Monday, June 15, 2015
Friday, May 15, 2015
somos sur (again)
I had links to this song before but this is video of Ana Tijoux's Somos Sur (featuring Shadia Mansour):
Lyrics: Somos Sur
Democracy Now!: Chilean Musician Ana Tijoux on Politics, Feminism, Motherhood & Hip-Hop as "a Land for the Landless"
Saturday, April 18, 2015
Friday, April 17, 2015
don't cashcrop my cornrows
Amandla Stenberg, who played Rue in the film Hunger Games, shares some incisive thoughts on cultural appropriation and hip-hop.
Amandla, we salute you.
Thursday, March 19, 2015
Saturday, February 14, 2015
first thoughts on chapel hill
New Idea: Instead of calling people "Islamophobic" we should say that they are "serious about their parking space".
Tuesday, December 30, 2014
Monday, September 15, 2014
Sunday, July 20, 2014
Thursday, July 10, 2014
Wednesday, June 25, 2014
happy muslims around the world
YouTube Playlist: Pharrell Williams Happy Muslims, Middle East, North Africa, South Asia, and Muslim World by Megan Reif covers alot of the same ground I have with my various blog posts of Muslims doing "Happy" videos. I think I've gotten a few she missed and vice-versa.
Tuesday, June 24, 2014
dear white people... (hopefully coming out this october)
Initial Trailer:
Longer Trailer:
Dear White People Concept Trailer from Justin Simien on Vimeo.
Democracy Now! on Dear White People:Sunday, June 15, 2014
kemal amin kasem - inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji'un
The voice of Robin on the Super-friends, Norville "Shaggy" Rogers in the Scooby-Doo franchise, and most famously the long-time host of American Top 40 and related/similar shows. (see Wikipedia)
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
Sunday, June 08, 2014
wow, another syrian happy video
From the video:
"Back in March 2014, Maiko went to Iraq as a Volunteer to help Syrian refugees.
She thought it would be wonderful and powerful if she could make a Happy song with syrian refugees living in the camp.
The life in the camp is of course, not easy, everyone has lots of burdens and have lost many things back home in Syria
But they are not only grieving
They celebrate their birthdays, or new born babies, or someone's wedding in the community
They always try to have something to have fun with. they are really living their lives.
She told them about this idea of a Happy clip,
They were so thrilled that they made one.. ;o)
I helped them remotely by doing the editing.
You can see that they are happy even though they are living a tough situation.
Thanks Maiko for your volunteering and your great help.
Good luck to all those Syrian refugees !!!!
Stay happy, whatever the circumstances."
Friday, June 06, 2014
"somos sur" - ana tijoux (featuring shadia mansour)
Third world solidarity by sisters rapping in Spanish and Arabic.
maps for language and religion
There have been some interesting maps circulating on the internet recently.
Here is one:
Gizmodo: The Most Common Languages Spoken in the U.S. After English and Spanish
and here is another:
Washington Post: The second-largest religion in each state (and county)
In the first link I was surprised at the appearance of Hmong, Vietnamese and Navajo on the map. While on the second I was surprised by the number of states where the second largest religion was either Islam or Buddhism (I suppose I just expected Jews to appear as the number two religion in more states... I mean, even in Florida, the second largest religion was Islam) I was also surprised that the Bahai Faith was actually the second largest religion in any of the states (they got South Carolina).
Thursday, June 05, 2014
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Tuesday, May 27, 2014
syria (restore) happy?
Published on May 26, 2014
Despite the heavy toll of the ongoing Syrian conflict on the lives of Syria's most vulnerable population, its children remain resilient. (RESTORE)Happy contains footage from Zaatari refugee camp and a Syrian refugee school inside Jordan. We traveled to Jordan in April of 2014 equipped with coloring books, crayons, soccer balls, hula hops, jump ropes, and toys and "Happy" by Pharrell Williams blaring on portable speakers...
We made this video with hopes to encourage people to support Education and Mental Health programs that work with Syrian refugees and internally displaced Syrian children.
Please visit: www.love4syria.com to find an organization to support.
Produced by:
Hazami Barmada
Omar Al-Chaar
Rameen Aminzadeh
A project of: Beats, Rhymes & Relief: www.beatsrhymesandrelief.org
Join us in the Fall of 2014 One World Syria, A Celebrity Benefit Concert for Syria. Learn more: www.oneworldsyria.com
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
50 facts about muslims
50 Actual Facts That Challenge What You've Been Told About Muslims is a nice little round-up of information, some of which I actually didn't know myself.
