Tuesday, November 22, 2005
islam in latin america and latino muslims
Islam in Latin America and Latino Muslims is a collection of English-language pages on the named topic. Some content has appeared on Grenada before but some is also new.
la diaspora del medio oriente
La Diáspora del Medio Oriente is a rich collection of links to Spanish pages on Middle Eastern people in Latin America.
Monday, November 21, 2005
the afrolatino connection
From Black Enterprise: The Afro-Latino connection: can this group be the bridge to a broadbased black-Hispanic alliance?
CID WILSON HAD HIS FIRST UGLY RUN-IN WITH RACISM AS A TEENAGER ON A FRIDAY AFTERNOON. "One kid threw something at another kid," Wilson recalls. "The kid actually thought it was me." One of only 11 minorities in a senior student body of 300, Wilson recalls being called the "n-word" by the white teen.
"I was so infuriated with him," says the New York native. "The following Monday--its something I'm not proud of--I looked for him and got into an actual physical altercation. That whole weekend, it was just building up inside, how angry I was."
Justifiably angry, Wilson's father was the voice of reason. James A. Wilson, a medical doctor, counseled his young son to handle racism in a more constructive way in the future: demand more of yourself and work twice as hard as your white counterparts.
Now a 33-year-old Paramus, New Jersey, resident, Wilson took his father's words to heart and worked hard to excel. A former market analyst at Salomon Smith Barney, he is now a senior analyst at Whitaker Securities, a boutique investment bank, where he tracks past performance and future prospects of publicly traded stocks. Politically active, the NAACP member hopes to run for office someday. But the sting of that racial slur remains to this day.
Wilson's tale seems a familiar one to African Americans, except he's not African American. He's un puro (pure) Latino, whose parents immigrated to the United States from the Dominicans Republic. Wilson, president of the Dominican American National Roundtable, is one of millions of America's Afro-Latinos who belong to both of the United States' largest minority groups. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, approximately 1.7 million of the 38.8 million Hispanics identified themselves as both Hispanic and of African descent, yet many believe this number to be much higher--closer to 3.9 million. (More than 42% of all Latino respondents marked a box labeled "some other race" on the Census form.) Among the more famous Afro-Latinos: Dominican baseball superstar Sammy Sosa, retired Puerto Rican boxing champ Felix Trinidad, and the recently deceased Cuban salsa icon Celia Cruz.
And while historically attempts by Latinos and African Americans to forge economic, political, and social alliances have yielded lackluster results, it can be argued that this group--many of whom feel comfortable in both the black and Latino communities--could be the key to a much-needed business and political link between America's largest minority groups.
It's estimated that between 10% and 80% of Latinos who hail from countries like Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Colombia, Panama, Venezuela, Belize, and the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico have African ancestry. As the slave trade proliferated in the Americas from the 1500s through the 1800s, Europeans used Caribbean ports as a hub to transfer African slaves throughout North, Central, and South America, as part of the African Diaspora.
And some say Afro-Latinos have as much or more in common with African Americans as their lighter-skinned countrymen. Many regularly face discrimination and battle racism, both in the United States and in their native countries. Such disparaging terms as negrito (little black one), pelo malo (bad hair), or worse are commonplace for this group that often wields little political and economic power in their homelands. Poverty as well as poor educational and employment opportunities are high on the list of concerns to both African Americans and Afro-Latinos. However, the beginnings of a civil rights movement for blacks throughout Central and South America has come about fairly recently and Afro-Latinos are beginning to make some progress.
"In essence, white Latinos discriminate against black Latinos just like [white Americans] may do here," says Harry C. Alford, president and CEO of the National Black Chamber of Commerce. In order to effect change, Alford believes, "The 40 million blacks in this country need to start communicating better with the 135 million blacks in the Caribbean and South America."
The good news is, this group is beginning to come together to build a sense of pride in their African heritage by forming organizations and teaching others that Latinos crone in all shades. "Blacks have already walked twice the miles we have walked," says Grace Williams, an Afro-Latino who is president of the Atlanta chapter of the National Society of Hispanic MBAs (NSHMBA). "We're starting to walk right now."
Interestingly, efforts to increase awareness regarding Afro-Latino culture and plight can be found on the campuses of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs). At Howard University, Nadine Bascombe heads Cimarrones, a 50-member black student union of Caribbean, Central, and South Americans that recently expanded to include a chapter at Benedict College in South Carolina. Before Afro-Latinos can even begin to link the black-Hispanic communities, more Afro-Latinos must embrace their African heritage. "Within the population of what are considered Afro-Latinos, not all people identify with being black, so they'll join the Latino organizations because it's more of an assimilation of being white," says Bascombe, a junior. "It seems that if you relate yourself to being black it's something negative, so with that problem existing within the Afro-Latino population, not too many people run towards having an organization with that name."
Another HBCU, Spelman College, recently hosted a series of lectures, performances, and a conference looking at the African Diaspora and its impact on the Americas. A visiting group of Afro-Latinos from the Spanish-speaking nations of South America discussed their similarities based on common African heritages. "It seems [to be] apparent that Afro-Latins of various sorts see [African Americans] as role models with respect to political participation and economic success," says Sheila S. Walker, a professor of anthropology, who organized the event. "Their consciousness raising and civil rights movements were inspired by their knowledge of ours."
There's no denying the merits of bringing these groups together from a business standpoint. "If we were to combine the African American and Hispanic community, it means a purchasing power block of $1 trillion dollars," says George Herrera, former president and CEO of the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. "That kind of purchasing power and that kind of strength can basically make industry come to a standstill ... power within our communities lays in our discretionary purchasing with corporate America, to be able to change the corporate landscape and change the dialogue of how corporate America deals with our communities." Herrera says this power can be used to affect corporate governance, procurement, and employment opportunities.
