black is black

Black Music Month is about to be a wrap, but that doesn't mean the party has to end. Keep the music blasting in the name of the founders of hip hop, jazz, soul, gospel, and rock n' roll.

People think they dis my person
By stating I'm darkly pack
I know this so I point at Q-Tip
And he states, 'Black is Black'...

Gangsta's Paradise (?)

On Sunday, June 22 I officially became part of Teach for America's 2008 NYC corps. And as I looked around the auditorium at St. John's University at the sea of eager and fresh faced newly minted college grads I wondered what the hell I was doing. Would I really be able to be a part of a group that for all of its best intentions reeks of noblesse oblige? Well since I'm down for educational equity (and am in need of a jawb) I'm in for the duration. But the 5 week training institute which is meant to be a crash course to prepare us to go into some of the most under-served schools in NYC is also going to be a social experiment for the 550 cohort (many of whom still think the City is as gully as it was in the 1970s and 1980s. This ain't the Wire).

I wonder if my fellow corps members fantasize about being a kind of Michelle Pfeiffer to their troubled inner-city black and Latino youth. Or maybe Hilary Swank's turn in "Freedom Writers" was more their fancy. You know, the unassuming white suburban teacher is the only one who can get through to the ghetto youth. They swoop in and give them something they never had - hope and in the end they choose the pen over the gun. Bamp. Either way, the story is tired. None of us know what the hell to expect or anticipate. The only thing I do know is that I hope my future students believe in me as much as I already believe in them.

I'm more of the Stand and Deliver school of model movie teachers anyway.

that swang

New.Jack.Swing
thank you Teddy Riley
(not sure if this particular song counts as such, but Blackstreet are the truth regardless of genre)

Irie

We here at Brooklyn Sis celebrate Black Music Month on the Diasporic tip so on that note Brother Bob provides another reason for Caribbean folk (and for the entire extended Diaspora fam) to be proud of our brethren

Sweet Love

Classic + True Soul = Anita Baker

keeping the spirit of black music month on the daily - June and beyond

Where the Daddies at?

Suffice it to say, growing up my friends and I often gasped in disbelief whenever we saw a father at a PTA meeting, choir concert or graduation. We often joked about our absentee fathers as we succeeded despite their lack of involvement.

It wasn't until college that the majority of my friends came from two-parent homes.

Many post-crack generation strivers like your Sis have benefited from myriad father figures, whether they be amazing stepdads (shouts to Pop), uncles, cousins, coaches, mentors, teachers. Yet even the best of mothers (like my own Mommy) need help. Why do we expect women, especially black women to do it alone without complaint, while absentee fathers are allowed to bounce when they choose and bask in the accolades when the children do right.

Its time for responsible leadership start at home, with present and involved fathers.

And to all those a bit peeved at Brother Obama for telling his people that we need to rebuild the infrastructure of our families, walk around the hood of your choice and take a casual poll of the kids posting a block to see how much of them will see Daddy when they get home. A love of one's people doesn't have to be an uncritical love.

Happy Father's Day Dr. Huxtable

As my sister and I reminisced on our childhood the other day, we realized that (quiet as it's kept) we learned much of what we know of how a healthy family is supposed to function from the Cosby Show. Say what you will about Bill today (I personally give him the George Schuyler Award for Telling black folk the truth they don't want to hear), but his show gave a generation of youth of color a mirror into a loving family atmosphere.

So here's to Cliff Huxtable in providing the nation with a different image of what black fatherhood could mean.

*special Father's Day go out to Pop, making him proud on commencement day, made my late nights spent in the library fade away*

June is...

june to me is the fulfillment of the promise of summer. and although i'm a child of the caribbean, i could do without the stifling humidity that engulfs nyc this time of year, i do love the ever present block parties, cook outs, and soul music blaring out of souped up cars.

Donnie's 911, is a throwb(l)ack to the honey dipped soul of Donny Hathaway with a healthy dose of social conciousness sprinkled within. Get hip to it

quarter life crisis (?)

These past few weeks have hit me with a peculiar kind of ennui. I keep on going back to my old Amherst email account, reading old messages that people have sent me, looking at old pictures from my time spent at college, vacations, study abroad and those amazingly random nights where your friends are the most important people in your life. I'm pretty nostalgic for the past that has yet to become a distant memory. I only graduated this past May. I still slip up and say that I attend Amherst. But I wonder if I'm slipping into the grey area of a quarter-life crisis. Whatever that term really means.

The days right after commencement were particularly hard, as it sunk in that the folks that I shared 3 1/2 years of my life with wouldn't be living with me anymore. The real world doesn't come with palatial dorms and a meal plan the way college did. But then, I began rediscovering NYC, not as an intransigent college kid, but as a real New Yorker. And seeing my fam on the regular is a nice change from getting voice mails informing me of the latest birth in the familia.

After being a student for so long, its a weird thing to switch identities. Even weirder is the knowledge that when I put on my cap and gown and received my cane I left my childhood behind (for real, regardless of the fact that I'm now a resident of my childhood home). Or maybe after 16 of being a student, I'm given to too much self-analysis.

I'm just waiting for my world to morph into a 21st century version of Living Single
Good friends. Good careers. Great brownstone = all the undergrad fun minus the awkwardness

the first pound

Cannot wait to see this again in November.

Look What God Has Made

Forty years hence, the dream of equality has been realized (in part), our nation has a black Democratic nominee.
I am in shock. But I am also audaciously hopeful that the United States, 140 years after the days of slavery and the failures of Reconstruction, 40 years after the Movement, and 2o years after the failed policies of Reaganomics that we can indeed have a President of color. We have gone from non-citizens to full citizens, representing a major political party on the cusp of representing the nation. And if Brother Obama was to take it, the face of our nation would change, into one that embraces the idea of a citizen of color leading in the most important office in the land and on the geopolitical stage.

It truly feels like the culmination of what our ancestors and leaders fought for. Yes, we still need to keep on climbing and keep on agitating for and end to the economic and race-based ills that effect our brothers and sisters everyday. But its a new season. A change is in the air.

Now get them checks out and donate to make a change at barackobama.com

Happy Black Music Month ya'll

Jilly from Philly.
nuff said.