Wednesday, May 14, 2014
Wednesday, May 07, 2014
Tuesday, May 06, 2014
Monday, May 05, 2014
Saturday, May 03, 2014
Saturday, April 26, 2014
Monday, April 21, 2014
Saturday, April 19, 2014
happier without women?
This is the "halal" version of the British Muslim "Happy" video (without instrumental music or "provocative" images of women dancing). I like the fact that they did an acapella cover, but it is somewhat disturbing that apparently some people seem unable to distinguish between smiling hijabi girls walking happily down the street and porn.
Friday, April 18, 2014
fbi uncovers plot to just sit back and enjoy collapse of united states
Given the last entry, this story is more sad than funny...
The Onion: FBI Uncovers Al-Qaeda Plot To Just Sit Back And Enjoy Collapse Of United States
it's official: the us is no longer a democracy, but an oligarchy
From Slashdot
"Researchers from Princeton University and Northwestern University have concluded, after extensive analysis of 1,779 policy issues, that the U.S. is in fact an oligarchy and not a democracy.
What this means is that, although 'Americans do enjoy many features
central to democratic governance,' 'majorities of the American public
actually have little influence over the policies our government adopts.'
Their study (PDF), to be published in Perspectives on Politics,
found that 'When the preferences of economic elites and the stands of
organized interest groups are controlled for, the preferences of the
average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero,
statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.'"
Thursday, April 17, 2014
Wednesday, April 16, 2014
happy british muslims
From: The Honesty Policy
List of participants (Rough order of appearance): Laith, Adam Deen, Safiah, Alia, Ghalia, Julie Siddiqui, Salma Yaqoob, Fuad Nahdi, Khalid Ahmed & Ruqaiya, Myriam Cerrah, Hannah Habibi Hopkins, Tanya Muneera Williams, Faisal, Izzi Hassan, Asiyah Juma, Abdul-Hakim Murad, Rukea, Nadir Nahdi, Mizan, Yaz, Sadiya Chaudhory, Kübra Gümüsay and Ali Gümüsay, Fareena Alam, Rahim Jung, Waqaas Ahmed, Saleha Islam, Mo Ansar, Rabie, Edris Khamissa, HP Team, LSE ISOC, Kifah Shah, Aisha and Tahiya, Rumi’s Cave, Thawab and Basma, Omar, Mecca2Medinah, Marwan, Bentley Wood, Remona Aly, Majid Khan, Na’eem Raza, Shama, Zainab and Nuri, Abdul-Rehman Malik, Malaysian family, Asim Siddiqi and kids, Asiyah and Juveid, HP, Omareeto, Rizwan, Bilal Hassam, Nuri, Humera and Khalida Khan, Anwar, Nazli and Jayde, HP team.
List of participants (Rough order of appearance): Laith, Adam Deen, Safiah, Alia, Ghalia, Julie Siddiqui, Salma Yaqoob, Fuad Nahdi, Khalid Ahmed & Ruqaiya, Myriam Cerrah, Hannah Habibi Hopkins, Tanya Muneera Williams, Faisal, Izzi Hassan, Asiyah Juma, Abdul-Hakim Murad, Rukea, Nadir Nahdi, Mizan, Yaz, Sadiya Chaudhory, Kübra Gümüsay and Ali Gümüsay, Fareena Alam, Rahim Jung, Waqaas Ahmed, Saleha Islam, Mo Ansar, Rabie, Edris Khamissa, HP Team, LSE ISOC, Kifah Shah, Aisha and Tahiya, Rumi’s Cave, Thawab and Basma, Omar, Mecca2Medinah, Marwan, Bentley Wood, Remona Aly, Majid Khan, Na’eem Raza, Shama, Zainab and Nuri, Abdul-Rehman Malik, Malaysian family, Asim Siddiqi and kids, Asiyah and Juveid, HP, Omareeto, Rizwan, Bilal Hassam, Nuri, Humera and Khalida Khan, Anwar, Nazli and Jayde, HP team.
