Category Archives: news

Asante Sana, Asa Grant Hilliard III

Posted on by drumsintheglobalvillage

Here are some details. Here’s his bio and some links.

4:45 P.M. UPDATE: Here’s a full bio on our new Ancestor:

DR. ASA G. HILLIARD, III [Baffour Amankwatia, II]
Biographical Sketch

By RUNOKO RASHIDI

Dr. Asa G. Hilliard, III, is the Fuller E. Callaway
Professor of Urban Education at Georgia State
University, with joint appointments in the Department
of Educational Policy Studies and the Department of
Educational Psychology/Special Education. A teacher,
psychologist, and historian, he began his career in
the Denver Public Schools, teaching psychology,
mathematics and American History. He earned a B.A. in Psychology, M.A. in Counseling, and Ed.D. in
Educational Psychology from the University of Denver,
where he also taught in the College of Education, and
in the College of Arts and Sciences in the Honors
Program in philosophy. Dr. Hilliard served on the
faculty at San Francisco State University for 18
years. During that time he was a Department Chair for
2 years, Dean of Education for 8 years, and was
consultant to the Peace Corps and Superintendent of
Schools in Monrovia, and school psychologist, during
his six years in Liberia, West Africa.

He has helped to develop several national assessment
systems, such as proficiency assessment of
professional educators, and developmental assessments of young children and infants. He is a Board Certified Forensic Examiner and Diplomate of both the American Board of Forensic Examiners and the American Board of Forensic Medicine. He served as lead expert witness in several landmark federal cases on test validity and bias, including Larry P v. Wilson Riles in California, Mattie T. v. Holliday in Mississippi, Deborah P. V. Turlington in Florida, and also in two Supreme Court cases, Ayers v. Fordice in Mississippi, and Marino v. Ortiz in New York City.

Dr. Hilliard is a founding member and First Vice
President of the Association for the Study of
Classical African Civilizations. He has conducted
Ancient African History study tours to Egypt for 15
years, is the co-developer of an educational
television series on Ancient Kemetic (Egyptian
history). He has produced videotapes and educational
materials on African history through his production
company, Waset Educational Productions. He is
Co-Founder, with his daughter, Nefertari Patricia
Hilliard-Nunn, of Makare Publishing.

Dr. Hilliard has written more than four hundred
research reports, articles and books on testing,
Ancient African History, teaching strategies, African
culture, and child growth and development. He served
with Dr. Barbara Sizemore as Chief Consultant on the
Every Child Can Succeed television series, produced by
the Agency for Instructional Technology.

Dr. Hilliard has consulted with many of the leading
school districts, publishers, public advocacy
organizations, universities, government agencies and
private corporations on valid assessment, African
content in curriculum, teacher training, and public
policy. Several of his programs in curriculum,
assessment, and valid teaching have become national
models. He has worked on projects with the National
Academy of Sciences, and has spoken at the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the
Smithsonian Institution, and the National Geographic
Society. He has been visiting professor at many
Universities, including Oakland University, Stanford
University, University of New Mexico, and Harvard
University.

Dr. Hilliard has served on such boards as the Agency
for Instructional Technology, Zero to Three, The
Public Education Fund Network, American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education, The Far West Regional Laboratory for Educational Research and Development, and The Center for Applied Linguistics.

His most recent books are:

  • The Maroon Within Us: Selected Essays on African American Community Socialization, Baltimore: Black Classics Press;
  • SBA: The Reawakening of the African Mind, Gainesville, Florida: Makare Publishing;
  • African Power, Gainesville, Florida: Makare
    Publishing;
  • Co-author of Young, Gifted and Black, Boston [Winner of American Education Research Association Award for Excellence], Beacon Press
  • Co-Author with Nefertari Hilliard-Nunn of True of Voice: The Poetry of Listervelt Middleton, Makare Publishing.

Selected Awards

Morehouse College “Candle in the Dark Award in
Education”

National Alliance of Black School Educators
“Distinguished Educator Award”

American Evaluation Association, President’s Award

Republic of Liberia Award as Knight Commander of the
Humane Order of African Redemption

New York Society of Clinical Psychologists Award for
Outstanding Research, Scholarly Achievement, and
Humanitarian Service.

