Social Justice and Equity Award in Creative Non-Fiction - $5.00

(pdf, doc, docx, txt, rtf, jpg, gif, tiff)
100,000 word limit
The winner of the Benu Prize for Creative Nonfiction receives $1000. The winner also receives 10% of the royalties from book sales. The initial run will be 1,000 copies.  The winner will also receive 20 copies of the book. Benu Press sells books to authors at a 35% discount, and these copies may be sold directly to customers at readings and events.  Benu Press will not sell books to authors on a sale or return basis. Books that have been previously published are not eligible. All work must be original work by the author.  

Manuscripts must be written in English, and must not contain excessive adult language or exploitive themes. Manuscript must be 144 to 450 pages. The contest readers will perform a blind review of each entry.

There is an early bird discount: $5.00 before Oct. 11th, and it will be $15 after. 4) The post-mark deadline is Nov. 11, 2010.
This year’s competition will be judged by Maria Gillan.

 Pay and Submit

 

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Science fiction

(pdf, doc, docx, txt, rtf, jpg, gif, mp3, mp4, tiff)
130,000 word limit
We are reading science fiction with social justice themes. The initial run will be 1,000 copies. The author will receive 10% of the royalties from book sales and 20 copies of the book. Benu Press sells books to authors at a 35% discount, and these copies may be sold directly to customers at readings and events.  Benu Press will not sell books to authors on a sale or return basis. Books that have been previously published are not eligible. All work must be original work by the author.

2010 Fiction Contest

September 3, 2010 by roanokereview

Awarding $1000 to some creative soul.

(And $500 to the soul placing second.)

Submission are currently being accepted for the Roanoke Review‘s 2010 Fiction Contest. Prize winner & runners-up will published in 2011 issue.

Send unpublished stories (max, 5,000 words) to Roanoke Review Contest, Roanoke College, Salem, VA  24153. Include $15.00 reading fee for each story.  Make checks out to Roanoke College. Also include a SASE for reply. Manuscripts are recycled.

Deadline is November 8, 2010 (postmark or online submission).

Note: All entrants will receive a copy of the 2010 Roanoke Review (if you provide us with your address).

** NOTE: You may now submit to the 2010 Contest online. Look for the submission link under “guidelines.” Thanks!

* Winners of the 2009 contest:

1^st Place ($1000 award)  Leslie Haynsworth, “Two Left Feet”

2^nd Place ($500 award)  Josie Sigler,  “El Camino”

3^rd Place ($150 award — a special one-time only award)  Alice Stern, “I Hear You Talking”

 

2010 Poetry Chapbook Competition

PRIZE: Winning poet will receive a $1,000 cash award and 25 copies of the published chapbook.

SUBMIT: 16-28 pages of original poetry with title page, biographical note and acknowledgements, if any. Please include your name, mailing address, email address, and phone number (optional). Simultaneous submissions are accepted, but we ask that you notify us if your manuscript is accepted elsewhere. Poets may enter more than one manuscript.

ENTRY FEE: $18. All entrants will receive a copy of the winning chapbook upon its publication in the fall of 2011.

NO RESTRICTIONS on form or content. The Ledge Press is open to all styles and forms of poetry. Excellence is the only criterion.

PLEASE include a SASE for the competition results or manuscript return.

POSTMARK DEADLINE: October 31, 2010.

SEND ENTRIES TO:

The Ledge 2010 Chapbook Competition
40 Maple Avenue
Bellport, NY 11713

Click here for printable guidelines

Commercial Break – Halle Berry Reveals…

By Tambay, on September 23rd, 2010

Halle Berry looking saucy in a new ad for her new fragrance, Reveal. So, who’s buying? Also, can you guess who the gentleman is interviewing her in the clip? For the answer, read the backstory underneath:

 

In “Reveal,” Halle Berry is asked a series of personal questions about love and life, from the interviewer – actor Stephen Dorff – who can be heard off camera. Shot in an intimate setting at the Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles, it was evident to Cooperman that this would be an honest Halle Berry piece. “I approached the piece with a non-linear editing style, based on the chemistry of the actors and the style of shooting,” says Cooperman. “I referenced the love scene from Steven Soderbergh’s, Out of Sight, between George Clooney and Jennifer Lopez. In this scene, thoughts are not only conveyed by words, but by gestures, and the character’s emotions become more truthful. This was the case with Halle as well. The challenge was to convey an air of confidence and elegance, while also capturing Halle’s humility. She is a successful actress, but also a mother.” Berry responds to questions not only with answers, but with expressions. A bat of an eyelash, a quick head turn, or a smile can be more expressive than a typical answer. Cooperman decided to craft the spot around the idea of confession, each answer more liberating, building up to a crescendo, and then a calming resolution. Berry shares, “It involved less acting than my other [commercials] because I got to be myself. I got to answer questions honestly, with my own sense of mystery, with my own wonderment about the world. I got to expose a part of my real self.”

Movie Review: The First Grader & Africa United

Our friend Monica purveyor of all good things in the cine-media field will join us for a review on the happenings about the film scene in Africa. As a film enthusiast and an organiser working with the Philadelphia Film Fest, we relish in her knowledge of seeking obscure films from the continent and delight that she is able to share with us.

Two African films made the list to be featured in the London Film Festival which opens on October 13th with the anticipated ‘Never Let me Go’ by Mark Romanek and featuring festival favourites, Black Swan (Darren Aronofsky) with 127 Hours (Danny Boyle) closing the festival. 

Of the African Films, one, is The First Grader, directed by Justin Chadwick. It’s the story of an ex-mau mau (ex-freedom fighter) and first 80-year-old first grader, Maruge.  Read more here from a recent post on my blog.

