This podcast features my latest radio broadcast with author, activist and Congressional candidate Kevin Powell. The program originally aired on Tuesday August 17th, 2010.

Please check out the interview Kevin called “one of the best I’ve ever done in all my years of public service.”

For more, tune into Washington DC’s WPFW 89.3FM every Tuesday evening from 10-11pm and visit the radio page on this site for archived shows.

Hello lovelies,

As I mentioned in my most recent blog post, I was deeply honored  to be invited to

deliver a keynote speech at the 50th anniversary celebration of my father’s high

school graduation  in Carbondale, IL. It was especially meaningful to me because

of the depth of history this particular institution holds for my family– he went to

the same school that employed both of my grandparents as teachers and where my

aunt also spent some of her high school years. In this excerpt, I talk a bit about my

work directing a mentorship program for incarcerated teens:

This next clip is my latest Decipher broadcast, featuring this week’s guests Head Roc and Diallo Sumbry.

We discuss DC hip hop, what it takes to create a life as an artist in this city, Wyclef’s presidential run and

their upcoming joint concert.  New radio shows air each Tuesday evening, 10-11p EST on 89.3 FM in the

nation’s capitol or streaming live at www.wpfw.org worldwide:

Lastly, I was interviewed by The Mind’s Eye television at the 2010 National Urban League centennial

conference. My segment comes on at about 1:45. See below for some footage from that conversation

and other highlights from the weekend:

Thanks so much for visiting! Please check back regularly for more in the musings & wanderings of…

sj

I recently had the opportunity to attend my father’s 50^th high school reunion.

It was quite a thing, being with him in this space. Hanging out with his classmates, the Attucks High School class of 1960, you could feel the kind of comfort created over 50+ years. The old jokes and rivalries, the high school roles that carry on even still… The musician, the athlete, the leader. It was beautiful to witness, and especially at this school where my own family walked the halls of this school– both as students and as teachers. My grandparents both taught at this institution, my aunt also attended the school.

As you may imagine, with the depth of history my family has in this place– and with my particular kin, who know a thing or two about how to tell a story and make it stick— I grew up hearing much about the impact of an Attucks eduction. I couldn’t have been more honored to have this opportunity to deliver the keynote speech on this occasion.

Here is an excerpt from my speech, entitled “We Need to Keep on Fighting:”

“My grandparents, teachers at Attucks, taught us much about how to fight. They fought hard to maintain their dignity in a segregated America.  They fought hard to get their education. In fact, their move to Carbondale, a town that they dearly loved, was a strategic one…  They needed to be in a college town so that each of their three children could live at home while enrolled in Southern Illinois University.  And earning a higher degree was not an option in their home, it was an expectation.

They valued education! And they fought for it! Look at the example of their lives:

teaching in one room school houses plus

working for the white folks to afford college and

sustaining five decades of marriage

while

studying genealogy & earning their college degrees over thirty

years, one class at a time oh

how they hated being perceived as servants but

now all of their children and grandchildren have college educations and can trace our family history back eight generations

huh?

The result was: In 1957 our family celebrated 3 graduations—Uncle John finished high school, Grandma got her bachelors and Grandpa got his masters degree. All in the same year.

The result was: the accomplishments of each of you young’ins as Grandma might say. (Grandpa might say girlies). They were so proud… so proud of you.

And they stood in a chorus of voices who committed themselves to you, names that we should lift up during this memorial service:

Your principals Mr. Clark, Mr. Jones and Mr. Thomas (ashe)… your teachers Miss Warren, Miss Lucille Walker and Ms. Thelma Walker (ashe)… English teacher Miss. Ikard… history teacher Mrs. Davis… music Director Mr. Anderson…

Please join me in calling their names, right now…  The people who invested in you, the people who made you who you are, they are always with us as long as we call their names.

Ashe, ashe, ashe.

The impact they had on all of you in this room… That is the way they made sure the things they held dear would continue long after they left this earthly plane.  We are the prize of their fight.

We need to keep on fighting.

There is an Adinkra symbol from the Ghanaian region of West Africa known as sankofa. It means you have to look to your past to be able to chart your future.  Who better to make sure this history gets passed down than you?

You are the class of 1960. You left Attucks and walked out into a world that was characterized by Jim Crow and Black Power, by water hoses and Marches, by assassinations and resistance.

