Mark Anthony Neal's Blog, page 436

Origins of Sound: Scholar Laurent Dubois on the History of the Banjo

"The Old Plantation," attributed to John Rose, Beaufort County, South Carolina, circa 1785. Photo courtesy of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation.




"If you really want to tell the story of the Caribbean, you have to understand and utilize other sources—oral history, religion, song, and more. A cultural understanding is critical to being a historian of that region." -- 'Laurent Dubois, Mellon Foundation New Directions fellow and director of the Forum for Scholars & Publics at Duke University, talks about using his fellowship to explore the history of the banjo and the links between the instrument and its African roots.'

Reflections of a Prodigal Daughter by Lisa B. Thompson

Reflections of a Prodigal Daughter by Lisa B. Thompson | @DrLisaBThompson | NewBlackMan (in Exile)
My new play Monroe is dedicated to my maternal great uncle, Aubrey C. Holmes, the gentlest man that I have ever known. He grew up the son of a preacher in Ouachita Parish, Louisiana, the site of the fifth highest number of lynchings in the US from 1877 to 1950. It breaks my heart to know that my maternal relatives came of age in a city steeped in violence against men and women who looked like them. Just like my grandmother, mother, and father, my Uncle Aubrey moved to the San Francisco Bay Area during the Great Migration. I still wonder how he remained so kind and caring despite coming from a place mired in such horror.
Growing up in California in the 1970s did not shelter me from racial violence. When I was a child, I discovered my father’s copy of Ralph Ginzberg’s 100 Years of Lynchings. I felt both aghast and fascinated by the numerous accounts of those killed “at the hands of persons unknown.” I also recall overhearing stories about “trouble” back home during Sunday morning breakfasts of grits, eggs, bacon, biscuits and fresh squeezed orange juice while the San Francisco fog rolled in.
As a new professor, I poured over the lynching photos in James Allen’s Without Sanctuary but my mind did not linger on the vicious white mobs that brutalized black people. Instead, I imagined the family and friends of the victims who were also terrorized by these heinous crimes. How did they survive, love and dream in the aftermath of such agony?
I find it remarkable that my parents and I never spoke directly about lynching. I just stored what I overheard, read, and saw deep inside me. Those images are intertwined with my curiosity about my family choosing California as their destination when they fled the south for a better life. I’m the cousin, niece, grandchild, and daughter of those who abandoned the south for the west coast. Now, as part of what is considered the reverse Great Migration, I’m raising my son in the south. I wonder what stories he’s storing inside his soul as a black boy growing up in Texas and what he will eventually do with them?
During rehearsal, I carried a list of all the lynching victims in Monroe with me. I needed their names near. I pray that this play honors their lives and their memory. I hope that Monroe inspires us to more bravely encounter what Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison describes as “unspeakable things unspoken.” Here’s to speaking the unspeakable, listening to history, and imagining a better future.

***
Lisa B. Thompson is a playwright and a professor of African & African Diaspora Studies at UT Austin. She is the author of Beyond the Black Lady: Sexuality and the African American Middle Class and the plays Single Black Female, Underground, and The Mamalogues. The world premiere of her new play Monroe runs September 7-30, 2018 at the Austin Playhouse.

Revival: Lee Breuer's 'Gospel at Colonus'

'The Public and the Onassis Foundation USA are partnering to remount MacArthur Genius Grant winner Lee Breuer's landmark “Gospel at Colonus.” Set in the context of a Black Pentecostal service, this production is a retelling of Sophocles’ classic Oedipus at Colonus. The production is free of charge and will run for just six performances at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park from September 4-9. Composer Bob Telson , choir director JD Steele , and Shari Addison , who stars as Ismene, discuss the production and Breuer’s seminal vision.' -- Midday on WNYC
         
        

How White Kids Understand Race

'For two years, Margaret Hagerman studied dozens of affluent, white families in a Midwestern community to get a sense of how the ideas of privilege, race, and racism, were talked about (or not). The result is her new book White Kids: Growing Up with Privilege in a Racially Divided America .'

