Digital Salon Interview with author Angelique V. Nixon

May 1, 2013 by Leave a Comment

On Thursday May 2nd, I have the honor of hosting the New York book launch of Saltwater Healing by Angelique V. Nixon.  This myth memoir and poetry collection is an intimate articulation of self, family herstories, and personal reflections. I am ecstatic to share this brief interview ( there were so many more questions I wanted to ask) where Angelique discusses the book and her creation process.  I could go on and on here but I’ll let you read Angelique’s words for yourself. If you’re your in NYC, come out and join us Thursday at Bluestockings Boookstore! You’ll want to get a copy of this amazing piece of literary artwork.  

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Jess: What is a myth memoir and why did you choose this genre form to negotiate with/and present your story?

Angelique V. Nixon: I call my literary artwork “A Myth Memoir” because this describes the blending of stories, experiences, memories, dreams, and mystical elements of the narrative and poetry in the artwork. Also, I am working in the tradition of Black women writers who insist upon our need to create our own stories out of what we know and what we don’t know — because so much of our histories and herstories are unknown. I am particularly inspired by the great Black feminist poet and activist Audre Lorde’s biomythography Zami where she defies literary boundaries by creating a new genre using storytelling, dreams, myths, and histories/herstories to tell her story.

 

Jess: Did you make a deliberate decision to handcraft the memoir? Does the physical form of the book become an extension of the reckoning process for you as it pertains to healing? If so, how?

AVN: I started the art pieces in a creative writing workshop as an assignment to tell our story using a graphic novel style. And so in some ways it was deliberate, but it grew organically and in ways I didn’t envision when I started the project. The entire process was very tactile and physical – creating each of the 18 pages and transforming them into art pieces and then putting it all together for an art exhibit. And then creating the book was another part of this very tactile process. The first few pages started with an adult me telling stories and then the later pages transformed into a childhood persona re-telling and re-imagining my childhood through the land/seascape and my grandmother’s mythic voice. Some pages started with the stories, while others started with photographs and scraps of materials.

I went back and forth with inspiration from the materials (cotton, fabric, seeds, dried plants and seeds, straw plaits, and sand) and with the stories that emerged as I wrote and created each page – interplay between visual and text. I used Androsia fabric and plaited straw specifically because of how these materials are used in Bahamian cultural production and for tourism. This vision expanded as I worked with the fabric and straw as a reflection of the obvious to tell what is not so obvious – the hidden from view, the unspoken, the silenced. The creation process was an incredible healing journey and the pieces transformed each day I was at home in March 2012 to do the installation for Transforming Spaces in the Bahamas. I was fortunate to be home during Woman Tongue season – trees being ripe with pods and the beautiful sounds they make during our Bahamian spring time. This took my project to the healing and mythic space I had envisioned through the stories, and working with the woman tongue seeds and pods captivated my poet self.

And so the pieces grow from distance and longing in photographs of the first few pages to a more physical closeness with tactile offerings of the last pages and the frame of woman tongue pods and coconut tree branches. I ended the memoir with a kind of opening and circular movement that I hope pulls readers/viewers back into the piece to share in my vision of Saltwater Healing. The book grew out of my original idea for this project, which blossomed into a visual art piece. I see the book as an extension and movement of the piece that includes the myth memoir and several of my poems that brought me to this creative journey of self love and survival.

 

Jess: You write in your memoir: I rememory the stories of my birth with fire tongue. Can you talk more about the act of rememory- your act of rememory?

AVN: I am inspired by and work in the tradition of other women writers of color who insist upon our need to create and re-create our stories. We must do this because so many of our stories have been marginalized, lost, stolen, misnamed, undervalued, and invisible. The act of rememory for me is acknowledging that these memories are with us always through shared experiences, ancestors, and the land/sea/environment. And its using these memories to tell, create, recreate, transform, and make new stories.

 

Jess: Your writing,  in many ways, speaks of crossing boundaries be them emotional, familial, geographic, social, or sexual. I’m thinking here of the line from the poem ” I am, we are, silent no more” which reads : and the in/betweens trouble boundaries/these must be spoken. What does it mean for black women to cross these boundaries? How have you crossed boundaries in your own life?

