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Preface

By Marvin X

After a life of failed relationships, I am now an authority on how to fuck shit up. But I also learned how to keep peace in the house by speaking the language of love and receiving it from my beloved. Call it the tone test, if you will, but the language of love will go a long way toward healthy male/female relations or any human relations.

My mother told me I didn’t need a wife but a maid, secretary, and mistress. In the fourth quarter of my life, I must admit and confess I think Mom was right. After someone read my essay "Creativity and Sexuality," they said we must keep a balance.

And this is true except for those like myself who manifest the addictive personality that consistently borders on the extreme, somehow missing that balance that provides the stability we need to survive and thrive in this turbulent world, now racing toward The End!

I am much like James Baldwin who said, “I had to live recklessly in order to live at all.” And it seems I am also like the Barakas who live with high drama. It is doubtful I would be able to live a life without drama, being the dramatist I am, although these days I try to stay in the no stress zone, yet drama finds me at every turn. I am fascinated with lesbians because interacting with them is so dramatic.

There is a natural dramatic tension when one desires what he can’t have! It’s a challenge, even greater than seeking a heterosexual woman, although she is fine with me, especially if she has mastered the language of love and doesn’t talk in a provocative language, i.e., don’t tell me to do shit. I don’t have to do a motherfucking thang!

As the Maid, the Ho, the Cook (see story inside) taught me, if you ask me right, in the right tone, I will do anything and everything, but if you come at me in a dictatorial manner that expresses domination, you can’t get nothing here! Matter of fact, I’ll do the opposite, as in kiss my ass.

Today, relationships are fragile at best because people are under great stress generally: will we have a job tomorrow, a house, a mate, sanity? So we can only take things one day at a time. There is great insecurity among the people, thus relationships are enduring major stress.

Yet, we cannot get out of these human relationships because love is all there is, even living in the imagination will not suffice, ultimately, we must leave our dream state to encounter reality, and the reality is that we often connect with people with whom we know and don’t know, whom we love and don’t love, yet must love. It takes the same energy to love as to hate, same energy. My favorite song says, “The greatest thing you will ever learn is to love and be loved in return.”

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Foreword

By Marvin X

Sexuality is determined by biology and social psychology. In the socialization of humans, mythology plays a critical role in manhood and womanhood training rites. Mythology lies in the deep structure of the mental process, yet mythical notions, stories, tales, ideas, values are clearly present in the surface structure of human behavior. Ritual behavior is simply the enactment of mythology, the stories of the tribe, the values, mores, manners, morals. Myths prescribe the acceptable and the forbidden, the sacred and the profane.

Of course the Shaman often transcends tribal mythology to extend the narrative, take it to a higher level, much like a Coltrane solo, or a Miles Davis tune, connected to the past but very much into the present and future, the unknown, into the space of fear and dread, and yet it is beautiful, if we go there with Trane, Miles, Dolphy. So mythology must be fluid, dynamic. There comes a time when old myths must be discarded, thrown into the dustbin of history. And so it is with the patriarchy or myth of male domination.

In the patriarchal or male dominated society, men are taught they own women, that women are their personal property or chattel real, as opposed to real estate, i.e., land, buildings. Isn't it ironic that a people who are descendants of chattel slaves would continue in the tradition upon liberation, that they would perpetuate relationship slavery, i.e., marriage, girlfriend, boyfriend?

I don't want to own nobody and surely don't want anyone to own me. Imagine, the other day a brother said, "My pussy is at home!" We tried to tell him, first of all, he doesn't have a pussy, his woman has a pussy, so his pussy ain't at home. And imagine when he arrives home and "his pussy" is gone. When he locates "his pussy" will he be happy, sad, angry, violent, for why wasn't his pussy at home, why did it leave, or does it have the right to leave? Maybe the sister was with her friends, telling them, "Damn, ya'll, I got to go home to give that nigguh some pussy." They reply, "Girl, you ain't gotta do that, that's yo pussy, girl!"