Currently, the state of black Hispanic relations in the United States is a mixed picture. Surely the media frenzy surrounding the emergence of the Latino population as the largest minority group has lent itself to a contest like atmosphere between the racial groups. There's also no denying that old prejudices and rivalries remain on both sides--bringing numerous challenges to overcome before any alliance can be formed.
In order for an alliance to succeed, a national agenda would have to be created that includes such issues as diversity, inclusion, and access to economic, political, and educational resources, according to Nicolas C. Vaca, a Harvard Law School graduate and author of The Presumed Alliance: The Unspoken Conflict Between Latinos and Blacks and What it Means for America (Rayo; $24.95). "Let's figure out exactly what each party needs and wants, what is important for each group, and then work out a plan for achieving it without the rose colored glasses," he recommends.
Efforts for alliances are being made on the political front. Members of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation hosted members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Congressional Black Caucus, and the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus in a small beach resort in Puerto Rico in October 2003. Politicians were invited for a weekend of social activities as well as political dialogue designed to foster cross-cultural understanding and facilitate the forging of common political agendas. This was the second gathering: the group met for the first time in 2002 at a New Orleans retreat.
"In order for us to work together and dialogue, we have to be able to interact, to get to know each other," says Congressman Ciro D. Rodriguez (D-TX), chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. Rodriguez adds that the caucuses have worked to jointly draft a minority legislative health initiative that will be presented to Sens. Daschle and Kennedy.
In the meantime hopefully, Afro-Latinos will continue on the path to becoming an economic and political force, and by doing so, bring the Hispanic and black communities together. This is something Cid Wilson hopes to see. "We can honestly say we know what it's like to feel racism and discrimination--on the Latino and the African American sides," he says. "The way to build bridges is to get involved in both communities."
Whether these bridges are eventually built remains to be seen. Hailing from different countries with different cultures, the movement toward a stronger sense of Afro-Latino unity and identity must pick up speed. There is no doubt that challenges will abound, but the potential rewards are too promising to dismiss.
BLACK ENTERPRISE spoke with several prominent Afro-Latinos to better understand the issues they face daily. Here's what they had to say:
MISCONCEPTIONS IN THE MEDIA
Cuban-American actress Gina Torres' television credits include recurring roles on the FOX drama 24 and ABC's Alias, as well as appearances on Law & Order, The Agency, and Angel. In nearly all her roles, however, she plays an African American. She hopes to take on more Latina roles in the future.
"I've gone out for several [Latina] roles," says Torres, who recently had cameo appearances in the highly success fill Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions films. "It has not been my experience thus far that the people that have the power to make those [casting] decisions are ready to embrace a Latina who is dark. They like to keep it simple. You don't want complicated when you're trying to sell gum. You want to say 'that is a black person, that is a Latin person, that is a white person. Everybody looks like they came from where they're supposed to come from. Let's not complicate that.'"
The Bronx-raised Torres admits that she gets annoyed when people assume she's not a real Latino. "That it's so out of the realm of possibility that somebody like me can be all Latina. Both my parents were horn in Cuba; they came over in the mid-50s before the revolution."
Torres, who married Laurence Fishburne in 2002 after meeting on the set of Matrix Reloaded, views her work as contributing to the struggle and making a difference. "I often say I didn't become black until I became a professional actress. It's when I realized I wasn't the Latina that America was comfortable with. I'm still not. Inside of the industry, it's changing slowly," she says. "The darkest Latina that first had name recognition was Rosie Perez, but because she sounded familiar no one made a big deal out of it. But the image the business perpetuates and is still most comfortable with is Jennifer Lopez, as was Rita Moreno in her day."
Torres says that she is comfortable with serving as a bridge between the black and Latino cultures. "As a people, we are both certainly much stronger if we align ... we all want our children to grow up in a better place and to have better opportunities than we did." she says. "We all want the same things, we all hit a similar wall in terms of being viewed [against] standards that were set up so long ago, that we continue to bust out of and redefine. I am proof that it works."
At an early age, Maria Perez-Brown learned to live in two worlds. Born in Puerto Rico and moving to Brooklyn at the age of 6, she lived in what she describes as a segregated neighborhood. "One block was all Puerto Rican and the other block was all black," she recalls. "I felt early on that my identifying quality was not only that I was Latina, but that I was a black Latina flora an urban experience, with much more in common with my black friends from my neighborhood than with my Puerto Rican cousins from Puerto Rico."
In the early 1990s, Perez-Brown left the corporate world for the world of television. Now, Perez-Brown is a successful television producer. Among her credits is creating and producing Gullah Gullah Island, which ran for six years and was named one of the Top 10 television shows for children by TV Guide in 1996. Sire was also the creator and executive producer of Taina, a comedy series that aired from 2001 to 2002 on Nickelodeon about a 15-year-old Latina caught between two cultures: that of her traditional Latino family and the modern world of her school and friends. Perez-Brown uses her insight into both cultures to breathe life into characters that are believable and real.
"Sometimes you look at I all no shows and Latino characters in American television and you have a Jewish writer from the Upper East Side or from Los Angeles purporting to write what he thinks is a character that's Latino," she says. "What results many times is an insulting and very offensive stereotype of a character. At no point did they think it was important to find an authentic voice to write that character, or to integrate their writers, which is a pet peeve in my industry."
If African Americans and Latinos were to form lasting alliances via the Afro-Latino connection. Perez-Brown believes perception is the first thing that needs to be addressed. "The moment you start creating an image that these two groups are separate and have separate interests, you start creating a rift that allows people to divide and conquer," she says. "We can have, wield, 25% of the population--that is huge political power. That is a huge economic force that could make a much bigger difference than we could separately."
EMBRACING HIS HERITAGE
Though he's a BE 100s executive, Frank Mercado-Valdes remains rooted in the Latino community. The CEO of The Heritage Networks (No. 61 on the BE INDUSTRIAL/SERVICE 100 list with $61,5 million in revenue) often laments the fact that with the except inn hi" baseball programming, Afro-Latinos are nearly non-existent on television--even on Latino programs.
