"TimePeace"

Madiba: The Life and Times of Nelson Mandela

FireworksChannel | Dec 13, 2009 | Rated: TV-Y

Life and Times: Nelson Mandela chooses from the many truly extraordinary intimate epiphanies of Mandelas life. This captivating biography is replete with the adventure, mishap, fortune and inexhaustible resolve of a truly historic life.

The Teacher’s Voice  
2010 Chapbook Contest

Deadline For Submissions: August 20, 2010

Book Release: December 2010

 1^st Prize: $200 honorarium and 50 copies
2^nd Prize: $100 Book Award
3^rd Prize: $ 75 Book Award

 

$20 Contest/Reading fee All contestants receive a copy of the winning chapbook

An editorial board plus an anonymous judge to be announced after the contest will conduct the judging of blind submissions. We accept simultaneous submissions and will consider publishing several manuscriptsas well as individual pieces in upcoming issues of The Teacher's Voice.Past and present TTV staff is ineligible.

 *

Guidelines: We will publish literary nonfiction, short stories, and poems that reflect aspects of the American educational or teaching experience. All styles and aesthetics are welcome. Please submit 16-24 pages of any combination of poetry, short story, or creative nonfiction along with a $20 check or money order reading fee. Prose needs to be double-spaced. Your name should appear on a separate title page along with your manuscript title, listing of contents, address, telephone, and email. Include an acknowledgements' page for any previously published work. No more than 50% of the manuscript may be previously published. Authors must own all rights to their work. Selected finalists will be asked to send their manuscripts as a word file. Pre-publication proofs and cover art are mailed for approval. Authors retain all rights to their work after publication. We retain the right to print up to 1000 copies; after this, a standard 10% of press run contract will be offered.   

 

Please send your manuscript along with SASE for notification of contest results.
Manuscripts are not returned. We shred and recycle all work not used, and do not take responsibility for any manuscript that is not returned. Do not send your only copy!

Please contact editors for any further information at: 

editor@the-teachers-voice.org      

http://www.the-teachers-voice.org

The Teacher’s VoiceChapbook ContestP.O. Box 150384Kew Gardens, NY 11415

 

 

RSJ 2011 Aspiring Author Contest

Each year aspiring fiction authors take a step closer to having their dreams come true by entering the Romance Slam Jam Aspiring Author Contest. The winners' manuscripts are read by an editor or agent with a chance at publication or representation.

Previous winners and prizes.

Genre: Black Romance/Women's Fiction

Prizes:

1st Place: Manuscript reviewed by Editor Latoya Smith from Grand Central Publishing for possible publication.

2nd Place: Manuscript reviewed by Editor Selena James from Kensington Books for possible publication.

3rd Place: Manuscript reviewed by Editor Monique Patterson from St. Martin's Press for possible publication.

Submission Package:
To help prepare contestants for submitting to publishing houses and agents, the entries will resemble a submission package sent to agents and publishers except remove your name from the query, synopsis and sample pages. You can call yourself Contestant. Submissions are electronic (sent via email). The file should be a Microsoft Word document. In the body of the email, be sure to give the name you registered in the contest under and the title of your novel.

Format:
• 1 inch margins all around
• Font Times New Roman, 12pt

Include (one email, 3-4 attachments):
• 1 page query letter single spaced addressed to:

Ms. C. Judge

2 Busy St.

New York, NY, 10101

Sign it Contestant.

Your query letter may be in the body of the email.

• Synopsis double spaced (3 page max).

• 15 sample pages double spaced.

• Cover page (this page does not count toward your 15 sample pages)
• In the manuscript header, place the Novel Title / Author and Page Number
• If you need an extra page or two to complete a scene, that’s okay.

• Contest registration form if you have not already submitted it.

Note on Eligibility: If you have not had a full-length novel published by a traditional publisher, you are eligible for this contest. Therefore, if your publishing credits are, short stories, novellas, poetry, non-fiction and or you are self-published, you are eligible.

Important Dates: All submissions must be received by 28 February 2011. The winners will be announced at the Emma Awards Banquet during RSJ 2011. Winners not in attendance at the the Emma Awards will be notified by email the first week of May 2011.

Contest Fee:
Please make a $30 money order or cashiers check payable to: Romance Slam Jam

Mail payment and Contest Registration Form to:
Romance Slam Jam
c/o Deatri King-Bey
P.O. Box 822
Tolleson, AZ 85353

If you'd like to pay using PayPal, the fee is $35. Email payment and registration form to deatri@romanceslamjam.org

Once payment and the Contest Registration Form have been received, instructions will be emailed to you on where to send the submission. Please note, registration fee is non-refundable.

