Mark Anthony Neal's Blog, page 336

Jazz great Jason Moran performs "Carolina Shout" | LIVE at The Kennedy Center

'American Jazz pianist Jason Moran, who composed music for the films Selma and 13th, performs "Carolina Shout" LIVE at the Kennedy Center as part of Two Wings: The Music of Black America in Migration.

'A Black Women's History of the United States': A Conversation with Daina Ramey Berry and Kali Nicole Gross

'Historians Authors  Daina Ramey Berry  and  Kali Nicole Gross  join All Of It with Alison Stewart to discuss their new book, A Black Women's History of the United States.'
         
        

Pam Grier, from Blaxploitation to Black Excellence

'Before Pam Grier, there were no movie stars like Pam Grier. She arrived in Hollywood in the late nineteen-sixties, just before a new genre of film called blaxploitation hit theatres. Outrageous and raunchy, these movies pushed boundaries and drew big audiences—and Pam Grier was one of blaxploitation’s biggest stars. In her titular roles as Coffy and Foxy Brown, Grier invented a character type that viewers had never seen before: funny, sexy, and empowered Black women who could take care of themselves. Grier served as a kind of cultural avatar for Angela Davis and the Black Power movement, and her films have influenced generations of artists. Grier insists that, however outlandish her characters might have seemed, they were drawn from real life. “When a woman takes out her earrings and her shoes, she’s going to whoop your behind, O.K.? So that’s in my movies”.' -- New Yorker Radio Hour

‘I feel the weight of everyone’: Keeth Smart Foiled Death to Make it to the Olympics

'Olympic athletes have, by definition, overcome overwhelming odds. But even among such a class of people, the US fencer Keeth Smart’s story stands out as extraordinary. He was the worst member of his high-school fencing club – which he joined only thanks to his talented sister (and future Olympian) Erinn – yet he ended up with a silver medal at the 2008 Beijing Olympics, just four months after he was diagnosed with leukemia. Combining family home videos, a voiceover from Smart and graphic-novel-style animations, Stay Close shows how a Black kid from Brooklyn dealt with his challenges to succeed in a sport dominated by affluent white athletes – and became the first US fencer to top the world’s rankings.' -- Aeon Video

New Ways of Seeing – The Black Figure with Deana Lawson, Paul Mpagi Sepuya & Antwaun Sargent

'Antwaun Sargent, author of The New Black Vanguard: Photography between Art and Fashion, is joined by leading contemporary photographers Deana Lawson and Paul Mpagi Sepuya to explore contemporary approaches to portraying the Black figure in photography.' --  Art Basel
 

Black Children Are Twice As Likely To Die By Suicide Than White Children

'Over the past decade suicide attempts among Black children rose 92%. The increase includes elementary aged children, some as young as 5 — and experts aren’t entirely sure why. We sat down with two mothers to hear their stories and how their sons’ suicides impacted their lives.' -- AJ+  

Left of Black S10: E10: Monika Gosin on The Politics of Racial in Multicultural Miami

[image error]
Left of Black host Mark Anthony Neal (@NewBlackMan) is joined in the studio by Dr. Monika Gosin, an associate professor of sociology at William & Mary. She is the author of The Politics of Racial Division:Interethnic Struggles for Legitimacy in Multicultural Miami (Cornell University Press, 2019), which “deconstructs antagonistic discourses that circulated in local Miami media between African Americans, ‘white’ Cubans, and ‘black’ Cubans during the 1980 Mariel Boatlift and the 1994 Balsero Crisis. Monika Gosin challenges exclusionary arguments pitting these groups against one another and depicts instead the nuanced ways in which identities have been constructed, negotiated, rejected, and reclaimed in the context of Miami's historical multiethnic tensions.”
<!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:Helvetica; panose-1:0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:-536870145 1342208091 0 0 415 0;} @font-face {font-family:"Cambria Math"; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} @font-face {font-family:Calibri; panose-1:2 15 5 2 2 2 4 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:swiss; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:-536859905 -1073732485 9 0 511 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-unhide:no; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} .MsoChpDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; mso-default-props:yes; font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.0in 1.0in 1.0in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.WordSection1 {page:WordSection1;}</style>

After 40 Years, 'A Soldier's Play' Finally Marches Onto Broadway

'In 1981, Charles Fuller's A Soldier's Play premiered in New York City, featuring actors who would go on to become household names, like Samuel L. Jackson and Denzel Washington. The following year, Fuller became the second African American in history to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. But, at the time, the play did not transfer to Broadway. Now, though, it's happened: A Soldier's Play opened at the Roundabout Theater in January, and runs through March 15. Fuller came to New York City for opening night, and stood on the stage with the current cast and the director of the original production, Douglas Turner Ward.' -- All Things Considered

Ways & Means S5E1: Reparations -- How it Could Happen with Sandy Darity

'When it comes to studying the feasibility of reparations in the U.S., no name is more called upon than Sandy Darity. Darity is a Duke University professor who has studied reparations for over 30 years. “The idea is that wealth begets wealth. That wealth is something that is acquired cumulatively. And so you can either get on the path of accumulation or you can be on the path of decumulation.” Darity argues the current racial wealth gap – in which African Americans, who make up 13% of the national population but hold only 3% of national wealth – can be traced to a series of government policies that denied economic opportunity to African Americans and provided opportunities to many White Americans.' -- Ways & Means Podcast

Depth, Complexity and Beauty: Princeton Professor Imani Perry Urges us to Reclaim Black History

'Born to social activist parents in Birmingham, Alabama, just nine years after the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing, scholar and author Imani Perry grew up during a time of great change. At age 7, her family relocated to Cambridge, Massachusetts; her mother earned a Harvard doctorate while Perry’s own academic and literary ambitions took root. Today, Perry is the Hughes-Rogers Professor of African American Studies at Princeton University where she examines the rich, layered interplay between history, race, law and culture, with an emphasis on hip-hop music. Her interdisciplinary work is deeply reflective and also grounded in experience – her own, of those who came before her and that of the next generation.'  -- Guardian Labs US