Mirth and Motivation

“Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.” Harriet Tubman

Motivation Mondays: Black History Month

Never be limited by other people’s limited imaginations. Dr. Mae Jemison
For I am my mother’s daughter, and the drums of Africa still beat in my heart. Mary McLeod Bethune
No person is your friend who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow. Alice Walker
Women, if the soul of the nation is to be saved, I believe that you must become its soul. Coretta Scott King
I would like to be remembered as a person who wanted to be free… so other people would be also free. Rosa Parks
Books were my pass to personal freedom. I learned to read at age three, and soon discovered there was a whole world to conquer that went beyond our farm in Mississippi. Oprah Winfrey
I do not know if these hands will become Malcolm’s—raised and fisted or Martin’s—open and asking or James’s—curled around a pen. I do not know if these hands will be Rosa’s or Ruby’s gently gloved and fiercely folded calmly in a lap, on a desk, around a book, ready to change the world . . .” Jacqueline Woodson
Of course I’m a black writer … I’m not just a black writer, but categories like black writer, woman writer, Latin American writer aren’t marginal anymore. We have to acknowledge that the thing we call “literature” is more pluralistic now, just as society ought to be. The melting pot never worked. We ought to be able to accept on equal terms everybody from the Hassidim to Walter Lippmann, from the Rastafarians to Ralph Bunche.” Toni Morrison

Black History Month (BHM): Every February, we join forces to celebrate the history, culture, and rich heritage of this great community and people of diverse backgrounds; we are here, we are in the diaspora and global. This year, I’d like to celebrate our mothers and fathers who have kept the threads that connect us together very strong and lasting… some against all odds. I’d like to honor the many souls, some unsung, who have inspired us over the years and those who inspire us daily, and I’d like to share a few quotes from some of our great icons/voices who have inspired me and many others in the African American community.  Some of the quotes shared are from activists, writers  and leaders of the Civil Rights movement. The power of quotes is that they tend to capture the essence of a key point being made and give us food for thought. They also shed light on the thinking and discourse of the period in question. Read them.

We live in a divisive world where racial tensions and petty hatreds continue to impact communities globally. We claim we are all equal while ignoring the anguish and suffering of the voiceless and oppressed in our midst. Some like to claim they don’t see color which is a ridiculous statement if I’ve ever heard one. I want you to see me, see my color, and still treat me with the same level of dignity and humanity you desire for yourself and loved ones. Even the colorblind see the fundamental uniqueness of our diverse backgrounds, features, and global distinctions. Let’s acknowledge and respect our differences. Sameness is not possible in a world where even nature and the animal world are rich and varied.  We can be the face of change but it has to start with each of us. It has to start in our homes and in our hearts. Without critical self-analysis and honest reflection, we will continue to pay lip-service to calls for equality in an unequal world. What do you know about BHM? Share your story!
READ: Motivation Mondays: Heart & History Matter
Black History Month: Eunique Jones Divine Transformations – Kids As Historic Icons

Won’t you celebrate with me by Lucille Clifton
won’t you celebrate with me
what i have shaped into
a kind of life? i had no model.
born in babylon
both nonwhite and woman
what did i see to be except myself?
i made it up
here on this bridge between
starshine and clay,
my one hand holding tight
my other hand; come celebrate
with me that everyday
something has tried to kill me
and has failed. via poets.org

“One day our descendants will think it incredible that we paid so much attention to things like the amount of melanin in our skin or the shape of our eyes or our gender instead of the unique identities of each of us as complex human beings.” Franklin Thomas

Motivation Mondays: Black History Month

Origins of Black History Month: In 1926, in the United States, historian, Carter G. Woodson, and the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History announced the second week of February to be “Negro History Week” In February 1969, black educators and the Black United Students at Kent State University proposed a Black History Month. The first celebration of Black History Month took place at Kent State one year later, from January 2, 1970 – February 28, 1970.
Six years later (1976), Black History Month was being celebrated all across the country in educational institutions, centers of Black culture and community centers, both great and small, when President Gerald Ford recognized Black History Month, during the celebration of the United States Bicentennial. He urged Americans to “seize the opportunity to honor the too-often neglected accomplishments of black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history”.
Since then, each American president has issued African American History Month proclamations. And the association—now the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH)—continues to promote the study of Black history all year. Sources: AfricanAmericanHistoryMonth, Wikipedia

Black History Month: By now, you all know that Green Book won the Academy Award for Best Picture last night. It is named after The Negro Motorist Green Book which was an invaluable travel reference guide for African Americans during the Jim Crow era. Because of the discriminatory, racist and even violent experiences black people suffered during that period, a postal worker from New York, Victor H. Green, created a green guide to help them find welcoming places to eat, shop, stay and visit while traveling around the USA. Some of the sharpest criticism the film received came from reviewers who felt the film was pandering to a form of revisionist history. They also noted that the film focused on the sanitized, even reinvented, perspective of the hired chauffeur. Granted, the story is told through the lens, perhaps selective memory, of the white chauffeur, Tony Vallelonga’s son, but he chooses to sweep some glaring facts under the table. Apparently, Dr. Donald Shirley’s family also objected to the way he was portrayed in the film.

