Kwanzaa Day 6: Kuumba

Kuumba/Creativity

Today let us think about what we can do to leave our community more beneficial and beautiful than we inherited it. What creative contributions can we make, individually and collectivity, to fulfill this valuable principle, KUUMBA?

Kwanzaa Day 5: Nia

On this the fifth day of Kwanzaa, we are asked to ponder NIA, that is, Purpose. Think what it is you were put here for? (For surely you were not made for naught.) How shall you make your mark? What is it that you'll strive for, that will help, not only you, but your family, and above all our community?

Kwanzaa Day 4: Ujamaa

Ujamaa -- it's all about the suporting business by us with the green ($$) "Cooperative Economics".

Let us strengthen our resolve to build and maintain our own stores, shops and other businesses and to profit from them together.

Do you support black businesses (online or in your neighborhood)?  Are there black businesses in your neighborhood?  What do you think caused this huge decline of black businesses in black neighborhoods?

Kwanzaa Day 3: Ujima

UJIMA (oo-JEE-mah)/Collective Work and Responsibility

Have you ever had to do team work and found yourself doing all of the work?  Or were you the person who shoved all the work onto someone else?  I like to term those situations the case of A TEAM OF ONE.  The finished product of the project will either be:

1.  The person who did all of the work, did a hell of a job BUT no one else learned anything.  You know you have a case of A TEAM OF ONE when the team at the front of the class has only one person answering all of the questions.  --OR--
2.  The person completes the project but a part of it suffers because they alone couldn't handle all of the work alone.  It is team work, right?! 

The case of A TEAM OF ONE is not only prevalent in school work but also in our community.  Our community is that project that suffers because we don't work together.  Our community's problem is OUR problem.  It's issues do not only affect one person but it affects us all directly and indirectly.

It is important to remember that yes, we are INDIVIDUALS, and we must celebrate our individuality. But we are also a PEOPLE.  A people with not only the power but the RESPONSIBILTY to change our neighborhoods, our communities, and our nations.

I think Mama Joe from Soul Food sums up the definition of Ujima best: One finger won't make an impact, but you ball all those fingers into a fist, and you can strike a mighty blow. Now, this family has got to be that fist.

still chasing honey . . .

Kwanzaa Day 2: Kujichagulia

Kujichagulia/Self-Determination

Let us affirm our determination to define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves.

What has the media attempted to define us as? How do we define ourselves?  Are these definitions (media vs. how we see ourselves) different? If, so why?

Merry Kwanzaa!

The name Kwanzaa derives from the Swahili phrase matunda ya kwanza, meaning first fruits of the harvest.  The celebration of Kwanzaa is a means for black people to affirm their commitment to themselves, their families, their communities, and the black struggle for equality. 


Today is the first of seven days in which we promote character-building principles: unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity and faith.

Today we celebrate Umoja (Unity): To strive for and to maintain unity in the family, community, nation, and race.

What is Umoja's relevance for today's black community?

Your Thoughts: Christian's Outraged

Read the Article here.

Educate a Girl Save the World

I have always heard the African saying, "Educate a boy and you educate an individual. Educate a girl and you educate a community,"  but i have never quite understood the entire truth of this statement.  this morning i read an article in the Miami Herald, For Young Brides in Africa, Marriage Has a Price.  I must admit i have read several articles about young African girls getting married off and dropping out of school. But today when I read the article, i totally understood the the importance of educating a girl. 

Are The Rolling Stones Racist?

While doing some unrelated research, I guess it was related, I stumbled on a song entitled Sweet Black Angel by the The Rolling Stones (TRS)- you know Mick Jagger, yea one of the tose old ass English all boy bands.  So I stumble upon this song and I decide to listen to it.  The words are kinda indiscernible so I look up the lyrics and listen to the song.  I'm reading the lyrics and was like "oh hell naw!"

so the little researcher in me decide to further investigate the song.  The song they say is dedicated to Angela Davis, so supposedly, she is the sweet little angel they are referring to.  yea, i could have walked away from this information and accept it but i couldn't i had to dig deeper. 

Apparantely TRS has another song called Brown Sugar which opened them to charges of celebrating slavery and rape of black women.  So I'm not sure how much of an honest tribute Sweet Black Angel is to Angela Davis considering their history. 

Just found out about another song called Some Girls where one of the most offensive lines is a about black women. 

French girls they want Cartier, Italian girls want cars

American girls want everything in the world you can possibly imagine

English girls they're so prissy, I can't stand them on the telephone

Sometimes I take the receiver off the hook, I don't want them to ever call at all

White girls they're pretty funny, sometimes they drive me mad

Black girls just wanna get fucked all night, I just don't have that much jam

Chinese girls are so gentle, they're really such a tease

You never know quite what they're cookin', inside those silky sleeves

 
I'm not a fan of TRS, are you?  Maybe someone who is a fan can bring a better perspective.  What do you think?  How do you rationalize Hip Hop music that is often misogynistic and sexist?  Or do you?

The Loc Diaries

so i am moving in another direction.  i have created another site dedicated exclusively to locks.  check it out at http://thelocdiaries.wordpress.com/.  tell me what you think.

don't cry im not leaving this site just yet.  so keep checking me out her and on wordpress. 

luv ya'll!

The Precious Effect

it's going happening all over the ghetto.

what's the effect?  well, after watching the precious preview on t.v. ( some folk don't even watch the movie) folk are popping off, out of control.  if you are a heavy set dark skinned woman/girl please know that you are not immune from the precious effect. 

Great Reads: My First Conk

My First Conk
By Malcolm X
from The Autobiography of Malcom X, 1964

Shorty soon decided that my hair was finally long enough to be conked1. He had promised to school me in how to beat the barbershops' three- and four-dollar price by making up congolene, and then conking ourselves.

I took the little list of ingredients he had printed out for me, and went to a grocery store, where I got a can of Red Devil lye, two eggs, and two mediumsized white potatoes. Then at a drugstore near the poolroom, I asked for a large jar of vaseline, a large bar of soap, a large-toothed comb, and a fine-toothed comb, one of those rubber hoses with a metal spray-head, a rubber apron, and a pair of gloves.

"Going to lay on that first conk?" the drugstore man asked me. I proudly told him, grinning, "Right!"

Out of Sight . . . Out of Mind . . .

this year I lost a baby cousin to the disease.  he was 21 years old.  even as i type these words i am still in disbelief that the disease took him away from us.  My sisters and I will sometimes in the blue say, "I can't believe he is dead."  but it was definitely him that we saw in the casket.   so young and so full of potential.  but I guess it goes without saying that HIV/AIDS does not discriminate. 

nothing hurts more than your baby cousin sobbing and telling you he's so sorry for letting you down. 

the disease is very serious and it affects us all.  so I implore you to get tested and to spread the word so that others can know their status as well. 

w/love
iamkamilah  

p.s. a great movie to watch is philadelphia with tom hanks and denzel washington.