Mark Anthony Neal's Blog, page 142

A Choice of Weapons: Gordon Parks Interviewed on NPR's Fresh Air (1990)

'The documentary A Choice Of Weapon: Inspired By Gordon Parks is about the great photographer who chronicled the Black experience for Life magazine. Later, he went on to become the first Black director in Hollywood to work for a major studio. We're going to listen to our interview with Gordon Parks. He directed Shaft, the first Hollywood Studio black action film, which went on to inspire a wave of what became known as Black exploitation films. Before Shaft, He directed The Learning Tree, an adaptation of his autobiographical novel about growing up in Kansas. Parks taught himself how to take photographs and became a staff photographer at Life magazine. He worked there for 20 years, documenting everything from fashion shows to gang wars in Harlem. Gordon Parks died in 2006. He spoke with Fresh Air in 1990, when he had published his memoir called Voices In The Mirror.'

The Dehumanizing Theatre of the Parole Process

'In The Interview, directed by Jon Miller and Zach Russo, formerly incarcerated people describe what it’s like trying to convince a group of strangers that they are more than the worst thing they ever did.' -- The New Yorker

New World Coming: Race in Socialist Cuba

'James Counts Early is joined by scholar and activist Zuleica Romay Guerra to discuss the history of Afro-descendants in Cuba’s historic struggle for liberation, what anti-racism work looks like in Cuba, and the complexities of what comes after revolution. Zuleica is the Director of Afroamerican Studies at Casa de las Américas in Havana, Cuba.' -- The People's Forum NYC

Beyond The Lens | An Interview with Michèle Stephenson

 

'Filmmaker and author Michèle Stephenson opens up with WORLD Channel about her Haitian roots, and the connection between her and her film's protagonist, ELENA. Stephenson also shares how humanness is her lens into bringing stories to the forefront.'

Aging While Queer: Aging with HIV

'In the early days of HIV and AIDS, a positive diagnosis was a death sentence. During the helm of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, on average, a patient died within 15 months of diagnosis. Today, new antiretroviral therapies (ART) can make a HIV positive person's viral load undetectable, meaning that someone who is HIV positive cannot pass the infection to others. Advocates use the common term U=U (Undetectable = Untransmittable). These medications allow HIV survivors to live long, fulfilling lives, but those who have aged with the virus still struggle with the burden of loss and learning how to live for a future they were previously denied.  In this segment, The Takeaway talks to Tez Anderson, a long-term survivor of HIV, activist and founder of the first and largest group in the world focused on long-term HIV survivors and older adults aging with HIV, Let's Kick ASS (Aids Survivor Syndrome).'

Tierra Whack and J Melodic Make the Leap from 'Whack World' to Something Otherworldly

'Genius loves company, especially the weird, wired sort of genius embodied by Tierra Whack. But we don't always get to peep the kind of collective effort that goes into making her brand of Black girl magic. Scroll down the Soundcloud of her musical timeline — after she'd dropped her Philly-freestyling, cypher-stealing handle Dizzle Dizz and before Whack World shot her into the stratosphere — and you'll find a treasure chest of early songs that capture her genre-bending eccentricity. The very first joint in particular, posted in February 2015, is a minute-and-a-half long ditty of backwards rapping and shape-shifting called "Color Blind." And the warm, warbling soundtrack propelling her flow is produced — as the credit reads — "by musty ass J Melodic".'

'1619 Project' Journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones Says Black People Shouldn't be an Asterisk in U.S. history

'Pulitzer Prize winner Nikole Hannah-Jones says the contributions of Black people are often left out of the American story. Her mission is to reframe U.S. history through the lens of slavery. "Every American child learns about the Mayflower, but virtually no American child learned about the White Lion," Hannah-Jones tells Fresh Air. The omission, she says, is "symbolic of how history is shaped by people who decide what's important and what's not. And that erasure is also a powerful statement." As editor of the New York Times' 1619 Project, Hannah-Jones fought against that erasure.'

Jessica Namakkal /// On French Colonialism in India

'When, in October 2021, The Funambulist Podcast interviewed Priya Ange and Anita Kittery for our francophone show “Diasporas et Imaginaires des Luttes” about the Tamil diaspora from Puducherry or Tamil Nadu at large in France, they relied a lot on the work of Jessica Namakkal, who dedicated a book to “the making and unmaking of French India.” Namakkal joins The Funambulist Podcast for an anglophone conversation about French colonialism on the Indian Subcontinent. This is part of a broader effort to render the complexity to the Subcontinent’s recent history, which is usually depicted under the sole and uniform history of British colonialism. Namakkal is associate professor of the practice in international comparative studies, gender, sexuality, and feminist studies, and history at Duke University. She is the author of the book Unsettling Utopia: The Making and Unmaking of French India, published by Columbia University Press is 2021.'

The Funambulist Podcast · Jessica Namakkal /// On French Colonialism in India

"The Oppressed Have a Way of Addressing Their Own Conditions" - On Joshua Myers' Cedric Robinson: The Time of the Black Radical Tradition

'On this episode of Millennials Are Killing Capitalism, Joshua Myers talks about his recently published book Cedric Robinson: The Time of the Black Radical Tradition.'

Intersectionality Matters!: Educators Ungagged–Teaching Truth in the Era of Racial Backlash

'For the last year, we have been surrounded by debates on Critical Race Theory spurred by the Right's organized, widespread campaign to stifle anti-racist education. For all of this debate, though, we hardly ever get to hear from the teachers, administrators, and students who are the subjects of these vicious attacks, and who are risking it all in defense of educational integrity and truth-telling. On this episode of Intersectionality Matters!, host Kimberlé Crenshaw presents a conversation from the African American Policy Forum's Under the Blacklight series, where an incredible line up of brave educators, students, advocates and activists gathered to share their stories from the frontlines. Moderated by Sumi Cho, the roundtable conversation shines a spotlight on the experiences of educators who have been victimized by the draconian legislative campaigns to prevent K-12 teachings about the realities of race and gender based oppression in the United States, past and present.'