In this atmosphere, women can be verbally, emotionally, and physically abused. They can be beaten and killed for violating the man's so-called ownership of their bodies, minds, and souls.

Clearly, there is absolutely no difference in a woman stoned to death in a Muslim society and shot to death in a Christian society because of her supposed adultery and/or infidelity. Of course, these days women are shooting the men to death for their freedom of expression or so-called sexual transgressions.

The man is more often than not afforded hero status in Muslim and Christian society for executing "honor killings" because he was disrespected by "his" woman. These days women are exercising their right to retaliate on the man for his indiscretions since marriage myths and rites suggest ownership by both parties, though man has the ultimate authority in the patriarchal society.

Women are now attending court mandated anger management classes and receiving convictions for assault and or homicide in the killing of their mates, all in the name of love. Tina asked what does love have to do with it? I ask, what kind of love is this—and if this is love I don't want it!

If we are to move toward healthy psychosocial sexuality, we must examine the myths we live by. We may discover these myths are toxic, reactionary, and detrimental to our psychosocial health. We may need to transform and radicalize these myths/rituals in the light of modernity and post modernity or the new millennium.

In the present era of spiritual consciousness, we cannot behave as cave men and women. We cannot continue rearing little cave children whose behavior befits the Stone Age, bereft of compassion, willing to kill at the drop of a hat because someone dissed them, especially their girlfriend who gave up "her pussy" to a friend or stranger.

We must jump out of the box of ignorance, jealousy, envy, religiosity, narrow mindedness, insecurity and the world of make believe. We do not own other human beings. This is called slavery by any word. Partners, boyfriends, girlfriends, husbands, wives, must dispel and discard mythical notions of ownership and domination.

Our bodies are the temple of God, not the property of another. No attachments but to God! We are slaves or servants of God, Abdullah (we are all Abdullah, the servant of God). This is the attitude of radical spiritual consciousness. No one owns us but God. Our life and death are for God. We are thus free to do as we will since we exist in God and God exists in us. We are indivisible from God, thus we are God, we are Divine. Man is divine, woman is divine. We are equal beings in the temple of God and the temple of God is the universe, and all in creation is of God, by God and for God.

If you desire to surrender yourself to your beloved, this is your rite/right. In love, it is indeed all for the beloved, love is the annihilation of self for the beloved. Yes, we lose our "self" in the beloved. In my play One Day in the Life, Karima says, "I sacrificed everything for you, but you blew it buddy, I'm through with you!"

We pray you shall do the will of God in your relationships. If you don't, no one can judge you but God, especially the God in you or the self accusing spirit! Certainly, no one has the right to beat or kill you, stone you to death, shoot you in the head. Nor does anyone have the right to verbally or emotionally abuse you because of your behavior that may, from time to time, cross the line of propriety. And as per sexual transgressions, pussy and dick ain't nothing but a muscle, so why are you tripping over flesh, a muscle?

Your pussy belongs to you, your dick belongs to you and you alone. It is attached to you, not your boyfriend, girlfriend, partner, husband, wife, lover, trick! Human beings are subject to do anything during the course of a day, and you are free to do so. Vows of fidelity must be thrown into the dustbin of history, along with Santa Claus, the Easter bunny, and the return of a dead man after two thousand years.

If you persist in your wretchedness, ignorance and world of make believe that you own someone's pussy and dick, your mental health shall suffer along with the general condition of society that is rapidly heading to the precipice as we write. The mental hospitals, prisons and jails shall remain full of those partner abusers guilty of assault and/or homicide.

We urge you to free yourself from the prison of your mind based on primitive mythological notions of ownership and domination. Indeed, love the one ya wit, but you don't own them. You can't force them to do anything.

Why can't we just get along, Rodney King asked? Why can we love and be loved in return? Why must we be ugly to each other, especially in the name of love? Why can't we love without the negativity? Why must we hurt the one we love, and yet, as Dr. Nathan Hare says, there can be no master without one willing to be the slave. Just as I cannot love you unless you allow me to love you, I cannot hurt you unless you allow me to hurt you.

