Watch Now – Teaser Trailer for

“Alice Walker: Beauty In Truth”

Alice Walker: Beauty In Truth is a feature documentary film by British filmmaker, Pratibha Parmar which tells the compelling story of an extraordinary woman’s journey from her birth in a paper-thin shack in cotton fields of Putnam County, Georgia to her recognition as a key writer of the 20th Century, and offers audiences a penetrating look at the life and art of an artist, a self-confessed renegade and human rights activist.

Parmar’s previous credits include A Place of Rage , a documentary about African-American women and the civil rights movement featuring Angela Davis and June Jordan. She has collaborated with Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist Alice Walker once before on another documentary, Warrior Marks , which documented female genital mutilation at a time when the subject was taboo globally. Parmar’s debut narrative feature film, multi-award winning Nina’s Heavenly Delights , was released theatrically in the UK and US in 2006/07 and was nominated for a GLAAD Award.

You can find out more about Alice Walker: Beauty In Truth by visiting the film’s official website HERE.

 

 

__________________________

 

 

How my mother's fanatical views tore us apart

By REBECCA WALKER
Last updated at 1:18 PM on 23rd May 2008

 

She's revered as a trail-blazing feminist and author Alice Walker touched the lives of a generation of women. A champion of women's rights, she has always argued that motherhood is a form of servitude. But one woman didn't buy in to Alice's beliefs  -  her daughter, Rebecca, 38. 

Here the writer describes what it was like to grow up as the daughter of a cultural icon, and why she feels so blessed to be the sort of woman 64-year-old Alice despises  -  a mother.

The other day I was vacuuming when my son came bounding into the room. 'Mummy, Mummy, let me help,' he cried. His little hands were grabbing me around the knees and his huge brown eyes were looking up at me. I was overwhelmed by a huge surge of happiness.

Maternal rift: Rebecca Walker, whose mother was the feminist author of The Color Purple - who thought motherhood a form of servitude, is now proud to be a mother herself

 

 

 

I love the way his head nestles in the crook of my neck. I love the way his face falls into a mask of eager concentration when I help him learn the alphabet. But most of all, I simply love hearing his little voice calling: 'Mummy, Mummy.'

It reminds me of just how blessed I am. The truth is that I very nearly missed out on becoming a mother  -  thanks to being brought up by a rabid feminist who thought motherhood was about the worst thing that could happen to a woman.

You see, my mum taught me that children enslave women. I grew up believing that children are millstones around your neck, and the idea that motherhood can make you blissfully happy is a complete fairytale. 

In fact, having a child has been the most rewarding experience of my life. Far from 'enslaving' me, three-and-a-half-year-old Tenzin has opened my world. My only regret is that I discovered the joys of motherhood so late  -  I have been trying for a second child for two years, but so far with no luck.

I was raised to believe that women need men like a fish needs a bicycle. But I strongly feel children need two parents and the thought of raising Tenzin without my partner, Glen, 52, would be terrifying.

As the child of divorced parents, I know only too well the painful consequences of being brought up in those circumstances. Feminism has much to answer for denigrating men and encouraging women to seek independence whatever the cost to their families.

My mother's feminist principles coloured every aspect of my life. As a little girl, I wasn't even allowed to play with dolls or stuffed toys in case they brought out a maternal instinct. It was drummed into me that being a mother, raising children and running a home were a form of slavery. Having a career, travelling the world and being independent were what really mattered according to her.

I love my mother very much, but I haven't seen her or spoken to her since I became pregnant. She has never seen my son  -  her only grandchild. My crime? Daring to question her ideology.

Well, so be it. My mother may be revered by women around the world  -  goodness knows, many even have shrines to her. But I honestly believe it's time to puncture the myth and to reveal what life was really like to grow up as a child of the feminist revolution.

My parents met and fell in love in Mississippi during the civil rights movement. Dad [Mel Leventhal], was the brilliant lawyer son of a Jewish family who had fled the Holocaust. Mum was the impoverished eighth child of sharecroppers from Georgia. When they married in 1967, inter-racial weddings were still illegal in some states.