"In Latino broadcasting we're invisible because Latino broadcasting is Mexican-centric and Mexicans really don't have many blacks--they have certain pockets of Mexico where there are black populations who have been there a long time," he says. "But for the most part, you won't see black people in anything Mexican."
The son of Cuban and Puerto Rican parents says blacks in Latin America have an even lower standing socially than African Americans did prior to the Civil Rights Movement. "There never was a Dr. King, a Malcolm X, or a Stokely Carmichael," says the Bronx native. "So some of them come here and shed their identity and what happens is they merge with the greater white Latino community rather than with the black community."
His Latino heritage has influenced his business decisions. "My business niche was the African American community at first," he recalls. "I've changed the name of my company from The African Heritage Network to The Heritage Networks because I wanted to get into the perpetuation of English-language Latino programming." The syndicated network includes original properties such as Showtime at the Apollo, Livin" Large, and Weekend VIBE, as well as Resurrection Boulevard, a drama set in Los Angeles with a Latino cast.
And though he has seen prejudices firsthand in his industry, he still gets upset when he experiences it from the African American community. "I think the most frustrating thing comes from the black side of the equation--not the white. I've never had white people say 'you're not really black, are you?'" he says, "I'm always thinking 'when did I stop being black because my last name is Mercado or Valdes?'"
Mercado-Valdes says that the Afro-Latino community could be a powerful ally to both the African American and Latino communities once more civic, business, and political leaders emerge. "It's one of the things that I feel I should have been more active in that I libel like I haven't been," he confesses. "I spent so much time being black I forgot I was Latino."
CID WILSON HAD HIS FIRST UGLY RUN-IN WITH RACISM AS A TEENAGER ON A FRIDAY AFTERNOON. "One kid threw something at another kid," Wilson recalls. "The kid actually thought it was me." One of only 11 minorities in a senior student body of 300, Wilson recalls being called the "n-word" by the white teen.
"I was so infuriated with him," says the New York native. "The following Monday--its something I'm not proud of--I looked for him and got into an actual physical altercation. That whole weekend, it was just building up inside, how angry I was."
Justifiably angry, Wilson's father was the voice of reason. James A. Wilson, a medical doctor, counseled his young son to handle racism in a more constructive way in the future: demand more of yourself and work twice as hard as your white counterparts.
Now a 33-year-old Paramus, New Jersey, resident, Wilson took his father's words to heart and worked hard to excel. A former market analyst at Salomon Smith Barney, he is now a senior analyst at Whitaker Securities, a boutique investment bank, where he tracks past performance and future prospects of publicly traded stocks. Politically active, the NAACP member hopes to run for office someday. But the sting of that racial slur remains to this day.
Wilson's tale seems a familiar one to African Americans, except he's not African American. He's un puro (pure) Latino, whose parents immigrated to the United States from the Dominicans Republic. Wilson, president of the Dominican American National Roundtable, is one of millions of America's Afro-Latinos who belong to both of the United States' largest minority groups. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, approximately 1.7 million of the 38.8 million Hispanics identified themselves as both Hispanic and of African descent, yet many believe this number to be much higher--closer to 3.9 million. (More than 42% of all Latino respondents marked a box labeled "some other race" on the Census form.) Among the more famous Afro-Latinos: Dominican baseball superstar Sammy Sosa, retired Puerto Rican boxing champ Felix Trinidad, and the recently deceased Cuban salsa icon Celia Cruz.
And while historically attempts by Latinos and African Americans to forge economic, political, and social alliances have yielded lackluster results, it can be argued that this group--many of whom feel comfortable in both the black and Latino communities--could be the key to a much-needed business and political link between America's largest minority groups.
It's estimated that between 10% and 80% of Latinos who hail from countries like Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Colombia, Panama, Venezuela, Belize, and the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico have African ancestry. As the slave trade proliferated in the Americas from the 1500s through the 1800s, Europeans used Caribbean ports as a hub to transfer African slaves throughout North, Central, and South America, as part of the African Diaspora.
And some say Afro-Latinos have as much or more in common with African Americans as their lighter-skinned countrymen. Many regularly face discrimination and battle racism, both in the United States and in their native countries. Such disparaging terms as negrito (little black one), pelo malo (bad hair), or worse are commonplace for this group that often wields little political and economic power in their homelands. Poverty as well as poor educational and employment opportunities are high on the list of concerns to both African Americans and Afro-Latinos. However, the beginnings of a civil rights movement for blacks throughout Central and South America has come about fairly recently and Afro-Latinos are beginning to make some progress.
"In essence, white Latinos discriminate against black Latinos just like [white Americans] may do here," says Harry C. Alford, president and CEO of the National Black Chamber of Commerce. In order to effect change, Alford believes, "The 40 million blacks in this country need to start communicating better with the 135 million blacks in the Caribbean and South America."
The good news is, this group is beginning to come together to build a sense of pride in their African heritage by forming organizations and teaching others that Latinos crone in all shades. "Blacks have already walked twice the miles we have walked," says Grace Williams, an Afro-Latino who is president of the Atlanta chapter of the National Society of Hispanic MBAs (NSHMBA). "We're starting to walk right now."
Interestingly, efforts to increase awareness regarding Afro-Latino culture and plight can be found on the campuses of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs). At Howard University, Nadine Bascombe heads Cimarrones, a 50-member black student union of Caribbean, Central, and South Americans that recently expanded to include a chapter at Benedict College in South Carolina. Before Afro-Latinos can even begin to link the black-Hispanic communities, more Afro-Latinos must embrace their African heritage. "Within the population of what are considered Afro-Latinos, not all people identify with being black, so they'll join the Latino organizations because it's more of an assimilation of being white," says Bascombe, a junior. "It seems that if you relate yourself to being black it's something negative, so with that problem existing within the Afro-Latino population, not too many people run towards having an organization with that name."