Association of Black Psychologists Distinguished
Psychologist Award

Association of Teacher Educators Distinguished
Leadership Award

Honorary Degree, DePaul University Doctor of Humane
Letters

Honorary Degree, Wheelock College Doctor of Education

American Psychological Association, Fellow

Kappa Delta Pi Honor Society Laureate Chapter

American Educational Research Association Committee on
the Role & Status of Minorities in Education, Research
& Development Distinguished Career Contribution Award

American Association of Higher Education Black Caucus,
Harold Delaney Exemplary Educational Leadership Award

American Association of Colleges for Teacher, one time
only Thurgood Marshall Award for Excellence, on the
occasion of the 50th anniversary observance of the
Brown versus Board of Education Topeka Decision

Copyright © 1998 Runoko Rashidi. All rights reserved.
Posted/Revised: December 14, 2006.
Webpage design: Kenneth Ritchards

5:35 P.M. UPDATE: From the 100 Black Men of Atlanta:

ATLANTA, Aug. 13 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — The following is being issued by 100 Black Men of Atlanta, Inc.:

“100 Black Men of Atlanta, Inc. and its members are deeply saddened by the loss of its member, Asa G. Hilliard, Ph.D.

“A teacher,historian,psychologist, activist and leader, Dr. Hilliard served as a formidable catalyst for social change as well as a beacon for the preservation and
advocacy of African cultures throughout the world.

“Dr. Hilliard served as the chairman of 100 Black Men of Atlanta’s Programs Committee and was a leading contributor to the ongoing development of Project Success, the organization’s flagship program, which provides tutoring, academic support, cultural enrichment and scholarships to students attending Atlanta Public Schools from challenged communities. His impact upon our organization, its members and the communities we serve has been immeasurable.

“We also would like to offer our sincerest sympathies to the Hilliard family, our thoughts and prayers are with you. The nation has experienced a significant loss today. Dr. Hilliard was truly an American hero and we pay homage to his legacy.”

AUGUST 14 UPDATE: Just got this today. This sister always does a good job heralding a New Ancestor.

AfricaWithin.com
PRESS RELEASE
August 13, 2007
For Immediate Release

Contact:

WebMaster@AfricaWithin.com
www.AfricaWithin.com


Amankwatia Baffour II [Dr. Asa Grant Hilliard III]
22 August 1933 – 12 August 2007

By Kwaku Person-Lynn, Ph.D.

CAIRO, KEMET (Egypt) – August 2007 – One of the giants in the academic world left us this past weekend in the most appropriate place it could happen, in Cairo, Kemet (Egypt), where he studied, wrote about, lectured, researched, conducted tour groups and redeemed his soul. He was attending the ASCAC (Association for the Study of Classical African Civilizations) Conference, an organization he co-founded, and giving lectures to the Pastor Jeremiah Wright tour group.

Early reports state that he passed due to complications of contracting malaria. More details are yet to come and funeral arrangements have not been made thus far.

Those of us who knew Baba Baffour, and/or were familiar with him, knew him as one of the premier scholars/researchers/educators/authors this world has ever seen. He was supremely dedicated to the total liberation and education of Afrikan peoples specifically, but humanity in general. It was his efforts that primarily started the Curriculum of Inclusion Movement, balancing school curriculums by adding information and lessons on Afrikan people. He was an educational psychologist, but dedicated his life to improving teaching/learning methods for children, and educating Afrikan people about our history. Family was the highest point of his consciousness.

In an interview I conducted with Baba Baffour, seeing parents as the first teachers, he stated, “What kids get from us most of the time are instructions: ‘do this,’ ‘don’t do that,’ ‘watch out for this,’ ‘watch out for that.’ That’s a monologue. What has to happen, if you want to activate the child’s intelligence, and release that intelligence, that child has to be invited to engage in questioning, in critique, all of those kinds of things. Parents have to organize their communication with children. All we have to do is remember to do it. We know how to do it, but we slip into some awfully bad habits.