You helped lay the ground for progressive social change, you are part of the generation that has become iconic, that has become a synonym, for social action.

You are the class of 1960.

Every year you all make your pilgrimage back to this hallowed place to reflect, rejoice and renew these friendships that have sustained you over the course of your lives. Many of you have parents who also attended Attucks, many of my generation or younger who sit in this audience also have some kind of an Attucks affiliation. There are governmental representatives here who understand the significance of the role that Attucks continues to play in this community.

You are the class of 1960, but the earliest graduating classes go back to the 1920s! We need to know this history.

Attucks was a school, it was a community center, it was and is a family. We need to know this history.

Your teachers and administrators hold a special place in your heart to this day, and celebrating them is part of what initiated the Spirit of Attucks celebrations. We need to know this history.

We need to know why so many of you love this school so deeply that you came across miles to be here today.

No one can ever take this experience from you. No one and nothing can ever change the fact that in 1960, you earned your diploma and became an alum of Attucks High School.  There is no force that could ever change the feeling of family that’s in this room… it’s hard won, it’s long lasting and it’s real.

We need to know this history. And we need you. We need you to continue making history and to inspire us, your children, to create our own.”

Hello lovelies,

Happy June! I kinda feel like this month played a trick on us, like it never really fully came. How else is it possible that it passed by so quickly?? Of course, in fairness, I am deep in a travel jag… which is one of my favorite places to be but also makes time pass like nobody’s business. The past few weeks have seen me wrapped in a whirlwind of trips to Vermont, Los Angeles and New York.

Vermont is not a state where I’ve spent too much time, but what brought me there most recently was a reunion with friends and colleagues, members of the New Voices community.  New Voices is a competitive fellowship program that works with non profit organizations in need of capacity building. It pairs social change workers with mentors in a specific institution a for a period of two years. It began as a nationwide group, and in recent years has focused specifically on the Gulf Coast.

I’m very honored to be a member of the NV community.  One of the things I appreciate most about it is that it’s so intentionally diverse in every single sense of the word (race, gender, class, sexuality, ableism, nationality, areas of expertise, etc). The primary thread that binds us is our commitment to creating a better world.

I also love that whenever we get together the default setting is freedom, the fallback is honesty. That you can spark up a conversation with someone you haven’t seen in years or someone you just met and begin in a very deep and open place.

Those kinds of relationships are hard won and I don’t take them for granted.

Sadly, after ten years, it appears funding for this fellowship is over. So for this last weekend we went paddle boating in Lake Champlain, made bonfires and s’mores on the shore, and I got to sit in the sun splattered grass with some of the most brilliant and beautiful minds I know.

A few days later I was off to the west coast. LA was once home for me, so on the rare occasions that I get to go back I always have a rack of people I’m trying to see and a list of places I’m trying to go while I’m there. This trip was no different, I still can’t believe how full the week was!

The centerpiece of my time in Cali was a human rights conference. Again, this was a group of people from all parts of the country who came together for the better part of a week to talk about issues like the school to prison pipeline and bringing human rights home.

One of my friends was joking about the irony having a human rights gathering in LA, she said the biggest violations that happen in that city is people not getting all the scented candles they want in their trailers on set. Lolol!! While it’s definitely true that the city is more known for its entertainment industry connects than its social justice work, the truth is some of the most innovative and impactful work is happening out there. For example, in January I did a site visit to the Youth Justice Coalition– they were also a core part of this conference.  Talk about a group who is challenging confinement and investing deeply in the leadership of young people! There are also amazing groups like Cadre and the  LA County Commission on Human Relations that are respectively dedicated to empowering parents to have a voice in educational reform and finding peaceful ways to resolve inter-cultural conflict.

I learned a tremendous amount at this gathering.  It only lasted a few days, but we went hard!

Finally, this past week I took a quick spin to NYC to honor Regent Adelaide Sanford’s many contributions to the field of education. This sister carries herself with such grace and power, she personifies for me what I want to be if I am fortunate enough to live as long and as fully as she does. Literally, every single time I hear her speak I am awestruck.

At this event she spoke quite passionately about language and culture, about what it means to be able to greet somebody in their mother tongue and how tragic it is that most Black Americans no longer know what ours is. Her ongoing work is a reminder of how we must honor the specific needs of our children, many of whom have been so failed by their schools and by society at large.