AVN: Black women writers have long taken up this work of exploring and exploding boundaries because as Black feminists have argued since the 1960s, we exist within the boundaries, at the intersections, and therefore have unique insights into the commonalities of oppression – and we have a right to theorize, study, explain, and write about our own experiences. The writings of Black women like Audre Lorde, Sylvia Wynter, June Jordan, Angela Davis, Erna Brodber, M. Nourbese Philip, Alice Walker, Jacqui Alexander, Michelle Cliff, and Dionne Brand, among others, have blessed me with tools, language, and inspiration to understand and explicitly trouble boundaries. I am a Black mixed-race queer migrant woman with poor working class roots, living abroad yet deeply tied to home and the Caribbean as homeplace. And so I feel as if I exist in the “in-between” all the time.

I rarely fit easily into any one particular space and so I have had to cross boundaries, but I do so with consciousness of my gender, race, color, class, sexuality, nationality, histories/herstories, etc. I am also keenly aware of where I come from and the politics of mobility and access. So I have had to stay grounded, and I keep my work and myself honest and true to my politics and my communities. As a person of African descent and a person of color, I feel deeply a sense of responsibility to my ancestors and the shared oppression marginalized peoples have experienced and continue to experience. Yet I am female, same-sex loving, light-skinned, immigrant, raised in poverty, etc. with my own stories but these are connected. And so the personal stories I share in my work reflect these larger stories that must be told.

 

Jess: In recent years, we’ve seen more black women writers being published by major houses. In your opinion, is this indicative of a wider climate change about the importance of black women’s stories?

AVN: There has certainly been an impressive and growing body of Black women writers across the diaspora getting published by major publishing houses. And perhaps this does indicate that Black women’s stories are finally getting more attention. But I think there is still so much work we have to do. Our stories and our lives continue to be either hypervisible or invisible. I believe that Blackness continues to be denigrated and devalued, and we must constantly be wary of how our bodies and our stories are used – in mass media especially.

 

Jess: On the opposite end of the spectrum, I personally have been invigorated by the number of black women story tellers using small presses and even self publishing their novels, memoirs, poetry collections etc. Why did you choose to publish via a small press?

AVN: I chose to publish with Poinciana Paper Press because I believe in small independent publishing, and I want to support local businesses in the Caribbean. Also for me, its an honor to be published, recognized, and supported by a local Bahamian press because my work is about home – and no matter how long I have lived away – The Bahamas is always my home.

 

Jess: How does your literary artwork inform your academic and activist work?

AVN: I would have to say that my poetry has long inspired me to stay rooted in community in  my academic work, and that my activist work has been fed by and feeds my poetry. The visual and mixed media art is a new creative exploration for me over the last year, and its been a welcome and needed escape from the rigidity of academic work. My creative work is vital to my very existence and so is my community work.

 

Jess: How can Zora and our readers continue to support you?

AVN: Please come out the New York launch and reading of Saltwater Healing on Thursday, May 2nd at Bluestockings at 7pm! And if you want to know more about my work, check out my blog conscious vibration, which is part archive of my writing life and part monthly musings/updates about what I’m working on at that particular time. Follow my blog at consciousvibration.blogspot.com. Follow me on instagram at “sistellablack.”

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Angelique V. Nixon is a Caribbean writer, scholar, teacher, community worker, artist, and poet – born and raised in The Bahamas. She earned her Ph.D. in English specializing in Caribbean literature and culture at the University of Florida. She teaches in the Department of English and Creative Writing at Susquehanna University in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania. Her work as a scholar and poet has been published widely in academic and literary journals, namely Anthurium, Black Renaissance Noire, Journal of Caribbean Literatures, MaComere, small axe salon, tongues of the ocean, and WomanSpeak. Angelique is deeply invested in grassroots activism and is involved with a number of community-based organizations, including Ayiti Resurrect, Caribbean IRN, and Critical Resistance, among others. She works through her writing and activism to disrupt silences, challenge systems of oppression, and carve spaces for resistance and desire.