Love begins with self love. If and when you don't love yourself, you cannot love someone else. You can fake the funk for a time. But if you don't know yourself, you cannot know your partner and mate. You can be with them twenty, thirty and forty years, but you don't know them. This is why couples break up after ten, twenty, thirty years together. They never knew each other, they were faking the funk, but the funk caught up with them. Yes, there was abuse because in their ignorance they first abused themselves, then abused their mate or partner simply because they never followed their own bliss or purpose as Joseph Campbell taught us. Nancy Wilson said, "I Never Been To Me!"

Indeed, life is about getting to the real you, your mission and purpose. When you cannot achieve this, in your frustration, you are bound to oppress and dominate your mate and those you love. Sadly, you have been programmed by the American or Western mythology of Christianity and Capitalism. You are thus the man and woman in the box. You may deny you are in the box, yet your very existence , and clearly your behavior with your mate is evidence you are inside the box of Christianity and Capitalism. In short, you are a slave, albeit a free slave, but a slave none the less. In turn, you desire to enslave your mate and children—Capitalism has programmed you to desire cheap trinkets, things and more things, conspicuous consumption, materialism, the world of make believe.

Yet with all your materialism, you have not followed your bliss, you are totally devoid of spiritual consciousness. You may be religious, yet your practice of religion is a desire for prosperity that would be alien to Mary's baby! You do not desire to liberate the captives, help the poor, the broken hearted, the hungry, the homeless. You are arrogant and wicked wearing your rocks, animal skins and plastic clothes. Yet you are not happy, nor is your mate. Even your children are little assholes, ungrateful bastards!

You hide the pain by medicating yourself with drugs, sex, video and internet games, religiosity and other escapism from your life of nothingness and dread.

We pray one day you shall awaken and throw off the chains on your brain, throw off the oppressive mythology of Christianity and Capitalism, or any other oppressive religion, including Islam, or any ideology that promotes pie in the sky or other worldism, escapism from facing reality with a radical agenda that is about seizing power from the blood suckers of the poor, the global bandits who promote the world of make believe.

How can you be at peace with yourself and your mate while you enjoy the benefits of a society that spends a trillion dollars per year to commit mass murder around the world to perpetuate a world of make believe, to keep people deaf, dumb and blind, consuming trinkets that send them directly to Yacoub's workers: the doctor, nurse and undertaker.

It is this mythological psychosocial order that has you drunk with thinking you must own and oppress somebody, especially those you supposedly love and cherish. Jump out of the box—free yourself, your mate and your children. Strive toward a radical spirituality that oppresses no one, but frees everyone. Love should not be slavery. Free your mind, free your mate, free humanity.

9 September 2010

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Introduction

By Delores Nochi Cooper

Mythology of Pussy and Dick is a compilation of everything Marvin X has written on  sexuality in America and the world. There are those who will miss this opportunity to receive wisdom from our brother because of the language he uses to describe the male and female anatomy, and his perceived objectification of women and men, and this is a tragedy because this information is crucial for men and women who are suffering from a psycho-linguistic crisis and inflicting actual violence upon lovers  in their male/female and partner relations including, same gender loving person relationships, and these dysfunctional interactions are witnessed by children who are the next generation of couples. They will emulate what they see elders enact.

The same people who dare judge his choice of words, his linguistic dexterity, are guilty of lingering in the comfort of their bedrooms watching shows on big screen TVs that depict graphic details of violence perpetrated against others, especially women, yet they call it entertainment. If children learn more from what they see than what we tell them, how will they process and act upon the continued sexual chaos that is manifested in our families and society?

The author has proven himself to be a leader and a teacher who has the best interest of the community at heart. He speaks truth with language that can be understood by the least of us and the best of us. His credentials includes brief tenure at the finest institutions in America : Fresno State University , 1969, University of California , Berkeley , 1972, Mills College , 1972, San Francisco State University , 1974, University of California , San Diego , 1975, University of Nevada , Reno , 1979.

