brilyahntpeacenotes-blog

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Notes on This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color 4th Edition (2015)

Edited by Cherríe Morage & Gloria Anzaldúa

Here is a link to a digital version of the first edition of this text. It is slightly different from the text I have.

From Catching Fire: Preface to the 4th Edition by Cherríe Moraga.

Cherríe Morage is a chicana lesbian from the US. She was 27 years old when publishing the first edition of This Bridge Called My Back (TBCMB).

"Egypt is burning/bonfires of celebration/ignited with the tinder/of that first/single/enflamed body/Tunisia."

Moraga starts this edition reflecting on the Egyptian Revolution and Tahir Square and how it is inspiring and somewhat satisfying to her.

She then discusses the first edition of TBCMB and how it was "penned...with similar hope for revolutionary solidarity." It was an effort to create a "shared political voice" for women of color in the US. Women of Color having evolved to be more explicitly transnational.

Moraga discusses how the world has changed since the original publishing in 1981. Fax machines, mass access to the internet, social media, cell phones, "Occupy" Wall Street, the invasion of Iraq, Afghanistan Grenada, Kuwait and Panama by the US, the AIDS/HIV pandemic, No Child Left Behind, the removal on the ban of corporate political spending by the Supreme Court, NAFTA betraying Mexico, the CIA aiding in the dismantling of Sandinista in Nicaragua, Hurricane Katrina, the Tea Party (which low-key evolved into MAGA), the US PATRIOT Act, and the gutting of the Voting Rights Act.... so many changes. So many lost battles and loaded guns.

Moraga notes:

"...it appears that today our identities are shaped less by an engaged democratic citizenship and more by our role as consumers."xvii-xviii

"Social change does not occur through tokenism or exceptions to the rule of discrimination, but through the systemic abolishment of the rule itself." xviii

"As I age, I watch the divide between generations widen with time and technology." xix

"I watch how desperately we need political memory...so we can enter upon an informed and re-envisioned strategy for social/political change in decades ahead."xix

"Ten years before TBCMB, the Third World Women's Alliance had already begun publishing Triple Jeopardy newspaper, l.inking "Racism, Imperialism, and Sexism" to domestic worker and welfare rights...In 1981, we were the inheritors of that vision. And it is my hope that h=the young readers of the 4th edition of TBCMB will be inheritors of ours, informed by a twenty-first century perspective of mind and heart." xxi

"...the oppression we experienced as human beings was not always materially manifested, and that we also suffered spiritually and sexually." xxi

Moraga also cites the Cohambee River Collective (CRC): "If Black [Indigenous] women were free...everyone else would have to be free since our freedom would necessitate the destruction of all the systems of oppression." (is this not afropessimism?) In her notes to this passage Moraga states "Black women are Indigenous women, once forcibly removed from their ancestral homeland. If not in the specifics, the major ideological tenets of the 1977 CRC statement can serve as a treatise for Indigenous women's rights movements globally."

"Refugees of a world on Fire." This is how I understood US woman of color citizenship in the early 1980s...It is also promised in the spirit of those young people who may first pick up this collection of poems, protests, and prayers and sudden;y, without warning, feel their own consciousness catch fire."

Foreword to the First Edition, 1981

by Toni Cade Bambara

"How I cherish this collection of cables, esoesses, conjurations and fusil missiles."

"...Sisters of the yam Sisters of the rice Sisters of the corn Sisters of the plantain..."

"TBCMB documents particular rites of passage...And coming to terms with the incorporation of disease, struggling to overthrow the internal colonial/pro-racist loyalties -- color/hue/hair caste within the household, power perversities engaged in under the guise of "personal relationships", accommodation to and collaboration with self ambush and amnesia and murder. And coming to grips with those false awakenings too that give us ease we substitute a militant mouth for a radical politic, delaying pour true coming of age as committed, competent, principled combatants." xxx

"There is more than a hint in these pages that too many of us equate tone with substance...it takes more than pique to unite our wrath and to wrest power from those who have it and abuse it, to reclaim our ancient powers lying dormant with neglect, and create new powers in arenas where they never existed before." xxx

"TBCMB...can coax us into the habit of listening to each other and learning each other's ways of seeing and being." xxxi

"As we heard each other in that rainbow attempt under the auspices of IFCO years ago...and before that when New Orleans African women and Yamassee and Yamacrow women went into the swamps to meet with Filipino wives of "draftees" and "defectors" during the so called French and Indian War." xxxi

"The work: To make revolution irresistible." xxxi

art by @bykellymalka on instagram

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Notes on Autobiography of Pauli Murray

The name of this text is Pauli Murray: The Autobiography of a Black Activist, Feminist, Lawyer, Priest, and Poet formerly title Song in a Weary Throat: An American Pilgrimage. This is the 3rd paperback edition printed in 1997

The following notes are mainly quotes from the book related to specific subjects. Pauli Murray was a Black, queer, likely trans person who left an indelible mark on this world and greatly influenced the Civil Rights and Human Rights movements in the USA and beyond. She or they (there is controversy about what pronouns Pauli may have used in this day and age) were a courageous trailblazer. I would say, Pauli Murray is one of my heroes. I cry reading their words and hearing about their story.

I am currently on chapter 13 of 35 and will add quotes and notes as I continue.

The quotes are separated by subject as I have determined.

