(Washington, D.C.) — The Exposure Group African American Photographers Association Inc., is pleased to present “Colors of Life,” a new juried members exhibition starting Tuesday, July 21 through Monday, September 4, 2009, at the Charles Sumner School Museum and Archives located at 1201 17th Street, N.W.
“Colors of Life” will showcase the photographic work of the association members which include portrait artists, photojournalists, documentary, and fine art photographers. The exhibition coincides with the release of the Association’s first photography book also entitled “Colors of Life”. Copies of the book will be available for sale during a “Meet the Artists” reception on Thursday, August 20, 2009 from 6:30 pm – 8:30 pm at the Charles Sumner School. This event is free and open to the public from Monday – Friday, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.
The exhibition is also co-sponsored by Port of Harlem magazine and is dedicated to the late African Cuban photographer and Instructor, Nestor Hernandez Jr. Photographs taken by children at his photography workshops in Washington, D.C.; Accra, Ghana; Pinar del Rio, Cuba; and Gary, Indiana from the “Our Children Our World” exhibit, which was the official event marking Gary, Indiana’s 100th Anniversary, will also be featured.
The Exposure Group is a membership driven, non-profit professional organization open to photographers worldwide since 1978. The mission of the organization is to improve the skills, professionalism, and productivity of its members through information, education, demonstration, and compensation in the photography business. The Charles Sumner School is a historic landmark housing the archives of the District of Columbia Public Schools. The Sumner School is a museum with exhibits curated by local DC community groups. It also serves as a venue for musical concerts, book signings, receptions, cultural activities, and Exposure Group meetings.
Directions: Red Line Metro (Farragut North) or Blue/Orange Line Metro (Farragut West)
I posted a story on this blog entitled “Michael Vick…” (click HERE to read this post and comments) back when Vick was released from jail. I wonder what Soledad and CNN would have to say about Michael Vick in a Black in America segment? As of now, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has reinstated Vick, assuming a team is willing to sign him, but has to adhere to some provisions until mid-October when he would be eligible for full reinstatement into the NFL.
For now…
Vick can immediately take part in preseason practices, workouts and meetings and can play in the final two preseason games…Once the season begins, Vick may participate in all team activities except games, and Goodell said he would consider Vick for full reinstatement by Week 6 (Oct. 18-19) at the latest.
What team do you think would consider Vick? Do you think his fans have and/or will forgive him?
The below essay was sent to me from Daniel Bruno Sanz with permission to re-post it on this blog. It’s a really interesting look at Obama’s candidacy from his own perspective and correlation to the mindset in Black America (I enjoyed his critical perspective on BET). Take a read and join in on the discussion.
Request free e-book download of Why the Democrats Will Win in 2008 by clicking HERE. Or learn more about the book HERE.
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Essay: Obama 2012
We approach the future walking backwards, our gaze forever fixated on the past. Predicting the future is not a passive exercise; we invent it every day with our actions.
I began the sketches for what would ultimately become Obama 2012 in March 2007, a month after Barack Obama declared his candidacy. I had spent much of the previous 18 months living abroad as an entrepreneur and statesman of sorts, and I was slightly out of touch with the pulse of life on the street in the United States. I learned about Sen. Barack Obama’s Springfield, IL speech formally declaring his candidacy for president of the United States through one of the international cable news channels and thought how great it would be to have a fresh start after years of mediocrity in Washington, and a plummeting reputation around the world.
By September, after what seemed like raising a six-month-old child, my sketches had turned into — Why the Democrats Will Win in 2008: The Road to an Obama White House. It was my answer to the burning question everyone had back in March: Can he really win? Actually, not everyone thought it was a question. For many people, including Mark Penn, director of the Clinton campaign, the answer was an easy “no way.” This strategic blunder made it that much easier for the Clinton campaign to be defeated. Then there were Black pundits like Shelby Steele, a fellow at the Hoover Institution, who came out with a 2007 book entitled, A Bound Man, Why Obama Can’t Win.
Being Black did seem to be an automatic disqualification, but then why did someone need to write an entire book arguing what should have been patently obvious? Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Colin Powell came to my mind and I remembered that he could have run for president in 1992 as a war hero. But Colin Powell was Ronald Reagan’s protege and got a special pass on the race question. Black conservatives like Justice Thomas, Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell were careful to disassociate themselves from liberal thinkers and activists like Jesse Jackson, who lost, as expected, the 1984 and 1988 Democratic primaries. Ultimately, Colin Powell, in spite of all his honors, declined to run for president. His wife Alma feared for his safety.
Common sense said that a candidate like Obama, for numerous insurmountable reasons, didn’t stand a chance of winning the Democratic primary, let alone a general election in which 10% of the electorate is African American and Republicans controlled the White House for 20 of the preceding 28 years. But I decided that Obama’s chances merited a closer examination. In it, I would bring to bear my gambling skills.
I went to New York to meet Obama the candidate, and in a Soho apartment he told a small group of us that his middle name was Hussein. I thought he was telling a joke. Barack Hussein Obama, a liberal Black senator with a name on loan from Al Qaeda… for U.S. president? Is he out of his mind?
Then I really wanted to know whether his campaign was worth getting my hopes up for and investing my time in. I applied techniques used in predicting financial markets and researched theories of voting behavior. I applied the theories, in my own way, to the upcoming primary and general elections. I learned as I went along. The result was an analytical and quantitative study concluding, with gaps filled in by some admittedly fuzzy logic, that not only could Obama win, but, in fact, he would win because the stars lined up in his favor. Call it God’s Will. I reached my conclusion and told everyone who would listen that I had a strong case to make for victory, and that I could prove there was indeed hope. Hope is essential to any difficult endeavor. But hope as a campaign slogan is not good enough; hope needs firepower. No one becomes heavyweight champion of the world, an astronaut or the president by accident or dumb luck.
By the time my book making the case for an Obama victory was first printed in bulk, in October, 2007, Obama was 20 points behind Clinton in the polls and I was dismissed by just about everyone in the New York Democratic Party establishment and the media. Ambitious, elitist and snooty Democratic Party insiders like New York Electoral College voters Deb Slott and Terrence Yang did all they could to shut me up and lock me out. Big-time Obama fund-raising bundler and millionaire Virginia Davies ordered her 12th Street rooftop penthouse minimum-wage Latino flunkies to turn off the elevator when I attempted to go upstairs to an Obama fundraiser on April 9, 2008.
Yang and Davies turned down my $250 check from a Black Masonic lodge and barred me from the premises because it was their private property and Yang didn’t like my “hostile attitude” or my “look,” i.e. I wouldn’t kiss his bourgeois butt or grin to reassure him I wasn’t a dangerous half-Negro. The irony of it! For them, Obama was bought and paid for that night and only invited celebrities like actor Lucy Liu and others on Yang’s exclusive clipboard could enter their coveted penthouse. Impostors like these are a big part of the problem in America, not the solution. Limousine Liberals jockey for position and the Democratic Party becomes indistinguishable from the Republican Party except at election time.
But even in Harlem I was on the defensive. Harlem was Hillary country. Boldface name Black celebrities like Maya Angelou, Magic Johnson and Tavis Smiley came out for Hillary. Then in January 2008, Bob Johnson, the billionaire founder of Black Entertainment Television, made this statement:
“And to me, as an African-American, I am frankly insulted that the Obama campaign would imply that we are so stupid that we would think Hillary and Bill Clinton, who have been deeply and emotionally involved in black issues since Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood — and I won’t say what he was doing, but he said it in the book — when they have been involved. That kind of campaign behavior does not resonate with me, for a guy who says, ‘I want to be a reasonable, likable, Sidney Poitier ‘Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.’ And I’m thinking — I’m thinking to myself: this ain’t a movie, Sidney. This is real life.”
I was indignant. Here was a man who had made a fabulous fortune peddling and reinforcing the worst stereotypes about his own people as dangerous drug dealers, thieves, thugs and rapists; had provided a launch pad for a thousand materialistic, misogynistic hip-hop videos that glorify the murder of young black men for trivial slights real and imagined; directed his vast entertainment empire to appeal to the lowest common denominator in order to maximize profits, and when confronted with protests from the Black community, retorted that “BET stands for Black Entertainment Television, not Black education television.”
The production of these videos outside of BET notwithstanding, I thought about the millions of viewer-hours that Black children (many of them obese) wasted imbibing BET programming and its emphasis on anti-social and self-destructive behavior to gratify primeval instincts of lust and greed. Mr. Johnson made himself the heir to and then continued the tradition of 19th-century popular American culture and journalism that portrayed Africans and their descendants as prurient savages who would still be swinging from trees had they not been saved by European colonialism and slavery. In true late 20th-century American form, Johnson, an African-American, was given the equal opportunity to exploit this tradition in Horatio Alger fashion and become what was hitherto an oxymoron: a Black billionaire.
Tyve, portrayed brilliantly by Zero Mostel in the musical A fiddler on the Roof and typical of the “music videos” my mother exposed me to as a boy before companies like MTV and BET came on the scene a generation later, laments that “when you’re rich, they think you really know.”
It is clear that in spite of his great wealth, Bob Johnson does not have a clue. Maybe he was exposed to BET programming in his formative years.
Obama the Outlier
The election of Barack Obama is analogous to a “black swan”event in that it defied common sense, convention, precedent and therefore probability in the popular imagination, i.e. it was not supposed to happen. Now that it has, the charts are indelibly shifted in his direction. In my 2007 book I argued that macroeconomic forces and cyclical patterns would bring on a recession and electoral realignment, culminating in his election. In that sense, his election was not a surprise. Now Obama as a concept larger than the man himself is a new novel form of power and has a reflexive relationship with other sources of power in all their variety, including the power of the subconscious mind in large numbers of people. We would call this conditioned power. As we have seen, Black Entertainment Television wields conditioned power through its ability to manipulate images that penetrate the subconscious and go on to influence people’s behavior without their knowledge and create the illusion of acting of one’s own “free will.” Conditioned power, like compensatory power (money), is neither good nor evil; it is a force to be harnessed.
The conservative cultural and political shift that dominated Washington and the American frame of debate since the 1980s is now in ruins because the election of Obama is much more significant than the mere election of another liberal to the White House. The convergence of his identity with the position he holds as the face of America to the world alters the essence of what it means to be an American, a real American, not just someone with United States citizenship resulting from accidents of history and geography. It is difficult to overestimate the repercussions this will have over time but some of the salutary effects on the culture are apparent.
I have seen more Black/White interracial couples in midtown Manhattan during the last week of April 2009 than I saw in all of New York during 2008. In what has long appeared to me to be the most race and caste conscious large city in America once you get past the diversity window dressing of Black receptionists, security guards and bouncers employed at all-white offices and night spots, Latino cheap labor and Asian immigrant mom-and-pop service industries, I now see Blacks and Whites actually socializing with each other in public places like Bryant Park during their free time. Some even hold hands. New York is starting to look like London ten years ago. Still, in 2009, the most fashionable Manhattan nightspots in Chelsea and the Meat-Packing District like Cipriani’s and Pink Elephant have an unwritten “No Blacks Allowed” admittance policy, and its often the 300 lbs. Black bouncer at the door charged with enforcing this policy under the guise of face-control and dress codes. Black celebrities, of course, are supra-racial and get the red carpet unless applying for the prestigious Harmonie Club, which has never admitted a non-white, not even as a token. Bloomberg wisely resigned from this club and Obama refused to speak before it while running for office.