He embraced the system and defied the system! Oriented in the Muslim tradition of polygamy or plural marriage (see his play In the Name of Love, Laney College Theater production 1981); he has conquered his own demons and  held his own with  associated intellectuals and psychopaths. In the words of James Sweeney “…Courageous and outrageous, he walked through the muck and mire of hell and came out clean as white fish and black as coal.”

We all have war stories about relationships gone bad. The difference between Marvin X and the rest of us is that Marvin X has lived what he is writing  about, survived it and is willing to talk about it, and holds nothing back, narrated in language that will grab your attention and cause you an epileptic  seizure!.

Each story is rich with commentary which speaks to society’s attitudes about male and female relationships: rape, athletes, toxic love, crack house sex, women without men, language of love, religious persecution of women (a woman stoned); gay and lesbian youth, same sex marriage, and much more…

His parables are commentary about events in real time is ingenious. If you are a follower of his blog, then you know with each daily entry he not only provides us with happenings locally and nationally, but walks us through events from a historical and global perspective.

Marvin X has chosen to sensitize our society by using words like pussy and dick. Language is fluid and if its primary use is communication, and if through words one fails to hit the target, then what is the point? It may be that the author is before his time, and in future generations, pussy and dick will become words of endearment, not relegated to the present negative connotations. Perhaps it will become a mantra chanted over and over as a pre-sex ritual. Why not? Lord knows we could use some more effective ways to get beyond reckless abandonment.

In his essay,  "The Maid, the Ho, the Cook," Marvin X demonstrates his tender side. Lil Joe describes this story as “One of the most beautiful pieces about real love I’ve ever read. The image of "crack-heads" as scandalous and without human dignity is destroyed by Marvin’s recollection of this sister with whom he fell in love. Because the object of MX’s affection is for  a whore, but there are those, and you know who you are, who will lose the essence of this story which addresses real feelings and real interactions between a man and a woman. Perhaps, you have only loved when it was safe to do so. But all of us who have loved surely know that passion and feelings can at times be both spontaneous and unsolicited.

Is Marvin X the only courageous one among us who dares to “tell the truth and shame the devil”?

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To get your copy of

Mythology of Pussy and Dick

Toward Healthy Psychosocial Sexuality

By Marvin X

Marvin X is putting the finishing touches on the expanded version of his Mythology of Pussy and Dick: Toward Healthy Psychosocial Sexuality. In its pamphlet form, this is the most stolen book in history! We urge you to buy two copies, one to hide and one for your coffee table so your friends can easily steal it! Approximately 400 pages, $49.95.

Black Bird Press, 1222 Dwight Way, Berkeley CA 94702

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The Invention of Heterosexuality By Jonathan Ned Katz Foreword by Gore Vidal. Afterword by Lisa Duggan Katz (Gay American History) argues that heterosexuality is a social construct rather than a natural, unambiguous given. He notes that the terms heterosexual and homosexual were coined in 1868 by German sex-law reformer Karl Maria Kertbeny and did not gain wide currency until the early 20th century. Katz contends that heterosexuality as a universal, presumed, normative ideal was invented by men, such as Kertbeny, Sigmund Freud and German psychiatrist Richard von Krafft-Ebing. Prior to the late 19th century, he maintains, the social universe was not polarized into "hetero" and "homo." The examples he cites in support of his thesis—ancient Greece, the New England colonies (1607-1740) and the U.S. between 1820 and 1850-do not substantiate Katz's claims.

Nevertheless, this often provocative work challenges rigid notions of gender identity, building on the ideas of French historian Michel Foucault and on feminist critiques of heterosexuality by Betty Friedan, Kate Millett, Adrienne Rich and others.—Publishers Weekly

Although we take for granted that heterosexuality is and has always been the sexual norm, historian Katz reexamines the constructions of sexual identity and postulates that heterosexuality has a history that has heretofore never been analyzed and that "such privileging of the norm accedes to its domination." Tracing the first appearance of the terms heterosexual and homosexual in 1868 in Germany, the author of Gay American History (LJ 12/15/76) analyzes the changes in usage in dictionaries, medical journals, and a wide variety of other published sources. Carefully building his argument using Richard von Krafft-Ebing's and Sigmund Freud's seminal theories in the creation of heterosexuality, he goes on to challenge such influential figures as Alfred Charles Kinsey, Betty Friedan, and Michel Foucault. 