“I’m not quite sure what the reasons are for those bad habits, but they are very prominent among our people. You know: ‘shut up,’ ‘be quiet,’ ‘sit down.’ That may give you control over the child’s behavior, but doesn’t give the child’s mind anything. The child has, if the mind is going to grow, it’s got to chew on something. It’s got to turn it over, try it out and not be directed from moment to moment. Nurturing that independent critical orientation is a part of what a parent has to do for a child.”

In the land he loved so much, Baba Baffour wanted to go beyond just admiring our ancient past, where the foundation of civilization existed. Being pro-active he did the following. “Somewhere in the late sixties, mid sixties to late sixties, I became acquainted with people who enhanced my information about Afrika, especially classical Afrikan civilizations. I knew that at some point I had to do more work to share this information. I tried to figure out a way to do that, mainly through slide presentations and lectures and so forth. But it occurred to me, that it would be much more powerful to be able to examine concretely whatever is left of that civilization, where it is right now.

The way to do that would be through a study tour. So my wife and I designed a study tour and tried to locate people who were really serious about study. We’re not interested in folk who want to collect ashtrays and float on the Nile and do all that. It’s a very hard working tour. We were up early and we go to bed late. We felt by being on the site, by visiting the museums, by visiting the monuments, by getting some sense of the space, geography, time perspective, that would help to make more real what this thing was in the past.”

In his parting statement, which applies even today, he leaves us with, “Let me say the thing that’s of course on my mind. We require a massive mobilization of Afrikan people around the world. We need to see what the future looks like for us in the next thirty to forty years. We need to take a long view. In fact, we need to think about the next two hundred years. To be real conservative, where do we want Afrikan people to be in the world twenty years from now? If you get an answer to that question that’s anywhere near correct, it tells you what you got to do now to get ready for that.

“I’m concerned because we are not now doing what we need to do to get ready for the world I think we would like to have, if we thought about it. I just would really hope we begin to mobilize our thoughts and ultimately our resources toward creating a new future for Afrikan people. That we revise and revitalize the continent so we will be safe wherever we live, anywhere in the world.

“And for the young, there was an old Bible verse that my mother emphasized when I was growing up, I still live by it and think of it all the time. One of the few I can remember completely. It was II Timothy 2:15 which says, ‘Study to show yourself approved unto God, not unto man, a workman that need not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.'”

Amankwatia Baffour II [Dr. Asa Grant Hilliard III]

# # #

by Dr. Kwaku Person-Lynn

Double Standard, Double Play

Posted on by drumsintheglobalvillage

Seven-Five-Six, Bay-bee!!

So howcum a brother can’t dope up, if everyone’s doing it?

MARK. MCGUIRE. The 1990s Great White Hope Of The Browning Game. 🙂 HEL-LO? Remember his doped-up ass, and how he wouldn’t talk about it? 🙂

C’mon, folks. Congratulate the brother. Hank Aaron did.

And admit it: it’s feels better to defend Bonds than Vick, right? LOL!

P.S. Here’s one columnist’s opinion on this issue.

Harry Potter And The Never-Ending Wait :)

Posted on by drumsintheglobalvillage

The whole family in front of me had round glasses of some type—some Harryish, some real. 

We were in line, outside, in downtown College Park, Maryland.

For The Book.

Evangelists and snarky, too-cool passerby college students couldn’t spoil our mood. In front of me, mostly 10-year-olds, dressed in black cloaks and black wizard hats I’d see all evening. In back, mostly teens, sans stuff.

Darkness was setting. The Wait Had Begun.

I’m an Old School Geek, so this particular fetish took some time to develop. I mean, I just like the movies. But since this was the last one—the last book, the last Friday/Saturday midnight book release party—I had to go to Vertigo.

One little girl was going to make sure the Vertigo folks kept their word about the 10:15 p.m. opening. She stuck her face up against the window and announced, “Two minutes.”

The doors opened on time. Staffer Jennifer Cook was in full let’s-have-fun-kids mode—y’know, the way she always is with grownups who enter Vertigo. 🙂 Kids in tonight’s standard uniform, circled on the floor. She asked them how many have read all the books more than once. Most, if not all, raised their hands.

While looking at the long line, my eye caught something from my childhood: “Charlotte’s Web.”

(Jen to Kids: “Should we trust Snape?”)