My early childhood was very happy although my parents were terribly busy, encouraging me to grow up fast. I was only one when I was sent off to nursery school. I'm told they even made me walk down the street to the school.

 

 

When I was eight, my parents divorced. From then on I was shuttled between two worlds  -  my father's very conservative, traditional, wealthy, white suburban community in New York, and my mother's avant garde multi-racial community in California. I spent two years with each parent  -  a bizarre way of doing things.

Ironically, my mother regards herself as a hugely maternal woman. Believing that women are suppressed, she has campaigned for their rights around the world and set up organisations to aid women abandoned in Africa  -  offering herself up as a mother figure.

But, while she has taken care of daughters all over the world and is hugely revered for her public work and service, my childhood tells a very different story. I came very low down in her priorities  -  after work, political integrity, self-fulfilment, friendships, spiritual life, fame and travel.

My mother would always do what she wanted  -  for example taking off to Greece for two months in the summer, leaving me with relatives when I was a teenager. Is that independent, or just plain selfish?

I was 16 when I found a now-famous poem she wrote comparing me to various calamities that struck and impeded the lives of other women writers. Virginia Woolf was mentally ill and the Brontes died prematurely. My mother had me  -  a 'delightful distraction', but a calamity nevertheless. I found that a huge shock and very upsetting.

According to the strident feminist ideology of the Seventies, women were sisters first, and my mother chose to see me as a sister rather than a daughter. From the age of 13, I spent days at a time alone while my mother retreated to her writing studio  -  some 100 miles away. I was left with money to buy my own meals and lived on a diet of fast food.

 

 

Sisters together

A neighbour, not much older than me, was deputised to look after me. I never complained. I saw it as my job to protect my mother and never distract her from her writing. It never crossed my mind to say that I needed some time and attention from her.

When I was beaten up at school  -  accused of being a snob because I had lighter skin than my black classmates  -  I always told my mother that everything was fine, that I had won the fight. I didn't want to worry her.

But the truth was I was very lonely and, with my mother's knowledge, started having sex at 13. I guess it was a relief for my mother as it meant I was less demanding. And she felt that being sexually active was empowering for me because it meant I was in control of my body.

Now I simply cannot understand how she could have been so permissive. I barely want my son to leave the house on a play-date, let alone start sleeping around while barely out of junior school.

A good mother is attentive, sets boundaries and makes the world safe for her child. But my mother did none of those things.

Although I was on the Pill  -  something I had arranged at 13, visiting the doctor with my best friend  -  I fell pregnant at 14. I organised an abortion myself. Now I shudder at the memory. I was only a little girl. I don't remember my mother being shocked or upset. She tried to be supportive, accompanying me with her boyfriend.

Although I believe that an abortion was the right decision for me then, the aftermath haunted me for decades. It ate away at my self-confidence and, until I had Tenzin, I was terrified that I'd never be able to have a baby because of what I had done to the child I had destroyed. For feminists to say that abortion carries no consequences is simply wrong.

As a child, I was terribly confused, because while I was being fed a strong feminist message, I actually yearned for a traditional mother. My father's second wife, Judy, was a loving, maternal homemaker with five children she doted on.

There was always food in the fridge and she did all the things my mother didn't, such as attending their school events, taking endless photos and telling her children at every opportunity how wonderful they were.

Alice Walker's iconic book was made in to a film in 1985, and starred Whoopi Goldberg and Margaret Avery (pictured)

 

My mother was the polar opposite. She never came to a single school event, she didn't buy me any clothes, she didn't even help me buy my first bra  -  a friend was paid to go shopping with me. If I needed help with homework I asked my boyfriend's mother.

Moving between the two homes was terrible. At my father's home I felt much more taken care of. But, if I told my mother that I'd had a good time with Judy, she'd look bereft  -  making me feel I was choosing this white, privileged woman above her. I was made to feel that I had to choose one set of ideals above the other.

When I hit my 20s and first felt a longing to be a mother, I was totally confused. I could feel my biological clock ticking, but I felt if I listened to it, I would be betraying my mother and all she had taught me.

I tried to push it to the back of my mind, but over the next ten years the longing became more intense, and when I met Glen, a teacher, at a seminar five years ago, I knew I had found the man I wanted to have a baby with. Gentle, kind and hugely supportive, he is, as I knew he would be, the most wonderful father.

Although I knew what my mother felt about babies, I still hoped that when I told her I was pregnant, she would be excited for me.

 

 

'Mum, I'm pregnant'

 

Instead, when I called her one morning in the spring of 2004, while I was at one of her homes housesitting, and told her my news and that I'd never been happier, she went very quiet. All she could say was that she was shocked. Then she asked if I could check on her garden. I put the phone down and sobbed  -  she had deliberately withheld her approval with the intention of hurting me. What loving mother would do that?

Worse was to follow. My mother took umbrage at an interview in which I'd mentioned that my parents didn't protect or look out for me. She sent me an e-mail, threatening to undermine my reputation as a writer. I couldn't believe she could be so hurtful  -  particularly when I was pregnant.

Devastated, I asked her to apologise and acknowledge how much she'd hurt me over the years with neglect, withholding affection and resenting me for things I had no control over  -  the fact that I am mixed-race, that I have a wealthy, white, professional father and that I was born at all.

But she wouldn't back down. Instead, she wrote me a letter saying that our relationship had been inconsequential for years and that she was no longer interested in being my mother. She even signed the letter with her first name, rather than 'Mom'.

That was a month before Tenzin's birth in December 2004, and I have had no contact with my mother since. She didn't even get in touch when he was rushed into the special care baby unit after he was born suffering breathing difficulties.

And I have since heard that my mother has cut me out of her will in favour of one of my cousins. I feel terribly sad  -  my mother is missing such a great opportunity to be close to her family. But I'm also relieved. Unlike most mothers, mine has never taken any pride in my achievements. She has always had a strange competitiveness that led her to undermine me at almost every turn.

When I got into Yale  -  a huge achievement  -  she asked why on earth I wanted to be educated at such a male bastion. Whenever I published anything, she wanted to write her version  -  trying to eclipse mine. When I wrote my memoir, Black, White And Jewish, my mother insisted on publishing her version. She finds it impossible to step out of the limelight, which is extremely ironic in light of her view that all women are sisters and should support one another.

It's been almost four years since I have had any contact with my mother, but it's for the best  -  not only for my self-protection but for my son's well-being. I've done all I can to be a loyal, loving daughter, but I can no longer have this poisonous relationship destroy my life.

I know many women are shocked by my views. They expect the daughter of Alice Walker to deliver a very different message. Yes, feminism has undoubtedly given women opportunities. It's helped open the doors for us at schools, universities and in the workplace. But what about the problems it's caused for my contemporaries?

 

 

What about the children?

 

The ease with which people can get divorced these days doesn't take into account the toll on children. That's all part of the unfinished business of feminism.

Then there is the issue of not having children. Even now, I meet women in their 30s who are ambivalent about having a family. They say things like: 'I'd like a child. If it happens, it happens.' I tell them: 'Go home and get on with it because your window of opportunity is very small.' As I know only too well.

Then I meet women in their 40s who are devastated because they spent two decades working on a PhD or becoming a partner in a law firm, and they missed out on having a family. Thanks to the feminist movement, they discounted their biological clocks. They've missed the opportunity and they're bereft.

Feminism has betrayed an entire generation of women into childlessness. It is devastating.

But far from taking responsibility for any of this, the leaders of the women's movement close ranks against anyone who dares to question them  -  as I have learned to my cost. I don't want to hurt my mother, but I cannot stay silent. I believe feminism is an experiment, and all experiments need to be assessed on their results. Then, when you see huge mistakes have been paid, you need to make alterations.

I hope that my mother and I will be reconciled one day. Tenzin deserves to have a grandmother. But I am just so relieved that my viewpoint is no longer so utterly coloured by my mother's.

I am my own woman and I have discovered what really matters  -  a happy family.

• 
  
• 
  
• Baby Love: Choosing Motherhood After A Lifetime Of Ambivalence by Rebecca Walker was published by Souvenir Press on May 8, £15.

• Interview by Tessa Cunningham

 

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1021293/How-mothers-fanatical-feminist-views-tore-apart-daughter-The-Color-Purple-author.html#ixzz1NWPMqH3M

>via: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1021293/How-mothers-fanatical-femin...

 

Lebo Mashile

Podcast:

Conversation with Lebo Mashile,

One of Africa’s Strongest Voices

by Victor Dlamini on Nov 16th, 2007

 

It was James Baldwin who said of Maya Angelou, “You will hear the regal woman, the mischievous street girl; you will hear the price of a black woman’s survival and you will hear of her generosity. Black, bitter and beautiful, she speaks of our survival”. It is to these words that I turned as I confronted the phenomenon that is Lebo Mashile. Join me on this wonderful voyage of discovery as I chat to a new South African icon, here on the Victor Dlamini Literary Podcast.

Lebo defies easy categorization because she has taken on so many roles: she is at once a poet (her first book of poetry, In a Ribbon of Rhythm, Oshun, 2006, received the Noma Award for Publishing in Africa); an actress, and presenter; a performance artist; an executive producer; a skills facilitator; and perhaps most importantly, a social and cultural activist.

In her writings and her public performances and utterances, Lebo speaks with great conviction and a refreshing directness. She tells of her unease at the “out of control consumer culture” gripping South Africa that she calls the “new religion”. Lebo also is much concerned with the “exile” experience that has been forced on so many of the world’s peoples – and she stretches the definition of “diaspora” to include much of the displacement that occurs even within a country’s own borders. She is not shy to refer to her own experiences of exile and socio-cultural dislocation, and how her coming back to South Africa was an important part of the healing and regeneration that she needed to make sense of her life.

Lebo reminds me so much of the “Phenomenal Woman” of Maya Angelou’s poem, and as she sits down next to me in the children’s section of Xarra Books in Newtown, Johannesburg, there is about her something of the regal bearing of the women of ancient Africa – especially those powerfully mysterious women of Egypt. Her headgear is resplendent in a dazzling gold that seems to mirror her own spirit. Like Maya Angelou, Lebo has performed at a Presidential Inauguration: she recited her poetry at the inauguration of President Thabo Mbeki, and in our conversation she shares with me how she is able to negotiate her way around the corridors of power, and yet still retain her artistic distance and skepticism.

Lebo is a young woman with a big and powerful presence whose artistic cord seems at once to connect her to the Johannesburg hip-hop scene, and also to the voices of pioneering women artists and writers such as Alice Walker, Bessie Head, Nikki Giovanni, Nawal el Saadawi, Nina Simone, Maya Angelou, Buchi Emecheta and Toni Morrison. She talks of her experiences when she revisited the United States – nine years after leaving it to return to South Africa – to attended the Yarri Yarri Phambari Writers Conference in New York City. She performed her poetry in the presence of many of the writers who had led her to fall in love with the written and spoken word – including Angelou, Walker and el Saadawi. Within South Africa she has shared the stage with the likes of Napo Masheane, Gabeba Baderoon and Maishe Maponya, and she counts Don Mattera and Keorapetse Kgositsile amongst her strongest influences

Lebo acted in the Academy Award-nominated film, Hotel Rwanda, and she links the genocide that took place in Rwanda to the many narratives of identity and power that were scripted into the lives of Africans by the colonial experience. In her poetry, Lebo does not flinch from one of the most pervasive social diseases that afflicts many South Africans, the predilection for sexual violence, and in this conversation she criticizes the tacit “cultural” endorsement of “hardship and brutality” as an inevitable condition of marriage.

In the short time that she has turned her attention to the world of entertainment and the arts, Lebo has emerged as one of the strongest of the young voices in South Africa – to be heard at many of our leading socio-cultural events, such as Poetry Africa, the Franschoek Literary Festival, the Cape Town Book Fair, as well as the hip-hop and other spoken word events that are daily mushrooming all over South Africa.

Please enjoy this stimulating conversation with one of Africa’s best and brightest:

• Play now: use the widget links below, or click the link under Latest episodes in the sidebar on the right.
• Visit feed: You can also play the podcast directly from its source feed; click here, then scroll to the bottom of the page (opens in new window).
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 Lebo Mashile on the Victor Dlamini Literary Podcast [38:49m]: Hide Player | Play in Popup | Download

 

Health vs. Pork: Congress Debates the Farm Bill

The Farm Bill, a massive piece of federal legislation making its way through Congress, governs what children are fed in schools and what food assistance programs can distribute to recipients. The bill provides billions of dollars in subsidies, much of which goes to huge agribusinesses producing feed crops, such as corn and soy, which are then fed to animals. By funding these crops, the government supports the production of meat and dairy products—the same products that contribute to our growing rates of obesity and chronic disease. Fruit and vegetable farmers, on the other hand, receive less than 1 percent of government subsidies.

The government also purchases surplus foods like cheese, milk, pork, and beef for distribution to food assistance programs—including school lunches. The government is not required to purchase nutritious foods.

When the House of Representatives debated the bill in July, PCRM, along with many other health and public interest groups, supported the Fairness in Farm and Food Policy Amendment, which was offered by Reps. Ron Kind (D-WI) and Jeff Flake (R-AZ). This amendment would have limited government subsidies of unhealthy foods, cut subsidies to millionaire farmers, and provided more money for nutrition and food assistance programs for Americans and impoverished children overseas.

Unfortunately, politics doomed the reform effort. At the eleventh hour, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) feared that freshman representatives who voted to cut subsidies might risk losing their seats in farm states in the 2008 elections, endangering the Democratic majority. The reform amendment was defeated 117 to 309.

Nonetheless, Congress did make some modest changes to the Farm Bill’s subsidy programs at the very last minute.

This fall, the Senate will have its turn debating and voting on the bill. PCRM will need your help again to encourage senators to cut subsidies for unhealthy foods and increase support for fruits, vegetables, and vegetarian foods. Other groups, including the American Medical Association and the President’s Cancer Panel, are also calling on Congress for sweeping reforms (see sidebar).

Learn more about these legislative issues and stay up to date with what’s happening with the Farm Bill>

Sign up to receive periodic e-mail updates about the Farm Bill and other PCRM campaigns>

Here’s what other groups are saying: The 2006-2007 Annual Report of the President’s Cancer Panel: “For example, current agricultural and public health policy is not coordinated—we heavily subsidize the growth of foods (e.g., corn, soy) that in their processed forms (e.g., high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated corn and soybean oils, grain-fed cattle) are known contributors to obesity and associated chronic diseases, including cancer. The upcoming reauthorization of the Farm Security and Rural Investment Act of 2002 (the Farm Bill) provides an opportunity that must not be missed to strongly increase support for fruit and vegetable farmers, improve the national food supply, and enhance the health of participants in the national school lunch, food stamp, and Women, Infant, and Children food assistance programs.” The American Medical Association in a resolution passed by the AMA House of Delegates in 2007: “RESOLVED, That our American Medical Association support efforts (1) to reduce health disparities by basing food assistance programs on the health needs of their constituents, (2) to provide vegetables, fruits, legumes, grains, vegetarian foods, and healthful nondairy beverages in school lunches and food assistance programs, and (3) to ensure that federal subsidies encourage the consumption of products low in fat and cholesterol.”

 

 

Volume 4 • Number 4 • 2011

On The Cover:
Ancient Kemet Alive.

 

● Editorial: Skin Bleaching and Global White Supremacy
by Yaba Amgborale Blay and Christopher A.D. Charles
[ view PDF ]

 

● Skin Bleaching and Global White Supremacy: By Way of Introduction
by Yaba Amgborale Blay
[ view PDF ]

This introductory article critically examines the symbolic significance of whiteness, particularly for and among African people, by outlining the history of global White supremacy, both politically and ideologically, discussing its subsequent promulgation, and further investigating its relationship to the historical and contemporary skin bleaching phenomenon.  The article also provides a broader socio-historical context within which to situate the global practice of skin bleaching, and provides a necessary framework for further realizing the critical significance of the articles presented in this issue.

 

● Skin Bleach and Civilization: The Racial Formation of Blackness in 1920s Harlem
by Jacob S. Dorman
[ view PDF ]

The author of this paper argues that for African Americans at the turn of the 20th century, skin bleaching represented much more than mere cosmetic practice. Examining historical archives, newspaper records, skin bleaching product advertisements, and the infamous and bitter wrangle between W.E.B. DuBois and Marcus Garvey, the author positions skin bleaching within the larger discourse of civilization and contends that the practice reflected ambiguous notions of racial progress and advancement.

 

● Visual Representations of Feminine Beauty in the Black Press: 1915-1950
by Amoaba Gooden
[ view PDF ]

In an examination of Black vanguard news reporting, this paper highlights the extent to which the Black press, influenced by White supremacy, patriarchy, and classism, assigned higher value to those ideals and physical features associated with Whiteness than those associated with Blackness. Given the frequent appearance of skin bleaching advertisements, and the extent to which reporters attempted to reject degrading popular images of Black women (e.g. the Mammy), the author argues that the Black press ultimately endorsed skin bleaching as a means through which Black women in particular could attain not only feminine beauty, but social respectability.

 

●Black No More: Skin Bleaching and the Emergence of New Negro Womanhood Beauty Culture
by Treva B. Lindsey
[ view PDF ]

An examination of a number of skin bleaching advertisements, focused specifically on late 19th to early 20th century Washington D.C. and skin bleaching among Washingtonian women. The author explores the relationship between White supremacy, skin bleaching, and New Negro womanhood, and in the final analysis she connects skin bleaching to a politics of appearance that intersected with White supremacist and gendered discourses about urban Black modernity and social mobility; and asserts that African American women of the time embraced a White constructed beauty culture as means to an end – social, political, and economic freedom.

 

● The Derogatory Representations of the Skin Bleaching Products Sold in Harlem
by Christopher A.D. Charles
[ view PDF ]

This work analyzes the images used to market skin bleaching products sold in contemporary Harlem in order to determine whether or not such imagery is derogatory. The author discovers that many of the underlying messages inherent to the imagery displayed on skin bleaching labels today are identical to those used decades ago in that they continue to exhibit hegemonic representations of Whiteness versus Blackness. In estimation of the author, it is this consistency and continuation that continues to push the sale of skin bleaching products in the United States.

 

● Buying Racial Capital: Skin Bleaching and Cosmetic Surgery in a Globalized World
by Margaret L. Hunter
[ view PDF ]

This contribution argues that the increased incidence of transnational skin bleaching is a result of the merging of old ideologies (colonialism, race, and color) with new technologies of the body (skin bleaching and plastic surgery). In this way, as one attains light skin, s/he attains a form of racial capital – a resource drawn from the body that provides tangible benefits within the context of White supremacy.

 

● From Browning to Cake Soap: Popular Debates on Skin Bleaching in the Jamaican Dancehall
by Donna P. Hope
[ view PDF ]

The article examines skin bleaching through the lens of dancehall music culture which, unlike the larger Jamaican society, contends that skin bleaching represents a mode of fashion and style. By examining dancehall artists, their public personas, and their lyricism about skin bleaching, and further situating skin bleaching within Jamaica’s historically three-tiered racialized society, the author attempts to unpack conflicting cultural debates surrounding skin bleaching in Jamaica.

 

● Shona Proverbial Implications on Skin Bleaching: Some Philosophical Insights
by Ephraim Taurai Gwaravanda 
[ view PDF ]

This paper examines the phenomenon of skin bleaching from a cultural perspective and argues that Shona proverbs (in Zimbabwe) are part of wise sayings that can be used to overcome the dilemmas, contradictions and uncertainties of skin bleaching. The research is theoretically grounded in the Afrocentric theory that defends African value systems and critiques global white supremacy.

 

● Commentary: On Skin Bleaching and Lightening as Psychological Misorientation Mental Disorder
by Daudi Ajani ya Azibo
[ view PDF ]

This commentary argues that skin bleaching is consistent with the psychological misorientation mental disorder articulated in Azibo Nosology. Thus, living under White domination has severely traumatized people of African descent and has destabilized people of African descent of the ability to psychologically orient themselves. Skin bleaching is thus regarded a reflective side effect of psychological destabilization.

 

Stakes is High*

I struggled to make sense of Jane Dutton’s underwhelming performance this morning on Al Jazeera English trying to discuss what’s happening in Sudan’s disputed, oil producing region, Abyei. She could not contain two party hacks (from the North and South respectively) as well as an expert in Beirut. In contrast, I found this fact sheet by Andrew Heaven and David Cutler of Reuters, way more helpful:

* WHY ABYEI?

– Abyei sits on Sudan’s ill-defined north-south border and is claimed by both halves of the country. In many ways it is a microcosm of all the conflicts that have split Sudan for decades — an explosive mix of ethnic tension, ambiguous boundaries, oil and age-old suspicion and resentment.

– Northerners and southerners fought hard over it during decades of civil war and have continued to clash there even after the 2005 peace deal that ended the war and set up the referendum.

– Abyei contains rich pastureland, water and, after a recent re-drawing of its boundary, one significant oilfield — Defra, part of a block run by the Greater Nile Petroleum Operating Company (GNPOC), a consortium led by China’s CNPC.

– It also has emotional, symbolic and strategic significance. A number of leading figures from the south’s dominant party the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) hail from the area. Many southerners see the fight for Abyei as an emblem of their long struggle against perceived oppression.

– For several months a year, Abyei is also used by Arab Misseriya nomads — a well-armed group that provided proxy militias for Khartoum during the north-south war.

– The Misseriya claim centuries-old rights to use the land for their livestock and Khartoum will have to back them to the hilt if it wants to keep them as allies. Abyei’s Dinka Ngok tribe, with its ethnic links to the south, also claims its own historical ownership rights.

* CURRENT STATUS:

– Under the 2005 peace deal, Abyei had a special administrative status, governed by an administration made up of officials from the SPLM and President Omar Hassan al-Bashir’s northern National Congress Party (NCP). On Saturday, state media reported Bashir had removed the two heads of the Abyei administration and dissolved the administrative council, without giving further explanation.

– Abyei was also supposed to be watched over by Joint Integrated Units made up of northern and southern troops and police. In reality those units remain far from integrated and soldiers from both sides have been caught up in the fighting.

* SETTLEMENT EFFORTS:

– Abyei proved so intractable that it was left unresolved in the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended the north- south civil war.

– The Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague came closest to solving the first in 2009 by re-drawing Abyei’s boundaries, ceding several other key oilfields to the north. The SPLM and the NCP accepted the ruling but the Misseriya rejected it saying it still put too much of their pastureland inside Abyei. They have resisted official efforts to demarcate the new border.

– The Dinka Ngok and Misseriya also remain at loggerheads over who gets to vote. The Dinka have said only that a handful of settled Misseriya tradespeople count as residents. The Misseriya were demanding equal voting rights to the Dinka.

* FIGHTING RESUMES:

– South Sudan voted to become independent in the January 2011 referendum agreed to under the 2005 peace deal but tensions have built up in the oil-producing Abyei region where both sides have built up forces. However President Omar Hassan al-Bashir had said last month that Abyei would remain part of the north after the south secedes in July.

– Last week North and south Sudan’s armies accused each other of launching attacks in the contested region, marking an escalation of tensions in the countdown to the south’s independence in July.

– Khartoum sent tanks into Abyei town on Saturday, the United Nations said and the next day seized control. North Sudan said it had sent in the troops to clear out southern soldiers that it said had entered the area, breaking the terms of earlier agreements.

Source

* With apologies to De La Soul.

 

The Jolly Boys

 

Pac Div “Fallin’ ”

Tuesday May 24, 2011 – by Clutch

 

Call for Contributions:

AXIS on “Diversity”

Axis, the journal of the Caribbean School of Architecture, the only school of architecture in the English-speaking Caribbean, is calling for contributions for its next issue: “Diversity.” Editor David Cuthbert invites submissions of abstracts and visual materials in support of original works of research that investigates the notion of “Diversity” as it relates to architectural, urban and design production at the conceptual, theoretical, and pragmatic levels. Submissions are open to all professions in their interpretation of diversity in the environment.

Deadlines are: May 30, 2011, for expressions of interest; August 29, 2011, for abstracts; and November 28, 2011 for completed papers. Submissions and expressions of interest should be sent to David Cuthbert at axis@utech.edu.jm.

Axis was founded in 1997 by members of the faculty of the University of Technology in Jamaica. Since then, it has grown to be an annual magazine that showcases student studio design work along with interesting articles and projects by students and faculty.

For more information on the journal, see http://www.csautech.com/axis.htm

 

RopeWalk Press

Fiction Chapbook Award Submissions

 

Short Story Writing Contest

 

 

OKANAGAN MEMORIES SHORT STORY CONTEST

Artistic Warrior Publishing is holding its first Short Story competition. The competition is open to all writers of all ages from anywhere the world.  The stories must be written in English, non-fiction, previously unpublished (in print and online) and between 1,000 and 3,000 words in length.

The topic is “Okanagan Memories.” You may live in the Okanagan, have friends or relatives here, maybe you've seen the Ogopogo or hit a hole in one; regardless of the memory, we want to read about it.  Humour is always welcome; however, you must ensure your story has an Okanagan setting and/or theme.

For first Canadian rights, the top 16 finalists will have their stories published in an anthology in the winter of 2011/2012. The anthology will be divided into two parts, Youth and Adult.  

Entries must be typed and double-spaced in either Arial or Times New Roman, with the title appearing on each numbered page. Please include a separate sheet with your name, address, phone number, email address, precise word count and title. Please ensure your story is available in electronic as well as printed format. The entrant's name must not appear on the manuscript itself.

Entry fees as follows:

$15 for adults (18 +)
$10 for young writers (up to 17)

Entry fees are non-refundable and multiple entries are welcome. As the judging is blind, you are eligible to win more than once.

Canadian submissions should have cheques made payable to Artistic Warrior Publishing and mailed with your submission to:

"Okanagan Memories"
Artistic Warrior Publishing
2475 Dobbin Road #22
Suite #207
West Kelowna, BC V4T 2E9

Submission via email and payment via PayPal are available.  Choose your category and click on Buy Now. Once your payment has been sent, please forward confirmation, along with your story to Artistic Warrior with Contest as the Subject.

Please choose your category

Youth - under 18 $10.00 Adult - 18 and over $15.00

Blind judging with a panel of judges will chose the top 16.  Our finalist judge is well known Canadian author and humourist, Gordon Kirkland.  He is a multiple award winning Stephen Leacock Award of Merit For Humour.

There will be three winners in each category and an additional 10 honourable mentions will be chosen.

Prizes awarded as follows:
1st Place Adult - $150
1st Place Youth - $100
2nd Place Adult - $75
2nd Place Youth - $50
3rd Place Adult - $50
3rd Place Youth - $35

Each of the winners will receive a copy of the published book.

All finalists must be able to supply an electronic copy of their work to be sent upon request by Artistic Warrior upon the completion of the first round of judging.

Artistic Warrior reserves the right to reject excessive profanity and explicit sexual or violent content. We also reserve the right to edit submission to ready them for publication.

The deadline for submissions is September 4, 2011. Results will be announced at www.artisticwarrior.com by late September.

We would also appreciate it if you told us where you heard about the contest. (i.e.: our website, posters, and other sites)  

For more information, please send us an email.