Refer any questions regarding the Romance Slam Jam Aspiring Authors contest to deatri@romanceslamjam.org

Good Luck!
 

Accents Publishing 2010 Poetry Chapbook Contest

(Click here to download the submission form)

 

 X  Richard Taylor is a poet and author who is currently a visiting writer at Transylvania University. He is the author of seven collections of poetry, two novels, and several books of non-fiction and history, mostly relating to Kentucky. Raised in Louisville, he lives in Frankfort and owns the bookstore Poor Richard’s Books. He served as Kentucky’s Poet Laureate from 1999 until 2001. In his free time he likes to kayak.

Accents Publishing is happy to announce its 2010 Poetry Chapbook Contest. Two winners will be selected – one by an independent judge, Richard Taylor, and one by the Senior Editor and founder of Accents Publishing, Katerina Stoykova-Klemer. Each winner will have his or her submission published as a perfect-bound chapbook and will receive 50 free copies, along with a $150 cash prize. Additionally, the winners will be invited for a featured reading at a book premiere celebration event. All contest entries will be considered for regular publication with Accents Publishing, as well.

The entry fee is $10.00. Multiple submissions are allowed, as long as each one is accompanied by a separate entry fee and submission form. Winning chapbooks may be pre-ordered at the time of submission for $5.00 each.

A complete submission should include the following:

• A completed submission form
• Your manuscript, including:
  • An acknowledgement page, if necessary
  • Two title pages – one with name and contact information, one without
• Your biography or CV
• A check or a confirmation of payment via Paypal (see Pay Now button below) covering the $10 entry fee, plus any optional book preorders
  • 26 to 30 pages of poetry
  • Table of contents
  • Single spaced
  • Numbered pages
  • 11 pt font minimum

Please do not include a SASE, as notification will be made by email only.

We will accept submissions between March 5th and July 31st. Winners will be announced in August. The contest is open to all residents of the United States and Canada writing in English. Employees of Accents or family members of judges are ineligible to participate. Simultaneous submissions will be accepted, but please notify us immediately if your manuscript is accepted for publication elsewhere.

Manuscripts should conform to the following guidelines:

Your name should not appear anywhere within the manuscript. Please do not send your only copy of your work, as manuscripts will be recycled.

Entries should be mailed to:

Accents Publishing
c/o Katerina Stoykova-Klemer
P.O. Box 910456
Lexington, KY 40591-0456
U.S.A

Contest Entry and Chapbook Preorder

Entry Fee Only $10.00 With Preorder of Judge's Selected Chapbook $15.00 With Preorder of Editor's Choice Chapbook $15.00 With Preorder of Both Winning Chapbooks $20.00

Lunch Poems: Michael S. Harper

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First Aired: 1/26/2004
58 minutes

Poet Michael Harper makes a rare West Coast appearance for this installment from the Lunch Poems series. Harper has published over ten books of poetry, including Songlines in Michaeltree: New and Collected Poems and his book Dear John, Dear Coltrane was nominated for the National Book Award. (#8419)

Watch “The Boundary” (Short Shots)

By Tambay, on July 19th, 2010

From my inbox… a short film directed by award-winning Julius Onah, a Nigerian filmmaker who’s currently pursuing his MFA in film at NYU’s prestigious Tisch School, where he’s been selected as a Dean’s Fellow.

The Boundary, which stars Alexander Siddig (Syriana, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine) was designated by Amnesty International as one of its “Movies That Matter“, it screened world wide, and eventually aired on HBO.

Julius is currently working on his feature debut titled, The Girl Is In Trouble, which is being executive produced by Spike Lee. The film was also selected for the Tribeca Film Festival’s 2010 Tribeca All Access program.

Watch The Boundary below, which just debuted on Hulu:

The Trials, Traumas and Triumphs of the British Black Press

Posted by Govender on Jul 16th, 2010 and filed under Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

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The veteran journalist, Robert Govender, one of the first and major players in a fascinating drama, provides a highly subjective view of the cultural, political, social and economic imbalances which demanded a media and political response to the assault on black dignity and human rights.

