I participated in the 32 day Black History Month Blog-a-thon on Mamalicious. Thanks to Deesha, Yvette & Crew. Check out the month's worth of blood and gold, and my post. The gang of folk who range from well-meaning souls who derive their foundation from inclusion and the Black Arts Movement, to out and out morons, say we shouldn't "debate" this dumbing down of our cultural and history legacy within the current thrust of black popular fiction and non-fiction (hell, let's toss in some poetry and 80% of the music out there). It's counterproductive. It's tired. It's...yikes...hating. I try to put that in a cultural/historical perspective. Soulja Boy ain't Scott Joplin, folks, so stop the inapt analogies. Making money and everyone reading "something" is a chimera. Hey, so then let's stop talking about the Chinese giving cash to the Sudanese so they can massacre black people. Let's say g'head to the Marlboro Academy and Alize Charter School.
What will our black history be? It won't be Jesse Owens and Joe Louis--it'll be clowns like "ocho-cinco" Chad Johnson of the Bengals, or Mike Vick. Not on my watch. Not on mine. Heed that...
6 comments:
Chad Johnson mentioned on a blog like this?! You certainly are breaking the mold!!
Chris,
Thanks for the shout-out--and for sparking a little dialogue on my lonely little blog. :-)
~Deesha
"Soulja Boy ain't Scot Joplin." That is a great quote, full of great symbolism. I know your whole approach from the statement!
Bravo. Saw it on that website and your other essay.
Did you see Susan Jacoby's piece in the Washington Post last week, and her new book? This "anti-illectual/anti-rationalism" theme isn't anything restricted to African Americans. This is part of a scary national trend that even regular, non academic people are starting to finally talk about, and if you the book debate is restricted to African Americans, you are wrong, too. Before he died Kurt Vonnegut got into an amazing debate with James "I don't even write my own books anymore" Patterson and none other than John Grisham came in and blasphemed, saying that the novel has become "facile and a soap opera or Lifetime movie." Have you been plagiarizing him?! I said it was blasphemy or hypocrisy at best because Grisham's just as guilty of this. However, at least he seems to admit it and laments it--after he's made his money!
Mamamlicious? Isn't that a porn site?
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