Sunday, April 13, 2014
yasiin bey (mos def) + marvin gaye
Amerigo Gazaway's *Soul Mates* series continues the theme of his previous work in creating collaborations that never were. On the series' latest installment, Amerigo unites Brooklyn rapper Yasiin Bey (Mos Def) and soul legend Marvin Gaye for a dream collaboration aptly titled "Yasiin Gaye". Building the album's foundation from deconstructed samples of Gaye's Motown classics, Gazaway re-purposes the instrumentation into new productions within a similar framework. Carefully weaving Bey's tangled raps and Gaye's soulful vocals over his new arrangements, the producer delivers a quality much closer to an authentic collaboration than a lukewarm "mashup" album.
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Monday, March 17, 2014
Monday, March 03, 2014
rebel music by hisham aidi
I haven't read this yet but it will probably find its way to my booklist:
From Amazon:
This fascinating, timely, and important book on the connection between music and political activism among Muslim youth around the world looks at how hip-hop, jazz, and reggae, along with Andalusian and Gnawa music, have become a means of building community and expressing protest in the face of the West’s policies in the War on Terror. Hisham Aidi interviews musicians and activists, and reports from music festivals and concerts in the United States, Europe, North Africa, and South America, to give us an up-close sense of the identities and art forms of urban Muslim youth.
We see how the current cultural and political turmoil in Europe’s urban periphery echoes that moment in the 1910s when Islamic movements began appearing among African-Americans in northern American cities, and how the Black Freedom Movement and the words of Malcolm X have inspired the increasing racialization and radicalization of young Muslims today. More unexpected is how the United States and some of its allies have used hip-hop and Sufi music to try to deradicalize Muslim youth abroad.
Aidi’s interviews with jazz musicians who embraced Islam in the post–World War II years and took their music to Europe and Africa recall the 1920s, when jazz inspired cultural ferment in Europe and North Africa. And his conversations with the last of the great Algerian Andalusi musicians, who migrated to Paris’s Latin Quarter after the outbreak of the Algerian War in 1954, speak for the musical symbiosis between Muslims and Jews in the kasbah that attracted the attention of the great anticolonial thinker Frantz Fanon.
Illuminating and groundbreaking, Rebel Music takes the pulse of the phenomenon of this new youth culture and reveals not only the rich historical context from which it is drawn but also how it can foretell future social and political change.
Excerpt:
Prologue
One muggy afternoon in July 2003, I headed up to the South Bronx for the Crotona Park Jams, a small festival that is little-known locally, but manages to draw hip-hop fans from around the world. The annual event is organized by Tools of War, a grassroots arts organization that invites artists from across the country and Europe to perform in the Bronx, hip-hop’s putative birthplace, and to meet some of the genre’s pioneers, figures like Afrika Bambaataa and Kurtis Blow. I arrived at the park and asked around for Christie Z, a local promoter and activist. Christie, who has blue eyes and a ruddy complexion and wears a white head scarf, is the founder of Tools of War and a smaller group called Muslims in Hip Hop. She is married to Jorge Pabón (aka Fabel), a well-known dancer and master of ceremonies (MC), who appeared in the classic 1980s hip-hop film Beat Street and currently teaches “poppin’ ” and “lockin’ ” dance styles at NYU. The two—Christie Z & Fabel, as they’re known—are a power couple on the East Coast’s hip-hop scene, but they’ve become significant players internationally as well, organizing shows in Europe and bringing artists from overseas to perform in America.
Christie’s story is unusual. “People always ask me,” she says with a laugh, “how did a white girl from central Pennsylvania become a Muslim named Aziza who organizes turntable battles in the Bronx? I say the lyrics brought me here. I was in high school when I heard ‘The Message,’ ” she says, referring to the 1982 breakout song by Grandmaster Flash, which vividly described life in the ghetto during the Reagan era, and was one of hip-hop’s earliest mainstream hits. “I heard that track and I followed the sound to New York.”
I had arrived early hoping for a pre-show interview with the French rap crew 3ème Œil (Third Eye), who had flown in from Marseille to perform that evening. The rap trio is known in France for its socially conscious lyrics. Since the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the group had become even more political, rapping about what they call the West’s “stranglehold” on the East. I stood around the stage waiting. A circle had formed with a group of boys clapping and dancing, as the DJ on duty that evening—another pioneer, DJ Tony Tone of the Cold Crush Brothers—spun rap and Latin soul classics. Soon Third Eye’s manager, Claudine, a brown-haired woman in her early twenties, appeared and led me backstage. I explained that I was a researcher at Columbia writing about global hip-hop. Her face lit up. “We’ve been wanting to talk to you for a while,” she said, as she walked me through a backstage tent and out into the open. Later I found out Claudine had thought I was a representative of Columbia Records, about to offer her group a contract.