That book spawned a great animated film and a live-action movie. But it never created its own culture. I wondered what it would have been like to have a “Charlotte’s Web” club, where kids would walk around dressed as pigs or spiders carrying signs saying “SOME PIG.”

(Jen to Kids, hosting a kind of Harry Potter version of “Jeopardy”: “The Weasley’s home is called THIS.”)

A palm reader was present, while a magician worked the crowd.

One beautiful young sister, looking about 10, not only had the full hood, but the Gryffindor scarf. You know the one.

Slowly, the line became a polite crowd. At least 100, including a tall guy who had on a trench and a “Mad-Eye” Moody eye.

The Bookstore Master Plan was also in effect: some of the patrons were looking at other books.

(Jen to Kids, announcing a Harry Potter quiz: “If you’re not careful, I’ll break out into a bad British accent.”)

Zero hour. Or, more appropriately, the Witching Hour.

My number was Four. I quickly squeezed my way out the store. Knowing now there would be no more.

Asante Sana, New Ancestor Sekou Sundiata

Posted on by drumsintheglobalvillage

The Realm of the Ancestors has gained another serious artist.

Check these two samples out.

Liked this description of him and his work.

And thanks to Akila Worksongs for the obit below. It says it all.

AUGUST 27TH UPDATE: Here is Baraka’s eulogy.

———————- 

Obituary:

Gifted Poet Sekou Sundiata
(August 22, 1948 — July 18, 2007)

by Louis Reyes Rivera

On Wednesday, July 18, 2007, at 5:47a.m. (ET), poet Sekou Sundiata passed away. A highly esteemed performing poet, Mr. Sundiata wrote for print, performance, music and theater. Born Robert Franklin Feaster in Harlem, on August 22, 1948, Sundiata came of age as an artist during the Black Arts/Black Aesthetic movements of the 1960s and 1970s.

While attending the City College of New York (CCNY), where he began reciting poetry publicly, Sundiata converged with several other student activists, including once-mayoral candidate of Pittsburgh and longtime friend, Leroy Hodge, to form the basis for what soon became known as the Black and Puerto Rican Student Community of City College (BPRSC). This phalanx of 400 students soon made their own history, closing the 21,000-student campus during the Spring of 1969, to demand, among other things, that CCNY be renamed Harlem University. The net effect of the student takeover culminated in both an Open Admissions Policy that took effect in September 1970, the full legitimization of ethnic studies departments throughout the nation, as well as the requirement that all education majors within the City University take courses in African American History and to have Spanish as a Second Language.

Among his acknowledged mentors at City were Toni Cade Bambara, June Jordan, and fellow student Louis Reyes Rivera, with whom Sundiata helped to establish the first Black student newspaper in the City University, CCNY’s The Paper Their association would span close to forty years of mutual respect and admiration.

Upon completing his Bachelor’s Degree (circa 1974), Sundiata enrolled and completed his Master’s in Creative Writing while regularly producing community-based poetry readings that were known to draw SRO crowds. In 1976, his creative sensibilities, his innate organizing skills, and his associations with a convergent generation of excellent poets, musicians and dancers immediately led to a collaborative project he directed that would commemorate 100 years of Black struggle for freedom and Human Rights. Titled The Sounds of the Memory of Many Living People (1863-1876/ 1963-1976), this production, which included upcoming novelist Arthur Flowers and such poets as Safiya Henderson-Holmes, BJ Ashanti, Tom Mitchelson, Louis Reyes Rivera, et al, was staged in Harlem over a period of two days, signaling much of what was to come from Sekou’s sense of vision, steadily breaking ground for what was then a new literary genre, Performance Poetry, fully anticipating elements of both Hip Hop Culture and Spoken Word Art.

In 1977, the aforementioned poets, along with Zizwe Ngafua, Rashidah Ismaili, Fatisha (Hutson), Sandra Maria Esteves, Akua Lezli Hope, Mervyn Taylor, and Sekou, among others, formed the Calabash Poets Workshop, which group signaled the arrival of a new literary heat in New York, regularly producing soirees and fori (1977-1983) that included all of the arts and culminated in a three-year attempt (1979-1982) to establish an independent Black Writers Union.