Another HBCU, Spelman College, recently hosted a series of lectures, performances, and a conference looking at the African Diaspora and its impact on the Americas. A visiting group of Afro-Latinos from the Spanish-speaking nations of South America discussed their similarities based on common African heritages. "It seems [to be] apparent that Afro-Latins of various sorts see [African Americans] as role models with respect to political participation and economic success," says Sheila S. Walker, a professor of anthropology, who organized the event. "Their consciousness raising and civil rights movements were inspired by their knowledge of ours."
There's no denying the merits of bringing these groups together from a business standpoint. "If we were to combine the African American and Hispanic community, it means a purchasing power block of $1 trillion dollars," says George Herrera, former president and CEO of the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. "That kind of purchasing power and that kind of strength can basically make industry come to a standstill ... power within our communities lays in our discretionary purchasing with corporate America, to be able to change the corporate landscape and change the dialogue of how corporate America deals with our communities." Herrera says this power can be used to affect corporate governance, procurement, and employment opportunities.
Currently, the state of black Hispanic relations in the United States is a mixed picture. Surely the media frenzy surrounding the emergence of the Latino population as the largest minority group has lent itself to a contest like atmosphere between the racial groups. There's also no denying that old prejudices and rivalries remain on both sides--bringing numerous challenges to overcome before any alliance can be formed.
In order for an alliance to succeed, a national agenda would have to be created that includes such issues as diversity, inclusion, and access to economic, political, and educational resources, according to Nicolas C. Vaca, a Harvard Law School graduate and author of The Presumed Alliance: The Unspoken Conflict Between Latinos and Blacks and What it Means for America (Rayo; $24.95). "Let's figure out exactly what each party needs and wants, what is important for each group, and then work out a plan for achieving it without the rose colored glasses," he recommends.
Efforts for alliances are being made on the political front. Members of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation hosted members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Congressional Black Caucus, and the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus in a small beach resort in Puerto Rico in October 2003. Politicians were invited for a weekend of social activities as well as political dialogue designed to foster cross-cultural understanding and facilitate the forging of common political agendas. This was the second gathering: the group met for the first time in 2002 at a New Orleans retreat.
"In order for us to work together and dialogue, we have to be able to interact, to get to know each other," says Congressman Ciro D. Rodriguez (D-TX), chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. Rodriguez adds that the caucuses have worked to jointly draft a minority legislative health initiative that will be presented to Sens. Daschle and Kennedy.
In the meantime hopefully, Afro-Latinos will continue on the path to becoming an economic and political force, and by doing so, bring the Hispanic and black communities together. This is something Cid Wilson hopes to see. "We can honestly say we know what it's like to feel racism and discrimination--on the Latino and the African American sides," he says. "The way to build bridges is to get involved in both communities."
Whether these bridges are eventually built remains to be seen. Hailing from different countries with different cultures, the movement toward a stronger sense of Afro-Latino unity and identity must pick up speed. There is no doubt that challenges will abound, but the potential rewards are too promising to dismiss.
BLACK ENTERPRISE spoke with several prominent Afro-Latinos to better understand the issues they face daily. Here's what they had to say:
MISCONCEPTIONS IN THE MEDIA
Cuban-American actress Gina Torres' television credits include recurring roles on the FOX drama 24 and ABC's Alias, as well as appearances on Law & Order, The Agency, and Angel. In nearly all her roles, however, she plays an African American. She hopes to take on more Latina roles in the future.
"I've gone out for several [Latina] roles," says Torres, who recently had cameo appearances in the highly success fill Matrix Reloaded and Matrix Revolutions films. "It has not been my experience thus far that the people that have the power to make those [casting] decisions are ready to embrace a Latina who is dark. They like to keep it simple. You don't want complicated when you're trying to sell gum. You want to say 'that is a black person, that is a Latin person, that is a white person. Everybody looks like they came from where they're supposed to come from. Let's not complicate that.'"
The Bronx-raised Torres admits that she gets annoyed when people assume she's not a real Latino. "That it's so out of the realm of possibility that somebody like me can be all Latina. Both my parents were horn in Cuba; they came over in the mid-50s before the revolution."
Torres, who married Laurence Fishburne in 2002 after meeting on the set of Matrix Reloaded, views her work as contributing to the struggle and making a difference. "I often say I didn't become black until I became a professional actress. It's when I realized I wasn't the Latina that America was comfortable with. I'm still not. Inside of the industry, it's changing slowly," she says. "The darkest Latina that first had name recognition was Rosie Perez, but because she sounded familiar no one made a big deal out of it. But the image the business perpetuates and is still most comfortable with is Jennifer Lopez, as was Rita Moreno in her day."
Torres says that she is comfortable with serving as a bridge between the black and Latino cultures. "As a people, we are both certainly much stronger if we align ... we all want our children to grow up in a better place and to have better opportunities than we did." she says. "We all want the same things, we all hit a similar wall in terms of being viewed [against] standards that were set up so long ago, that we continue to bust out of and redefine. I am proof that it works."
At an early age, Maria Perez-Brown learned to live in two worlds. Born in Puerto Rico and moving to Brooklyn at the age of 6, she lived in what she describes as a segregated neighborhood. "One block was all Puerto Rican and the other block was all black," she recalls. "I felt early on that my identifying quality was not only that I was Latina, but that I was a black Latina flora an urban experience, with much more in common with my black friends from my neighborhood than with my Puerto Rican cousins from Puerto Rico."
In the early 1990s, Perez-Brown left the corporate world for the world of television. Now, Perez-Brown is a successful television producer. Among her credits is creating and producing Gullah Gullah Island, which ran for six years and was named one of the Top 10 television shows for children by TV Guide in 1996. Sire was also the creator and executive producer of Taina, a comedy series that aired from 2001 to 2002 on Nickelodeon about a 15-year-old Latina caught between two cultures: that of her traditional Latino family and the modern world of her school and friends. Perez-Brown uses her insight into both cultures to breathe life into characters that are believable and real.