The sun was setting, a blue glow had enveloped the park, and I walked up to the four young men lounging on a bench facing the spectacular Indian Lake, which sits at the park’s center. Soon I was chatting with the rappers—Boss One (Mohammed) and Jo Popo (Mohammed), both born in the Comoros Islands off the coast of East Africa, but raised in Marseille—and their DJ, Rebel (Moustapha). They were dressed similarly in sagging denim Bermudas, eighties-style Nike high-tops, and baseball caps. Jo Popo gave me a copy of their new hit single, “Si Triste” (So Sad). I told him I’d already seen bootlegged copies at African music stands in Harlem. He nodded and gave me a fist bump. The song, popular among West African youth in New York, offers social commentary over a looping bass line, decrying police brutality and mass incarceration (with a special shout-out to the American death-row prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal). I asked them how the French press responded to their lyrics, and about the anti-immigrant National Front leader Jean-Marie Le Pen’s claim that hip-hop was a dangerous musical genre that originated in the casbahs of Algeria.
Boss One shook his head, “For Le Pen, everything bad—rap, crime, AIDS—comes from Algeria or Islam.” This was mid-2003; the War on Terror was in its early years. “The more Bush and Chirac attack Islam and say it’s bad,” said Boss One, “the more young people will think it’s good, and the more the oppressed will go to Islam and radical preachers.” His tone became a little defensive when talking about the banlieues, the poor suburbs that ring France’s major cities, stating that life in France’s cités was better than in the American ghettos. “Life is hard in France, but we have a social safety net. Here there is no such thing”—he stood up to emphasize the point—“and it will get worse with Bush, the cowboy, le rancheur!”
Their bluster disappeared when I asked what they thought of the Bronx. They grew wistful talking about the Mecca of hip-hop. Jo Popo smiled describing their meeting the day before with hip-hop legend Afrika Bambaataa. “C’était incroyable!” Bam, as he is known, is particularly loved in France, where he was instrumental in introducing hip-hop in the early 1980s. The group’s music mixer, DJ Rebel, who previously hadn’t said a word, suddenly spoke up. “I have dreamed of visiting the Bronx for all thirty-six years of my life. This is where hip-hop started, this music which has liberated us, which has saved us,” he said with apparent seriousness. “Yesterday we met Bambaataa and Kool Herc. I thanked them personally for what they have done for us blacks and Muslims in France—they gave us a language, a culture, a community.” His voice broke a little.
I was struck by the emotion and sincerity of their words, and I had a few academic questions to ask: Why was the Bronx so central to the “moral geography” of working-class kids in Marseille? Where did this romantic view of the American ghetto come from? Why were they more fascinated by Bronx and Harlem folklore than by the culture of their parents’ countries of origin? Claudine suddenly reappeared and asked them to return to the tent. Grandmaster Flash, the legendary DJ and another iconic figure of global hip-hop, had arrived, and they were scheduled to meet him. “Flash invented scratching—I get paid to teach scratching in France,” said DJ Rebel getting up to leave. “A bientôt,” and the rap trio and their thoughtful DJ walked off. Half an hour later they were on the stage, waving their arms: “Sautez! Sautez! Sautez!” Boss One translated: “That means, ‘Jump! Jump! Jump!’ ”
One muggy afternoon in July 2003, I headed up to the South Bronx for the Crotona Park Jams, a small festival that is little-known locally, but manages to draw hip-hop fans from around the world. The annual event is organized by Tools of War, a grassroots arts organization that invites artists from across the country and Europe to perform in the Bronx, hip-hop’s putative birthplace, and to meet some of the genre’s pioneers, figures like Afrika Bambaataa and Kurtis Blow. I arrived at the park and asked around for Christie Z, a local promoter and activist. Christie, who has blue eyes and a ruddy complexion and wears a white head scarf, is the founder of Tools of War and a smaller group called Muslims in Hip Hop. She is married to Jorge Pabón (aka Fabel), a well-known dancer and master of ceremonies (MC), who appeared in the classic 1980s hip-hop film Beat Street and currently teaches “poppin’ ” and “lockin’ ” dance styles at NYU. The two—Christie Z & Fabel, as they’re known—are a power couple on the East Coast’s hip-hop scene, but they’ve become significant players internationally as well, organizing shows in Europe and bringing artists from overseas to perform in America.