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Approaching Truths In Hip- Hop

May 16, 2012 by Leave a Comment

I spend a lot of time thinking about Hip Hop.  The energy. The bad rappers. The  kick ass activists. The record labels. The legends. It’s a conversation that can often be overwhelming but not necessarily mundane because  such spaces of dialogue allow me to define, interpret, and process in order to reach definitions of truths. Here, I consider a truth to be any belief a person may hold about the music, art, or business of Hip Hop.

Truth, however, is a strange word when thinking about Hip Hop.

There are multiple realities and identities that intersect and converge. A young emcee rhyming in Brooklyn in 1988 may or may not think about the game the way  a young emcee rhyming in Dallas in 2012 would. The southern- womanist -writer-in me engages with Hip Hop in a manner that could be unknown or irrelevant to a 16 year old DJ learning how to spin in his basement on Chicago’s South Side. It is a safe space where I interrogate conceptualizations of blackness or sharpen my writing skills or refine my weekend dance skills ( ’cause yes, sometimes a girl just wants to juke. blame it on my residency in the Chi.)

It may not be that deep for you.

And that’s perfectly fine. In fact, I’m pretty sure that’s how things are supposed to work.

I recently attended an artist talk with photographer Mike Schreiber where he discussed his new book  True Hip Hop. A collection of black and white photographs, the  book features portraiture of  some of the most interesting Hip Hop artists from the last decade. When asked by the moderator why he  had chosen to title the collection True Hip Hop, Schreiber simply responded that the book was a Hip Hop as he had experienced it, a Hip Hop that marked a moment of his life as a young professional. It was a truth that Schreiber, as a photographer, defined and created in his own language. It wasn’t really about the artists as much as it was about the connections Schreiber cultivated with the artists in order to tell a story.

And maybe I’m the only person in awe of this concept but I had an epiphany. As I engage in conversation about the culture across boundaries- age, class, geographic location- I  have learned that multiple truths must exist because it is in the tension that an art form truly flourishes. Without the interaction of truths, there wouldn’t be room for a Foxy Brown and a Lauryn Hill.

And so what if Nikki G wants to ink Thug Life on her forearm in honor of a fallen flawed poet? Shouldn’t her truth be allowed to speak to and with Pac’s truth, despite what may appear to be an inherent contradiction of feminism and gangsta? Someone has to talk to our men about misogyny and love and greatness.

If I may adapt Chimamanda Adichie’s language: there is a danger in a singular understanding of Hip Hop. While universal, it is full of specificities. I learn from these details.

I’m convinced no single truth can ever exist in Hip Hop  because it carries on its shoulders so many experiences.  Folks evolve and with this growth comes new knowledge and responsibilities that shape us or our truths. And if we can change, our truths certainly can.

Although, I think I will always strongly dislike Chief Keef. That’s just me though…

How do you define truth in Hip Hop?

 

 

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On Sisterhood

April 25, 2012 by 1 Comment

I’ve recently made a decision to remove the term ‘best friend’ from my personal vocabulary. For me, the term does not convey an accurate reflection of my affection for another person with whom I am extremely close, nor does use of this term, in my experience, offer room for multiple options. Think about it. When we use the adjective ‘best’, are we not implying that the object being modified is an absolute? For what can be better than best?

There is something that really irks me about thinking of other people in terms of best, better, or worse. Sure there are folks with whom we are simply acquainted and other people with whom we would rather have no interaction and even still, there are those high school classmates who were my ride-or-dies as a 16-year-old but I hardly speak to them now some five years later. But the people who have remained in my life as a support system could never be filed into a hierarchical system.

I think about this a lot whenever someone asks me to talk about the women friends in my life. I’ve been blessed to meet women who I’m convinced could move mountains. There is a power in them that is nothing short of divine and the moments when I am in the company of these teachers and writers and painters and mothers and students and activists and travelers are my warmest. Friendship then becomes a sisterhood- my acknowledgment of a connectivity that transcends cultures or geopolitical boundaries or languages or religions.

Sometimes sisterhood is political. I smile when I reflect on the ways in which my sistafriends combat various social injustices as they speak spiritual truths to power.  Sometime sisterhood is alarming because its very existence means that we are capable of exhibiting some of that agape love and we know that love is dangerous because love is resistance.