The black press has a long and courageous history. The first newspapers in the form of leaflets in prose and poetry, protesting against slavery, economic exploitation and global injustice appeared in the early part of the 19th century. This continued sporadically through-out that century and well into the twentieth century, reaching its nadir after the settlement of the Windrush generation.

The earliest newspapers like the African Times, the Orient Review, the Pan African and the African Telegraph were of the highest journalistic standard with some fine writers who could match the best of those in the white media. They were also the first representatives of what I would like to call the idealistic period in journalism which survived well into the late 20th century.

The papers of this period, lacked capital, had no advertising hinterland and had, of necessity, a rudimentary distribution system. They were clearly not out to make a profit. Many of the publishers, largely professional men, met printing and running costs from their own pockets. Their writers, again mainly doctors, lawyers and businessmen, passionately driven by a love of freedom and a hatred of oppression, toiled for free. They scorned Dr. Johnson’s famous adage that “only blockheads wrote for nothing.” This mercenary approach, however, was to be a feature of black journalistic life in the more materially advanced conditions dating from the 1990s.

Africa was in chains. Slavery had been “officially” abolished but persisted under new forms in the Caribbean. Imperialism was at its inglorious height and racism was rampant everywhere.

The first Black publishers and writers did not take too kindly to this preposterous, unacceptable and unscientific imperialist world view. They also had to contend with British racism. Black politicians, too, zealously campaigned against domestic and international racism, particularly against the infamous racism of the white-dominated and unfree Caribbean and the lynching and the insolent racism of the Dark and Deep South of America, the so called headquarters of that monstrous fiction the Free World. The pioneers – media and politicians – did not succeed in their ambitions to liberate their people in this country, the Caribbean and Africa but they made a huge and indispensable contribution to the eventual enforced retreat of imperialism and colonialism from these lands.

The 20th century was dominated by intellectuals of the calibre of the brilliant George Padmore, the charismatic CLR James, the very learned Eric Williams, first Prime Minister of free Trinidad and the incorruptible Cheddi Jagan of Guyana. All these men were widely admired and greatly respected by the people whose cause they championed – through agitation and articles in the Black press in Britain – and also by some of their opponents in the Empire who probably knew that the game was up. What endeared and still endears these Caribbean-born titans to Africans and people of African descent all over the world is their noble crusade for the liberation of the Continent from which their ancestors came though many of them had never set foot on African soil.

There was no break in the historic continuity of what the heroic Winnie Mandela of South Africa was later to call The Struggle. This was not just local, but universal with black political leaders in this country, particularly Bernie Grant and Dianne Abbott, two of Britain’s most effective and incorruptible politicians, taking up the baton from another uncompromisingly committed leader and journalist, Claudia Jones. The latter set a fiercely matchless and much emulated pace with her professionally produced and vigorous West Indian Gazette.

The politics of the Caribbean and Caribbean British politics are not straight forward. They are characterised by moderation which translates into reactionary, Uncle Tommist conservatism of the formerly plantation-owned Jamaican Gleaner, the astute pragmatism of the highly influential Christian Church to the radical, anti-colonial socialism of George Padmore, CLR James and Cheddi Jagan. These strands were sensibly reflected in the black press well into the 1990s when there was an abrupt about turn in favour of the conservatives.

Claudia Jones was an articulate and intelligent Marxist who made no secret of her views. She was convinced that race prejudice was a vile carbuncle on the political body and only socialism with its class view of history and the brotherhood of man would, in the long run, eliminate this virulent disease. She was an able reporter, a brilliant analyst and commentator, and she had an expert hand on the pulse of the black community. She was the first to tackle the issue of police brutality, which until then had been swept under the carpet by a cowardly and frightened white media. The Gazette regularly and fearlessly exposed police crimes against black people and other human rights abuses. Claudia did not have to go out on investigative forays to unearth the reality of the black human condition – the victims of abuse, encouraged by the honest reporting and searing exposures of racist crimes, came to her office to tell her about their own painful experiences.

The Establishment did not like Claudia or her paper, but they could do little to stem the tide of accurate and unfavourable publicity. The police harassed Claudia, stopping her car and sometimes taking her to the “station” for questioning but Claudia was more amused by these acts of desperation than annoyed.

Claudia Jones died tragically young and the Gazette died with her but her immortal spirit survived, manifesting itself in succeeding publications from 1975 with the emergence of the highly principled and selfless publisher and editor Aubrey Baynes to the late 1990s when Arif Ali who was in the same deeply idealistic mould, eventually sold The Caribbean Times, The Asian Times and the African Times to a non-Caribbean company. This move was condemned by, among others, committed journalists like me and leading black politicians led by Bernie Grant.