         
       

Why America Doesn't Value Low-Wage Work

'Geoffrey Owens, who decades ago played Elvin Tibideaux on the Cosby Show, was photographed bagging groceries at Trader Joe’s. The photo went viral, and Owens was shamed for taking a job beneath him by some.  Despite recent drops in unemployment,  an estimated 65 million Americans are in low-paid service jobs. And if wages are low, can this idea that no job is better than another job still be true? Brittany Bronson is an English instructor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and a beverage server on the Las Vegas Strip. She argues low-wage workers are undervalued in this country, contributing to a cycle of poverty and discrimination.' -- The Takeaway

About Last Night: How HBCU Students are Addressing Sexual Assault on Campus

'Students at several prominent historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), have demanded that school administrators address sexual assault more vigorously. Last year, student protests at Morehouse College, Spelman College, Hampton University, and Howard University focused on inadequacies in the way sexual assault and rape cases are handled. Two current students at HBCUs and two alums join our roundtable discussion to explore what is particular about reporting and preventing dating violence and sexual assault at HBCUs. Campus rape is an issue across all colleges, and today we're hearing some students at HBCU's take on it.' -- Making Contact 

Blackness Holds Us Together: Sociologist Kehinde Andrews on Returning to the Power of Black Radicalism

'Sociologist Kehinde Andrews connects anti-Black oppression within the US and UK to a global system of White supremacy - and explains why Black liberation won't be conceded by the state, or achieved by representation within liberal politics, but won through a radical fight against capitalism and the nation states enriching themselves by exploiting Black and Brown people around the world. Andrews is author of Back to Black: Retelling Black Radicalism for the 21st Century from Zed Books.' -- This Is Hell! Radio

Keepers Of The Underground: The Hiphop Archive At Harvard

'Dr. Marcyliena Morgan wasn't an archivist and she didn't listen to hip-hop. But she listened to her students. Bit by bit, she opened her office and her resources and began to collect the history and material culture of hip-hop. In 2002, The Archive went from her office at UCLA to Harvard University, where she and Professor Henry Louis Gates founded The Hiphop Archive & Research Institute at the W.E.B. Dubois Institute at the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard.' -- Morning Edition/The Keepers

Making Contact: Darnell Moore on Coming of Age Black and Free in America

'When Darnell Moore was fourteen, three boys from his neighborhood tried to set him on fire. They cornered him while he was walking home from school, harassed him because they thought he was gay, and poured a jug of gasoline on him. He escaped, but just barely. It wasn't the last time he would face death. Three decades later, Moore is an award-winning writer, a leading Black Lives Matter activist, and an advocate for justice and liberation. In No Ashes in the Fire, he shares the journey taken by that scared, bullied teenager who not only survived, but found his calling. Moore's transcendence over the myriad forces of repression that faced him is a testament to the grace and care of the people who loved him, and to his hometown, Camden, NJ, scarred and ignored but brimming with life. Moore reminds us that liberation is possible if we commit ourselves to fighting for it, and if we dream and create futures where those who survive on society's edges can thrive.'

Barbara Arnwine On Gerrymandering In North Carolina

'A U.S. federal court struck down North Carolina's congressional map on Monday, August 27 ahead of the U.S. midterm elections, ruling that districts were unconstitutionally gerrymandered to favor the GOP. Gerrymandering is a practice intended to establish a political advantage for a particular party or group by manipulating district boundaries. Oftentimes, its used to suppress the power of liberal and progressive Black and Brown voters across the United States, especially southern states like North Carolina. Joining Sojourner Truth with Margaret Prescod to discuss gerrymandering in North Carolina and how it will impact midterm elections is Barbara Arnwine, a veteran civil rights and human rights leader and advocate. She is currently the Executive Director of the Transformative Justice Coalition .'