Sisterhood is a shared pheromone gut type of feeling. It’s a I-hope-you would-really-tell- me-if-this looked-stupid- type of thing. It’s hug after the worst weekend of your life and you haven’t even opened your mouth to run down the list of problems but girl, you didn’t have to say a word because  the sista already knew.

Sisterhood is pure despite our flaws.

And call me crazy but I don’t believe for a second that any advice column or magazine could ever tell you how to be a sistafriend because when you find sisterhood ( or perhaps, when it finds you) you know it.

Maxine Hong Kingston taught me about women warriors. These are my sisters, each with their own swing and sass.

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For My Brother (A Love Letter)

March 21, 2012 by 1 Comment

Little Brother,

Have I ever told you how amazing you are? Not in the infantile, often obligatory sense that looms over the head of an older sister confronted with questions about her siblings. Little Brother, you are amazing because you teach me how to be brave. Although, I doubt you realize this super strength with which you are endowed.

Even when we were young, battling the childhood monsters of chicken pox and ear infections, I admired your Achilles like tendencies that rendered you healthy after the most vicious of bouts. And when I think of the time when you  cut your ear on a counter corner because you slipped and fell on spilled lemonade that I was supposed to clean, I cringe at my carelessness. Despite the blood, you remained strong.

You are tough kid.

You have hurdled and tackled and sprinted your way through adolescence and you have done so as a beautiful, brown-skinned, wide-eyed adventurer. I love you for that. Because even when the world ( or George Zimmerman) deems you a suspicious threat as a 6’2 ( remember when I was taller than you? ), 19 year-old black boy, you remain open, living fearlessly. The bounce in your walk is like a middle finger to those who dare question your boldness. I imagine at any given moment you’re comforted by thoughts of our parents and dance and skateboarding.

You’ll probably read this and tell me that I’m overthinking, over-analyzing. Maybe you’re right but that’s what older sisters do.

I can’t save you from danger, little brother. I wish I could tell you that all of your dreams will come true and that people are genuinely good but we live in a nation consumed by student loans and religious rifts and occupied streets- a land where skittles on a late night can get you killed. But I’m not going to claim to have the answers for our existential questions. I can only tell you that I love you and perhaps you need, like Trayvon Martin needed, more than words, no matter how deeply felt these words are.

But for now, take them for they carry my admiration and gratitude. You teach me how to be brave in the face of a (dangerous) world that doesn’t yet understand your power.

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Chicago’s Inner City Muslim Action Network Raises a Call to Arms

March 2, 2012 by Leave a Comment

If you are familiar with any urban metropolis, you’re probably aware of the many discrepancies that plague these cities in regards to food access and resources. Often, in places such as Washington D.C., New York, and Los Angeles, poorer neighborhoods suffer disproportionately from the lack of adequate markets and businesses that offer fresh, affordable , healthy food products. While, gentrification is on the rise in said areas, these poor neighborhoods also tend to be overwhelmingly black and brown, posing a significant health risk to already vulnerable communities. Food activists refer to these areas as food deserts, a place with no or distant grocery stores.

The conversation about food access is not new. However, as First Lady Michelle Obama continues to champion healthy eating habits and rally against the obesity epidemic, food activism discourse increasingly permeates our society.

And that’s certainly a  good thing.  But talking about a subject and acting in order to create sustainable change are two different concepts.

Luckily, in Chicago, one organization  is committed to action. The Inner City Muslim Action Network is dedicated to, amongst other causes, ameliorating the food realities of more than 300,000 individuals living on the South and West side of the city. Sponsored in part by the Open Society Foundations, IMAN hosts a series of free art workshops referred to as Community Cafe. The organization’s most recent workshop focused on Chicago’s food crisis through an interactive and creative presentation of facts and solutions.

Founded in 1997, IMAN is a three tiered coalition. ” IMAN does community organizing work, it does social services and it cultivates the arts,” say Arts and Culture Director Asad Jafri. This vision set the tone for last Saturday’s Just Food Community Cafe. Featuring a performance by British Duo Native Sun, the event was more than a display of disheartening statistics. Instead, attendees were treated to great food, courtesy of vendors such as A Natural Harvest, My Halal Kitchen and Soul Vegan, great music, and great art.