Does Green Book have some missteps? Yes, the film misses an opportunity to delve deeply and honestly into a period when traveling while black in a “sundown town” could cost you your life.  The film is supposed to be about the personal challenges a brilliant African American jazz pianist faces as he travels through the South with his white chauffeur, yet it veers left re-framing the focus on the latter. The main characters, played by Viggo Mortensen, as Tony Vallelonga, and Mahershala Ali, as Dr. Donald Shirley, develop a friendship that brings them together as allies against the spewing, simmering racial hatreds of the time. We get to see them travel through the south including through some of those scary “sundown towns.” But the real terror of that period is not captured, it is downplayed and that is what most find offensive and egregious. Even the movie’s concluding scene offers a seemingly fairy-tale ending that some dismiss as implausible. It is interesting that Green Book beat out stiff competition from some truly excellent movies. Here are the Academy Award nominees for Best Picture: Black Panther, BlacKkKlansman, Bohemian Rhapsody, The Favourite, Green Book, Roma, A Star Is Born, and Vice. Which movie would you have chosen?
READ: Oscars 2019: ‘Green Book’ is the worst best picture winner since ‘Crash’
Motivation Mondays: Black Panther Movie Review – Lessons On Leadership

Coherence in Consequence by Claudia Rankine
Imagine them in black, the morning heat losing within this day that floats. And always there is the being, and the not-seeing on their way to—
The days they approach and their sharpest aches will wrap experience until knowledge is translucent, the frost on which they find themselves slipping. Never mind the loose mindless grip of their forms reflected in the eye-watering hues of the surface, these two will survive in their capacity to meet, to hold the other beneath the plummeting, in the depths below each step full of avoidance. What they create will be held up, will resume: the appetite is bigger than joy. indestructible. for never was it independent from who they are. who will be.
Were we ever to arrive at knowing the other as the same pulsing compassion would break the most orthodox heart. via poets.org

I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality…. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Motivation Mondays: Black History Month

Freedom is never given; it is won. A. Philip Randolph
Black history is American history. Morgan Freeman
If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Frederick Douglass
The cost of liberty is less than the price of repression. W.E.B. Du Bois
We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world. Nelson Mandela
My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together. Desmond Tutu
In recognizing the humanity of our fellow beings, we pay ourselves the highest tribute. Thurgood Marshall
In all my life, I have never been free. I have never been able to do anything with freedom, except in the field of my writing. Langston Hughes
I love America more than any other country in this world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually. James Baldwin
Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome while trying to succeed. Booker T. Washington

Black History Month: Green Book Observations – A few months ago, before the movie, Green Book, hit the theaters, I got an early invite to preview it at my local cinema. I was curious. Why? Because it was a movie about a period of national, cultural, and historical significance and little had been shared about it. Many folks did not know of the Green Book and I can attest to the fact that it wasn’t taught in schools either so my curiosity was piqued. The theater was not packed and the attendees were mostly senior citizens who might have been cognizant of the shameful practices of that era. While the subject matter was fascinating and equally disturbing, and the acting chops of the lead characters well placed, I also found the movie wanting/lacking and whitewashing/glossing over the frightening tensions of that period in American history. Yet, I believe stories like this, even when flawed, need to be told because they give us an opportunity to have a dialogue, to educate, and to rebut or revisit such stories through the lens and eyes of other historians and filmmakers.

The Smithsonian Channel Documentary – The Green Book: Guide to Freedom that premieres today Monday, Feb 25, offers a perspective shared through the eyes of people of color who lived through that period. It is highly recommended. What do you know about BH? Were you aware of the Green Book and its historical significance to the black experience while traveling? Were you aware that it spurred a rise in black entrepreneurial efforts to offer motels, rest stops, shops and other solutions to the problem? Even though I didn’t grow up in the USA, I learned a lot about this great nation in school, at home, and through a wide range of multimedia offerings. Some of my earliest memories are of the rich, creative, and cultural contributions made by black people to the world of music, literature, science and the global movement for change. Watching the Smithsonian documentary gave me pause and was a powerful reminder of how indomitable the human spirit can be.  It is a reminder of how people can rise to combat oppression through solutions that benefit and raise the spirits of a maligned group.  Share your story!
READ: The Documentary Highlighting the Real Green Book
Revisiting a Jim Crow-Era Guide for Traveling While Black

On Being Brought from Africa to America by Phillis Wheatley
‘Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land,
Taught my benighted soul to understand
That there’s a God, that there’s a Saviour too:
Once I redemption neither sought nor knew.
Some view our sable race with scornful eye,
“Their colour is a diabolic die.”
Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain,
May be refin’d, and join th’ angelic train. via poets.org

The details for Motivation Mondays are below. Join in! The themes for JAN – FEB 2019 are:

JAN

01/01   –  01 New Year’s Day, 05 National Bird Day
01/06   –  06 Golden Globe Awards,  07 Orthodox Christmas, 11 Human Trafficking Awareness Day,
01/13  –  13 Critics Choice Awards, 14 Image Awards, 16 Religious Freedom Day
01/20   –  21 Martin Luther King Jr. Day, 26 Nat’l. Spouses Day
01/27 –    27 Commemoration Victims of the Holocaust, SAG Awards

FEB

01/03   –  04 World Cancer Day, 05 Chinese New Year
01/10   –  10 Grammy Awards,   14 Valentine’s Day
01/17  –  18 Presidents Day, 14 Image Awards,
01/24   –  24 Academy Awards,

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