islam and dreadlocks

I recently found an interesting blog called Islamically locked. which reminded me of how way back in the day, around the time I first became Muslim, I toyed with the idea of growing dreadlocks. At the time I thought that dreadlocks were "cool" but questionable for a couple of reasons:

1. Firstly (and this is probably the most nitpicky argument) If you go all out and take some version of the Nazrite vow, you would have to break it when you went on Hajj.

2. Even without dreads, when I would go out at night, random people would occasionally ask me for weed. (although I should probably add that I would sometimes wear a big poofy red, black, yellow and green "rasta" hat). In any case, I thought that if I went further and actually had dreads, the requests probably would have gotten ridiculous.

3. In Islam, there is a basic principle of not imitating the practices of non-Muslims and dreadlocks are pretty distinvely associated with Rastafarianism.

4. Dreads make it harder to do the ablutions for prayer (salat).

5. Dreads make it harder to wear a normal-sized kufi.

On the other hand, (to address 3) there are some indications that the prophet (saaws) may have had his hair in some sort of braid. And memebrs of the Baye Fall Sufi order are known to wear dreads. While the other considerations don't necessarily mean one shouldn't grow dreads, just that they come with certain burdens which one must be willing to accept if you want to grow them. (e.g. grow dreads but trim them after hajj, get a bigger kufi, take the extra effort to wash them, etc.)

I you really want to reflect more on the subject, I would suggest that you check out the above blog.

obama: yes we can

This reminds me of how Bob Marley took Haile Selassie's speech to the UN and turned it into the song "War" (see until the color of a man's skin is of no more significance than the color of his eyes). Apparently will.i.am took a recent OBama speech and quickly transformed it into the song "Yes we can" (complete with a video directed by Bob Dylan's son, Jesse Dylan, and starring John Legend, Kate Walsh, Aisha Tyler, Amber Valletta, Taryn Manning, Nicole Scherzinger, Common, Scarlett Johansson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Tatyana Ali, Herbie Hancock, Nick Cannon and many others.



Lyrics:
It was a creed written into the founding documents that declared the destiny of a nation.
Yes we can.
It was whispered by slaves and abolitionists as they blazed a trail toward freedom.
Yes we can. Yes we can.
It was sung by immigrants as they struck out from distant shores and pioneers who pushed westward against an unforgiving wilderness.
Yes we can.
It was the call of workers who organized; women who reached for the ballots; a President who chose the moon as our new frontier; and a King who took us to the mountaintop and pointed the way to the Promised Land.
Yes we can to justice and equality.

Yes we can to opportunity and prosperity.
Yes we can to opportunity and prosperity.
Yes we can heal this nation.
Yes we can repair this world.
Yes we can. Yes we can.

We know the battle ahead will be long, but always remember that no matter what obstacles stand in our way, nothing can stand in the way of the power of millions of voices calling for change.
We have been told we cannot do this by a chorus of cynics. They will only grow louder and more dissonant.
We've been asked to pause for a reality check. We've been warned against offering the people of this nation false hope.
But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope.

Now the hopes of the little girl who goes to a crumbling school in Dillon are the same as the dreams of the boy who learns on the streets of LA; we will remember that there is something happening in America; that we are not as divided as our politics suggests; that we are one people; we are one nation; and together, we will begin the next great chapter in the American story with three words that will ring from coast to coast; from sea to shining sea...
Yes. We. Can.


And here's the longer clip which inspired the song, Obama's speech on the evening of the New Hampshire primary:



For hundreds of other Obama-related clip's check out BarackObamadotcom on YouTube.

grenada-esque politics

After coming back from a shaykh-imposed blogging break, Ali Eteraz shares some of his thoughts on Obama and American-Muslims and Why Muslims shouldn't Support Ron Paul.

On NPR, Earl Ofari Hutchison, Congresswoman Maxine Waters, Farai Chideya and Rober Lovato consider the question: Is there really a Black/Latino divide? (Ans: Not really)

On his own blog, Robert Lovato starts to unpack some of the complexities of the Latino population and the shortcomings of non-Latino pundits talking about the same in Everyone’s an Expert on the Latino Vote, Except Latinos.

And finally, on Indypendent, Al Giordano's article Divide and Conquer: Clintons Exploit Black-Latino Tensions.

bits of grenada

A couple of new Grenada-esque links out there in cyberspace:

Yusuf Sanchez recently started a rather informative blogspot blog on Latino Muslims.

A myspace page called BFN Latino deals with Afro-Latino and it appears as if it will give way to www.bfnlatino.com which also strives to be "an international portal to Afro Latin America"

And finally, IslamCrunch announced a community forum in Oakland, CA with the unfortunate title Should Muslims use the N word? My hope is that whoever named the forum was simply trying to stir up attendance and was not imagining that the affirmative position should be seriously considered.

radicalism is the realization of marginalization

“Radicalism is the realization of marginalization” is a new interview between Imam Zaid Shakir and Wajahat Ali at the alt.muslim website. The conversation touches on the invasion of Panama, the Darfur crisis, Obama's candidacy and U.S politics, the need for a revolution of values, the clash of civilizations, color prejudice within the Muslim community and the invasion of (the island nation of) Grenada.

(global) southern girl

More signs of "an emergic global anti-hegemonic culture" with Islam at its heart (Not that I'm making any declarations on the Islamic identity of Badu or Farrakhan... but there is obviously enough of a "family resemblance" for them to be included in the mini-manifesto at the top of the blog):

Sporting a huge, billowing afro and a T-shirt with an anti-Iraq war slogan, Erykah Badu expressed her support of black leader Louis Farrakhan and the Palestinian cause Thursday before a crowd of Israeli fans and journalists in Tel Aviv.

The Grammy-award winning neo-soul vocalist, 36, is in Tel Aviv to perform on Saturday night. She has also won acclaim for her acting roles in "Cider House Rules" and "House of D."

"I come from across the water bringing light and hope," said Badu in her deep, languid voice. She commissioned a poster design especially for her visit to Israel, featuring a large hamsa - a traditional Middle Eastern good luck charm _ that appears to be growing out of her hair. At the bottom, the words for peace in Hebrew and Arabic appear side by side.

(For the rest of the story: Visiting hip hop artist defends Farrakhan, Palestinian cause

sweetest day / millions more march / erykah badu
an african american muslim convert as the founder of chinese hip-hop

morrison endorses obama for president

Associated Press: Morrison Endorses Obama for President (actually, I found out through La Chola who got it from Diary of an Anxious Black Woman)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The woman who famously labeled Bill Clinton as the "first black president" is backing Barack Obama to be the second.

Author Toni Morrison said her endorsement of the Democratic presidential candidate has little to do with Obama's race — he is the son of a black father from Kenya and a white mother from Kansas — but rather his personal gifts.

Writing with the touch of a poet in a letter to the Illinois senator, Morrison explained why she chose Obama over Hillary Rodham Clinton for her first public presidential endorsement.

Morrison, whose acclaimed novels usually concentrate of the lives of black women, said she has admired Clinton for years because of her knowledge and mastery of politics, but then dismissed that experience in favor of Obama's vision.

"In addition to keen intelligence, integrity and a rare authenticity, you exhibit something that has nothing to do with age, experience, race or gender and something I don't see in other candidates," Morrison wrote. "That something is a creative imagination which coupled with brilliance equals wisdom. It is too bad if we associate it only with gray hair and old age. Or if we call searing vision naivete. Or if we believe cunning is insight. Or if we settle for finessing cures tailored for each ravaged tree in the forest while ignoring the poisonous landscape that feeds and surrounds it.

"Wisdom is a gift; you can't train for it, inherit it, learn it in a class, or earn it in the workplace — that access can foster the acquisition of knowledge, but not wisdom," Morrison wrote.

In 1998, Morrison wrote a column for the New Yorker magazine in which she wrote of Bill Clinton: "White skin notwithstanding, this is our first black president. Blacker than any actual black person who could ever be elected in our children's lifetime. After all, Clinton displays almost every trope of blackness: single-parent household, born poor, working-class, saxophone-playing, McDonald's-and-junk-food-loving boy from Arkansas."

Obama responded to Morrison's endorsement with a written statement: "Toni Morrison has touched a nation with the grace and beauty of her words, and I was deeply moved and honored by the letter she wrote and the support she is giving our campaign."

See also: black presidents (part six)

a saint in the city: sufi arts of urban senegal

Better late than never: A Saint in the City: Sufi arts of urban Senegal is a rather rich and informative article about a book about an art exhibit of works inspired by the influential Senegalese Muslim holy man, Amadou Bamba.

"A Saint in the City" presents the visual culture of a dynamic religious movement known as the Mouride Way that is inspired by a Senegalese Sufi pacifist, poet, and saint named Amadou Bamba (1853-1927). Mourides are galvanizing contemporary Senegal and its ever-expanding diaspora through their hard work and steadfast devotion. The exhibition presents a striking range of Mouride arts, from large popular murals, intricate glass paintings, and calligraphic healing devices to posters for social activism, colorful textiles, and paintings by internationally known contemporary artists. A devotional sanctum filled with sacred imagery and an urban market scene capturing the bustle of contemporary Dakar are re-created to suggest how Mourides live and work under the beneficent eye of the Saint (Fig. 1). Artist profiles and videos feature the voices and works of nine artists who have shaped our understanding of this deeply spiritual movement. Signal works from Islamic cultures elsewhere in Africa reveal a similarity to Mouride arts while underscoring particularities of Mouride creativity.

[...]

Mouridism is one of the most distinctive aspects of contemporary Senegalese social life. Indeed, it would be impossible to understand how the republic's "brisk and vigorous democracy" (NPR 1998) makes it "a beacon of hope ... in a troubled region" (Wallis & Caswell 2000) without fully appreciating this, the republic's most economically and politically influential Islamic movement. Mouridism links all secular and sacred activities. Senegal also has "a long tradition of amicable and tolerant co-existence between the Muslim majority and the Christian ... and other religious minorities" (CIR 2000; see also Ndiaye 2002:606); and political scientist Leonardo Villalon (1995) holds that the country's striking stability can be attributed to the unusual balance of power between the Senegalese government and the Mourides and other religious orders (also see Biaya 1998). In the year 2000, Senegal peacefully elected the long-time opposition candidate Abdoulaye Wade their president. Mr. Wade is a devoted Mouride, and since his election he has played a prominent role in negotiations for African peace and economic recovery (Onishi 2002).

[...]

"Islam in Africa is nearly as old as the faith itself" Rene Bravmann reminds us (2000:489), and a mere century after the Prophet Muhammed's death in 632 C.E., Islam was being practiced in trading towns of the Sahel. Islam reached what is now Senegal by the tenth century (Hiskett 1994:107) and soon became important to local politics (Levtzion 2000:78). In the eighteenth century, Sufism brought its international influences, spiritual technologies, and paths to divinity to Senegal. The growth of Islam in Africa has been phenomenal ever since, and now, at the turn of the twenty-first century, one of every eight Muslims hails from sub-Saharan Africa, while one of every three sub-Saharan Africans is Muslim (Kane & Triaud 1998:7, 12).

Ocean trade has connected Senegal to other parts of the world for many centuries. Lying at the westernmost point of the African continent, Senegal is the first sub-Saharan country encountered as one sails southward "around the bend" from Europe. It has long been a threshold between the Americas and Africa as well, and the fortifications and infamous "Slave House" of Goree Island lying just off the coast of Dakar provide poignant reminders of the transatlantic slave trade. Senegalese Muslims were among the first slaves brought to the Americas. "Literate, urban, and in some cases well traveled," they "realized incomparable feats in the countries of their enslavement" (S. Diouf 1998:1). (12) To underscore the point, Manning Marable writes that "faith and spirituality have always been powerful forces in the histories of people of African descent. Central to that history is Islam" (quoted in S. Diouf 1998, back cover).

If the above intrigues you, check out the entire article which goes into more detail about the concept of baraka, the role of Sufism in Senegal, the branch of Mouridism known as Baye Fall, and other subjects.

Related links from Third Resurrection:
Shaykh Amadou Bamba
catching up

indiana jones and the kingdom of the crystal skull

So aparently my speculations about the upcoming Indiana Jones film back in indiana jones and the spear of destiny were totally off the mark. The new film will be called Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and will center around crystal skulls which are a part of pre-Columbian culture rather than the Abrahamic tradition. It makes me wonder if across the various incarnations of the Indiana Jones stories; the movies, the television series, the novels (graphic and otherwise) etc. does the theology get any clearer? In the first and third films, we see Judeo-Christian relics which are clearly endowed with real power. But in second film, we see Hinduism-related artificats which are also "real". So will this fourth film help clarify the issue or will it make things more complex by throwing another pantheon into the mix? Or have things already been "mixed" in the other Indiana Jones stories?

see also
indiana jones and the temple of orientalism

y tu abuela, a’onde esta?

La Chola (formerly Brownfemipower) recently linked to a post over at Waiting 2 Speak: Y tu abuela, a'onde esta? which touches on and fleshes out some of the gendered hassles faced by Afro-Latinas. especially in the contexts of personal relationships. The title is a reference to a poem by Fortunato Vizcarrondo (which is a central text in terms of Afro-Latino identity and which has appeared before on Planet Grenada in y tu abuela donde esta?)

The author over at Waiting 2 Speak also links to Latinopundit and the more explicitly political post: Barack Obama and Latinos: ¿Sí se puede?

Also check out:
obama and black latinos
nigger-reecan blues by willie perdomo (maybe it should be nigger-rican blues?)

cornel west on the santa clausification of dr. martin luther king jr.

Recently, on Tavis Smiley's show, Cornel West made some timely comments on “The Santa-Clausification” Of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.:
video clip on nobodysmiling.com
transcript from Tavis Smiley's website
I really liked West's comments but I also realize that, after hearing him speak several times and reading much of his work, his basic "rap" is pretty familiar to me so nothing he said was really surprising. But if you like West and haven't seen this yet, check it out. One important insight he shares (which I've tried to get across through many of the mlk posts here) is just that if you take him seriously, Martin's message of love is much more radical, demanding, "dangerous" and "funky" than most folks realize. Therefore his message is sanitized and deodorized for public consumption before it is allowed to spread.

More Cornel West from Grenada's past.
a philosophical view of easter
islam and the passion (for social justice)
that was kanye west, not cornel west -- kanye west
cornel west on katrina
"...he run venezuela"

heru: live in lagos, nigeria

Here is another dose of Heru. The YouTube clips below are from World Music Day in Lagos, Nigeria June 23, 2007 so it is more reggae than spoken word. It makes me wonder about the relation between Ausar Auset (alluded to in some of Heru's other pieces) and Rastafari (which is usually associated with reggae music and the idea of "Babylon")

more heru on tv
even more heru

"i have a nightmare"

Black mathematician, Jonathan Farley shares some rather inconoclastic thoughts about King in the recent Guardian piece, I have a nightmare. While Latina blogger, La Chola, responds in "non-violence failed us" Both pieces make me wonder if anyone out there is actually a pacifist anymore? And if we don't really believe in pacifism then what is the meaning and value of King's legacy? Did he only teach us how to take a beating? What do you think?

you can't please everybody (part two)

So the civilizational discussion is continuing with the folks (Forest Gump fans?) over at Pros and Cons in the post: You oughta come back home … to Greenbow ALABAMA!
And check out part one in: shock and awe or... you can't please everybody

rerun

I thought I should repost last year's in preparation for mlk day. I especially hope that, given the current conflict in the Middle East. instead of merely looking at, listening to, recalling the "I Have a Dream" speech that folks would also reflect on Beyond Vietnam Also consider: no wonder they shot him.

boycott

I was flipping channels the other day and came across Boycott (a tv movie on the Montgomery Bus Boycott) on BET. The movie was decent but mainly it reminded me of how Jeffery Wright (who played King) is an amazing actor. Every role I've seen him in (in Angels in America, in Shaft, The Manchurian Candidate, Basquiat, Presumed Innocent etc.) have been intense and radically different from one another. The next time I rent some DVDs I'm definitely going to look for more of his films.

old boondocks

On a Hill...

Huey to Ceasar: Soon our nation will pause and celebrate the Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday. We will reflect on his legacy and his wisdome. Who can forget when he said, "Violence against your fellow man is never the answer...

"... unless you suspect your fellow man has a weapon that you yourself have but don't want him to have, then you should bomb the bejeezus out of 'em!"

Ceasar to Huey: Stop that.

the urgency of now

On the occasion of MLK day, from Chickenbones Journal here is The Fierce Urgency of Now: Martin Luther King Birthday Celebration 2008 by Grace Lee Boggs

amir sulaiman: like a thief in the night

So one of the albums I did end up getting at the aforementioned trip to the music was was Amir Sulaiman's Like a Thief in the Night which I definitely recommend. I was able to find videos clips to go along with two of the tracks. One is the very short film by Bobby O'Neil called Spit:


and then there is also the more sensitive piece "She Said I Prefer a Broken Neck (To a Broken Heart)" which appears on Like a Thief in the Night. But this particular performance is from Def Poetry Jam:



See also: upon the ashes of babylon

mayda del valle

Just the other day I was in a music store and came across The Best of the Roots. There was no way my conscience was going to let me pay $17 get the CD since I already had the first six Roots albums, but one track which definitely intrigued me was a version of (Hip-Hop is the) Love of my Life featuring Mayda del Valle. (At least for now, the track seems to be available on her myspace page) I've mentioned her in passing before but for those that don't know, she is an amazing Puerto Rican spoken word artist, originally from the southside of Chicago. When I was at the National Poetry Slam a couple of years back, she was the only performer who actually made me feel starstruck when I would see them walking down the street.

She has a lot of different "ethnic" pieces which are amazing (I think "Descendancy" is my favorite) but I just happened across some of her other pieces which are pretty powerful too. First is "To all the boys I loved before" which is obviously a relationship piece...



And then there is "The Gift" which starts off as a why-I-write type of poem but also dips into relationship territory (Like she says, "my poems go off on tangents.")



I think that both poems should inspire any male to be the kind of man she says she deserves.