CELEBRATE AFRIKAN HERITAGE MONTH ALL YEAR
Enslavement is not our beginning, middle nor our end as a people. Check the Timeline
Juneteenth - the Fourth of July
Kujichagulia = Self-Determination = Destiny
To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves ... no matter what.
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by Jacque Kofi, 2003
Seen you in the ball of confusion
Living life like we've got a brain contusion
All I wanna say is don't let 'em fool ya
We should be the rulers of our own destiny
Seen you chillin' there in the valley of decision
While they try to break us down with the devil's precision
Divide and conquer is the way they school us
But we should be the rulers of our own destiny.
(Chant) Eh, compodo bada pa tete yeh (repeat 3x)
Color ain't never really made the man
But that's really for them to understand
We taught everything in our native land
We used to be the rulers of own destiny
I think it's time now that we've got to recover
Starting with the violence that we give each other
Understand the conditions given by another
He ain't your brother if he doesn't honor your destiny
(Chant)
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Who are you?
"You're not an Afrikan because you're born in Afrika. You're an
Afrikan because Afrika is born in you. It's in your genes ... Your DNA ... Your entire biological makeup. Whether you like it or not, that's the way it is. However, if you were to embrace this truth with open arms ... my, my, my ... what a wonderful thing!''
Marimba Ani, activist and scholar
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"If a race has no history, if it has no worthwhile tradition, it becomes a negligible factor in the thought of the world, and it stands in danger of being exterminated. ...""Those who have no record of what their forebears have accomplished lose the inspiration which comes from the teaching of biography and history.''
founder of Negro History Week, now called Black History Month
In 1884, abolitionist Frederick Douglass made ... comments about Ancient Egypt in a commencement speech before the literary societies of Western Reserve College in Rochester:
"The fact that Egypt was one of the earliest abodes of learning and
civilization, is as firmly established as are the everlasting hills, defying, with a calm front the boasted mechanical
and architectural skill of the nineteenth century ... Greece and Rome -- and through them Europe and America have received
their civilization from the ancient Egyptians. This fact is not denied by anybody. But Egypt is in Africa. Pity that it had not been in Europe, or in Asia, or better still in America!
Another unhappy circumstance is, that the ancient Egyptians were not white people; but were undoubtedly, just about
as dark in complexion as many in this country who are considered genuine Negroes; and that is not all, their hair was far
from being of that graceful lankness which adorns the fair Anglo Saxon head."
From Legrand H. Clegg II, Editor & Publisher of MAAT News, "A Brief History of Africentric Scholarship." Read more here.
Happy 50th Anniversary of Independence,Ghana!
"All Afrika Will Stand Together'' - the Hon. Marcus Mosiah Garvey
"It is far better to be free to govern or misgovern yourselves than to be governed by anybody else. - Ghanaian President Kwame Nkrumah
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s journey through Afrika took him to Nigeria and Ghana, where he spoke with President Kwame Nkrumah and witnessed the momentous celebration of the Ghana's independence from British colonial rule in 1957. Ghana's independence signaled the coming independence of many African nations - a new day in Africa and the world.
"Before I knew it I was weeping. I was crying for joy and I knew all of the struggles, all of the pain and all of the agony that these people had gone through for this moment.
"After Nkrumah made the final speech, we walked away, and we could hear the little children, six years old, and old people, eighty and ninety years old, walking the streets of Accra crying 'Freedom! Freedom!' They were crying it in a sense that they had never heard it before. And I could hear that old Negro spiritual once again crying out: 'Free at last, free at last! Great God Almighty, we're free at last!'
"They were experiencing that in their very souls, and everywhere we turned we could hear it ringing out from the housetops. We could hear it from every corner, every nook and crook of the community. 'Freedom! Freedom! This was the breaking loose from Egypt." 1957. From the book, "The Autobiography of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.''
"Ghana has something to say to us. It says to us first that the oppressor never voluntarily gives freedom to the oppressed. You have to work for it. Freedom is never given to anybody. Privileged classes never give up their privileges without strong resistance.'' -- The Autobiography of Martin Luther King Jr.
Thank you, Ghana, for standing up for Afrikans worldwide.
Black History Month Events
"A COMMUNITY TRIBUTE TO AFRIKA THROUGH MUSIC AND WORDS''
Much love and thanks to everyone who participated in this One of a Kind celebration of Black History at OnaJava Coffee & Soul Cafe. Special thanks to OnaJava owner Reggie Pickard, Charles "CJack Run" Jackson, Tasneem Grace Tewogbola, Dr. Adam Banks, Chuck Jones, New Jersey's Divinia Davis, Tyasiah LeFlore, Shiann Obioma Atuegbu and Baltimore's Odyssey.
Rest in Peace, Godfather of Soul
James Brown: Soul Brotha No. 1's Journey Through Afrika
JB's incredible journey took him from stateside to the Motherland (Nigeria 1970), whose musicians he influenced, and vice-versa.
"
By the late 1960s Mr. Brown’s funk was part of pop,R&B and jazz: in his own hits, in songs by the Temptations and Sly and the Family Stone, and in the music of Miles Davis. It was also creating a sensation in Africa, where it would shape the Afrobeat of Fela Kuti, the juju of King Sunny Ade and the mbalax of Youssou N’Dour.
"
-- The New York Times
Fela's drummer and a key architect of Afrobeat, claims that Brown sent his arranger, David Mathews, to check him out. 'He watches the movement of my legs and the movement of my hands, and he starts writing down ... They picked a lot from Fela when they came to Nigeria. It's like both of them sort of influenced each other. Fela got influenced in America; James Brown got the influence in Africa."
''
The Observer Music Monthly.
More on James Brown-Fela connection here.
Thank you, James
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