Bernie Grant deplored the sale and predicted that the The Caribbean Times, for which he wrote and gave interviews regularly, would lose its campaigning sting and become a tame, money-making paper. Others said the same of the once hard-hitting and brilliantly analytical Asian Times. And so it has come to pass with both papers a pale emaciated and bloodless caricature of their former selves.

The Caribbean Times and the Asian Times were in my time lively, irreverent and hard hitting papers which always had their hands on the throat of a hypocritical and uneasy Establishment which found it increasingly difficult to break away from the institutional racism that so malevolently scarred the troubled landscape of multiculturalism. Both newspapers energetically exposed and held up to ridicule the Establishments pious pronouncements on the virtues of multiculturalism while on the other hand holding back its advance in the face of hostility from the tabloids and an unreconstructed right wing led by troglodytes of the pro-apartheid, Hang Nelson Mandela pack.

Aubrey Baynes, in my view The Father of Black Journalism in Britain, was the finest personification of publishing idealism in this country. The prematurely balding Baynes was a member of the famous Baynes clan of St. Kitts. They ran some very successful farms, factories and wholesale and retail outlets. Although born with a silver spoon in his mouth, Baynes was the outsider. He was restless, adventurous and fiercely proud and independent. He could have stayed in his small and beautiful island and grown rich, very rich in fact, not only because of the inheritance but because of what appeared to be inherent business acumen.

But he wanted to conquer new worlds. His first stop was New York where he joined a college graduating with a degree in business administration. He did not like America with its ugly and stultifying racial intolerance and proceeded to England. He used to say over endless cups of coffee, his favourite drink and his chain smoking which was to eventually kill him when he was in his early fifties, that the English for all their faults were far more subtle, sophisticated and intellectually and culturally emancipated than “the damn thick, stupid and dim-witted Yankees.”

Baynes oozed charm and confidence and was a lady’s man. He won friends and influenced people of all races effortlessly. He spoke with an Oxbridge accent which seemed more natural than contrived. He had a fund of anecdotes and was one of the wittiest and fluent conversationalists I have ever known.

We first met in 1958 in the office of Flamingo magazine in Marylebone just behind the old railway station. The magazine was run by a man called Ross one of the many West Indians who had served as pilots in the Royal Air Force in World War II. Flamingo was edited by the enterprising historian, Edward Scobie, a writer who spent a lot of his time in the British Museum unearthing some inspiring stories of black achievement throughout history.

Flamingo was for that time, when colour and glossy paper were as rare as gold dust, well in advance of its time. Its cover and some inside pages were in full colour on glossy paper, beautifully illustrated and with some outstanding literary, historical and political contributions by writers like Andrew Salkey, Scobie, Baynes and me. Flamingo was professional in another important sense – it actually paid its contributors and generously too.

Besides Flamingo the only other black publication was West Africa owned and run by the IPC Group which published the Daily Mirror and scores of other publications. It was in the good old neo-colonial spirit of the times edited by a white Welshman. Baynes quickly spotted an opening. Neither Flamingo nor West Africa were properly distributed in what is now called the inner city. He set up a highly successful distribution system, so profitable that he bought two mini vans and employed his own drivers who were also well paid.

From there Baynes ventured into publishing. His first effort was Magnet, a tabloid followed by Daylight International, a fortnightly in magazine format. Both folded within months and Baynes went into a calculating hibernation. In 1975, he made a famous reappearance with The West Indian World, Britain’s first professionally produced news-paper edited by him with a small group of black journalists including myself in offices in Harlesden. It was hard going. Baynes was frequently running up debts – although he honourably paid his journalists, he was frequently behind with his rent and printing bills.

Baynes himself barely kept his head above water, and with the help of well wishers and a liberal white girlfriend, he was able to meet the rent for his flat. He drank alcohol sparingly, ate very little and his only luxury was two packets of Rothmans cigarettes a day. He didn’t want to make money. He had a magnificent obsession – the black freedom struggle. He felt deeply about the plight of his people, about apartheid in South Africa and the continuing poverty of the Caribbean islands and he genuinely sought to change their wretched world.

His well written newspaper, which was keenly read by the “race relations specialists” of Fleet Street, Scotland Yard and even 10 Downing Street, had a large and influential readership in the black community.

