 6" wide x 9" tall (trade paperback size) at 300 DPI

 

 or website portfolio links.

 

 

Contact Information:

For inquiries: submissions@22ndcenturypress.com

For submissions: submissions@22ndcenturypress.com

Website: http://22ndcenturypress.blogspot.com 

 

How to submit your entries for the Writers’ Village Best Writing Award 2011

1. Prizes total £450 ($700).

The prizes are: First Prize £200 ($308); Second Prize £100 ($154); Third Prize £50 ($77). Five further prizes will also be awarded of £20 ($31) each. Prize monies will be paid via PayPal (if entry was paid for by PayPal), or by a cheque payable in sterling pounds if entry was paid for by cheque.

The top three winners will be entitled to accredit themselves: ‘Winner, 1st prize [etc], The Writers’ Village Best Writing Award 2011, when approaching agents, publishers, editors (etc). Other winners will be entitled to use the phrase: ‘Shortlisted for the Writers’ Village Best Writing Award 2011'.

Winning entries will be showcased here on the Writers' Village site.

In the unlikely event that insufficient entries of reasonable quality are received to provide a fair basis for judging, no prizes will be awarded but all entrants will be returned their entry fees.

2. Types of entry accepted & judging criteria

Any form of short story may be submitted up to 3000 words and in any genre (eg. mystery, romance, fantasy, crime, science fiction, children’s, etc).

The work should not have been previously published in print media at the time of its submission to the contest.

Playscripts and poetry may not be entered. (True, the definition of a ‘script’ or ‘prose poem’ may be arguable. But to ensure a level playing field for all entrants, anything that clearly appears to be a script or poem will be excluded and the judge’s definition of the term ‘clearly’ will be final :))

In judging entries, particular weight will be given to their power to move the reader, their originality and their demonstration of the craft skills of creative writing.

3. Deadline & timings

Entries must be received with payment by 12 noon (GMT) 30th June 2011. Winners will be announced by 31st July 2011 on the Writers’ Village website.

4. Presentation format

Prepare your stories exactly as you would for submission to an agent or publisher: a cover sheet with the story’s title, approx. word length, and your full contact address plus e-mail and telephone number.

The subsequent text should be in Times Roman or similar (no exotic fonts, please!), 11 or 12-point, double or 1½ spaced. Put your story title and page numbering in the header. (Presentation rules for the professional submission of work can also be found in The Writers’ & Artists’ Year Book, and similar manuals.)

5. How to submit entries

We would greatly prefer stories to be e-mailed as an attachment. Click here to e-mail us. Payment may also be made from this site by PayPal, using the PayPal button below

Important: in the Subject line of your e-mail put ‘Writers’ Village: 2011 entry: [your name]’. That way, the system will recognise it as a competition entry rather than spam :)

E-mailed attachments must be in the format: Word.doc, .docx, RTF, txt (plain text) or .odt (Open Office).

Alternatively, hard copy entries can be posted to: Village Guild, The Old School House,  Leighton Buzzard, LU7 9DP, UK and a cheque payable in pounds sterling (GBP) enclosed with the entries. However, if you wish your work to be showcased on the Writers’ Village website, should you win a prize, your entry must additionally be e-mailed as an attachment around the time of entry or enclosed on a CD or floppy with your posted entry.

Entries will be accepted from anywhere in the world, provided that they are in the English language and that payment is received via PayPal or by a cheque in pounds sterling, drawn upon an account held in pounds sterling.

The single best entry that a contestant submits will be selected to go forward for final judging. In this way, every individual will stand an equal chance of winning in the final round.

6. How to pay for your entries

The entry fee is just £10 (approx $15). The fee covers up to TWO entries. You may submit as many entries as you wish but each two entries must be accompanied by a fee of £10 (approx $15), paid either by PayPal or cheque.

Pay by PayPal: This is the fastest, easiest way to pay, especially if you want to be sure that your payment is received by the contest deadline. If you are paying your entry fee by PayPal, simply click on the PayPal button below and follow the instructions given. To submit more than two entries, please make each subsequent pair of entries a separate PayPal transaction.

Alternatively, you can send the fee directly from your PayPal account. Our PayPal address is: cwriting [at] btinternet.com (fill in the obvious bit in the middle!).

Or pay by credit card: Clicking on the "Buy Now" button below will also let you pay by credit card if you do not have a PayPal account.

Always be sure to include the note: "Writers’ Village entry 2011 [your name and the story titles]" when the form asks you to add 'instructions for merchant'.