"Sometimes you look at I all no shows and Latino characters in American television and you have a Jewish writer from the Upper East Side or from Los Angeles purporting to write what he thinks is a character that's Latino," she says. "What results many times is an insulting and very offensive stereotype of a character. At no point did they think it was important to find an authentic voice to write that character, or to integrate their writers, which is a pet peeve in my industry."
If African Americans and Latinos were to form lasting alliances via the Afro-Latino connection. Perez-Brown believes perception is the first thing that needs to be addressed. "The moment you start creating an image that these two groups are separate and have separate interests, you start creating a rift that allows people to divide and conquer," she says. "We can have, wield, 25% of the population--that is huge political power. That is a huge economic force that could make a much bigger difference than we could separately."
EMBRACING HIS HERITAGE
Though he's a BE 100s executive, Frank Mercado-Valdes remains rooted in the Latino community. The CEO of The Heritage Networks (No. 61 on the BE INDUSTRIAL/SERVICE 100 list with $61,5 million in revenue) often laments the fact that with the except inn hi" baseball programming, Afro-Latinos are nearly non-existent on television--even on Latino programs.
"In Latino broadcasting we're invisible because Latino broadcasting is Mexican-centric and Mexicans really don't have many blacks--they have certain pockets of Mexico where there are black populations who have been there a long time," he says. "But for the most part, you won't see black people in anything Mexican."
The son of Cuban and Puerto Rican parents says blacks in Latin America have an even lower standing socially than African Americans did prior to the Civil Rights Movement. "There never was a Dr. King, a Malcolm X, or a Stokely Carmichael," says the Bronx native. "So some of them come here and shed their identity and what happens is they merge with the greater white Latino community rather than with the black community."
His Latino heritage has influenced his business decisions. "My business niche was the African American community at first," he recalls. "I've changed the name of my company from The African Heritage Network to The Heritage Networks because I wanted to get into the perpetuation of English-language Latino programming." The syndicated network includes original properties such as Showtime at the Apollo, Livin" Large, and Weekend VIBE, as well as Resurrection Boulevard, a drama set in Los Angeles with a Latino cast.
And though he has seen prejudices firsthand in his industry, he still gets upset when he experiences it from the African American community. "I think the most frustrating thing comes from the black side of the equation--not the white. I've never had white people say 'you're not really black, are you?'" he says, "I'm always thinking 'when did I stop being black because my last name is Mercado or Valdes?'"
Mercado-Valdes says that the Afro-Latino community could be a powerful ally to both the African American and Latino communities once more civic, business, and political leaders emerge. "It's one of the things that I feel I should have been more active in that I libel like I haven't been," he confesses. "I spent so much time being black I forgot I was Latino."
somos primos: black latino connection
Somos Primos is a website dedicated to Hispanic heritage and diversity issues (with a really strong emphasis on history). One area of the site is the Black Latino Connection which deals with the role of people of African descent in Hispanic American history. A distinctive feature of the Black Latino Connection is that instead of emphasizing Caribbean, most of the information has to do with people of African descent in Mexico, Florida and Argentina.
Sunday, November 20, 2005
gender jihad
Earlier I had a blog entry about the international congress on islamic feminism. A few weeks ago, BBC News followed up on the congress with a story: Islam feminists urge gender jihad
zaid shakir on rosa parks
Now that I have a new source to plunder content from... lol... here is: Zaid Shakir commenting On the Passing of Rosa Parks The article invites a comparison between the Black Civil Rights movement and Muslim efforts for greater acceptance and tolernace in the current political climate. And of course, the obvious question is: Will we stand or will we sit?
new islamic directions
I've frequently included links related to Imam Zaid Shakir here at Planet Grenada. For example:
martin and malcolm
civic involvement and islam
approaching ramadan
not just in february
we are all collateral damage
islam, prophet muhammad and blackness
But now there is also a website called New Islamic Directions which is "dedicated to disseminating the work of Imam Zaid Shakir through print and audio formats". Check it out.
martin and malcolm
civic involvement and islam
approaching ramadan
not just in february
we are all collateral damage
islam, prophet muhammad and blackness
But now there is also a website called New Islamic Directions which is "dedicated to disseminating the work of Imam Zaid Shakir through print and audio formats". Check it out.
Saturday, November 19, 2005
exotic
by suheir hammad ([1] , [2] , [3])
don't wanna be your exotic
some delicate fragile colorful bird
imprisoned caged
in a land foreign to the stretch of her wings
don't wanna be your exotic
women everywhere are just like me
some taller darker nicer than me
but like me but just the same
women everywhere carry my nose on their faces
my name on their spirits
don't wanna
don't seduce yourself with
my otherness my hair
wasn't put on top of my head to entice
you into some mysterious black voodoo
the beat of my lashes against each other
ain't some dark desert beat
it's just a blink
get over it
don't wanna be your exotic
your lovin of my beauty ain't more than
funky fornication plain pink perversion
in fact nasty necrophilia
cause my beauty is dead to you
I am dead to you
not your
harem girl geisha doll banana picker
pom pom girl pum pum shorts coffee maker
town whore belly dancer private dancer
la malinche venus hottentot laundry girl
your immaculate vessel emasculating princess
don't wanna be
your erotic
not your exotic
don't wanna be your exotic
some delicate fragile colorful bird
imprisoned caged
in a land foreign to the stretch of her wings
don't wanna be your exotic
women everywhere are just like me
some taller darker nicer than me
but like me but just the same
women everywhere carry my nose on their faces
my name on their spirits
don't wanna
don't seduce yourself with
my otherness my hair
wasn't put on top of my head to entice
you into some mysterious black voodoo
the beat of my lashes against each other
ain't some dark desert beat
it's just a blink
get over it
don't wanna be your exotic
your lovin of my beauty ain't more than
funky fornication plain pink perversion
in fact nasty necrophilia
cause my beauty is dead to you
I am dead to you
not your
harem girl geisha doll banana picker
pom pom girl pum pum shorts coffee maker
town whore belly dancer private dancer
la malinche venus hottentot laundry girl
your immaculate vessel emasculating princess
don't wanna be
your erotic
not your exotic
what kind of food am i?