What was perhaps most powerful about the Community Cafe was the deep spiritual  engagement by the audience. Regardless of religious affiliation or race or ethnicity, the sincerity of a community desiring to provide solutions to its problems could be felt.  ” If people are educated and they demand healthier food and healthier options, that’s one level of the things we’re aiming to accomplish,” Jafri says.

Coalition building is critical because as you build in one community you gain the tools (and language) necessary to assist others in their respective communities.  ”I think with a three pronged approach- business practices, knowledge, and access- we can hit everything and it’s not just about food deserts in Chicago anymore, you can begin to talk about famine in Somalia in the same way,” says Jafri.

Indeed, IMAN is on a mission: to revolutionize Chicago, one corner store at a time.

To join in on the action or to learn more about IMAN visit their website at: www.imancentral.org. You can also follow on twitter at : @imancentral

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British Duo Native Sun Warms Listeners with Diasporic Energy

February 28, 2012 by 1 Comment

Discovering new music is such an invigorating process for me because I am able to encounter new stories of culture and language and growth. It feels good to sing along with an artist who knows how to speak to my soul in a new way. Such was the case when I discovered British Duo Native Sun who blend afro beat melodies with Hip Hop lyricism in order to charm and inspire.

When you listen to Native Sun, you are invited into diaspora. Group members, Mohammed Yahya and Sarina Leah are both musicians committed to not only quality music but edifying words through a message of peace. Their new album, Indigenous Soundwaves, is a testament to the fact that brothers and sisters around the world are speaking truth to power in the most creative of ways. Zora had the pleasure to chat with the duo as they prepared for their first Chicago performance. Effortlessly cool, the group dropped their thoughts on the recording process, listener support, and spirituality.

Zora: Thanks for speaking with us today! For those of us new to your music, can you talk about how you two connected? How did Native Sun come about?

Sarina: Myself and Mohammed met about ten or eleven years ago. My best friend is Mohammed’s wife and a member of the group Poetic Pilgrimage so we moved in the same circles and there were various events that Poetic Pilgrimage and Mohammed Yahya would create and one event was called Rebel Music. Because we were like a little family we ended up eventually working together after Mohammed kept pushing me to do a track with him. One track turned into two then three and we decided to be a group and build.

Zora: Has music always been something you knew you wanted to do?

Mohammed: For me, music came at such a young age. I was born in Mozambique and I fled to Portugal where I lived for 10 years and music played a big role because I didn’t have literature that would teach me about my country. I was taught through music so as soon as I was able to read and write, I started writing poetry. I was really, really young and when Hip Hop came to Portugal I thought “Oh my God, this is amazing. This is it.”

Sarina: I used to sing all the time. Back in my era there were tapes [laughs], not CD’s and so I would record alot of radio music like TLC, SWV, and Brandy. I would record the songs,rewind, and then try to remember how to sing it just like the artist.I spent alot of time writing the wrong lyrics [laughs] thinking I was singing the right thing. But it was cool because I learned to write and also sing that way.

Zora: As I listened to your music, I was immediately struck by an energy of an artform that is dedicated to peace and cultural dialogue. Why is it important for these themes to resonate in your music?

Mohammed: I think because it is such a universal message. Me and Sarina both have different spiritual paths in our lives but ultimately we’re trying to project that and as we look around us it’s obvious that the world needs more peace, love, understanding and cultural dialogue because ultimately we have to live with each other regardless of what paths or backgrounds we are coming from.

Sarina: I also think that the things that we write empower our own lives and vice versa. I’ve been a vegan for a year and being conscious of what I eat and what I choose to do empowers our music as well. There is a give and take element that is inspiring.

Zora: Your new project, Indigenous Soundwaves is dope! My favorite track is Gallery of Dreams. What was the recording process like? How do you feel now that the album is complete?