Or pay by cheque: If you pay by cheque, it must be made out to 'Village Guild' and payable in pounds sterling (GBP). Enclose with the cheque a note that clearly indicates your name, postal address, e-mail address and telephone number plus the title(s) of the stories you are submitting. Cheques should be posted to: Village Guild, The Old School House,  Leighton Buzzard, LU7 9DP, UK.

Note: your submission can be enclosed as hard copy and mailed along with your cheque but if you wish your story to be showcased on the Writers’ Village site, should you win, it must also be sent electronically as an attachment around the time of entry or enclosed with your hard copy on a CD or floppy.

7. Disclaimer & Copyright

By the fact of entering, entrants attest that the work submitted is their own original composition, that they own the copyright, and that the work has not at time of entering been published in print media elsewhere.

Entrants will retain the copyright to their own submitted work and are free to submit it at any time for publication elsewhere, or for entry in other competitions.

Entries will not be returned. While every reasonable precaution will be taken for the safekeeping of entries, neither John Yeoman nor Writers' Village will accept responsibility for the loss or non-arrival of entries. Entrants are strongly advised to keep a copy of all entries.

If you would like confirmation that your entry has been received, either: for e-mailed submissions, tick 'Request read receipt' (under the Tools menu in Outlook Express) when sending your email or, for posted submissions, enclose a stamped addressed postcard.

Queries

Please feel free to e-mail any queries you may have about the contest by clicking here.

A tip: as always, start the Subject line ‘Writers’ Village’ so that your message will be given priority :)

Deadline reminder: entries must be received with payment by 12 noon (GMT) 30th June 2011. 

Entry for Writers' Village award 2011

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Corey D. B. Walker. A Noble Fight: African American Freemasonry and the Struggle for Democracy in America. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2008. xii + 288 pp. $45.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-252-03365-0.

Reviewed by Chernoh Sesay
Published on H-Law (September, 2010)
Commissioned by Christopher R. Waldrep

The Freemasonry of the Race

A Noble Fight, by Corey D. B. Walker, responds to the neglected study of Freemasonry and to scholarship that has interpreted it as a misguided strategy for attaining American citizenship or worse, as an exceptionally conservative force in African American politics and social life. Furthermore, this volume builds on and pushes forward the recent and excellent work of such scholars as Joanna Brooks; Steven Bullock; Stephen Kantrowitz; Cecil Revauger; Theda Skocpol, Ariane Liazos, and Marshall Ganz; Martin Summers; Mark Tabbert; Maurice O. Wallace; and Craig Wilder.[1] A Noble Fight opens with a vignette from James Weldon Johnson’s The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man (1912) that reveals the unnamed narrator admitting that it was the “‘freemasonry of the race’” who exposed him to, in Walker’s words, “a degree of racial knowledge of which he was totally unaware” (p. 2). Walker argues that “the freemasonry of the race” constitutes a perspective particularly suited to deflecting and countering the sources and effects of racial prejudice within the democratic context of the United States (p. 3). In addition, Walker argues that democracy arises not only from sources of liberation and justice, but also from extreme proscription and racial violence. Hence, the acceptance and rejection of various parts of American democracy by African Americans leads Walker to search for new answers to the vexing question of how “African Americans rationalize American democracy?” (p. 9).

By framing his study of African American Freemasonry within debates about democratic theory and association, Walker successfully illustrates the significance of black Freemasonry, and he makes original contributions toward “establishing some preliminary considerations for rethinking the connections between the cognitive processes and cultural practices of voluntary associations and articulations of democracy in America” (p. 4). Legal scholars should pay close attention to how Walker’s discursive understanding of democracy relates to the contestation and complexity within American democracy and the multiplicity and irreducibility of African American experience.

An introduction, five chapters, and an epilogue organize the book. Chapter 1 contains little that is directly about African American Freemasonry. However, this section situates later chapters that discuss how black Masonic activism and ideology reveal democracy as an inherently contested category. Walker accounts for bureaucratic definitions of democracy that entail the “‘rule of law, promotion of civil and political liberties, and free and fair election of lawmakers.’” However, he is more interested in democracy understood as a “set of cultural habits, critical sensibilities, and ideological positions that animate and register particular ideas and understandings of the United States and what it means to be an ‘American’” (p. 228n5).[2]

In an impressive review of secondary literature, Walker explains that current configurations of the relationships between democracy and association, whether arising from literate intellectual communities, public activism, or associational activity, define democracy as an inherently valuable phenomenon and suggest that it is declining because of a decrease in various kinds of associative behavior. Walker contests both arguments by exposing “the underside of the democratic experiment,” and by showing how black Masonic activism demonstrates the vitality of American democracy (p. 7). Using the tools of literary theory and American studies, Walker traces the idea of democracy from Alexis de Tocqueville to Martin Luther King Jr., and he highlights how democratic ideas have inspired liberal activism while also arising from social, economic, and political exclusion.