Aspiring black politicians, community leaders, intellectuals, writers and concert promoters were regular visitors to the West Indian World office, useful news sources, sometimes providing advertising support and all proud that at last they had a powerful media voice. There was very little advertising but the paper kept going from sales and the small but helpful advertising from West Indian small businesses particularly the hard working and dynamic women’s hairdressing sector. The World needed their money and they needed the editorial and advertising support of the paper.

It was idealism at its most noble and also commercially enlightened. But even this and the sacrifice of its team of professionals who often went without pay could not keep the paper afloat. One of Baynes’ closet friends was the irreverent Hyde Park orator Roy Sawh. When Sawh learnt of the dire straits of the West Indian World he arranged for a meeting which was to ensure the continuity of the paper for another decade at least.

Roy Sawh introduced Baynes to the Guyanese Arif Ali. Arif at that time was successfully publishing a small magazine The West Indian Digest and had his eye on expansion. Arif quickly saw the potential of the World and took it over. Ali and Baynes were like minded. They felt strongly about racial justice, were radical in outlook and wanted to bring down the walls of oppressive British racism.

Unlike Baynes, Arif with only an elementary education could not write but he had an instinctive feel for publishing realising that while editorial was important the commercial side was equally so. A first rate wheeler-dealer Arif introduced a welcome era of stability and even prosperity to the World.

The paper paid its printing bills and rents without much difficulty. Arif also took on more editorial, advertising and administrative staff and paid them reasonably and unfailingly.

Many reporters were trainees with the aptitude for the job. In addition to their pay, journalists on the World could also claim expenses, unprecedented in black or for that matter ethnic publishing.

Arif came out fighting. The new and stronger West Indian World continued the tradition of exposing racist mischief in high places. The authorities, including a seriously embarrassed Scotland Yard, took notice and made efforts to address black grievances. The new developments were also strengthened by the emergence of a new and less romantic breed of black politicians who with the help and encouragement of the World began to realise that the futility of spitting in the wind if they did not immerse their feel in real, practical politics and thus we saw black councillors in hitherto all white town halls and eventually the Mother of Parliament itself opened its doors to the representatives of black and ethnic peoples.

The World produced some outstanding journalistic talent, people like Tony Douglas whose biting and amusing satire in his weekly column in the World won for him a huge and grateful following. Pierre Russell, a versatile writer and a master political and sports analyst, Leo Pennant a stylish lay-out man, Stephen Bulgin, the mastermind behind many human rights campaigns and Caudley George, a news photographer of distinction.

This was the halcyon age of Black journalism. It was bliss to be alive then for we had some very decent human beings and bright and decolonised writers without the mercenary ambitions that were later to sour and demean black journalism and publishing. These pioneers were sickened by racist injustice and devoted their lives to raising awareness of the problems that faced a bewildered, confused and defenceless people and empowered them by devising strategies to see off white racist chicanery and supremacy. Racism is still with us, blighting many lives black and white, but only the most cynical will deny that its diseased wings have not been significantly clipped. This is, in large measure, due to the unalloyed age of journalistic reason, idealism and altruism that dominated black journalism until mercenary developments in the late 1990s.

Briefly what happened was that most of the new breed of publishers and journalists were single-mindedly career and profit minded. We even had the obscene spectacle of the formation of black trade unions whose sole objective was to catapult some “moderate”, opportunistic and mercenary writers into profitable areas of the white-run, controlled and manipulated media.

These are large issues, impossible to deal with adequately in a few thousand words. I hope, with the Editor’s permission, to enlarge on the descent from idealism to materialist opportunism in a later article on The Colorful Times.

Efforts to save Gulf coastline slog on in face of massive oil disaster

Published: Sunday, July 18, 2010, 10:00 AM

The Times-Picayune
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By Kari Dequine. contributing writer

Photos by Kari Dequine, The Times-PicayuneCynthia Zmetromak of Metairie and Letitia Huckaby of Texas carefully push the roots of each stem of marsh grass into the thick mud, then give it a tug to make sure it will not come up.  

It was immediately apparent that walking upright wasn't going to work. With each step, the merciless muck sucked every boot, sandal or shoe into the depths -- and didn't want to give it back. It was better to crawl, using caution in case of sharp oyster shells, or better yet, dip down into the bayou's muddy water and move in a half-squatting, half-swimming motion.