This provocatively original research, recalling similar problematizations of race, gender, and other seemingly immutable, ahistorical constructs, is complemented by Gore Vidal's foreword and Lisa Duggan's afterword. For informed readers.—James E. Van Buskirk, San Francisco, Library Journal

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I Am Your Sister: Collected and Unpublished Writings of Audre Lorde Edited by Rudolph P. Byrd, Johnnetta Betsch Cole, Beverly Guy-Sheftall The editors of this abundant feast of a book remind us of the importance of [Audre Lorde's] work, which for 40 years has served as a foundation and catalyst for questions of identity, difference, power and social justice. There is much to ponder, discuss, teach, and revere in this compilation.—Ms. Magazine I Am Your Sister is a collection for those who want and need to be introduced to Audre Lorde's thinking, and it is a great anthology for those who have read and been inspired by Lorde's writing all of their lives...a celebration, an honoring, and a thoughtful presentation of who Lorde was...an eye opener to how the struggles of past times continue to be what we grapple with today...a tool for survival—a teacher to help us realize our possibilities for change.—Feminist Review

I Am Your Sister combines some of Lorde's most powerful essays with previously unavailable writings, as well as reflections on her work from other influential artists and activists.—Southern Voice  

In "harsh and urgent clarity" Audre Lorde spoke directly to "that chaos which exists before understanding," insisting on work to be done, the necessity for difficult alliances, for standing up to be counted, and for inclusive liberation. The poetic realism of these essays and speeches resonates here and now.—Adrienne Rich, poet, essayist, activist

Audre Lorde's unpublished writings, combined with her now classic essays, reveal her to be as relevant today as during the latter twentieth century when she first spoke to us. This new collection should be read by all who understand justice to be indivisible, embracing race, gender, sexuality, class, and beyond, and who recognize, as she so succinctly put it, that "there is no separate survival."—Angela Y. Davis, author of Women, Race & Class and Are Prisons Obsolete?

Provocative and profound, the work of poet, essayist, and autobiographer, Audre Lorde, has positively affected scholars and writers, teachers and students, feminists, gays, lesbians, and indeed countless individuals in the United States and elsewhere who have struggled with the question of how to integrate aesthetic, cultural, and political concerns. Now, with the publication of this collection of some of Lorde's best writing, we all have the opportunity to consider seriously Lorde's legacy and to continue in our efforts to resist the silencing of our various communities, our various selves in these wondrous and difficult times.—Robert F. Reid-Pharr, author of Once You Go Black: Choice, Desire, and the Black American Intellectual

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Joseph F Beam (December 30, 1954 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – December 27, 1988 in Philadelphia) was an African-American gay rights activist and author who worked to foster greater acceptance of gay life in the black community by relating the gay experience with the struggle for civil rights in the United States. . . . Joseph F. Beam was working on a sequel to In the Life at the time of his death of HIV related disease in 1989. This work was completed by Dorothy Beam and the gay poet Essex Hemphill, and published under the title Brother to Brother in 1991. Both books were featured in a television documentary, Tongues United in 1991. “As a writer, Joe was more profound than prolific,” wrote his friend Craig Harris after his death. “His articles and essays were poetic, containing turned phrases and puns, metaphors in meters that made his writing musical with penetrating meaning. He took great pride in his skill and devoted time to multiple rewrites, crafting his work to create the style which other writers of the Black genre dubbed `Beamesque'.”—Wikipedia

 

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Essex Hemphill—poet, editor, and activist—was born April 16, 1957, in Chicago, Illinois. Hemphill's first books were the self-published chapbooks Earth Life (1985) and Conditions (1986). He first gained national attention when his work appeared in the anthology In the Life (1986), a seminal collection of writings by black gay men. In 1989, his poems were featured in the award-winning documentaries Tongues Untied and Looking for Langston. In 1991, Hemphill edited Brother to Brother: New Writings by Black Gay Men, which won a Lambda Literary Award. In 1992, he released Ceremonies: Prose and Poetry, which won the National Library Association's Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual New Author Award. His poems appeared in Obsidian, Black Scholar, Callaloo, Painted Bride Quarterly, Essence, and numerous other newspapers and journals. His work also appeared in numerous anthologies including Gay and Lesbian Poetry in Our Time (1986) and Life Sentences: Writers, Artists and AIDS (1993). He was a visiting scholar at The Getty Center for the History of Art and the Humanities in 1993. On November 4, 1995, Hemphill died from complications relating to AIDS.

 

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Malcolm My Son a play by Kalamu ya Salaam

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The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo

Film Review by Kam Williams

Congo: White King

Red Rubber, Black Death

A Belgium King’s Sins Revealed in Film

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Our Women Keep our Skies From Falling

Six Essays in Support of The Struggle To Smash Sexism/Develop Women

 

Rape: A Radical Analysis 

from an African-American Perspective

By Kalamu ya Salaam

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Rape Crisis in Congo Tied to Mining Activity—Washington Eve Ensler, author of The Vagina Monologues, helped launch an international awareness raising campaign called V-Day in 2007 to end sexual violence in eastern Congo. UNICEF estimates that hundreds of thousands of girls have been raped in the last decade in the two eastern provinces of North Kivu and South Kivu. "Corporate greed, fueled by capitalist consumption, and the rape of women have merged into a single nightmare," Eve Ensler said at U.S. Senate hearings on May 13. "Women's bodies are the battleground of an economic war." Ensler said that international mining companies with significant investments in eastern Congo value economic interest over the bodies of women by trading with rebels who use rape as a tactic of war in areas rich in coltan, gold and tin.

"Military solutions are no longer an option," she said. "All they do is bring about the rape of more women." The United States has invested more than $700 million in humanitarian aid and peacekeeping to Congo, according to the U.S. Department of State. Prendergast said this money will do nothing to root out the economic causes of eastern Congo's conflict and sexual violence. He said a comprehensive long-term strategy to combat rape needs to change the economic calculus of armed groups. Prendergast asked senators to support the Congo Conflict Minerals Act, which was introduced by Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback, Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin and Wisconsin Sen. Russ Feingold in April of this year.

The bill aims to break the link between resource exploitation and armed conflict in eastern Congo by requiring companies trading minerals with Congo or neighboring states to disclose mine locations and monitor the financing of armed groups in eastern Congo's mineral-rich areas.

"The sooner the illicit conflict minerals trade is eliminated, the sooner the people of Congo will benefit from their own resources," said Prendergrast. U.S. consumers, Prendergrast said, can also help by pressuring major electronic companies - from Apple to Sony - to certify that cell phones, computers and other products contain "conflict-free minerals," a campaign tactic popularized by the Sierra Leone-based film Blood Diamonds.     Such a process would use a tracking system for components, similar to that developed in 2007 under the Kimberly Process. This international certification scheme ensures that trade in rough diamonds doesn't fuel war, as it did in Angola, Cote d'Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sierra Leone during the 1990s.

Germany has already developed a pilot fingerprinting system for tin that could be expanded to other minerals and help establish certified trading chains, linking legitimate mining sites to the international market. Truthout

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Congo has attracted attention in the media [as a place that is suffering] systematic rape in war. One statistic quoted is 200,000 rapes since the beginning of the war 14 years ago, and it is certainly an underestimate.

When in Congo, I met government representatives and particularly women who had been raped and violated. It was interesting but also disappointing - nothing is getting better and more and more civilians are committing rapes.