On gender and queerness

"My talents never included handicraft...the divisions of labor in our household was such that I did not cook. I would have enjoyed working with a hammer and tools, but cooking and sewing seemed beyond me..." (p 22)

"At home...[my] duties were to split and stack endless loads of wood and kindling, keep all the rooms supplied with scuttles of coal...feed the chickens...clean wicks and chimneys...scrub the outhouse, white wash the trees and fences...hoe the garden, cut down weeds..." (p 22)

For pay PM would clean her aunts house for 25¢. Pm also had a newspaper rout earning up to $1.30

On disability

"Grandfather's blindness did not prevent him from contributing to the family enterprises...In the springtime he would prune the grapevines so that each new crop of grapes would be large and juice." (p 21)

"My initial assignment was a teacher on the WPA Remedial Reading Project...Remedial reading was then a new concept...I had only 2 or 3 children in my classroom at any one time. Each child was tested for his or her particular reading disabilities, and then I constructed a set of reading materials for that child's individual use...the children did not have to compete with each other, only with their own records." (p 100 - 101)

This sounds like an early version of Special Education programs and individualized education plans

PM noted many educator did not fund value in the program or used it as a way to get rid of "discipline" problems....The latter is something echoed today especially with students labeled under EBD

PM mentioned feeling isolated from professional collegues in part because of the program goals (helping students with reading disabilities) and in part because it was a WPA project...likely similar to "professional educators" today response to Teach For America or similar programs.

On protest/resistance/rebellion

"My aunts were "Race women" of their time. They took pride in every acheivment of "the race" and agonized over every lynching..." (p 30)

"I carried on my own private protest. I walked almost everywhere to stay off the Jim Crow streetcars and I would not go downtrown to the theaters because that meant climbing the back stairs to the colored "peanut gallery". (p 32)

Pauli Murray reflects on their childhood in Durham, NC and the ways they avoided subjecting themselves to the humiliations of segregation and Jim Crow laws and policies.

"I had cast my first vote in the election of 1932, and it was a vote of protest. Since I would not vote Republican and, having lived under the apartheid of Democratic rule in the "solid South, could not bring myself to vote for a Democrat, I had voted for the Socialist candidate, Norman Thomas." (p 93)

"For all my bravado, deeply engrained notions of respectability filled me with distress. It was one thing to ride freights anonymously or sleep in jails in strange towns where I was unknown. It was quite another to carry a picket sign in the heart of Harlem, where many people knew me. I felt as if I had been asked to parade in public undressed..." (p 99)

This quote is a reflection of PM's first picket line. Joined in support of friend, Ted Poston, who was picketing a Black weekly paper, New York Amsterdam News. Ted and others had organized a local unit of the American Newspaper Guild. He had been arrested previously for picketing. PM was arrested at this picket line but the judge dismissed their case.

Labor protest at this time are in line with history I have studied in Minneapolis about Black labor movements during this era.

"Pee Wee had an amazing sense of her own worth, and she feared no one. Her strong convictions about civic responsibilities lef her to write long letters to public officials [over social concerns]...I owe Pee Wee's example my later habit of writing to newspapers and public figures on social issues, letters I came to call "confrontation by typewriter." (p 96

On the nearness of Slavery

"Racial lines, which had been blurred to some extent during Reconstruction, were now being drawn ighter by the wave of segregation laws enacted by southern states in the wake of the 1896 Plessy decision, which validated the doctrine of "separate but equal." (p. 14)

"On the all [in Pauli's childhood home in Durham, North Carolina] above the cross hung Miss Mary Ruffin Smith's painting of a mother of pearl fountain cascading from a silver basic. Grandmother Cornelia gave this painting an honored place in our household as a testimony to the strong bond of affection that had existed between her and the antebellum who had been both her blood relative and legal owner." (p. 19)

"...but Grandfather's tiny pension from his Civil War service was little more than enough to keep up the taxes." (p. 21)

Pauli's childhood home included her grandparents and Aunt Pauline and was owned by her Grandparents

"The preservation of the Negro cultural heritage was another important aspect of WPA activity. Interviews conducted with many former slaves preserved their firsthand stories before they passed from the scene." (p. 100)

Pauli is discussing her recollection of Works Progress Administration program that was focused on collecting and recording the history of living formerly enslaved people.

When Pauli Murray (PM) was 5 years old they participated in a play called "Fifty Years of Freedom" put on by an organization her aunts, who were race women, participated in. Later, they (PM) found an earlier version of the play titled "Thirty Years of Freedom" likely put on in 1890.

"In our segregated world, we had a sense of identity and a sense of racial pride, fragile though they might be. We were close to the roots of our immediate past because many elderly people still alive who had been born in slavery." (p 31)

[Pauli Murray's Grandmother Cornelia]

On passing

"...Pauline Fitzgerald [Aunt Pauline] married young, blond, blue eyed Charles Morton Dame, fresh from Howard University Law School but they had not reckoned with the formidable barriers to the success practice of law by a colored man...The best young Dame could do was to earn a few dollars...writing wills and deeds for white attorneys, income supplemented by his wife's meager earnings as a teacher...

Some of the white men for whom he worked told him flatly that he would never get anywhere as a colored lawyer..."You're as white as any white man...and you'll have a better chance if you cross the line..."