Upon the release of his first vinyl album (circa 1980), Are & Be, Sekou Sundiata was dubbed by Amiri Baraka as “the State of the Art.”Since then, Mr. Sundiata established a longtime relationship with CCNY’s Aaron Davis Performing Arts Center, through which venue he intermittently produced new material for the stage, consistently collaborating with musicians, dancers and actors. He was eventually selected for a number of earned fellowships, including a Sundance Institute Screenwriting Fellow, a Columbia University Revson Fellow, a Master Artist-in-Residence at the Atlantic Center for the Arts (Florida), and as the first Writer-in-Residence at the New School University in New York, in which university’s Eugene Lang College he remained a professor.

He was, as well, among those featured in the Bill Moyers’ PBS series on poetry, The Language of Life, and in Russell Simmons’ Def Poetry Jam on HBO.

Among several highly acclaimed performance theater works in which he served as both author and performer are: The Circle Unbroken is a Hard Bop, which toured nationally and received three AUDELCO Awards and a BESSIE Award; The Mystery of Love, commissioned and produced by New Voices/ New Visions at Aaron Davis Hall in New York City and the American Music Theater Festival in Philadelphia; and Udu, a music theater work produced by 651 ARTS in Brooklyn and presented by the International Festival of Arts and Ideas in New Haven, the Walker Art Center and Penumbra Theater in Minneapolis, Flynn Center in Burlington, VT, the Hopkins Center at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire, and Miami-Dade Community College in Florida. Throughout this period and since 1985, he developed a close association with co-collaborator and legendary trombonist Craig S. Harris.

blessing the boats, Sundiata’s first solo theater piece, an exploration into his own personal battles with kidney failure, opened in November 2002 at Aaron Davis Hall, NYC. It has since been presented in more than 30 cities and continued to tour nationally. In March 2005, Sundiata produced The Gift of Life Concert, an organ donation public awareness event at the Apollo Theater that kicked off a three-week run of blessing the boats at the Apollo’s SoundStage. in partnership with the Apollo Theater Foundation, the National Kidney Foundation and the New York Organ Donor Network with support from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Since 2006, his the 51st (dream) state has been presented throughout the U.S. and in Australia. Both blessing the boats and the 51st (dream) state were produced in collaboration with MultiArts Projects and Productions (MAPP). In addition to working within community engagement activities at Harlem Stages/Aaron Davis Hall, the University of Michigan and University Musical Society (Ann Arbor, MI), the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill, NC), the University of Texas Austin (Austin, TX), in Miami Dade College (Miami, FL), and the Walker Arts Center in Minneapolis, Sundiata has appeared as a featured speaker and artist at the Imagining America Conference (Ann Arbor, MI), at the Institute of Contemporary Art (Boston, MA), and at the Pedagogy and Theater of the Oppressed Conference (Minneapolis, MN), among others. Prior to his demise, he was engaged in producing a DVD documenting the America Project for use by universities and presenters as a model for art and civic engagement.

In addition to the 1979 Are & Be album, Sundiata’s other releases include a second album, The Sounds of the Memory of Many Living People, and two CDs, The Blue Oneness of Dreams, nominated for a Grammy Award, and longstoryshort. Each of these works are rich with the sounds of blues, funk, jazz and African and Afro-Caribbean percussion, with the latter two featuring Craig Harris.

He is survived by beloved family members, including his mother, Virginia Myrle Feaster, his wife, Maurine Knighton, daughter Myisha, stepdaughters Dina Gomez and Aida Riddle, grandson Aman, brothers William Walter Feaster, and Ronald Eugene Feaster, sister Devona, sister-in-law Nitah, a niece, Tisha Taylor, nephews William, Keith Omar and Glenn and their respective wives, Aloma, Irene and Marie, as well as a host of other relatives, admirers, students and friends.

# # #

—————

An official statement from the family of Sekou Sundiata…


The memorial service for
SEKOU SUNDIATA
will take place
Wednesday, August 22, 2007
New School University
Tischman Auditorium
64 W. 12th Street • 1st Floor
New York, NY 10011
7:00 pm

AUGUST 18 UPDATE: