Ethiopian-American rapper Gabriel Teodros of group Copperwire, gives a speech about hip-hop, media corporations and technology, activism, and afrofuturism. Some of the quotable parts from it:
“I use to say it’s the art of making something out of nothing. Now I realize hip-hop is realizing you have everything you need already when the world sees nothing there.”
“If we don’t write our stories down, we get written out of the pages of history. I realize now if we don’t write ourselves into the future, we get written out of tomorrow as well.”
“The feeling of having to fight with your back against the wall is a very familiar place. When you’re in that place, it is easy to forget that change is inevitable, that nothing lasts forever and we can win. When you’re so focused on the fight that it becomes a part of your identity, you start defining yourself as a fighter, warrior, a revolutionary, it’s not far off to say that the monsters you’ve been fighting against have become a part of your identity too. So what happens when the monsters are no longer there? What happens when you win?”
Here is more info about Octavia’s Brood from Adrienne Maree Brown that he mentions, and links to albums, Colored People’s Time Machine , Copperwire’s Earthbound, and more.
Sherese Francis: Futuristically Ancient 