So that has been the month thus far… I have been on the road more than I’ve been home, but that for me equals a beautiful thing.

I hope that each of you is well and happy. Thanks for making time to check out this site… Be blessed!

Whoo, I am LATE and wrong with this one. But happily, I have a lot to report back after waiting this much time to blog.

First of all, this past weekend was incredible. I got to fill it with some of the people and activities I love most. I took a little trip up the road to Philly for the 26th Celebration of Black Writing. What a gathering.

I was there to moderate Saturday’s Main Stage panel that was organized around the theme Movement: Paying It Forward. On the dais with me were literary legends Sonia Sanchez and Baba Haki Madhubuti, SNCC co founder Dr. Bernard Lafayette Jr., and brilliant thinkers Nia Ngina Meeks and Steven Barnes.

When we began the outdoor panel we were concerned about the threat of rain. But we must’ve done something right, because the sun made its way to us before we were even halfway done. And stayed shining.

It is only today, after having the opportunity to come down a bit, that I am finally catching my breath. Imagine having the chance to sit with the people whose words have sustained you since college and conduct a conversation that inspires both you and everyone in the audience. That is no small thing. And that was just for two hours in the midst of two days where Black writers from around the country stood together to honor Nikki Giovanni and our shared literary legacy.

This kind of immersion in our art is what I live for.

My time in Philly was bookended by my participation in the Bellydancers of Color Association (BOCA) annual expo. BOCA is a time of year where DC becomes filled with master classes, vendors and performances. My teacher, Sunyatta Amen, organizes sisters for a weekend of shimmies, mayas, undulations, zagarits, culture and context.

Over the past several years bellydance has become a deep love of mine, it feeds me in a way that defies description. This weekend I learned more about the history of this African dance in countries like Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco. I took a journey into Brazilian samba and experienced traditional Gypsy movement. I literally spent hours upon hours studying with women who have dedicated themselves to mastering this art that fetes our femininity and teaches us how to know and love our bodies right.

After these past several days my hands are hennaed, my body is stretched, my spirit is lifted and I am happy.

Thankful for these traditions that are ours.

If you follow me on Facebook or Twitter you already know, but I thought I’d take a second to post the info here as well. Please join me tonight at 7pm for a panel on juvenile justice and the need for progressive reform in the criminal justice system. Details are below. Hope to see you there, and stay tuned to this blog… new postings coming soon!

JDCY CO-SPONSORS THE BIG READ DC 2010

Presented by The Humanities Council of Washington DC in partnership with the Academy for Educational Development (AED), Justice for DC Youth, and Provisions Library.

Panel: At the age of sixteen, Reginald Dwayne Betts — a good student from a lower middle class family — carjacked a man with a friend. He had never held a gun before, but within a matter of minutes he had committed six felonies. He served his nine year sentence as part of the adult population in some of the worst prisons in the state. He’s documented coming of age in prison in his memoir A Question of Freedom. Betts, David Muhammad, Chief of Committed Services for the DC Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services, and Shani Jamila, Director of Justice for DC Youth, give an overview of juveniles in the criminal justice system and the possibilities for second chances in a system that is long overdue for reform.

1927 Florida Avenue, NW  Washington DC

UPDATE: This panel, organized about the Ernest J. Gaines book A Lesson Before Dying, morphed into one of the most difficult and heartbreaking discussions on youth and crime that I have ever experienced. One of my fellow panelists, author R. Dwayne Betts, wrote an important piece about that evening for the Washington Post that I am linking to here. Please take a moment to read his thoughts, and to think about ways that we can collectively work to make our communities better.

This past weekend I had the opportunity to travel down to Raleigh, North Carolina. I went because it was the 50th anniversary of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and people were gathering at Shaw University to celebrate. What I appreciated most about this together time was the opportunity I had to bear witness to the well-deserved celebration of our elders. It felt really good to see them reflect on the global impact their work thus far has had.

I don’t believe we take the time to mark our victories enough. This is especially true for those of us who have dedicated ourselves to working for social justice. There’s always so much more work to be done, it’s often on to the next. In fact, I was a bit guilty of that myself on this trip… Sunday morning I was up by dawn so I could make the trip back to DC for the Prison to College Pipeline workshops I run at a local detention facility.

I hated to leave the conference early, but I was excited to tell the kids about this experience! Many of the SNCC members were the same age as the young people I work with when they got started changing the world.