...the temptation to end a grubbing existence finally overpowered Charles Dame. He told his wife what he had decided to do and tried to persuade her to join him. She, too, looked indistinguishable from a Caucasian, and the two of them would have had little difficulty fading into the white background. Aunt Pauline's refusal brought an end to their marriage." (p 14 - 15)

Aunt Pauline was married around 1899

"During the first half century after Emancipation, thousands of near whites exercised this option to escape racial oppression..." (p 15)

"Once when a fair skinned form the North came to visit and took me to town one day for company, she made me stand outside while she went into the stores on Main Street. She said they would give her better service if they did not know she was colored. (p 32)

Pauli, like many Black Americans*, is of a mixed, multiracial, multiethnic background. This included African, European and Native American heritage. Their relatives, like many Black Americans, had relatives who ranged in skin color from deep, dark skin to fair, pale skin.

Pauli's Aunt Pauline, who is also her namesake and legal guardian, was greatly offended by this relative's actions and did not allow Pauli to interact with them privately moving forward.

*Black Americans on this blog refers to people of African descent who survived USA chattel slavery, the maafa and have lived in the USA for the last several hundred years.

"It was no secret that my fairer-skinned relatives indulged in casual "passing"...in their pragmatic view it was not disloyalty to "the race"...Curiously enough, my relatives from the South did not bother to pass where segregation was most oppressive, but sometimes did in the North, where they were unknown and jobs were at stake. (p 34)

PM mentions a story where her Aunt Marie/Maria passed in the North for higher wages, but did not pass in the South and lived as a negro while working in the colored county schools (p 34)

"Some girls married Italian men and disappeared completely from the colored race. Others "passed" sporadically, working white collared jobs..." (p 35)

PM talks of a cousin who would bleach his hair blonde and another who wore wigs to cover his "kinky coils" (and was eventually found out by a white woman caller)

PM also tells the story of Amos Burton, who they name as the first Negro professional baseball player, was known to be colored in his hometown but known nationally (p 35)

On segregation

"College graduates were hit hard as other groups...the New York Times reported an estimated 10,000 unemployed college graduates in New York City...One could spot several women on any floor at Macy's wearing the Hunter College ring -- that is, if they were white. Negroes were limited to elevator and cleaning jobs whether they had a degree or not." (p 92)

When Pauli intially visited NYC as a child/teen they commented on how free it felt compared to Durham, NC. Their experiences after moving there quickly highlight that the colorline was still in place if more liberal...This highlights that segregation, though not always enshrined in law in Northern states and cities, was still a firm practice

"[Great Uncle Richard] had defied custom and bought the property in the face of fierce opposition from white people. It was said in the family that a white businessman named Tom Walker had fallen out with some of his asociates and settled his grudge by selling his home to a colored man." (p 29)

"In our segregated world, we had a sense of identity and a sense of racial pride, fragile though they might be. We were close to the roots of our immediate past because many elderly people still alive who had been born in slavery." (p 31)

"It was confusing to me because I was both related to white people and alienated from them." (p 31)

"While this discriminating assessment of he whie population prevented me from developing a blanket hatred of all white people, there was a threshold reserve which applied to the white world generally." (p. 31)

"white aristocrats" were cool to PM's family, they were "nice white people"

"mean, prejudiced white republicans" which Pm compares to the contemporary (at the time the book was written) "whitey" and "honkie"

PM did not/was not allowed to greet white people on their porch even their neighbors

"My meager contact with white people was paradoxical, since the two races lived close together, and, within the limits of the strict racial code...My family prederred never to cross the gulf that separated us from white people unless we could do so without lsing our dignity and pride." (p 34)

"It was a straitjacket existence, which became more oppressive as I grew older." (p 34)

"The only hope for me to go to college, it seemed, was to matriculate at the North Carolina College for Negroes in Durham. Since I was determined not to attend a segregated college, this prospect prompted my first overt stand against racial segregation. " (p 65)

"...the overriding purpose of segregation was to humiliate and degrade colored people." (p 109)

"During [FDR's] 6 years he had been in the White House, I had become increasingly dismayed over his apparent coziness with white supremacy in the South, his silence on civil rights and his refusal to speak out for a federal antilynching bill, which the NAACP had modestly proposed." (p 111)

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Notes on sex work (intepertations of different scholars)

Mackinnon would argue that sex work is the combined resultof male dominance coupled with/and a capitalist society

Rubin and Kempadoo kind of play into that by saying that sex work is just another job. Where there is a demand there is a market. “Sexual labor” can be considered similar to other forms oflabor that humankind performs to maintain itself, such as manual labor..etc. 

But Mackinnon would argue that the reason there is a market (for sex work) is because we live in a male dominated (Patriarchal) society.

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Quotes from Zora Neale Hurston’s How it feels to be colored me

“I am colored but I offer nothing in the way of extenuating circumstances except the fact that i am the only Negro in the US whose grandfather on the mother’s side was not an indian chief.” pg 152 (of anthology, I love myself when I am smile and then again when I’m looking mean and impressive)

“I remember the very day that i became colored…when I was sent to school in Jacksonville…I was not Zora off OC anymore, I was not little colored girl.” pg 155 after moving from eatonville (all black town) to jacksonville

“Slavery is the price I paid for civilization. I have paid through my ancestors for it.”

“I feel my race among the thousands of white persons, I am a dark rom surged upon and overslept, but through it all, I remain myself.” pg 154

“I feel most colored when I am thrown against a shaper white background.”

“A white person set down in our midst, but the contrast is just as sharp for me.”