The second, Africa United directed by Debs Gardner-Paterson is a film that follows four protagonists, all below the age of fourteen that travel from Rwanda to South Africa for the World Cup. The idea for the film came from Eric Kabera, whose own experience as a filmmaker would make a great study. He began the Rwanda Cinema Center and the Rwanda Film Festival. Also on the Maisha Film Lab board of directors, his own films have been featured in noted festivals all over the world. Some of themes tackled in the film are child prostitution, Aids and civil war are in a sense, a homage to the history of African cinema, which centered heavily on PSAs and Documentaries. What I can tell from the trailer and reviews is that this is just the backdrop in which the story takes place. The similarities in context, with Slumdog Millionare may be unintentional, but Pathe’ Films, an international production and distribution company found the link, and are banking on this x-factor to facilitate the film’s potential for international sales. It will be opening in October in the UK and France, Pathe’s primary market.

Production of this film was possible partly because of the UK Film Council.

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New SOHP Interview: Willie Blue

Published by smkotch on September 23, 2010 in LCRM Project News, Related Events and Uncategorized. 0 Comments Tags: interview, oral history, sncc, student nonviolent coordinating committee, willie blue.

In 1960, Willie Blue returned to his native Tallahatchie County, Mississippi, a twenty-one year old Navy veteran. From what he could tell, life for African Americans there had not improved much in his absence, and he didn’t like what he saw. Local whites didn’t like him much, either. “A lady from the NAACP,” he remembers, “she worked at the funeral home, she pulled me aside and she said, ‘I heard about some guys, some Freedom Riders, down in Greenwood.  Things are getting rough for you and I keep hearing things.  They’re going to get you.  You might need to go down there and see what’s up with them.’  I went to Greenwood, I met Bob Moses, and the rest is history.”

Blue went on to become Mississippi Field Secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. In April, he joined other movement veterans at SNCC’s 50th Anniversary Conference, where he sat down with an interviewer from the Southern Oral History Program-Duke University Oral History Project collaboration there to cover the event. Enjoy.

<p>Willie Blue from Southern Oral History Program on Vimeo.</p>

Willie Blue from Southern Oral History Program on Vimeo.

 

Chapel Hill NC
sohp.org

The Southern Oral History Program, founded in 1973, documents the southern past by recording interviews with those who lived it. Our 4,500 interviews are freely available for listening and reading at the Southern Historical Collection on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and, more and more, online. We are proud to be part of the Center for the Study of the American South.

Street Etiquette Presents ‘The Black Ivy’ Video Editorial

Thursday Sep 23, 2010 – By Clutch

Just in time for many of you undergrads who have returned to HBCU campuses for fall semester, the Street Etiquette known for their personal style blog and short films have released “The Black Ivy.” The video editorial is dedicated to the classic style found on Historically Black Colleges and Universities. The group of young men pays homage to the Black intellectual tradition nurtured and refined in the select HBCU institutions known as the “Black Ivy.”

Featuring looks evoked from the dandy tradition, and Harlem Renaissance, and we see a bit of aesthetic borrowed from the 40′s and retro athleticism, the fellas are styled in looks by The Brooklyn Circus among other coveted vintage and contemporary menswear.

The Street Etiquette’s last project, a Black History tribute “Sewn from Soul” received much acclaim from the online community, now one of our favorite fly duos reminds us all that we don’t have look too far away from our own sartorial history to capture style and character.

Photo Credit: Fred Eagan

Check out the short below. Be sure to peep the slideshow!

‘Waiting for Superman’ Questions America’s Public Education System

Thursday Sep 23, 2010 – By Clutch

A new film questioning America’s public education system will release in theaters tomorrow. “Waiting for Superman” is an enlightening and emotional documentary that reveals one of America’s sweeping disasters; a hidden disaster whose damaging affects many of don’t realize.

Directed by Davis Guggenheim, the Academy Award winning director of “An Inconvenient Truth,” the film explores the current state of public education and how it’s affecting America’s children. Filled with startling statistics, and personal accounts the film is sure to raise a few eyebrows, and hopefully evoke some much needed change.

Featuring a multi-cultural cast, Daisy, an L.A. fifth-grader, Anthony from D.C., also a fifth-grader, Emily, an eighth-grader from Silicon Valley, and Harlem’s Bianca, kindergartner, “Waiting for Superman” shows that while race is a major factor in the educational gap, failed hopes triumphs skin color.

Among the film’s shocking revelations is that while America is a leading nation, we rank 25th in math, and 21st in science. Education insiders lend fascinating details on America’s failed education, and the fact while the country’s access to technology has heightened, this generation will be more illiterate than the last.

The film releases in theaters, tomorrow on Friday. Check out the film’s website for showtimes in your area.

Estelle’s BET Rising Icons Session | Video

September 22, 2010 by Verse  

In this episode of BET Rising Icons not only do we get to watch Estelle perform a few of her hits, she also talks about her childhood, setting up her charity All Of Me, her struggles as an artist, her fear of childbirth, John Legend and more.

 

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"1980"

Estelle's first music video directed by Andy Hylton.

"Fall In Love" ft. Nas

"Fall In Love" ft. John Legend

☀ ☁☀ ☁The Miguel Atwood Ferguson Ensemble “Deliver the Word” Ft. Aloe Blacc

This was raw...Bless up to the architect Guru and this tribute to Gang Starr’s “Betrayal”.

Miguel Atwood-Ferguson Ensemble "Deliver the Word" feat Aloe Blacc from Miguel Atwood-Ferguson on Vimeo.

Miguel Atwood-Ferguson – Deliver The World Ft. Aloe Blacc