But I should be fair and say that there has been progress, the government has introduced laws against rape, it has a national plan and there is political will. There is a lot to do to implement the legislation, but now there is an ambitious legal ground to stand on to be implemented by the police, judiciary and health care. Margot Wallstrom - "There Is Almost Total Impunity for Rape in Congo"

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Contemporary African Immigrants to The United States  / African immigration to the United States

African Renaissance /  Kwame Nkrumah, Kenyatta, and the Old Order / God Save His Majesty  

For Kwame Nkrumah  / Night of the Giants /   The Legend of the Saifs  /  Interview with Yambo Ouologuem   

Yambo  Bio & Review     African Renaissance (Journal)

Guarding the Flame of Life / Strange Fruit Lynching Report / Ancient African Nations

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The Warmth of Other Suns The Epic Story of America's Great Migration By Isabel Wilkerson Ida Mae Brandon Gladney, a sharecropper's wife, left Mississippi for Milwaukee in 1937, after her cousin was falsely accused of stealing a white man's turkeys and was almost beaten to death. In 1945, George Swanson Starling, a citrus picker, fled Florida for Harlem after learning of the grove owners' plans to give him a "necktie party" (a lynching). Robert Joseph Pershing Foster made his trek from Louisiana to California in 1953, embittered by "the absurdity that he was doing surgery for the United States Army and couldn't operate in his own home town." Anchored to these three stories is Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Wilkerson's magnificent, extensively researched study of the "great migration," the exodus of six million black Southerners out of the terror of Jim Crow to an "uncertain existence" in the North and Midwest. Wilkerson deftly incorporates sociological and historical studies into the novelistic narratives of Gladney, Starling, and Pershing settling in new lands, building anew, and often finding that they have not left racism behind. The drama, poignancy, and romance of a classic immigrant saga pervade this book, hold the reader in its grasp, and resonate long after the reading is done.

 

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Weep Not, Child By Ngugi wa Thiong'o This is a powerful, moving story that details the effects of the infamous Mau Mau war, the African nationalist revolt against colonial oppression in Kenya, on the lives of ordinary men and women, and on one family in particular. Two brothers, Njoroge and Kamau, stand on a rubbish heap and look into their futures. Njoroge is excited; his family has decided that he will attend school, while Kamau will train to be a carpenter. Together they will serve their country—the teacher and the craftsman. But this is Kenya and the times are against them. In the forests, the Mau Mau is waging war against the white government, and the two brothers and their family need to decide where their loyalties lie. For the practical Kamau the choice is simple, but for Njoroge the scholar, the dream of progress through learning is a hard one to give up.—Penguin

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Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America By Melissa V. Harris-Perry According to the author, this society has historically exerted considerable pressure on black females to fit into one of a handful of stereotypes, primarily, the Mammy, the Matriarch or the Jezebel.  The selfless Mammy’s behavior is marked by a slavish devotion to white folks’ domestic concerns, often at the expense of those of her own family’s needs. By contrast, the relatively-hedonistic Jezebel is a sexually-insatiable temptress. And the Matriarch is generally thought of as an emasculating figure who denigrates black men, ala the characters Sapphire and Aunt Esther on the television shows Amos and Andy and Sanford and Son, respectively.      Professor Perry points out how the propagation of these harmful myths have served the mainstream culture well. For instance, the Mammy suggests that it is almost second nature for black females to feel a maternal instinct towards Caucasian babies. As for the source of the Jezebel, black women had no control over their own bodies during slavery given that they were being auctioned off and bred to maximize profits. Nonetheless, it was in the interest of plantation owners to propagate the lie that sisters were sluts inclined to mate indiscriminately.

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The White Masters of the World

From The World and Africa, 1965

By W. E. B. Du Bois

W. E. B. Du Bois’ Arraignment and Indictment of White Civilization (Fletcher)

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Ancient African Nations

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Negro Digest / Black World

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The Death of Emmett Till by Bob Dylan  /  The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll  /  Only a Pawn in Their Game

Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson Thanks America for Slavery

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The Journal of Negro History issues at Project Gutenberg

The Haitian Declaration of Independence 1804  / January 1, 1804 -- The Founding of Haiti 

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posted 12 September 2010