- ZNH recognizing whiteness as radicalization, when “white” or “white” people are in the room, then “colored” exists or is at least brought to mind What does this say about race? White is defined by what it is not, therefore it is controlled by what it is not (Black) and therefore seeks to control what it is not (Black) in an effort to afford self-determination to whiteness

- radicalized through contrast and by the presence of white

“He is so pale in his whiteness then and I am so colored.”

“The cosmic Zora emerges. I belong to no race nor time. I am the external feminine with its string of beads.” pg 155

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Notes: garveryism -> Black power

These notes are likely from listening to Peniel Joseph speak at Macalester or on Urban Agenda/KMOJ

Garveyism ---> NOI

Garveyism --> Malcolm X, 2nd generationgarveyite --> Black identity and criticism of white supremacy

Malcolm ---> Stokely Carmichael/Kwame Ture (1952) --> PanAfrican --- Miriam Maekba, who is a cultural revolutionary

Stokely C. -- mentored by Dustan McCalrke, Fannie Lou Hamer, Ella Baker

“Democracy don’t have classes of citizens” 

from civil rights --> Black Lives Matter

What do we mean by leadership today?

includes criminal justice education -- healthcare -- education -- violence against black women

Peniel Joseph founded the sub-field of aMerican Studies Black Power studies

resistance started during the slave trade, on the ships; Black people have a long, hundreds of hers of history of resistance

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

Notes on Race, Class and Gender

[these are the answers to exam 1 of afro 3251W 2011, can be used as notes because they show information]

A capitalist economy is one in which “an economic arrangement in which property is held privately and for profit

Sexism refers to the individual, cultural and institutional arrangements/prctices that generate gender inequality

Heteronormative refers to the idea that societies are structured to privilege and treat as natural heterosexuality

The intersectionality of race, class and gender refers to the interactive and reinforcing set of race, class and gender forces which generate inequality

Space and time are reflections of the societies and the cultures in which they are located, constructed

Professor B defines race as a socially constructed idea rooted in the misunderstanding of human biology and the power of white supremacy

A key component of the Maxist definition of class is relationship to means of production

According to Bodkin, whiteness for Jews involved  the social construction over time of a people who were defined as not white but became white

The ideology that people of Arabic descent are inherently dangerous and inferiors to Western people is an example of  Anti-Arab racism

Racial formation refers to  the constellation of racal meanings and social practices which get made over historical time in every institutional, state and cultural structure (according to readings)

Hegemony should be defined as  a framework which articulates the many layers through which power is maintained by elites, for example, through police, culture, law, media, etc (according to lecture)

Key components of a mainstream definition of class are education, occupation and income

Gender encompasses  the social construction of maleness and femaleness, the social construction of biological sex and male sex roles

Racism is imbedded in the belief system of american society, in the very organization of american society and in the notion of white supremacy

Masculinity is made, not given

Sexism and racism are maintained in american society through  the language and symbol system (culture), violence, threat and intimidation and institutional practices, procedures and traditions

Objectification is the component of social construction which  is structural, taking form and shape beyond the humans which make up society

Institutional racism referes to  procedures and practices which have the consequence of disadvantaging and/or excluding racially marginalized groups

We can conceptualize gender and heterosexism as intertwined and key factors in understanding sexism in US society

Wealth is  treated as an invisible form of economic inequality, something that allows a greater range of opportunities and options than income alone and is passed on generationally (according to Thomas reading)

The following definitions and answers are from the short-answer portion of the test and are written in my own words. Remember, this test is from 2011, things (including my own understanding) may have changed. I got 40/40 on this section, so it’s safe to say the following info is relatively accurate. 

Intersex - showing endocrinological signs of both biological sexes

Matrix of domination  - the interlocking oppressions of race, class, gender and sexuality. It is based on Western dichotomous and oppositional thinking. It also shows how one can be both the oppressed and the oppressor based on one’s racial, gender, sexual or class identity (conceptualized by Patricia Hill Collins, black woman)

Externalization  - naming objects/defining objects outside of one’s self, thus bringing them into social reality. Example: calling something (an object) with 4 legs and a seat a chair

Internalization -  The process after objectification (where objects take on a life of their own separate from human creation) where the ideas that have become facts are now taught and learned as common knowledge/common sense. They become a part of cultural knowledge and popular culture. Example: The word chair now conjures images of an object with four legs and a seat. The two cannot be separated from one another and the knowledge/knowing is taking for granted (becomes part of the ‘duh’ factor)

Dichotomous/oppositional thinking - Western philosophy thinks in either/or categories with an oppositional mindframe, meaning that every category there is a mirror image that is considered “less than” or inferior. For example: if there is white there is black (and only Black) and one must be either white or black and white or black must be either inferior or superior (under white supremacy, white is superior making black inferior).

Capitalism -  the economic system of buying and selling based on consumerism and wealth

Karl Marx - German philosopher, sociologist responsible for the bourgeoise/proletariat framework for thinking about capitalism. He theorized that the world’s history is the history of the struggle between classes and that the workers/proletariat will one day overthrow the bourgeoisie/the owners because of class oppression and tension

Bourgeoisie - the owners; the wealth-holders in marx’s explanation of capitalism. These people own  the land on which the workers work (and live) and the goods they produce. They are sellers of goods and owners of wealth. For example, the owner of The Vikings is a bourgeois's because he profits from the workers’ (like Adrian Peterson) labor/wins and losses. He makes the most money from the franchise

Proletariat - The workers in Marx’s explanation of capitalism. These are the people who do not own the land they work on or the goods they produce. They must buy everything, always consumers but not true owners of any significant wealth. For example, Adrian Peterson would be a proletariat because he does not own the team (or the large majority of profits produced by the team) he plays for

heteronormative  - the system in which heterosexuality is defined as the norm, thus othering and oppressing all other forms of sexuality

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Different types of selfs

(below originally appeared in boxed drawing, idk the context of these notes anymore)

known to others + known to self = public self

known to others + unknown to self = unaware self

unknown to others + known to self = hidden self

unknown to others + unknown to self = unconscious self

“You don’t event know what you don’t know”

what if the people in the room know their reality better than you know their reality...