In the second chapter, rather than pin the beginnings of black Freemasonry to 1775, in Revolutionary era Boston, Walker employs the idea of “‘zones of cultural contact’” to map the encounters between the African diaspora and the expansion of Freemasonry (p. 13).[3] Moreover, he argues that these junctures underlay the “supranational” outlook and politics of early African American Freemasonry (p. 74). Walker rightly contends that the significance of black Freemasonry reached well beyond the confines of local and private fraternal groups; it shaped and was shaped by the African diaspora. 

Chapter 3 starts from the slave revolt conspiracy, Gabriel’s Rebellion, that occurred in the summer of 1800 near Richmond, Virginia, and it ends with the close of the Civil War. Walker traces how the fear of slave uprisings continually forced violent and proscriptive reactions from whites who worried about the psychological and physical results of a reversed racial order. This argument is not new; however, Walker’s novel contribution illustrates how the secrecy and connectivity of black Freemasonry helped organize covert and subversive networks of slave communication.

This section also explores the imagining of a black nation. For whites, the idea of a black nation represented not just the acceptance of black citizenship, but also a nightmare of black political control. In contrast, blacks increasingly relied on the concept for inspiration and community formation. Walker threads this debate through a discussion of Gabriel’s Rebellion; Martin Delany’s Blake, or the Huts of America (1859-62); and the decision of a black Virginian Lodge to name itself Jefferson Lodge, after Thomas Jefferson. Walker discovers black Freemasonry at work in Gabriel’s Rebellion. He examines how Delany’s Masonic beliefs infused his literary work, and he sees the name Jefferson Lodge as a significant appropriation of a symbolic American founder. Together, these examples indicate how Masonic ideas both absorbed and contested racial boundaries. 

Chapters 4 and 5 retain Walker’s insistence on a discursive approach; however, he narrows his focus to a close examination of the literate and public activities of black Freemasons in postemancipation Virginia. By understanding African American Freemasonry as representative of a larger field, “the freemasonry of the race,” these last two chapters clear new analytic space for understanding black masculinity and respectability as complex and complicated, but nonetheless animating mechanisms of public and discursive activism.

Black Freemasonry expressed the gendered conventions of Freemasonry and larger society, ideas that excluded women from lodge membership and reflected paternal and patriarchal assumptions about female political roles. Walker notes this conflict, while explaining that it reflected a partial response to a history of constant sexual threat and violence. African American Freemasons expressed their masculinity, in part, through the supervision and guarding of black female bodies. Placing the body at the center of Masonic notions about self-representation and self-respect, Walker explains that black Freemasonry sought to redeem the female and male black body by expressing them as “controlled, principled, moral, and upright,” a view that contrasted with white depictions of the black body, “a specter ... uncontrolled and uncontrollable” (p. 142).

Walker describes respectability to function less in terms of socioeconomic differentiation and more in terms of psychological redemption. He examines respectability as a key emotional alloy. Walker also argues against an “economically deterministic model” of class that overlooks the social and educational heterogeneity of lodge members (p. 205). Moreover, he shows how a narrow materialist approach obscures the symbolic nature of status. Walker admits that Masonry created difference among African Americans; however, he examines Masonic parades, funerals, and cornerstone laying ceremonies to reveal how public Masonic rituals also provided a broad sense of community.

Walker successfully opens up the mind of black Freemasonry and locates its symbolic importance within the politics of broader black and white societies. However, Walker could have more closely investigated the role of Freemasonry in the appearance of material and political divisions. For example, using new and fascinating sources Walker narrates a tension between Fairfax Taylor and his son, James T. S. Taylor, who were both prominent social and political activists in postbellum Virginia. The elder Taylor was a black Freemason, and, in the 1860s, helped organize Delevan Baptist Church, the first separate black religious group in Charlottesville, Virginia. However, the father opposed the nomination of his son to be a state constitutional convention delegate and voted for a white candidate. Moreover, James never became a Freemason. Walker sees differences of personality behind the generational conflict, and he suggests that for Fairfax, the black lodge may have represented “‘a replacement for emotional ties to [his] own children’” (p. 151).[4] This episode raises important questions about whether the tensions between father and son reflected, to any degree, thorny issues among a broader group of African Americans. Following this inquiry would have led to a clearer understanding of Freemasonry relative to varied and competing interests. In addition, pursuing this question would have only deepened an analysis to which Walker is committed; he demonstrates that the formation of black identity and community are always “contingent,” and even fraught (p. 4).

The question of context arises in another way. Walker does explore the “changing conception and meaning of the nation as articulated through the institutionalization of African American Freemasonry in the postemancipation context” (p. 91). He also does show African American Freemasonry to be “a malleable and responsive associational form that permits the articulation and development of new dimensions in conceptions of the nation” (p. 91). Approaching African American Freemasonry simultaneously as an analytical tool and an object of historical inquiry reveals new dimensions of the dialectical relationship between American democracy and African American Masonry. Yet this investigative strategy demands clarity about how, for example, the historical forces of abolition, nationalism, migration, and community formation affected change and continuity in the connections between Freemasonry and democracy.

Walker recognizes that black Freemasons, in the late eighteenth-century North, derived their claims for “national citizenship” through “an appeal to non-nation-specific ideals” arising partly from the Masonic concept of universal brotherhood (p. 80). This insightful interpretation raises a series of important questions. Did the attraction of black Masons to supranationalist ideas wax or wane from the American Revolution through the Civil War, and how did these ideological transformations function? Increasing numbers of black leaders, many of them Freemasons, demanded that blacks be recognized as full citizens given the expansion of radical abolition, the rise of the American Colonization Society, and the entrenchment of southern slavery. Furthermore, after the United States formally ended slavery, and as African American Masonry expanded and became more bureaucratized, what became of supranationalist ideas in black Masonic political thought? Explicitly addressing these issues would have enriched the analysis. However, these are quibbles that mark the success of this book in pushing forward the study of African American Freemasonry and fraternalism.

A Noble Fight is an ambitious, imaginative, and interdisciplinary book that demonstrates the historical, cultural, and theoretical significance of black Freemasonry. Moreover, it also adeptly addresses debates within critical race studies and democratic theory. Walker contributes original conceptual frames and empirical evidence to a small but slowly growing body of work about African American fraternalism. Although his volume is not definitive, it introduces promising questions about black Masonry that force a rethinking of certain interpretations within the field of African American studies. For example, scholars need to continue to flesh out the origins, parameters, and fluctuations of respectability and further explore black identity formation as an always developing process. Walker carefully investigates how Freemasonry evolved from and shaped the fissures between being defined as black and expressing blackness. In addition, his examination of black Freemasonry introduces novel ways of understanding how the relationships between association and democracy arose from roots nourished simultaneously by the promise of equality and the peril of prejudice. Future scholars exploring questions of masculinity, respectability, and democracy in North America and the African diaspora must consider Walker’s insights about “the freemasonry of the race.”

Notes

[1]. Joanna Brooks, American Lazarus: Religion and the Rise of African-American and Native American Literatures (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003); Stephen Bullock, Revolutionary Brotherhood: Freemasonry and the Transformation of the American Social Order, 1730-1840 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996); Stephen Kantrowitz, “‘Intended for the Better Government of Man’: The Political History of African American Freemasonry in the Era of Emancipation,” Journal of American History 96, no. 4 (March 2010): 1001-1026; Cecil Revauger, Noirs et Franc-Maçons (Paris: Edimaf, 2003); Theda Skocpol, Ariane Liazos, and Marshall Ganz, What a Mighty Power We Can Be: African American Fraternal Groups and the Struggle for Racial Equality (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006); Martin Summers, Manliness and Its Discontents: The Black Middle Class and the Transformation of Masculinity, 1900-1930 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004); Mark Tabbert, American Freemasons: Three Centuries of Building American Communities (New York: New York University Press, 2005); Maurice O. Wallace, Constructing the Black Masculine: Identity and Ideality in African American Men’s Literature and Culture, 1775-1995 (Durham: Duke University Press, 2002); and Craig Wilder, In the Company of Black Men: The African Influence on African American Culture in New York City (New York: New York University Press, 2001).

[2]. Walker quotes from Iris Marion Young, Inclusion and Democracy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 5.

[3]. Walker borrows the idea of “zones of cultural contact” from Sally Engle Merry, Colonizing Hawai’i: The Cultural Power of Law (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2000), 29.

[4]. Walker quotes from Mark C. Carnes, Secret Ritual and Manhood in Victorian America (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989), 123.

If there is additional discussion of this review, you may access it through the list discussion logs at: http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse.pl.

Citation: Chernoh Sesay. Review of Walker, Corey D. B., A Noble Fight: African American Freemasonry and the Struggle for Democracy in America. H-Law, H-Net Reviews. September, 2010.
 

URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=30746

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7 African Animations

You Should Know

And Their Creators

• May 30th, 2011

 

Kwame  is an animator and illustrator living in Nairobi, Kenya heading up animation studio Apes in Space. He has been involved in several animation training and production initiatives on the continent, including UNESCO’s ‘Africa Animated!’ Project, and Tiger Aspect’s ‘Tinga Tinga Tales‘ children’s TV series. Kwame produces short films, commercials, and storyboard work for the budding film and animation industry in Kenya. Kwame also illustrates for book and editorial. His most notable success being writing and illustrating the children’s book ‘A Tasty Maandazi’  2006.

The short film ‘The Legend of Ngong Hills’, produced in 2010, marks Kwame’s endeavor to showcase the possibilities that lie in using animation to tell African folklore and fantasy.

Adamu Waziri is a lover of all things animation. As is common with most animators, he was drawing comics and cartoons from a young age. He trained as an architect originally at the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London. He then did a Masters in Animation at the NCCA in Bournemouth in the UK. He worked as a 3D animator in London in companies like Passion Pictures and Arup. He proceeded to set up EVCL, a creative studio in Abuja Nigeria. EVCL is now producing a new children’s series called Bino and Fino.

Dr. Mohamed Ghazala is a lecturer, artist of animated films, and the founder and director of the first chapter of the International Animated Film Association ASIFA in Africa and in the Arab world based in Egypt. Currently he works as full-time lecturer in Minia University and Since he finished his under graduation study, he directed and co-directed many awarded films, such as "Carnival" (2001), "Crazy Works" (2002), "HM HM" (2005),"Sayari Yetu" (2006), including the first Yemen's animated film "Salma" in 2006.and "Honyan's Shoe" (2009) which won the Animation Prize at The African Movie Academy Awards (The African Oscar AMAA) in Lagos/Nigeria 2010.

 

Ree Treweek forms a third of the fantasy collective The Blackheart Gang whose focus largely concerns explorations into a realm best known as The Household. The Gang have been documenting this realm using a number of mediums including music, books, short films and Instillation pieces. Ree also forms part of the Gang’s commercial counterpart, Shy The Sun. As a character designer and director, Ree forms an integral part of the company, adding pivotal ideas and imagery to the company’s creative process.

 

A Kenyan Digital Content Creator, Gatumia trained in Canada and has been working in Kenya for the last 9 years. He has worked with various advertising agency teams to produce advertising material for the television broadcast media. He has also done editing and post-production work on two short documentaries. He currently heads RECON-Digital, a local animation outfit, actively engaged in developing top quality animation products for both the Kenyan and the international markets with a strong leaning towards producing story-driven animation.

 

Anthony was born in 1979 in Cape Town, left a career in science to pursue his love for animation. He studied stop-motion animation at Van Arts, in Vancouver, and his first film "The Slipper Cycle", was awarded in Tampa, Florida, and the NTVA Stone Awards. Anthony is now Head of Story and Creative Producer/Director at Triggerfish, in Cape Town. He is one of the founding members of Animation SA and animationXchange.

 

Phil Cunningham’s is an entrepreneurial, “out of the box” animation producer & the owner of Sunrise Productions. His passion is story and the incredible power of how story translates across race, cultural and age barriers in the format of animation. He produced Africa’s first animation feature film The Legend of the Sky Kingdom. Following that came Jungle Beat a CGI TV series that has been broadcast in 170 countries. Series 2 is currently in production. Soon to be released is The Lion of Judah a full-length CGI animated feature Phil produced. Sunrise also created Bokkie a CGI animated character who is the official mascot of SA Rugby.

Big up to our partners at African Digital Art, an incredible resource for digital artist enthusiasts and professionals. Jepchumba, the creative director and founder, is responsible for the fine look and feel and functionality of the site you're browsing right now.

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About the Author

Mark Kaigwa   mark kaigwa

Mark Kaigwa co-wrote an award-winning videogame for Warner Bros. Interactive and also wrote 5 animated short films with Warner Bros. Animation. When this wunderkind is not showing brands how to make sense of the web he’s either making films (He’s turned his own short Dawa into a transmedia storytelling project) or blogging at Memeburn, Afrinnovator, African Digital Art. Holler at him on twitter: @markkaigwa