The benefit of the soft squelch, however, came with the ease in which the roots of the California bulrush could be shoved into the mud using only one's fist. And on one of the seemingly endless days with a heat advisory, the benefit of submerging up to the neck was that being wet was cooler than being dry.

"I wish I could do this every day," said Che Gilliland, a kindergarten teacher on Whidbey Island in Washington, who had come to southeast Louisiana to pitch in on the Gulf oil spill cleanup.

Despite months of oil gushing in the Gulf of Mexico in the worst oil spill in U.S. history, the work of rebuilding Louisiana's rapidly vanishing coast slogs on in the face of the massive disaster and its accompanying cleanup effort. A football field of the state's wetlands is lost every 38 minutes.

The 2,000 stems of marsh grass planted by volunteers on Tuesday just east of Golden Meadow in Bayou L'Ours will help the marsh defend in the daily battle against enemies such as erosion, storm surge and even oil, said Mel Landry, public involvement coordinator for the Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Program. Still, Landry is realistic about the ongoing battle, reminding volunteers during their six hours spent in the mud that far more marshland had been lost than gained.

"We're not going to save the coast in a day," he said. "But anywhere we can improve the habitat and help offset impacts of the spill--it's definitely a clear benefit."

Unified effort

Tuesday's planting was a partnership between the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, the estuary program and the federal Natural Resources Conservation Service.

The task of restoration is immense, said Jennifer Hathorn, the coalition's coastal restoration coordinator. "We realized we needed to work together," she said.

While restoring lost land is the coalition's principal goal, the oil disaster "gives us even more reason why we need to get out there and get out there as fast as possible," she said. A direct consequence of erosion, she said, is that oil is allowed to permeate farther inland.

Volunteers Shannon Kirkpatrick of Houma and Betsy Gosling of Metairie get down and dirty planting marsh grass in the muddy waters of Bayou L'Ours. 

The partnership joined other conservation groups to start a website and an entirely new acronym, GRIT, for Gulf Response Involvement Team, where people could register to volunteer. More than 20,000 people have signed up.

Volunteers come at all levels and types of skills and expertise and at varying motivating forces and places of origin. Willingness is the only requirement.

"I went through Katrina, and I know that we need to have wetlands or we won't have much of a city left," said Metairie resident Betsy Gosling, explaining why she finds herself waist-deep in muddy water among the fish, crabs, bugs and potential (though never sighted) snakes and alligators on a hot July day. "I won't go into politics, but no one else is going to do it."

Planting the marsh grass is a considerable investment, Landry said, as the plants cost about $2 each. In addition, research must be done on such factors as salinity, and test plots must be planted to determine the species with the highest chance for survival. Logistical support, especially in finding boats to use, is always an issue.

First, do no harm

Repairing the marsh always begins with the question of finding ways that do more good than harm, Landry said.

That is often the case when cleaning oil that has washed into the marsh. "It would be better if we just left it. The grass is very resilient. But that's a hard thing for people to understand -- they are upset and desperate. They want to see something done,'' he said. "The fact that it might be best not to do anything can be a hard pill to swallow."

With the oil-related safety concerns, coastal restoration efforts have been limited significantly in what sites can be selected for plantings. Yet the overall goal has never held such importance.

"Given that we can't go and actually have contact with the oil, we try to go to the surrounding areas that are affected," Hathorn said.

She also pointed out that the need will last for decades. "This is not a short-term disaster," she said. "It's not a simple fix -- it's a slow process. When everyone says it is safe to go in, we will go in and replace any parts of the grass that has been damaged."

On one of the few positive notes, Landry said the oil has brought national attention to the perils the marsh has faced for many decades. "It provides us the opportunity to reach out to people who otherwise would not have been interested or had the opportunity to be involved," he said.

'All you can do is laugh'

One key element in fostering successful volunteer projects and thus an increased sense of stewardship over the land, Hathorn said, is fun.

"This is a kick," Gosling said. "How many people get to go out and play in the marsh like this?"

Throughout the day smiles never left faces. Laughter abounded, and as one volunteer pointed out, when you are stuck in the mud and frequently falling over, "all you can do is laugh."

From a Jefferson man who just retired from a long career with Shell Oil Co. to a young woman from Bourg about to head off to veterinary school, the volunteers ended the day's work drying off on the dock and bonding over watermelon. The strongest bond -- wanting to do something to help save the coast -- was there before they met. Gilliland pressed the staff as to whether there would be another project while she was still in town.