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

Notes on Gender

(cleaning out my room and old notebooks. these notes are likely from my GLBTA/GWSS course at U of MN Twin Cities circa 2010…it was an intro course. May be incorrect, the more i learn the more i learn many have different ways of identifying. I do think the info is good on an introductory basis)

gender - a system of meaning and symbols and rules, privileges and punishments for their use (diff from sex; sex is what’s between your leg’s, gender’s in your head/heart)

gender expression - how you express your gender (i.e. feemes may express gender by wearing a skirt)

Trans - movement across socially imposed boundary away from an unchose starting place

Cis - on the same side of (cis sexual, how you express/present matches your sex or given gender)

gender based on sex, sexual orientation based on gender

“passing” as presented gender like blacks passing for white

1919 0 magnus hirshfield, 1949 Henry Benjamin, 1952 Christin Jorgenson

trans woman --> identify as woman M-->F

trans men --> identify as man F-->M

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

Notes from Black Panther: Vanguard of the Revolution (-the movie-)

 **these notes are incomplete. Once I find the notebook that contains them I will update/reblog**

Panthers who were interviewed: Jamal Joseph, Wayne Pharr, Elbert “Big Man” Howard (gave gun to Bobby Hutton), Sherwin Forte, Mohamed Muburak, Tarika Lewis, Erica Huggins (drove from NY to join with friend), Landon Williams, Phyllis Jackson, Ora Williams (was in labor while cooking pancakes for the free breakfast program), David Lemiuex, Akua Ngeri (Deborah Johnson), Elaine Brown, Kathleen Cleaver

“I was a cocktail waitress at a strip club 2 years before I joined the Black Panther Party” – Elaine Brown

 Known FBI Informant: William O’Neal, provided the layout of the apartment where Fred Hampton was living in Chicago; got $300 bonus for this, was Fred Hampton’s bodyguard. (If you don’t know how FH died, peep here. #triggerwarning: It was violent and it was tragic. )

BPP open carry, which was legal, changed the conversation on gun rights

-       Huey cites “citizens have the right to open carry guns on public property”; they stood within legal distance while observing cops interact with Black folks on the streets of Oakland

-       Cali government officials quotes saying “nuts with guns” and “my intention is to make it a misdemeanor to carry loaded guns in public”

(I believe this all under Reagan’s term as governor or california (1967-1975)

Panthers did not create “Black is Beautiful”, there was already a cultural movement embracing African roots, dishikis, etc, but they did influence and affirm that URBAN Black was beautiful

-       this was done through their visual aesthetic; all Black, leather, and black tams and of course guns

-       they were cool

BPP was media savvy; they “knew what the media wanted”

Breakfast program was not a “fly by night” program

-       fed 20,000 meals a week

Panther pads

-       where panthers lived together to protect one another and to practice fully committing to a lifestyle of revolution and change

“Capitalism+Racism=Facism”

 Eldridge Cleaver

-       wrote Soul on Ice before joining the party; book was on the New York Times bestseller list

o   details his political beliefs, why he was a criminal (serial rapist) and other

-       considered an “intellectual

-       visuals in movie shown in movie show him with a largely majority white audience

-       was a celebrity before he entered the party

o   “you can’t control someone like Eldridge”

-       There was a time when Huey, Bobby and others were in jail and Eldridge was the only available spokesperson

o   Was he a plant? No evidence saying so

- After MLK’s assassination he put into action a plan to attack the police; many old heads were like naw that’s wild-crazy idea; Bobby Hutton, a 17 year old borrows gun from “Big Man”, gets shot by police while surrendering….Cleaver was in the house as well, but sent Hutton out first,told him to get naked before walking out but he didn’t, killed by police…Cleaver still alive

 David Hilliard becomes leader

 ‘Justice is merely incidental to law and order.” – Hoover

 Panther21 – charged with terrorist activities in NY; were not convicted

 Bobby Seale; gagged and ciffed and tied to his chair because he demanded the right to defend himself after the judge refused to delay his trial to wait for his lawyer to arrive in Chicago; didn’t stop him from making noise

Fred Hampton; worked with the youth branch of the NAACP before joining the panthers; was building a multiracial, multigenerational and likely multiclassed broadbase coalition in Chicago and was a moving transfixing orator (“messiah”)

           -“you don’t fight fire with fire, you fight fire with water.” “fight racism with solidarity”

----

Not in recorded notes, but did you know the The Black Panther Party for Self Defense chose it’s name and it’s symbol very smartly and strategically? Black Panthers attack only in self-defense. If you push a panther against a wall, then it will strike back. The Black Panther Party for Self Defense. 

I also remember them saying the majority of the Black Panthers were women. 