One of the things I shared with them is the renewed appreciation I have now for the role of cultural work in the movement. How easily music punctuated the speeches and filled the concert halls and emerged spontaneously in the back rooms at the conference hotel.

In most movement songs the melodies are simple and the messages direct, designed to be learned quickly and sung in community. The lyrics tell of the dogs they faced, their refusal to ride the bus, their faith that another world was on its way and that they were willing to sacrifice everything they had to bring it about.

The harmonies are a study in collaboration. Each person finds their own voice, holds their note, and folks support each other in making the music. When everyone plays their part the end result is each person who hears it feels a change in their spirit that brings them to their feet and compels them to move.

Here’s a video of  song snippet inspired by the Alabama bus boycotts:

SNCC Singers

I also took a bunch of pictures, feel free to check out the entry below for a small gallery.

May we all be inspired to live fully and to create a better world while we’re here.

**Soundtrack for this entry: Mos Def,  Modern Marvel. The New Danger.

I did this because I needed a metaphor. Something tangible to remind me I’m capable of taking the next major steps I want to take in my life. 24 hours later I can be assured I got it– I have never known soreness like I do today. Lol! But yesterday? Total. RUSH!

Here’s what I learned from my first ever trapeze class:

– The twenty six foot climb up  is the point in the process where you have the most time to ask yourself if you have lost your ever loving mind.  But at that point you are already walking your path. Before I set foot on the ladder I took the deepest of breaths and told myself “I trust the universe and the universe trusts me. Now move.”

– Once you get up there, you have no choice but to put your entire self into it. There can be no half stepping. You must commit in order for this to work.

– After you grab the bar, you have to do what you’re told at the exact instant you receive instruction.  Timing is the most critical part of this art. Overthinking options or allowing fear to mark your steps is an impossibility– a second’s hesitation can lead to someone really getting hurt.

– Let yourself be inspired. I first learned about this from my girl, artist extraordinaire Holly Bass. I asked her about it and within 48 hours I was standing on a little 3×5 platform suspended in the sky! It’s amazing how quickly things can work in your favor once you set the action in motion.

– Never get so grown that you don’t allow yourself time to play!

How many times have we known what we were supposed to be or do, but have chosen to talk ourselves out of it?

Take a leap and believe. You are capable of more than you know.

Check out the link below to see video footage from my experiment with flying. I still can’t believe that’s meeeee up there!!

Stepping Out On Faith

Hello Lovelies,

Been a while since my last posting. I have been on a move… just back from a couple quick trips, including one to Mexico’s Mayan coast. This trip was all about celebrating love!  It was a great opportunity to witness the wedding of a dear friend and allow myself a moment for rest and rejuvenation.  I believe deeply in taking time every now and again to break free of the daily grind and honor the need each one of us has for self care.

Also during this time  I had the chance to check out the 2010 National Black Writers Conference at Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn.  Many thanks to Dr. Brenda Greene and those who supported her in creating a transformative place for members of this community to connect and learn from one another. There was a bit of controversy about having a space specifically dedicated to Black writers in an era that some seek to dub “post-racial.”  I have to admit, I find it hard to devote too much energy to combating such a fundamentally flawed notion. I’m clear that working from the kind of expansive vision generated by familial challenges and conversations is a necessary part of creating a better world.  I’m grateful that I was able to attend.

The brilliant Grace Aneiza Ali wrote an article about the proceedings for The Defenders Online.  She was gracious enough to include a quote from me in her article. Please see below for the piece in its entirety.  Much love to you all!

National Black Writer’s Conference: A Literary Feast
Posted By The Editors March 31st, 2010

By Grace Aneiza Ali

Perhaps it was the sight of Sonia Sanchez, Toni Morrison, Cornel West, Kamau Brathwaite, and Amiri Baraka huddled together around a table at the conference’s awards reception and chatting it up like old pals out on the town for a Saturday night dinner, that was the most memorable. Theirs was a moment of legends.

Or, perhaps it was when Indian author Meena Alexander put the dialogue in the “East Meets West” panel on hold to recite Audre Lorde. Hers was a moment of the beauty of literary encounters and cultural intersections.

