Mark Anthony Neal's Blog, page 67

How the 'White-Grievance Industry' Helps Republicans Thrive

'Jennifer Rubin, opinion columnist for The Washington Post, offers her thoughts on how what she calls the "White-grievance industry" fuels Republicans and anti-Democratic ideas, and what she thinks Democrats should do about it.'

In 'Freewater,' Author Amina Luqman-Dawson Uses Fiction to Illuminate a Little-known Black History

'Here & Now's Celeste Headlee speaks with Amina Luqman-Dawson about Freewater, her book for young adults. The novel is a fictional account of a society founded by runaway slaves in the Great Dismal Swamp, which stretches between parts of Virginia and North Carolina.'

The Limits with Jay Williams: Megan Rapinoe On Achieving Equal Pay In U.S. Soccer

'U.S. soccer star Megan Rapinoe is of course a champion on the field, but off the field, she's a champion for the causes that matter. She has long been one of the biggest voices advocating for equal pay in the U.S. Soccer Federation, which was historically reached via collective bargaining agreements this month.  Now, as she's reaching the end of her trailblazing run in professional soccer, Megan sat down with Jay Williams to talk about the path to equal pay for the U.S. Women's National Team, and what work still needs to be done across professional sports. Plus, she reveals whether she'll appear in the 2023 World Cup, the sacrifices she has made as a lifelong athlete, and whether or not a future in politics is in store for her.'

'It Was All a Dream' Explores the Notorious B.I.G.'s Life and Legacy

'Christopher Wallace, better known as the Notorious B.I.G,  was killed in 1997, six months after his friend turned rival Tupac Shakur was murdered. They were 24 and 25 years old, respectively. Neither case has been definitively solved. A quarter-of-a-century later, neither of these icons have left the popular imagination. Journalist Justin Tinsley's new book,  "It Was All a Dream: Biggie and the World That Made Him" tracks the rapper’s life and the lasting impact of his short career. “I struggle to think of an artist who accomplished as much in such a short window as The Notorious B.I.G.,” Tinsley says.'

Remembering NYC's "Forgotten" Women's Prison

'The Women’s House of Detention was a prison that housed primarily poor, or Black, or queer people, and people living at multiple intersections of those identities. It stood in Greenwich Village, New York City from 1932 to 1974 and had an indelible impact on the modern and intersecting movements for queer liberation, Black liberation and abolition.The Takeaway speaks with Hugh Ryan, author of “The Women’s House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison,” a new book about the prison and its place in the history and present of the movement for LGBTQ rights.'

Conversations in Atlantic Theory • Jay Rajiva on Toward an Animist Reading of Postcolonial Trauma Literature

'A discussion with Jay Rajiva, who teaches in the Department of English at Georgia State University in Atlanta, Georgia. He has published widely in anglophone postcolonial literary studies, focusing on South Asia and English language works from sub-Saharan Africa. Rajiva authored the 2017 work Postcolonial Parabola: Literature, Tactility, and the Ethics of Representing of Trauma, published by Bloomsbury Press, and is the author of Toward an Animist Reading of Postcolonial Trauma Literature, published in 2020 by Routledge, the occasion for our conversation today. In this conversation, we discuss the fecundity of animism as an interpretative frame, the ongoing relevance of traumatic memory in a range of postcolonial literatures, narrative and the complexity of representation, and the nature and promise of comparative, intertextual study.'

Millennials Are Killing Capitalism: "The Research Arm of the Movement" - Abdul Alkalimat on The History of Black Studies

'Abdul Alkalimat is a founder of the field of Black Studies and Professor Emeritus at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. A lifelong scholar-activist with a PhD from the University of Chicago, he has lectured, taught and directed academic programs across the US, the Caribbean, Africa, Europe and China. His activism extends from having been chair of the Chicago chapter of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in the 1960s, to a co-founder of the Black Radical Congress in 1998. This conversation is framed around his recent book The History of Black Studies. Alkalimat shares some of his background, and his experiences with the struggles for Black Studies in the 1960’s. We also talk about his role in the founding of the Institute of the Black World. In discussing Black Studies, we ask Dr. Alkalimat about the ideological strains that make it up, the origins of it as an academic discipline, and what Black Studies looked like before it was allowed into the academy and how it continues to look outside of the academy.'

Simone Leigh Accentuates Black Women in Her Venice Biennale Debut

'Simone Leigh is the first Black woman to represent the U.S. at the Venice Biennale, one of the most high-profile art exhibitions in the world. WBUR's Lauren Williams went there and met some visitors who were deeply moved by her work.'

The Takeaway: Disparities Faced By Black Veterans

'The Takeaway speaks with Richard Brookshire, co-founder of the Black Veterans Project, an organization dedicated to advocating for the needs of Black veterans. Brookshire can speak about the disparities in how Black veterans are treated compared to their white counterparts, and is also very open about his own mental health struggles following the end of his active duty service.'

On the Media: What We Got Wrong About Herd Immunity

'Back in 2020, the term "herd immunity" was the light at the end of the tunnel. If we could somehow gather enough antibodies from vaccines and natural infections, we could reach "full immunity" and stamp out COVID-19 for good. But quickly enough, our hopes were dashed by wave after wave of variants, breakthrough infections, and now, reinfections. Nowadays, "herd immunity" is associated with a seemingly careless "let it rip" mentality, and has been left in the dust — especially by advocates within the disability community, who claim that it sidelines those most vulnerable to infections and long-term conditions like long covid. David Robertson, a doctoral candidate in Princeton University's History of Science Program, says that we prematurely abandoned the term — and that we never truly understood what herd immunity meant in the context of COVID-19.'