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

Towards an African Education

: A Critical Essay

by Professor Mahmoud El Kati

Education - to lead one(’s self) out of ignorance. An education that works compels one to self examine. Much of what passes for information and knowledge that we receive is mere propaganda. Knowledge should teach people how to solve their problems. Information becomes knowledge when it’s intepreted for use. You history is your humanity, it is who you have been. As an institution in the Western world “education” has been primarily a defender of the status quo, slavery, colonialism, imperialism, Jim Crow, apartheid, neo-racism, rather than a liberating force. If education in the Western world is to become a liberating process, Africans the world over must play a creative and central role. Education is humanization

Education

is not and cannot:

be confined to negative ideology[that negates] the worth of any segment of the human family

mean mindless preparation for simply earning a living

mean striving for status, prestige or other pursuits which serve only to fatten the ego at the expense of nourishing the human spirit

Education:

is the search for human freedom

must teach and train to resist any forces which seek to suppress human

will and human freedom

[is] a process

towards human growth and awareness

is a search for

human freedom

must be tied the freedom of the human personality

must be about change

, growth and freedom

To struggle is to progress. The last few paragraphs of the article give me hope, love and inspiration. It ask me to think of the future, viewing this world and this work in the view/through the lens of long history, a galatic picture, a human family picture, i suddenly became of my ancestors and they work they put forth here. Has me, thinking of what was progressed, grown and built for me and what i must struggle to build and love in to the future and the now.

To struggle ≠ to be oppressed

What are you doing right now to ensure 300 years from now no oppression exists

?

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

A SAMPLE FISCAL AGENT/SPONSOR AGREEMENT LETTER

An example of an agreement between a business or organization that is not a (501c3) non-profit receiving a grant or donated funding through a (501c3) non-profit typically called Fiscal Agents or Fiscal Sponsors 

This relates to Notes on Grants 

& types of non profits

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

UPDATE: 11/18/2014

So, I went to a [portion of a] Minnesota State Arts Board Grant Info Session earlier this evening..thusly, I have new information that relates to this post, but is most specific to MN State Arts Board grant writing.

The info session consisted of a small panel of past grant recipients and committee members (those who are the deciding body for who receives grants….my understanding..) as well as Kathee Foran (who plays some kind of role in this process and can be reached directly by phone or email and is purportedly very helpful in helping artists submit their best possible proposals…going even so far as reviewing and giving feedback on proposals).

Anywho…chegg it

It was emphasized that the WORK SAMPLE submitted with your proposal be very strong and showcase your best WORK, even if it's not directly related to the "PROJECT" that you're proposing

"Read the overview" so you can get a since of what types of work or resumes or cover/reference letters etc., you'll have to submit and how; what pieces will you need?

START. EARLY. I think this is a sentiment that's echoed above too

Funds from the MN State Arts Board cannot be used to fund travel outside of Minnesota

Be word efficient and CLEAR in the writings for your grant proposal

Organizations looking for Operations Support must be at least two years old

Include a narrative of how you're going to budget your time? For example, I'm a working father of three so Monday thru Friday most of time is spent waking and readying the kids to school, shuffling off to be at work by 9:30am, working until 5pm sometimes 6:00 o'clock in the evening then cooking meals for my children and finding time to talk. While I plan on committing most of my hours working on this project during the weekend, I also plan to write for at least one hour every night Monday thru Friday. or something like that

Non-profits (or otherwise..?)/Fiscal Sponsors need letters of agreement between fiscal agent and partner discussing how the money will break down between them. (this sentence is confusing, i know…i'll try to post a sample letter soon)

submitting work, especially visual medium works, within the context that is supposed to be seen (for example, picture of it hanging in the gallery) presenting your WORK SAMPLES submitted with your grant proposal in a way that allows reviewers to experience the way the audience is meant to experience it

I hope this is helpful for just general grant writing as well! I think many of these tips are universal and even if not, they should raise some questions you should be asking about the grants your applying for as well as give you some things to consider about your project when applying. peace

-brilyahnt peace

UPDATE 12/2/14

sample fiscal agreement letter here

These notes come out of a workshop facilitated in MPLS by Keno Evol about grant writing. Keno recently opened a clothing line with the support of grassroots funding and grants. His knowledge is valued and valuable. 

Grants are an idea contest and it’s all about how one articulates the idea

On the Minnesota States Arts Board website you can view past grants and get ideas on what works.

  Make sure you include:

-       Background, profession, who are you

-       major goals

-       Barriers (what is holding you back)

Many successful applicants name TIME and MONEY/FINANCIANCES as barriers to completing a successful project

Try the phrase.. “This grant will allow me the time to…”; “will allow for the necessary time to strategically design…”

-       why is this event needed? If it is not there, what happens?

-       A clear definite goal

Make sure your idea is TANGIBLE & DIGESTABLE

  General Tips:

-       have a clear definite goal

-       Are assertive

“Being awarded this grant I will…” vs “ If I get this grant, I will…”

-       express your ideas in a clear, straight-forward method

-       express non-complex ideas (Keep it simple!)

-       Send the grant around to trusted friends/collegues for feedback

-       Make YOUR deadline 2 weeks before the grant is actually due (don’t procrastinate! duh)

-       Don’t be needy

Approach the grant with the attitude of “I’m going to do this event/project anyways, but you’re money would make life easier/help me be less stressed”

-       Talk about TIME TIME TIME

-       Talk about what else is being donated (is another organization/person donting time or space to your project/event?)

Some things to think about (and to perhaps include):

-       how are you going to market?

