The pairing of rapper Blitz the Ambassador and director Terence Nance for the short film for Blitz’s album Native Sun is a coming together of two visionary minds. Ghana-born musician, Blitz the Ambassador, first gained attention with his album, Stereotype, which featured the startling image of a radio man shooting himself in the head on […]
Read More Modern Griots: Blitz the Ambassador and Terence NanceIn light of the recent controversy over the Dutch Magazine, Jackie’s ignorant article on Rihanna, in which she was called “de niggabitch” (reminiscent of the term “negro wench“), I decided to give my two cents on how I feel about the word. When I was younger, I was completely against the use of the word. […]
Read More The N-Word…… who’s naughty or nice.” Although “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” may seem like an innocent Christmas song, could there have been subtle motives to its creation. Last year, I read Mark Anthony Neal‘s post about the song that I found interesting. Here is a sample of it and you can read the rest […]
Read More “He’s Making a List, And Checking It Twice, Gonna Find Out…Professor of Sociology, African American Studies and Library and Information Science, Abdul Alkalimat, has recorded several lectures about theory in black studies. The five lectures are available at the eblack studies website. In his lectures, Alkalimat discusses ideology, methodology, history, tradition and debate. So far, I have seen only the tradition lecture in which he […]
Read More Rethinking Black Studies…I was listening to the podcast Blacking It Up yesterday and documentary filmmaker Byron Hurt was there discussing his new film, Soul Food Junkies. Lolis Eric Elie, who came to my college Baruch in September to discuss the show Treme, is in this film, too. Not only is he a jazz journalist, but he is […]
Read More Thoughts for Food…Singer and violinist, Marques Toliver has released his new mixtape, “Studying for My PhD,” which is a compilation of 14 tracks commenting on the London riots. Toliver samples a variety of sources including Al Green, Nina Simone, Roberta Flack, Beyonce, Jackson 5, Bobby Womack, Shuggie Otis, Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell, James Baldwin speeches, and even […]
Read More Modern Griot Spotlight: “Studying for My PhD Mixtape”Remember Desi Arnaz’s performance of Babalu on the show I Love Lucy? Well, Afrodiaspores wrote a post about the Afro-cuban origins of the song: “Last night was the vigil, and today the day, celebrated as that of Saint Lazarus, associated among practitioners of the Afro-Cuban tradition Lucumí with the orisha Babalú-Ayé, also called Asojano. He […]
Read More BABALU!!!!!!Rapper Kenny’s Myth released last week his new mixtape, “Soul Krops Presents: The Promised Land.” Sampling several sources, including afrobeat music, the album mixes afrofuturism and holistic spirituality. This is the description of the album: The Promised Land is the overstanding that every man is ONE and thus we are all created perfectly. Standing on […]
Read More Modern Griots Spotlight: “Soul Krops Presents: The Promised Land”Junkanoo Obeah consists of folk magical practices that are performed in Caribbean islands, such as in my parents’ islands of Barbados and Dominica. It is also practiced in the Bahamas where singer Macfarlane Gregory Anthony McKay (Tony McKay) was born in 1942, and he later adopted the name of one of its islands, Exuma. Active during […]
Read More Modern Griots: Exuma
Sherese Francis 