Christie’s story is unusual. “People always ask me,” she says with a laugh, “how did a white girl from central Pennsylvania become a Muslim named Aziza who organizes turntable battles in the Bronx? I say the lyrics brought me here. I was in high school when I heard ‘The Message,’ ” she says, referring to the 1982 breakout song by Grandmaster Flash, which vividly described life in the ghetto during the Reagan era, and was one of hip-hop’s earliest mainstream hits. “I heard that track and I followed the sound to New York.”
I had arrived early hoping for a pre-show interview with the French rap crew 3ème Œil (Third Eye), who had flown in from Marseille to perform that evening. The rap trio is known in France for its socially conscious lyrics. Since the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the group had become even more political, rapping about what they call the West’s “stranglehold” on the East. I stood around the stage waiting. A circle had formed with a group of boys clapping and dancing, as the DJ on duty that evening—another pioneer, DJ Tony Tone of the Cold Crush Brothers—spun rap and Latin soul classics. Soon Third Eye’s manager, Claudine, a brown-haired woman in her early twenties, appeared and led me backstage. I explained that I was a researcher at Columbia writing about global hip-hop. Her face lit up. “We’ve been wanting to talk to you for a while,” she said, as she walked me through a backstage tent and out into the open. Later I found out Claudine had thought I was a representative of Columbia Records, about to offer her group a contract.
The sun was setting, a blue glow had enveloped the park, and I walked up to the four young men lounging on a bench facing the spectacular Indian Lake, which sits at the park’s center. Soon I was chatting with the rappers—Boss One (Mohammed) and Jo Popo (Mohammed), both born in the Comoros Islands off the coast of East Africa, but raised in Marseille—and their DJ, Rebel (Moustapha). They were dressed similarly in sagging denim Bermudas, eighties-style Nike high-tops, and baseball caps. Jo Popo gave me a copy of their new hit single, “Si Triste” (So Sad). I told him I’d already seen bootlegged copies at African music stands in Harlem. He nodded and gave me a fist bump. The song, popular among West African youth in New York, offers social commentary over a looping bass line, decrying police brutality and mass incarceration (with a special shout-out to the American death-row prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal). I asked them how the French press responded to their lyrics, and about the anti-immigrant National Front leader Jean-Marie Le Pen’s claim that hip-hop was a dangerous musical genre that originated in the casbahs of Algeria.
Boss One shook his head, “For Le Pen, everything bad—rap, crime, AIDS—comes from Algeria or Islam.” This was mid-2003; the War on Terror was in its early years. “The more Bush and Chirac attack Islam and say it’s bad,” said Boss One, “the more young people will think it’s good, and the more the oppressed will go to Islam and radical preachers.” His tone became a little defensive when talking about the banlieues, the poor suburbs that ring France’s major cities, stating that life in France’s cités was better than in the American ghettos. “Life is hard in France, but we have a social safety net. Here there is no such thing”—he stood up to emphasize the point—“and it will get worse with Bush, the cowboy, le rancheur!”
Their bluster disappeared when I asked what they thought of the Bronx. They grew wistful talking about the Mecca of hip-hop. Jo Popo smiled describing their meeting the day before with hip-hop legend Afrika Bambaataa. “C’était incroyable!” Bam, as he is known, is particularly loved in France, where he was instrumental in introducing hip-hop in the early 1980s. The group’s music mixer, DJ Rebel, who previously hadn’t said a word, suddenly spoke up. “I have dreamed of visiting the Bronx for all thirty-six years of my life. This is where hip-hop started, this music which has liberated us, which has saved us,” he said with apparent seriousness. “Yesterday we met Bambaataa and Kool Herc. I thanked them personally for what they have done for us blacks and Muslims in France—they gave us a language, a culture, a community.” His voice broke a little.