In American cinema 20 years ago, Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing and Jungle Fever, both set in New York and brimming with explosive racial tension, were box office hits. A generation before Spike Lee there was Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, A Patch of Blue, To Kill a Mockingbird and Imitation of Life. Now, naturalized American supermodel Heidi Klum and her African husband Seal (Henry Olusegun Olumide Adeola Samuel) are on the front cover of tabloids because they are expecting a baby and the movie The Dance Flick opened in theaters on May 22, 2009. Miscegenation has become fashionable. Nevertheless, in 2009 more Americans and Black men and women than ever are in prison. More than a few of them are innocent. America has 25% of the world’s prisoners and millions of de-facto orphans, mostly Black boys. The complex American problem of passive collaboration between marginalized people and phony Wars on Drugs and Crime finds an outlet in the mentally disturbed culture of our time. They say they’re just keeping it real, but what passes for music today is like a finger painting done by men who shit in the palm of their hand and call it high art because it makes money.
W.E.B. Dubois (the wise) observed budding materialism and a culture that pardons shiftlessness and celebrates crime as defiance of the “man” (an unjust, racist order enforced by the organs of state power, i.e. ex-Confederate soldiers and Klansmen in the police force) 110 years ago in Georgia. Now in 2009 a Black man — Black not just by accident, i.e. melanin count and the width of his nose but by virtue of struggle, study and voluntary consciousness, sits at the pinnacle of American state power as he commands conditioned power of millions at home and abroad who would believe in and heed him. His re-election in 2012 is more likely than any other outcome.
His Presidency does not usher in the Post-Racial Era, as the gap between White and Black America remains enormous by any indicator. It does conclude the Civil-Rights Era, a long unfinished chapter of Reconstruction and the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments to the Constitution. The conclusion, i.e. triumph of the Civil-Rights Era does not magically prevent any abuse from occurring in the future; work must be continuously done to hold on to its gains. This is why we support Sotomayor for the Supreme Court.
Booker T. Washington exhorted us to cast down our buckets where we are. Now is the time to finally let go. Not of the collective memories and historical record, but of the mental chains. Just as 19th century internal combustion technology ( diesel and gasoline engines) must give way to better methods, culture steeped in passive acceptance of slavery and resistance to exploitation needs to re-asses what is true and what is a big lie. No one person can will this to happen. It will be a movement of broad masses of people as they make a million decisions large and small everyday of their lives.
Theory is far behind reality and must now play catch up.
This essay is the prologue to Obama 2012, a collection of essays to be published later this year. Daniel Bruno Sanz writes about financial and political affairs. His areas of expertise include currencies, stock markets, Latin America, Japan and Russia. In early 2007, he predicted that Obama would win the Democratic primary when polls showed him 20 points behind Senator Clinton. He also forecast Obama would win 52% of the popular vote and beat the Republican nominee in the general election.
Thanks to all of you for submitting photos, stylists/barbers, and natural hair blogs.
The folks at CURLSTM are back with your girl Affrodite (that’s me ) to offer you another opportunity to win free products! This promotion will run until noon on Saturday, July 18, 2009 EST. The winner will receive a CURLSTM Essentials Sample Kit of their choice valued at $22 like the one you see below, perfectly sized for air travel or any travel you may be doing this summer.
The CURLS Essentials sample kits are customized to suit your curl pattern- Fine/Medium, Medium, or Kinky. Following are some of the product descriptions, and you are invited to check out the Sample Kits on the CURLS website (CURLS Essentials Sample Kits).
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NAME and CONTACT information (address, city, state, phone, email, website- as much info as you have available) for a hairstylist/barber that you would recommend WHO SPECIALIZES IN NATURAL HAIR CARE (curly to nappy/kinky).
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If you know of any other inductees please use the CONTACT form at the upper right corner of this blog or leave a comment. I would like to post a full list, if available.
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 10, 2009
(BLACK PR WIRE) July 10, 2009 – New Orleans, LA —- Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc., in session, at its 95th Anniversary Conclave in New Orleans, LA, voted to induct the Honorable William Jefferson Clinton, the 42nd President of the United States of America, as an honorary member of the organization. Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity’s International President Paul L. Griffin, Jr. commented “It is a high privilege and a matter of great significance that we the members of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc. accept and welcome the Honorable William Jefferson Clinton into our wondrous band.”