Or, perhaps it was when the young poet and photographer Thomas Sayers Ellis paid tribute to his mentor and fellow poet, Kamau Brathwaite, who he admitted he’d never met until that Thursday night at the conference’s opening ceremony. Loyal to his craft, Ellis’ gift to Brathwaite was a poem itself, in which he said, “I am on this stage (this page) because I owe him.”

This past weekend, I had the honor of being both a speaker and an attendee at the 10th National Black Writers Conference (NBWC) at Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn, New York City, spearheaded by Dr. Brenda Greene, Executive Director of the Center for Black Literature. It felt more like a reunion than anything else. Four days of forums, readings, workshops, and special tributes that showcased the breadth and dimension of the 21st century black literary landscape—a literary feast.

The Conference was not without a bit of controversy, however. No conference worth its salt is. Just days before its opening, a New York Times article, “Black Writers Ponder Role and Seek Wider Attention,” questioned if a conference such as this is needed in a post-racial America?

“In the age of President Obama, when successful black writers can be found across genres and a Nobel Prize winner, Toni Morrison, can be tapped to be the honorary chairwoman of the event, do black writers still need a conference to call their own?”

Underscoring the question was the notion, or criticism, that as writers at black writers’ conferences, we are speaking only to ourselves. Martha Southgate, author of Third Girl from the Left, was quoted in the article saying that the dialogue among authors should be extended “beyond our community.”

The New York Times article and the online comments it elicited about the value of a black writers conference in 2010 was certainly a topic of debate throughout the Conference’s weekend. Kevin Powell, the Brooklyn-based writer and activist and a featured speaker, dedicated his entire speech in response to the question of why a black writers conference is needed.

I asked Shani Jamila, radio host and blogger at shanijamila.com, who made the trip from Washington, DC to attend the Conference, to weigh in on the debate. For her, the value lies in the “sacred space” the Conference fosters. “Sacred spaces like the one created by the NBWC are critically important for nurturing the deep community creativity that allows our collective imagination to flourish,” she says.

Politics, controversies and post-racial America debates aside, what I found most powerful about the National Black Writers Conference was the very thing that was most easily missed or at best, overshadowed. The Conference served as a place, a moment in time, that bridged the gap between generations of writers and literary change makers. It was space of intersection—cultural and generational—that for me was its most sacred quality.

Years ago, when I read Meena Alexander’s Nampally Road for the first time I knew that I wanted to see the city of Hyderabad, India she described as it reminded me of the city of Georgetown, Guyana where I was born and grew up. It was that book that served as the inspiration for my Fulbright Fellowship to India. Later, I would write to Ms. Alexander, a Fulbright Fellow herself, thanking her for penning that novel. And so to hear the Indian-born Alexander reading Audre Lorde at the National Black Writers Conference, a poet who she has found a deep connection to in her own life and work, it was clear to me, that we are not, and never have been, speaking to ourselves—that our work is always making connections and intersections with other communities and cultures beyond our own, and vice versa.

As young writers, the Conference was a pivotal moment for us to honor and thank the writers who fashioned and formed the blueprint for us. So often we say how important it is that the dialogue between generations be nourished and supported—but more often than not, I wonder how much that is actually put into practice. I didn’t question that this time with the National Black Writers Conference. In fact, Dr. Brenda Greene’s leadership and vision to create a space where those exchanges can flourish are to be commended.

My friend Thomas Sayers Ellis captured this culture of gratitude best. He represented our generation of writers well. And he did so with candor and humility in his tribute to Kamau Brathwaite (who I was once privileged to be a student of) at the Conference’s opening ceremony. I’ve borrowed his words below as I found them poignant as they are universal. They mimic a conversation any of us from the younger generation of writers would offer to our literary light posts.

“I am on this stage because I have tried my hand at writing poems and because he has more than tried his hand at writing poems. I am on this stage because his hand, his trying, has managed mine. Because his management has kept my path well-paved and well-lit. Because there’s a difference between accomplished-trying, and in-search-of-trying; and I am on this stage (this page) because I owe him. Thus I am grateful to all that has come through him.”

For the younger generation of writers present at the 10th National Black Writers Conference to stand in the same room, to share the same space, to join in on the same stage as the men and women who’ve inspired, challenged , enlightened, frustrated, pushed, and motivated us as writers and scholars—the moment was invaluable.

Grace Aneiza Ali is the founder and editor of Of Note Magazine, which celebrates people of color in the arts. She is also an Adjunct Professor of Literature at Medgar Evers College.