I was struck by the emotion and sincerity of their words, and I had a few academic questions to ask: Why was the Bronx so central to the “moral geography” of working-class kids in Marseille? Where did this romantic view of the American ghetto come from? Why were they more fascinated by Bronx and Harlem folklore than by the culture of their parents’ countries of origin? Claudine suddenly reappeared and asked them to return to the tent. Grandmaster Flash, the legendary DJ and another iconic figure of global hip-hop, had arrived, and they were scheduled to meet him. “Flash invented scratching—I get paid to teach scratching in France,” said DJ Rebel getting up to leave. “A bientôt,” and the rap trio and their thoughtful DJ walked off. Half an hour later they were on the stage, waving their arms: “Sautez! Sautez! Sautez!” Boss One translated: “That means, ‘Jump! Jump! Jump!’ ”
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Thursday, January 09, 2014
Sunday, January 05, 2014
aishah, rebeccah and young marriage
From time to time I've been caught up into highly-polemical religious discussions on the internet. At times I've found such discussions personally useful as a way to clarify for myself what I believe. Other times, the discussions are a source of aggravation and a waste of time. One of the more hot-button issues in the context of such discussions is the fact that Muhammad (saaws) married Aishah (ra) when she was relatively young. Alot of the time, my main response would be to point people to The Young Marriage of Aishah by Abû Imân cAbd ar-Rahmân Robert Squires, which provides a fairly well reasoned discussion of the subject.
Recently my mind has been blown after reading the article: Child Marriage in Ancient Israelite times which, among other things, cites the "respected" rabbinic opinion that Rebecca was only three years old when she got married to Isaac, and that in general, child marriage was INCREDIBLY widespread in the ancient Jewish world
Huff Post: Three-Year-Old Bride In Bible Kids' Book
Also see: Our Mother A'isha's Age At The Time Of Her Marriage to The Prophet which presents a fairly detailed argument for Aishah being older than is usually stated, while at the same time making it clear that young marriages were not at all atypical for the time (for example, Aisha herself was almost engaged to someone else).
Thursday, December 26, 2013
Monday, December 23, 2013
Monday, December 16, 2013
lorde's royals and the people's revolt
For some reason I find the minor controversy over Lord's song, "Royals" and whether it is racist or not really intriguing. I'm especially interested in seeing how different artists of color have engaged with the song through covers and remixes, with varying degrees of creative and political sophistication. (There are even a few white artists who add new levels of appropriation in the mix as well).
Feministing: Wow, that Lorde song Royals is racist
Feministing: A little more on Lorde, Royals, and Racism
The Guardian: Lorde's song Royals deserves nuanced critique
XXL: Five Best Rapper Remixes of Lorde’s “Royals”
ROYALS REMIX LORDE FT VA DRIVE from IN FOCUS on Vimeo.
(Ghetto from my head to my toe cover) by Vamsi ft. AceThursday, December 12, 2013
Thursday, December 05, 2013
Tuesday, December 03, 2013
muslim hijabi hipsters in america + reactions
Tumblr: Muslim Hipsters (Mipsterz)
Dr. Suad: On "Somewhere in America" and Mipsters
Struggling Hijabi: Somewhere in America, Ish is Complicated
The Islamic Monthly: Somewhere in America, Muslim Women Are “Cool”
I am the Poppy Flower: While I was Sleeping
Monday, December 02, 2013
the end of totally biased
Unfortunately, the show Totally Biased has been cancelled. But hopefully it will lead to bigger and better things for W. Kamau Bell.
W. Kamau Bell: A Baker’s Dozen of My Favorite “Totally Biased” Clips
see also: zain malik on w. kamau bell's totally biased
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Saturday, November 16, 2013
scientology and the nation of islam
This has got to be one of the more bizarre and unexpected developments on the American religious landscape:
Beliefnet: Is Louis Farrakhan trying to merge Islam and Scientology?
Examiner: Louis Farrakhan has sold out the N.O.I.
Patheos: When Worlds Collide II: Scientology and the Nation of Islam
New Republic: The Mothership of All Alliances
Wednesday, November 06, 2013
Saturday, November 02, 2013
tato laviera is dead
Hispanic New York: Tato Laviera, Prominent Nuyorican Poet, Is Dead
This makes me sad. When I was in college I discovered Tato Laviera's poetry and it played a big role in my thinking about what it means to be Afro-Latino. I even organized an event to bring him to campus and got to spend a chunk of time with him. He's apparently been sick for a while with diabetes and unconscious. Rest in Peace. Inna illahi wa inna ilayhi raji'un.