-       what’s the community getting from it? what’s the greater good?

-       KNOW YOUR SURROUNDINGS

-       Partner creatively with others or businesses

-       KNOW YOUR IDEA! Make sure you can express it in a tangible and easily digestable way

Common fuck-ups mistakes: 

-       Application is not spell checked, contains spelling errors

-       Application does not follow grant formula

-       Overly complex idea that is poorly explained

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

List of type of 501s available in the state of Minnesota*

501(c)(2) — Title Holding Corporation for Exempt Organization

501(c)(3) — Religious, Educational, Charitable, Scientific, Literary, Testing for Public Safety, to

501(c)(4) — Civic Leagues, Social Welfare Organizations, and Local Associations of Employees

501(c)(5) — Labor, Agricultural, and Horticultural Organizations

501(c)(6) — Business Leagues, Chambers of Commerce, Real Estate Boards, etc

501(c)(7) — Social and Recreational Clubs

501(c)(8) — Fraternal Beneficiary Societies and Associations

501(c)(9) — Voluntary Employees Beneficiary Associations

501(c)(10) — Domestic Fraternal Societies and Associations

501(c)(11) — Teachers' Retirement Fund Associations

501(c)(12) — Benevolent Life Insurance Associations, Mutual Ditch or Irrigation Companies

501(c)(13) — Cemetery Companies

501(c)(14) — State-Chartered Credit Unions, Mutual Reserve Funds

501(c)(15) — Mutual Insurance Companies or Associations

501(c)(17) — Supplemental Unemployment Benefit Trusts

501(c)(19) — Post or Organization of Past or Present Members of the Armed Forces

*this list may be incomplete

it is my understanding that "501" means the organization is tax exempt. i may be wrong though

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

Sitting With El Kati - Prep Notes 8/12/14 - I AM A MAN

[note: words in italics signify quotes or paraphrasing and are not the voice of the brilyahnt peace]

This show (and the notes below…show linked at bottom) drew the line of connection between 2014′s Ferguson Uprising and the 1960s garbage workers’ strike. 

Emphasize I AM MAN slogan

this slogan originated in the 1960s amongst garbage workers who went on strike in order to earn a living wage

These men, who had jobs working for the sanitation department, had to also be on welfare to maintain; they demanded better pay 

 (Top: 1960s garbage workers’ strike Bottom: 2014 Ferguson protest)

"These young people still have their memories." - Professor El Kati

What are we trying to undo?

We are trying to undo White Supremacy. The ideological basis of this country is WHITE. SUPREMACY. The power and dominance of white skin. White Supremacy is an ideology, a doctrine, a set of beliefs, myths….

racism is an *act* of discrimination. What causes that act? The ideology, the doctrine, the myth, the set of beliefs that is White Supremacy.

"Ideas have no color." - Professor El Kati

Many people subscribe to and disseminate the ideology of White Supremacy unknowingly. It is taught, often unconsciously. 

White Supremacy functions as a silent, unseen political party AS WELL as a religion.

It is the higher power that one owes its allegiance too.

MLK was trying to lead this country to be a Christian based country…however, the ideology/religion/belief of W.S. supersedes religion

"There is no negro problem. The problem is whether or not the people of this country have loyalty enough, honor enough, patriotism enough to live up to their own Constitution" - Fredrick Douglass

Again, people are indoctrinated into W.S.

immigrants pledge allegiance, unknowingly to W.S.

You wanna know why white people seem to look or act so funny to you? because they can't think certain things due to the doctrine of W.S.

- they can't see certain things, know certain things, THINK certain things because the doctrine of W.S. and its principles and boundaries prevents it..disallows it.

What is going on in Ferguson is a direct result of a doctrine, set of bliefs, system that puts a high value on "whiteness" and white skin and no/low value on everything Black. 

People in Ferguson are speaking back with the slogan I AM A MAN/I AM A WOMAN, however, the doctrine of WHITE SUPREMACY simply says, "this is not true."

-----

During the show, Professor El Kati predicted the emergence of guerrilla warfare somewhere in the country. 

To listen to the show that these prep notes are for click here

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

Gudeman - Strange Economy essay/notes

The base is the reservoir of strength for an economy. The base is the intrinsic power of the person and community. The power of the human as individual and the power of humans in a collective. The house is built upon the base.

The house keeps, holds and serves. It is the stage of self-sufficiency. Cost, here, is defined as "means". The house, ideally, is focused on thrift. The house seeks to use as little means as possible as not to overly exploit (and strain) the base.

The market is the space of capital-based exchanged. It is an abstract concept that does not 

In a market-based society, the Government is the partner to the house. 

During the housing bubble burst and the economic recession, US citizens retreated to their homes and became more thrifty. They worked to become more self-sustainable, keeping their capital in their homes in order to protect their wealth and ensure the safety of their base. Thus, there was less capital

This stress, of the imploding economy, exposed our Government as partner and in favor of the market. Government encouraged citizens to spend, thus stressing their base, instead of thrift, which would protect their base. The Government showed obtuse interest in protecting the abstract wealth of the market over the material (and mental) w/h/ealth of its citizens. 

The root is the energy that sparks said power. 

The house is set on the base

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

Women's Entrepreneurship MTG - stats on poverty in MN + notes on Black ppl 8/9/14

The figures cited in this post come form these (1, 2, 3, 4) documents

11.4% of Minnesotans are living at or below the poverty line. Of this 11.4%:

White people are 8.1% of the total number of impoverished people in MN

American Indians make up 31.9% of the total number of impoverished people in MN

25.7% are Latino. 15.9% are Asian. and 37.8% are Black.

Black people make up the largest percent of impoverished persons in MN

  The median income of a household in MN is $58,906

median income of Asian households $65,959

median income of White households $61, 667

median income of Latino households $41,718

median income of American Indian households $32,153

median income of Black/African households $28,136

(para Black & American Indian households, most are single income earners)

This begs the importance of the need to be specific and intentional about talking about Black people vs PoC

  MN poverty rates for PoC are higher than the national average although the total percentage of poverty is lower than the national average

11.4% of MNsotans poor vs 15.5% of total US pop. HOWEVER

Black/Africans make up 34.8% of the total poverty in MN versus 28.1% nationally

American Indians make up 31.9% of the total poverty in MN versus 29.1% nationally

  Who are the primary breadwinners?

60% of Latino women are the primary breadwinners of their households

77% of Black/African women        

80% of American Indian women

47% of Asian women

46% of White women are the primary breadwinners of their households

  Why is this? One reason this is the case is because when the federal govt. started contracting with Disadvantaged Business Enterprises (DBE) many white female led businesses got those contracts

-       What is a DBE? DBE’s is a type of business created under Affirmative Action. PoC AND Women owned businesses are considered DBE’s. The federal and state govts are mandated to contract with a certain number of DBE’s per year/project (my understanding).

-       Like with affirmative action, BECAUSE women are included as a “disadvantaged group”, many white women (and their families) and white female owned businesses are reaping the benefits of federally mandated business, in collusion with white male husbands/partners

This is one way the White majority maintains its wealth

  What is the average income for female headed single family households?

Asian women - $22,000

White women - $18,000

American Indian women - $12,000

African/Black women – $14,000

Latino women - $14,000

 More numbers & facts

In Minnesota, Black people are the largest users of the Metro

Nationally, Black women make up 200% of new businesses in the US

90% of Black americans are American Indian+Black*

80% of income made by Black households is spent outside of Black households 

Black women spend the most, where? Dollar stores, Walmart, Walgreens & more

Black women control 43% of the Black American spending power

21% of Black women have Bachelor’s degrees

Average earnings of Black women nationally is $50,000+

More Black women are waiting to complete school before having children, slowing the overall pop. growth of Black persons

Black women are the number one college graduates in the country

Black women are the highest employed and educated group in the US

Black people lost 40% of our wealth during the recession

  Hey, did you know…

Grandparents (largely of white families) would take our loans for their grandchildren’s education, would make their grandchildren the insurance beneficiaries and would transfer their households to their children or grandchildren before death. This allows for a massive accumulation and continuation of wealth amongst (white) families for generations. Grandparents would then die with the debt and the grandchildren would be scott-free.

Apparently, this is why collection agencies started gouging Social Security checks..

  Have you heard of…

501 C-6?

-       Business league business license

-       Public non-profit

-       cooperative shared business model

-       members are the owner

-       not eligible for grants but can get govt. contracts 

Lastly….

1. We need to build capacity  in our community so that when we’re down shaking up the tree we have baskets (businesses) to catch the apples.

2. We don’t control our image

we react

and work to disprove

what a waste of energy

-       Toni Morrison says as much in 1975

3. We need to work on NORMALIZING BLACK CULTURE. #normalizeBlackCulture which involves some reeducating ourselves about what needs to be normal…you decide where and how to use your language

*fact not cited

[brilyahntpeacenotes-blog]

Grants - how to write them

These notes come out of a workshop facilitated in MPLS by Keno Evol about grant writing. Keno recently opened a clothing line with the support of grassroots funding and grants. His knowledge is valued and valuable. 

Grants are an idea contest and it’s all about how one articulates the idea

  On the Minnesota States Arts Board website you can view past grants and get ideas on what works.

  Make sure you include:

-       Background, profession, who are you

-       major goals

-       Barriers (what is holding you back)

Many successful applicants name TIME and MONEY/FINANCIANCES as barriers to completing a successful project

Try the phrase.. “This grant will allow me the time to…”; “will allow for the necessary time to strategically design…”

-       why is this event needed? If it is not there, what happens?

-       A clear definite goal

Make sure your idea is TANGIBLE & DIGESTABLE

    General Tips:

-       have a clear definite goal

-       Are assertive

“Being awarded this grant I will…” vs “ If I get this grant, I will…”

-       express your ideas in a clear, straight-forward method

-       express non-complex ideas (Keep it simple!)

-       Send the grant around to trusted friends/collegues for feedback

-       Make YOUR deadline 2 weeks before the grant is actually due (don’t procrastinate! duh)

-       Don’t be needy

Approach the grant with the attitude of “I’m going to do this event/project anyways, but you’re money would make life easier/help me be less stressed”

-       Talk about TIME TIME TIME

-       Talk about what else is being donated (is another organization/person donting time or space to your project/event?)

  Some things to think about (and to perhaps include):

-       how are you going to market?

-       what’s the community getting from it? what’s the greater good?

-       KNOW YOUR SURROUNDINGS

-       Partner creatively with others or businesses

-       KNOW YOUR IDEA! Make sure you can express it in a tangible and easily digestable way

  Common fuck-ups mistakes:

-       Application is not spell checked, contains spelling errors

-       Application does not follow grant formula

-       Overly complex idea that is poorly explained