President Clinton has been focusing on the activities of the William J. Clinton Foundation since he left the White House. He wanted the Clinton Foundation to address the areas where he could make the most difference as a private citizen. The Foundation has grown into a global non-governmental organization with more than 1,400 staff and volunteers in more than 40 countries and with offices in New York City, Little Rock, Ark., Boston, Mass., and other cities around the world. The Foundation, working in collaboration with governments and other partners, makes a significant impact in the lives of hundreds of millions of people around the world.
Phi Beta Sigma’s programs, including Bigger and Better Business, Social Action and Education are compatible with the mission of the Clinton Foundation. The Alliance for a Healthier Generation, a partnership between the Clinton Foundation and the American Heart Association to help combat childhood obesity, is in alignment with Phi Beta Sigma’s partnerships with the March of Dimes, and the American Cancer Society. The Clinton HIV/Aids initiative is right on target with Phi Beta Sigma’s partnership with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) which provides awareness and prevention strategies through its Conversation Among Brothers Series (CABS). Clinton’s Economic Opportunity Initiative embraces the same values that have been core to Phi Beta Sigma’s Bigger and Better Business program since its inception in 1925.
Congressman John Lewis (D-GA), a long-time member of Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc. responded “I am so pleased and delighted that President Bill Clinton has accepted membership in my fraternity. As a true servant-leader it is fitting for him to join the ranks of civil rights activist and labor leader A. Philip Randolph, Atlanta businessman Herman Russell, former U. S. Secretary of Education Rod Paige, former NAACP Leader James Weldon Johnson and renowned scientist George Washington Carver. My heart is warmed today.”
Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity is an international organization dedicated to the principles of Brotherhood, Scholarship and Service, founded in 1914 at Howard University in Washington, DC, comprised of college and professional men, predominantly of African American origin, open from its inception to men of all race, religion, class and national origin. The Fraternity holds as its motto, “Culture for Service and Service for Humanity.” With over 150,000 alumni and collegiate members, located in over 500 chapters throughout the United States, the Caribbean, Africa and Asia, the organization has its international headquarters in Washington, DC. It conducts national programs in the areas of Education, Social Action and Bigger & Better Business, a youth mentorship program of Sigma Beta Clubs for young men from 8 to 18, and a Sigma Wellness program in partnership with the American Cancer Society and the March of Dimes. Notable members include James Weldon Johnson, George Washington Carver, Congressman John Lewis (GA), Congressman Edolphus Towns (NY), Former Mayor Harold Washington (Chicago), and African Presidents: Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana), Benjamin Nnamdi Azikiwe (Nigeria) and William Tolbert (Liberia). For more information, visit www.pbs1914.org.
In an effort to reflect more of a diverse voice to Sunday morning talk shows centered around politics, Roland Martin has partnered with TV One to launch “Washington Watch.” The first episode will air on September 27, 2009 at 11:00am. Martin plans to feature guests from varied ethnicities and regions of the US- both demographics that he feels are not tapped enough on existing shows.
With our nation’s first African American president, Martin feels there’s an unsatisfied craving from the African American community to be plugged more into politics and government affairs. Like “Meet the Press” and other similar shows, it will be filmed weekly in Washington, DC; however, being aired via TV One whose focus is programming for African Americans, Martin will cater his show to cover politics with an African American target audience in mind.
I received this information below in honor of National HIV Testing Day 2009 from the Black AIDS Institute. The written documentation was copied verbatim from the email communication and then formatted for this blog post.
Greater Than AIDSSM, a new national movement seeks to inspire hope and promote the possibility of change in the AIDS epidemic facing Black America through the united actions of individuals, families and communities. The campaign promotes individual action to prevent and reduce the spread of HIV, beginning with knowing one’s HIV status.