Saturday, October 26, 2013
Sunday, October 06, 2013
william copeland & joe reilly - twice in a lifetime
This is a sequel of my favorite song by Will Copeland and Joe Reilly (see "i've seen ethiopians knocking out rome")
A version of the same song also appears on Copeland's (aka Namaste Brown aka Ill Wizard aka Will See) new digital album: The Basics. (check the link to hear free samples, buy the whole album or individual tracks)
A version of the same song also appears on Copeland's (aka Namaste Brown aka Ill Wizard aka Will See) new digital album: The Basics. (check the link to hear free samples, buy the whole album or individual tracks)
Friday, September 27, 2013
the ugliness of beauty pagents
Latin@rebels: When You Are Not Latin@ Enough: The Sad Case of Jakiyah McKoy, Little Miss Hispanic Delaware
HuffPost:
Miss America 2014 Win Prompts Racist Twitter Backlash, Followed By (Some) Twitter Apologies
It is surprising to me how ugly and political beauty pageants seem to be getting lately. First Nina Davuluri becomes the first Miss America of Indian descent (prompting a confused and ignorant racist backlash). And then Jakiyah McKoy wins Little Miss Hispanic Delaware, only to have her crown stripped from her because 1) some racist Hispanics don't believe a black little girl can represent "latin beauty" and 2) she apparently wasn't able to produce proof of her Dominican grandmother. For me, Jakiyah's situation cuts a little closer to home since I could totally imagine crap like that happening to some of my younger relatives. I also find it especially ironic that the issue should ostensibly turn on the identity of the grandmother (see y tu abuela donde esta? and y tu abuela, a’onde esta?)
Tuesday, September 17, 2013
Thursday, September 12, 2013
bobby mcferrin & aziza mustafa zadeh
For some reason I thought I had posted this a long time ago but apparently not... it is a thoroughly "Grenada-esque" clip of Bobby McFerrin, Aziza Mustafa Zadeh singing Carmen.
qahera
I just found this tumblr with the comic adventures of Qahera, a sword-wielding, hijab-wearing, salty-mouthed, Egyptian super-heroine. There are only a few pages posted (with versions in English and Arabic) but I look forward to seeing what develops. Check it out.
Friday, July 26, 2013
muslim latinos: a new hybrid identity
Notes from the Social Field: Muslim Latinos: a new hybrid identity
no más, por favor: stereotypes of latina muslims
This is an old article but somehow I missed it. It is a nice reflection from Racialicious on the ways in which the media chooses to cover Latina Muslims (who would have thought there would be enough of a presence to generate a stereotype?)
Racialicious: No Más, Por Favor: Stereotypes of Latina Muslims
Wednesday, July 10, 2013
it's a small world after all...
black-arab solidarity: what could it mean? by liz derias
The Palestinian struggle is a black struggle by Susan Abulhawa
The Subjects of American Empire Are Joining in Solidarity by Kevin Zeese & Margaret Flowers
The Palestinian struggle is a black struggle by Susan Abulhawa
The Subjects of American Empire Are Joining in Solidarity by Kevin Zeese & Margaret Flowers
yasiin bey (aka mos def) demonstrates guantanamo bay force-feeding standard operating procedure
Yasiin Bey appears in a video launched recently demonstrating the Standard Operating Procedure for force-feeding prisoners on hunger strike at Guantanamo Bay. Made by human rights charity Reprieve and Bafta-award winning director Asif Kapadia, the film shows US actor and rapper formerly known as Mos Def experiencing the procedure.
Thursday, July 04, 2013
"somebody's watching me"
On the serious tip, I definitely think that "America the Beautiful" would make a much better national anthem than the "Star Spangled Banner". But this is starting to be a rising contender.
Thursday, May 09, 2013
race in cuba: the eternal black problem
Race in Cuba: The Eternal 'Black Problem' When it comes to race, Cuba is far from the utopia that black intellectuals like to think it is. As part of The Root's series exploring the island's color complex, Cuba's best-known novelist weighs in.
the afro-iranian community
The Afro-Iranian Community: Beyond Haji Firuz Blackface, the Slave Trade & Bandari Music at the Ajam Media Collective takes an interesting look at a little-known branch of the Black diaspora. (I think the only other time I've heard more than a passing comment about black Iranians was in the context of discussing the slaves belonging to the founders of the Babi and Bahai faiths.)
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