I'm not sure what this means about me... but in case you were wondering, this is the result I got... It is sort of an odd concept, thinking of people as things to be consumed. The idea reminds me of a Suheir Hammad poem. Also, the movie Soylent Green
| You Are Japanese Food |
 Strange yet delicious. Contrary to popular belief, you're not always eaten raw. |
islam and the blackamerican: finally reading it
Yesterday, I finally started reading Prof. Sherman (Abdul-Hakim) Jackson's book Islam and the Blackamerican: Looking Toward the Third Resurrection. In the section I've read so far, Jackson deals with the question of why African-Americans (or Blackamericans) seem to have such a strong affinity to Islam and why Blackamericans form the largest part of the American Muslim community.
One might be tempted to suggest (and I actually have in some early Grenada entries like it's a black thing? and my name is kunta) that that there is a general affinity between "Blackness" and "Islam" but Jackson questions whether it is even possible to meaningfully speak in such abstract and universal terms.
In South Africa, for example, the Muslim community is represented mostly by people of Asian descent and Islam hasn't really made significant inroads in the Black population. And this situation wasn't helped by the fact that the Muslim community was incredibly late in terms of getting involved in the struggle against apartheid.
While in Latin America (where Catholicism was prevalent), it was easier for people of African descent to resist white supremacy through following African-based syncretic religions (rather than Islam).
What Jackson argues is that there is a specific body of ideas and themes he calls "Black Religion" which arose in the United States and exists somewhat autonomously from any particular religious community.
But Black Religion isn't just a catch-all for all the religions of Blackamerica, only those with a certain "political" outlook:
Jackson argues that historically in the United States, Black Religion had been "married" to the Black Church but that the nature of that relationship changed and a "divorce" occured (this is reminiscent to some things we've mentioned before in no place for me and pimpin' ain't easy) If we want to extend the metaphor further, we might even say that for a long time now, Black Religion has been "seeing other people" which might help to explain Blackamerican willingness to explore certain non-mainstream spiritual paths (Islam, Nation of Gods and Earths, Hebrew Israelites, Rastafarianism, Ma'at, Santeria, African Traditional Religion, etc.)
In the early part of the 20th century, Black Religion was strongly associated with proto-Islamic movements like the Nation of Islam and Moorish Science. This affinity continued even after Warithdeen Muhammad took over the Nation of Islam (after the death of his father, Elijah Muhammad) and brought them into the Sunni fold. Now there is an interesting and complex relationship now between orthodox Islam of Blackamericans and Black Religion (which I'm assuming the book will discuss further.)
(to be continued...)
More on the book:
review of islam and the blackamerican
Islam And The Blackamerican: The Third Resurrection
black orientalism
an extensive excerpt from the book
More on Jackson's other work:
islam, past, present, and future: summary
more on sherman jackson
might as well make it sherman jackson day
One might be tempted to suggest (and I actually have in some early Grenada entries like it's a black thing? and my name is kunta) that that there is a general affinity between "Blackness" and "Islam" but Jackson questions whether it is even possible to meaningfully speak in such abstract and universal terms.
In South Africa, for example, the Muslim community is represented mostly by people of Asian descent and Islam hasn't really made significant inroads in the Black population. And this situation wasn't helped by the fact that the Muslim community was incredibly late in terms of getting involved in the struggle against apartheid.
While in Latin America (where Catholicism was prevalent), it was easier for people of African descent to resist white supremacy through following African-based syncretic religions (rather than Islam).
What Jackson argues is that there is a specific body of ideas and themes he calls "Black Religion" which arose in the United States and exists somewhat autonomously from any particular religious community.
Black Religion has no theology and no orthodoxy; it has no institutionalized ecclesiastical order and no public or private liturgy. It has no foundation documents or scriptures, like the Baghavad Ghita or the Bible, and no founding figures, like Buddha or Zoroaster. The God of Black Religion is neither specifically Jesus, Yaweh, nor Allah but an abstract category into which any and all of these can be fit, the “God of our weary years,” the “God of our silent tears.” In a real sense, Black Religion might be profitably thought of as the ‘deism’ or ‘natural religion’ of Blackamericans, a spontaneous folk orientation at once grounded in the belief in a supernatural power outside of human history yet uniquely focused on that power’s manifesting itself in the form of interventions into the crucible of American race relations.
But Black Religion isn't just a catch-all for all the religions of Blackamerica, only those with a certain "political" outlook:
[At] bottom, Black Religion remains, in its abiding commitment to protest, resistance, and liberation, ultimately more committed to a refusal to be the object of another’s will than it is to a positive affirmation of any particular philosophy of life. Subversion, resistance, protest, opposition: These are all key to the constitution of Black Religion.
Jackson argues that historically in the United States, Black Religion had been "married" to the Black Church but that the nature of that relationship changed and a "divorce" occured (this is reminiscent to some things we've mentioned before in no place for me and pimpin' ain't easy) If we want to extend the metaphor further, we might even say that for a long time now, Black Religion has been "seeing other people" which might help to explain Blackamerican willingness to explore certain non-mainstream spiritual paths (Islam, Nation of Gods and Earths, Hebrew Israelites, Rastafarianism, Ma'at, Santeria, African Traditional Religion, etc.)
In the early part of the 20th century, Black Religion was strongly associated with proto-Islamic movements like the Nation of Islam and Moorish Science. This affinity continued even after Warithdeen Muhammad took over the Nation of Islam (after the death of his father, Elijah Muhammad) and brought them into the Sunni fold. Now there is an interesting and complex relationship now between orthodox Islam of Blackamericans and Black Religion (which I'm assuming the book will discuss further.)
(to be continued...)
More on the book:
review of islam and the blackamerican
Islam And The Blackamerican: The Third Resurrection
black orientalism
an extensive excerpt from the book
More on Jackson's other work:
islam, past, present, and future: summary
more on sherman jackson
might as well make it sherman jackson day
Thursday, November 17, 2005
good questions, better answers
Recently, in an op-ed piece for the LA Times, Dennis Prager put forth a series of questions to the world's 1.3 billion Muslims which probably express many of the nagging suspicions (or blatant accusations) many Westerners have towards Islam.
1. Why are you so quiet (about terrorism)?
2. Why are none of the Palestinian terrorists Christian?
3. Why is only one of the 47 Muslim-majority countries a free country?
4. Why are so many atrocities committed and threatened by Muslims in the name of Islam?
5. Why do countries governed by religious Muslims persecute other religions?
Both Umar Lee (in Muslim Answers to the Questions of Dennis Prager) and former Bahai, Juan Cole (in Muslims and the 5 Questions) soundly address these suspicions on their respective blogs.
1. Why are you so quiet (about terrorism)?
2. Why are none of the Palestinian terrorists Christian?
3. Why is only one of the 47 Muslim-majority countries a free country?
4. Why are so many atrocities committed and threatened by Muslims in the name of Islam?
5. Why do countries governed by religious Muslims persecute other religions?
Both Umar Lee (in Muslim Answers to the Questions of Dennis Prager) and former Bahai, Juan Cole (in Muslims and the 5 Questions) soundly address these suspicions on their respective blogs.
Wednesday, November 16, 2005
los cabildos
Los Cabildos is a rich portal for articles and other information of interest to Afrolatinos.
saxakali
I recently found the Saxakali People of Color Portal which has some excellent links to information involving multicultural and political topics. In particular, they have a section on Caribbean Studies with many good articles which fit in well with Planet Grenada.
next french revolution
From the Christian Science Monitor:
Next French revolution: a less colorblind society
Next French revolution: a less colorblind society
go back to mexico?
This is a very interesting piece from Seeingblack.com called The Black Man's White Man Fantasies by David Ikard. For me it is a reminder of how some Blacks in the United States are what I would call Afro-Gringos, people who are Black, but still very much Anglo and willing to use what little power they have (through U.S. citizenship, facility with English, knowledge of the "system" etc.) against non-Anglos. It also discusses a certain insanity behind the ways we participate in the oppression of ourselves, and people who should be our allies. Here is an excerpt:
The truth of the matter is that most Black men, whether they will admit it or not, have a love/hate relationship with White men. They covet the ways that White men are able to use their social and economic power to control minorities and women, even as they vehemently repudiate the ways that that power is being used to dominate and control them. It is this phenomenon of complicity in oppression that Audre Lorde had in mind when she noted that the "master's tools will never dismantle the master's house." The point that I am trying to make is simply this: In order to have a serious impact on the dismantling of racial inequities in the twenty-first century, Black men must own up to the ways that they participate in the maintenance of the White male status quo. I am not talking about the "treat-your-woman-as-a-Black-queen-and-take-care-of-your-children" kind of transformation. I am talking about a serious overhaul of the ways that we think about manhood.
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
roger bonair-agard
A poem by Roger Bonair-Agard (I imagine it was dedicated to Martin Espada, at least in part, because of this poem, previously mentioned on Grenada). At the very least, one poem reminds me of the other.
part 2 / electric boogaloo / song for Trent Lott (again) who said “…I want the president to look across the country and find the best man, woman or minority that he can find, …a strict constructionist -- yes, a conservative… I suspect there are a lot of really good, qualified women and minorities and men in America that could step up to this job.” / a sermon and some prayers
(for Amiri Baraka and Martin Espada)
this is the hardest poem
to write
I’d believed we’d agreed
on at least one thing
the fundamental human-ness
of us all
even your beloved Strom
(see my first song for you)
entertaining his black daughter’s
twice annual visits
(for checks for college and her silence)
I imagine
cringes
at this (less foot-in-the-mouth
than deep-seated hate)
projection
through bus boycotts and Martin’s sermon
on the mount
through apartheid’s fall
and the revelations of Sally Hemmings
through Muhammed Ali and Clarence
and Malcolm and Condoleeza
three-fifths is still enough
math for you to divide
man from minority
from Mississippi King Cotton’s bleeding
fingers to Harriet
even after Thurgood and Rosa
your rhetoric still
a white supremacist Nazi salute
to a nation that will excuse you
(again)
while it condemns Angela
and Amiri and Mumia and Assata
you pulpit for man or minority
a strict constructionist (spell revisionist)
to people the people’s highest court
so dig it
On this Halloween
may the spirits of 2 million
drowned-at-sea Africans
drag you to their graves
demanding a meeting
May the souls of men
- men I say – railroaded North
by Harriet pick the scabs
of their foot-blisters
over the soup
during your evening meal
May Nat Turner show up
naked and grinning
and covered in the blood
of plantation owners
in your daughter’s room
May you hallucinate
Martin’s little black children
and little white / little black
children and little white / little
black children and little white
children till all your grandkids
turn brown
May every black maid
you’ve ever coveted
show up nine months pregnant
in labor and deliver on the steps
of the capitol babies all of whom
have your eyes
This is the hardest poem
I never thought I’d have to prove
human again
though I’ve come to expect
to prove worthy
to prove non-threatening
to prove intelligent
to prove not hip-hop
to prove I won’t rob you
to prove English speaking
to prove innocent after being assumed guilty
but never human Trent
never human
Trent
What do you expect to prove
when you awake on mornings
how do you a Christian man (you say)
expect the spirits the saints
Jesus any just God
to let you get away
with all those bodies
all those hanging bodies
all those burnt bodies
all those scarred bodies
all those bottom of the Tallahachee bodies
and Amadou’s body
and Biko’s body
and my grandfather’s body
and Fred Hampton’s body
and Fred Hampton, Jr.’s body
and Jimi and Emmett and Medgar
and the invisible man who stole
Susan Smith’s kids
and all those boys shot dead in East New York
and Little Rock and Watts
and everywhere people know
the meaning of colonialism
and pre-emptive war
and first-strike option
how do you expect to get away
from your conscience
from all them black babies
born of all them colored people
all them orphaned Iraqi babies
all them orphaned AIDS babies
and children of disappeared Latin American
activists for the people Trent
from all them Bloods Crips
and Latin Kings from all them vatos
and re-incarnated of badass Indian and
runaway slave gun-toting
in the streets of America niggas Trent
how?
you keep talking and we’ll keep coming
showing up in your dreams
every Halloween in every revolution’s age
here’re a sermon and some prayers for you
what heaven do you think waits for you?
what hell are you living in right now?
part 2 / electric boogaloo / song for Trent Lott (again) who said “…I want the president to look across the country and find the best man, woman or minority that he can find, …a strict constructionist -- yes, a conservative… I suspect there are a lot of really good, qualified women and minorities and men in America that could step up to this job.” / a sermon and some prayers
(for Amiri Baraka and Martin Espada)
this is the hardest poem
to write
I’d believed we’d agreed
on at least one thing
the fundamental human-ness
of us all
even your beloved Strom
(see my first song for you)
entertaining his black daughter’s
twice annual visits
(for checks for college and her silence)
I imagine
cringes
at this (less foot-in-the-mouth
than deep-seated hate)
projection
through bus boycotts and Martin’s sermon
on the mount
through apartheid’s fall
and the revelations of Sally Hemmings
through Muhammed Ali and Clarence
and Malcolm and Condoleeza
three-fifths is still enough
math for you to divide
man from minority
from Mississippi King Cotton’s bleeding
fingers to Harriet
even after Thurgood and Rosa
your rhetoric still
a white supremacist Nazi salute
to a nation that will excuse you
(again)
while it condemns Angela
and Amiri and Mumia and Assata
you pulpit for man or minority
a strict constructionist (spell revisionist)
to people the people’s highest court
so dig it
On this Halloween
may the spirits of 2 million
drowned-at-sea Africans
drag you to their graves
demanding a meeting
May the souls of men
- men I say – railroaded North
by Harriet pick the scabs
of their foot-blisters
over the soup
during your evening meal
May Nat Turner show up
naked and grinning
and covered in the blood
of plantation owners
in your daughter’s room
May you hallucinate
Martin’s little black children
and little white / little black
children and little white / little
black children and little white
children till all your grandkids
turn brown
May every black maid
you’ve ever coveted
show up nine months pregnant
in labor and deliver on the steps
of the capitol babies all of whom
have your eyes
This is the hardest poem
I never thought I’d have to prove
human again
though I’ve come to expect
to prove worthy
to prove non-threatening
to prove intelligent
to prove not hip-hop
to prove I won’t rob you
to prove English speaking
to prove innocent after being assumed guilty
but never human Trent
never human
Trent
What do you expect to prove
when you awake on mornings
how do you a Christian man (you say)
expect the spirits the saints
Jesus any just God
to let you get away
with all those bodies
all those hanging bodies
all those burnt bodies
all those scarred bodies
all those bottom of the Tallahachee bodies
and Amadou’s body
and Biko’s body
and my grandfather’s body
and Fred Hampton’s body
and Fred Hampton, Jr.’s body
and Jimi and Emmett and Medgar
and the invisible man who stole
Susan Smith’s kids
and all those boys shot dead in East New York
and Little Rock and Watts
and everywhere people know
the meaning of colonialism
and pre-emptive war
and first-strike option
how do you expect to get away
from your conscience
from all them black babies
born of all them colored people
all them orphaned Iraqi babies
all them orphaned AIDS babies
and children of disappeared Latin American
activists for the people Trent
from all them Bloods Crips
and Latin Kings from all them vatos
and re-incarnated of badass Indian and
runaway slave gun-toting
in the streets of America niggas Trent
how?
you keep talking and we’ll keep coming
showing up in your dreams
every Halloween in every revolution’s age
here’re a sermon and some prayers for you
what heaven do you think waits for you?
what hell are you living in right now?
the melungeons
From Hispanicmuslims.com
The Melungeons: An Untold Story of Ethnic cleansing in America By Brent Kennedy (full story)
Many of these people made their way to the Americas where, to varying degrees, they remained a distinct ethnic group.
The Melungeons: An Untold Story of Ethnic cleansing in America By Brent Kennedy (full story)
Perhaps Nancy Hanks, the mother of Abraham Lincoln, was Melungeon. It somehow seems fitting that one of America's greatest Presidents should be of mixed race and probably Muslim heritage. But who are the Melungeons? Historical records document that from 1492 through the early 1600's an estimated 500,000 Jews and Muslims were exiled from Spain and Portugal through a religious witch-hunt known as the Spanish Inquisition. Hundreds of thousands of Muslim exiles escaped to their ancestral homelands of Morocco, Algeria, Libya, and Tunisia. In fact, the well-known Barbary Coast Pirates of North Africa sprang from this group. They, along with their Turkish compatriots, were renowned for their seagoing exploits as they sought revenge against the Spanish and Portuguese in ferocious Mediterranean Sea battles.
Many of these people made their way to the Americas where, to varying degrees, they remained a distinct ethnic group.
Monday, November 14, 2005
rolling... rolling... rolling on the river
new blogs on my blogroll: A Beautiful Struggle and The Crime of Aquinas Just goes to show you, if you make enough cool comments on my blog, you'll be famous... lol...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)