As he thanked them for their "important and valuable work," Landry pushed for his volunteers to aid in one of the most powerful aspects of conservation: education. It will take a national effort, he said, to garner the vast resources needed to truly make an impact.

"Go home and tell the story of what you did," he urged. "Tell your friends why this place is so important."

 

How to Write About Africa II:

The Revenge

By Binyavanga Wainaina

 

PMD, Excerpts from 911: The Synopsis, 2006/2007, PMD Publishing

 

Novelists, NGO workers, rock musicians, conservationists, students, and travel writers track down my email, asking: Would you please comment on my homework assignment / pamphlet / short story / funding proposal / haiku / adopted child / photograph of genuine African mother-in-law? All of the people who do this are white. Nobody from China asks, nobody from Cuba, nobody black, blackish, brown, beige, coffee, cappuccino, mulatte. I wrote “How to Write about Africa” as a piss-job, a venting of steam; it was never supposed to see the light of day. Now people write to ask me for permission to write about Africa. They want me to tell them what I think, how they did. Be frank, they say, be candid. Tell it like it is. I have considered investing in a rubber stamp.

I have imagined myself standing at the virtual borders of Africa, a black minuteman with a rubber stamp, processing applications — where YES means “Pass go, pay one hundred dollars,” and NO means “Tie ’em up and deport ’em.” It’s almost a sexual thing. They come crawling out of the unlikeliest places, looking to be whipped. I am bad, Master Binya, beat me. Oh! Beat me harder. Oo! They seem quite disappointed when I don’t. Once in a while I do, and it feels both good and bad, like too much wasabi. Bono sent a book of poems. Someone wrote an essay, “How to Write about Afghanistan.” I shook hands with, not one, but two European presidents, who read my text and shook their heads: How bad, how very bad. I shared a cigarette in Frankfurt with the bodyguards of Yar Adua, the Nigerian president, who said they don’t like gyms back in Abuja because the wives of the big men come onto them and cause all kinds of trouble. They preferred hotel gyms in Europe. But German cigarettes were not as good as Nigerian cigarettes. German vegetables were not as good as Nigerian vegetables. German beer was, when you really looked, deep into the foam, not nearly as light and golden as Nigerian beer. When all is said and done, they said, stamping out their cigarettes and smelling of fine French cologne, Nigeria is the best place. Have you been to Abuja, they asked? No, I said. Abuja is ultramodern, they said, and we all looked out at the wet, gray, old, stained buildings in front of us.

—

One day a man I know called me in some agitation. He had just read “How to Write about Africa” and wanted to know why I would write about him as I’d done. I had said, “After celebrity activists and aid workers, conservationists are Africa’s most important people. Do not offend them.” I had offended him. I had not mentioned anyone by name, but he was personally affronted. Yes, he’s a conservationist, and, yes, he has hosted a celebrity or two — but he didn’t trade in game animals, and he paid his workers well. Sure, I said. It’s beyond the pale, he said. I have never really understood what that means, where that is, the pale, and why such a mild-seeming phrase promises interpersonal Armageddon.

—

“How to Write about Africa” grew out of an email. In a fit of anger, maybe even low blood sugar — it runs in the family — I spent a few hours one night at my graduate student flat in Norwich, England, writing to the editor of Granta. I was responding to its “Africa” issue, which was populated by every literary bogeyman that any African has ever known, a sort of “Greatest Hits of Hearts of Fuckedness.” It wasn’t the grimness that got to me, it was the stupidity. There was nothing new, no insight, but lots of “reportage” — Oh, gosh, wow, look, golly ooo — as if Africa and Africans were not part of the conversation, were not indeed living in England across the road from the Granta office. No, we were “over there,” where brave people in khaki could come and bear witness. Fuck that. So I wrote a long — truly long — rambling email to the editor.

I was busy working on my novel. Then I was drinking chili-flavored vodka with the editor of this magazine, and before I knew it I had agreed to write a sequel to “How to Write about Africa.” Okay, I said, absentmindedly. So, here we are.

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Binyavanga Wainaina is a Kenyan author, journalist and winner of the Caine Prize.

Wainaina was born in Nakuru in Rift Valley province. He attended Moi Primary School in Nakuru, Mangu High School in Thika, andLenana School in Nairobi. He later studied commerce at the University of Transkei in South Africa, after which he worked in Cape Town for some years as a freelance food and travel writer.

In July 2002 he won the Caine Prize for African Writing for his short story “Discovering Home”.