Mohammed: You know, it’s interesting because Gallery of Dreams was actually the first song that we recorded and as a rapper I’m used to writing really quickly, going to the studio and then recording but that song took months to do because we would record it in parts. Alot of our songs start off with us discussing different subjects and during that particular conversation Sarina was talking about children and the song grew from there. It’s a very emotional process.

Sarina: It’s very touching. You know what’s really deep as well? We thought of the title but we didn’t realize that it was G.O.D. Gallery of Dreams. That was such a spiritual thing. Usually, as a vocalist you are given a track and you put your vocals around the track but on this song I sang the melody and then Samantha, who plays the keys on the track, imitated my voice with the keys and it became a deep involvement.

Mohammed: And songs like that, we don’t even believe come from us. They comes through us.

Zora: What artists are you listening to currently?

Mohammed: I listen to people like Ian Kamau from Canada. I also listen to alot of West African Music from countries like Mali, Senegal.

Sarina: I’m really inspired by European Electro music. Little Dragon.And of course soul music is embedded in me as well, Erykah Badu, Jill Scott.

Zora: How can Zora and our readers continue to support you?

Mohammed: Keep up todate with us through our twitter and facebook but most importantly share the music!

Be sure to stay in touch with Native Sun via twitter at @nativesunmuzik or find them on facebook at Native Sun. You can also support the dynamic duo by picking up the digital copy of their soul stirring album Indigenous Soundwaves

It’s good stuff. I promise!

Filed Under: Blog, Culture, Featured, Hip Hop, Interviews Tagged With: , , , ,

So This is Why Hip Hop is Still Complicated for a Sistah…

February 24, 2012 by 2 Comments

By now, I’m sure  you’ve heard about the recent Too $hort interview with XXL Magazine in which the Ol’ G rapper dishes out  fatherly advice about the “birds and the bees” to middle school and high school aged boys. Although, to say his was a discussion about  the “birds and the bees” puts it mildly. Too $hort referred to his wisdom as “mind manipulation” to  ”turn girls out .” In the video interview that has now been removed, he graphically describe a scene for such a process: ”You push her up against the wall,” he says. “You take your finger and put a little spit on it and you stick your finger in her underwear and you rub it on there and watch what happens.” He was sure to preface his statements by asking women listeners to “cover their ears” should they be offended.

I don’t have to tell you that folks weren’t happy, including myself.

As soon as the interview dropped, the godmothers of hip hop literary feminism were up in arms. Writers Joan Morgan and dream hampton turned to twitter to articulate the problematic nature of the interview and have been calling for XXL Mag editor Vanessa Satten’s resignation. They, like me, question the continued sexual assault of young black and brown girls. They, like me, pondered aloud the absurd belief of black and brown female bodies as sites of degradation and hypersexualization.  Why does it seem like Hip Hop is out to get us? As Ebony.com editor-in-chief Kierna Mayo tweeted: so this is why Hip Hop is STILL complicated for a sis…

I feel her.

But I hesitated to write any type of response. What could I say that had not been already said?

How many other ways could I think about Too $hort’s violating remarks? For the discourse about women of color and our sexuality remains a painful dialogue- a conversation that often invites discomfort.

Like the godmothers before me, I know the beauty of Hip Hop. When you love Hip Hop, you love radically. But when Hip Hop hurts, it hurts. I proclaim the profundity of an artistic production, a life movement, yet cringe at words that reinforce harmful ideologies present within said life force that affect the development of healthy relationships.

Instead of writing an immediate response or trying to wax poetic, I decided to talk to my boys. And not my suit-and-tie-degree-toting or kickin’it-on-the-block- got -every jay- track-memorized- boys. Not them.

I am the personal counselor for 20 of Chicago’s freshest boy wonders- a group of quirky sophomores itching to put their grown man on. If there is to be an eradication of the sexist, misogynistic practices present in Hip Hop and more importantly society, young men must become allies. So, it was with these young men- the gentlemen to whom Too $hort directed his advice- that I conversed.

While our collective sessions can often be rowdy, loud, discombobulated centers of teenage hormones, the Too $hort conversation was different. I came into the room somber. I asked for complete silence. I read the aforementioned Too $hort statement. I told them to write the first 3 words that came to mind when the quote was read aloud.