Passing the Test, a report released today by the Black AIDS Institute examines the challenges and opportunities of HIV testing in Black America. As compared with other race and ethnicities, Black Americans are both more likely to be infected with HIV and die of AIDS. Early diagnosis and treatment saves lives, yet many Black Americans living with HIV do not know their status with some studies showing that rate as high as one in two.
We have a stake in one another… what binds us together is GREATER THAN that drives us apart… if enough people believe in the truth of that proposition and act on it, then we might not solve every problem, but we can get something meaningful done…
Barack Obama, December 1, 2006 (World AIDS Day)
Test 1 Million, a corresponding campaign produced by the Black AIDS Institute, kicks off an effort to test one million people in one year by next National HIV Testing Day (June 27, 2010). Visit www.test1Million.org to pledge to be 1 in a Million.
ABOUT GREATER THAN AIDSSM Greater Than AIDSSM is a campaign of the Black AIDS Media Partnership (BAMP), a sustained commitment among major U.S. media companies to work together to address AIDS in Black America. The Kaiser Family Foundation is providing day-to-day management for BAMP, with technical support from the Black AIDS Institute, the Elton John AIDS Foundation, and a number of major civil society partners. The campaign is organized in collaboration with Act Against AIDS, a multi-year effort by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to help refocus national attention on the HIV/AIDS crisis in the United States.
I was on Twitter yesterday when I ran across this story from CNN, and I could not believe what I was reading! Apparently, no one else could either as it generated a lot of Twitter chatter. I thought I would look into the story a little more and post it here.
This occurred in Cambridge, Maryland and the lady’s name is Candy Vigneri, age 44 years. She was at Long Wharf Park inside a portable toilet when she gave birth and then dropped the baby into that blue yuck below (makes me sick to my stomach to even retype this). Afterward, she went outside and asks someone (some sites report a construction worker) for a cigarette. The details on the story that led to the witness calling 911 and rescuing the baby from the portable toilet are sketchy, but I personally am glad that someone was there to respond quickly and save this baby’s life.
CNN writes, “The baby is in stable condition at Easton Memorial Hospital. Dorchester County social services will take control of the newborn after she is released from the hospital.”
Police have charged her with 1st and 2nd degree child abuse and reckless endangerment.
Melissa Cannon knows Vigneri; she says she does have other children. ‘You can tell by the way she looks and by the way she acts that there is really something wrong with her; that she does need some help,’ she said.
The baby girl was over six pounds at birth. Police say she’s in stable condition.
If you run across and further details on this story, please use my contact page or leave a comment here. As I find more details, I will also update this post.
50% of your donation (less Pay Pal fees) will go to Emerge Global charity (http://emergeglobal.org/). The other 50% funds the sweat equity I put into my work for your enjoyment. My hope is that one day I will be able to donate 100% to charity.
As of now, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell has reinstated Vick, assuming a team is willing to sign him, but has to adhere to some provisions until mid-October when he would be eligible for full reinstatement into the NFL.
) to offer you another opportunity to win free products! This promotion will run until noon on Saturday, July 18, 2009 EST. The winner will receive a CURLSTM Essentials Sample Kit of their choice valued at $22 like the one you see below, perfectly sized for air travel or any travel you may be doing this summer.
The CURLS Essentials sample kits are customized to suit your curl pattern- Fine/Medium, Medium, or Kinky. Following are some of the product descriptions, and you are invited to check out the Sample Kits on the CURLS website (
President Clinton has been focusing on the activities of the William J. Clinton Foundation since he left the White House. He wanted the Clinton Foundation to address the areas where he could make the most difference as a private citizen. The Foundation has grown into a global non-governmental organization with more than 1,400 staff and volunteers in more than 40 countries and with offices in New York City, Little Rock, Ark., Boston, Mass., and other cities around the world. The Foundation, working in collaboration with governments and other partners, makes a significant impact in the lives of hundreds of millions of people around the world.
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