I had no idea what words or phrases my boys would share out but I held no expectations . Even still, my heart hurt when words like foreplay and experimentation were articulated. One student asked: couldn’t this be considered rape? Another student repsonded: If she likes it. it’s cool. Some students fell asleep.

I winced.

When it was my turn to share, I spoke slowly, hesitating between each syllable almost: misogyny. objectification. hip hop. Blank faces looked back at me. I proceeded to stumble over explainations laced with feminist rhetoric. Sentences full of bell hooks interpretations and angela davis tonality. And when the school bell rang at the end of the period, my boys said their usual goodbyes without a single follow-up question. Later that day, a teacher approached me to tell me that he overheard a few of my students giggling about the “sex” talk we had.

They’ve missed the point I thought. Then I realized that I had no clue how to talk to teenage boys about the hypersexualiztion of black and brown female bodies. Of course, they missed the point because in my anxious attempt to “drop knowledge”, I spoke in a foreign language. In my head I had created a scenario in which my students would immedialtely become enraged about the perpetual victimization of their sistahs and take up arms in solidarity with me. Yet, I offered no entry point, no gateway into the movement. I gave them three new vocabulary words without context, and they walked away giggling about sex.

Perhaps it would have been easier to ignore the incident or raise hell on twitter about XXL Magazine or Too $hort. To be clear, I support all the critiques that have been put forth thus far. I just wasn’t sure I had any new ideas to contribute and I hate intellectual clutter. I’m frustrated with this incident  because I am a black woman deeply committed to this thing we call Hip Hop. I’m frustrated because I want to tell my boys for whom I care  tremendously that Too $hort is wrong. I want to explain objectification and misogyny and sexism. I want to speak to the boys who will grow up to become the men who will touch, support, kiss, hug, and hurt our daughters or sisters or nieces. I want to explain the tenants of radical love but so far I’ve failed.

So, if you have any suggestions, I’m all ears.

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Howard University Students Respond to Somali Crisis

January 30, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Somali women and girls are in crisis.

Shaken by extreme famine and drought since last July, the country’s most vulnerable citizens have become the target of increased sexual violence.  The famine has resulted in the displacement of thousands of people and those who have been displaced are disproportionally women and children. Most often, these women and children seek shelter in refugee camps. However, the threat of violence still looms and the political instability of the nation is heightened not only by current social conditions but the rise in power of the Shabaab Islamic group.

According to  NY Times Bureau Chief Jeffery Gettlemen, the Shabaab ,which controls a large portion of southern Somalia, has created a system of temporary marriages where families are forced to give up their daughters as wives of fighters. Yet, as Gettlemen notes, this practice is nothing more than rape. Those women who avoid temporary marriage and enter a refugee aid camp are not necessarily immune to such sexual atrocities. Somali soldiers too pose a danger, further deepening a cycle of violence where women become the spoils of war.

The UN reports that approximately 1.5 billion dollars are needed to provide  humanitarian relief for famine victims. There is no doubt that much of this aid will go to  woman and girls. And while the UN is a powerful tool for human rights work, it is not the only source of help. Individuals, organizations and places of worship can all become agents of change.

The students of Howard University are agents of change.

After learning about the Somali crisis, several students formed the Howard University Somalia Relief Team. United by a common commitment to social justice, the members of the Relief Team have organized the Eternal Voices Benefit, an art showcase and fundraiser.

“Through this event, we are not only raising awareness about the crisis in the horn of Africa, but also testing the legacy of this esteemed university,” says Victoria Fortune, Eternal Voices co-coordinator.

Eternal Voices will feature the legendary Amiri Baraka with musical performances by GWN and the Afro- Blue Vocal Band. The event is apart of  a yearlong campaign in conjunction with CARE International that ultimately aims to raise $10,000 towards Somali relief efforts.

The plight of women, children, and famine victims in Somalia cannot be fixed over night but the utilization of our collective resources as a means of support is a step in the right direction.

Eternal Voices will be held on Thursday February 9th at 7pm in the Cramton Auditorium of Howard University. Tickets can be purchased online at ticketmaster.com

If you are in the D.C area, I urge you to attend.

 

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