Tag Archives: Joan Morgan

#imixwhatilike: re: #TaNehisiCoates: What Is The Message? ft. #ToddStevenBurroughs

Posted on by toddpanther

2026 COMMENTS: This was my version of a #KattWilliams interview. 🙂 I cut and pasted comments below I made today, almost two years later.


@IsiahBradley

4 hours ago (edited) Listening to, and laughing about, this almost two years later…..

[2026] UPDATES:

There is now a book on the history of #TheVillageVoice. It’s called “The Freaks Came Out to Write: The Definitive History of the Village Voice, the Radical Paper That Changed American Culture.”

There is a book about Coates’ run on the #MarvelComics character #BlackPanther. It’s called “Writing Black Panther: Ta-Nehisi Coates and Representation Struggles.”

2:02:45: “Freedom Fighter: My Life as a Soldier in the #BlackLiberationArmy,” #AshaBandele‘s collaboration with Black #politicalprisoner#SekouOdinga, is due to be out October 2026, as of this writing.

CORRECTIONS: 14:07 ; 2:01:55: Political prisoner #MaroonShoatz openly said the goal of his 2024 book #IAmMaroon was to get a film deal, a la “#TheHurricane.”

37:41: The James Baldwin essay that pissed #RichardWright off was “Everybody’s Protest Novel.” Baldwin’s obit of Wright was “Alas, Poor Richard.”

50:26: I meant ” AMIRI BARAKA’s daughters from Hettie…”

59:41: The #JohnHenrikClarke essay was called “The Alienation of James Baldwin.”

#TaNehisiCoates#ImixwhatIlike#TheMessage#Blackwriting#politicaleconomy#JamesBaldwin#AlexHaley#AmiriBaraka#CornelWest#MayaAngelou#magazinejournalismhistory#Palestine#literaryjournalism

Asante Sana, The Village Voice

Posted on by toddpanther

Even putting on my media historian’s hat, it is difficult for me to explain how important The Voice was to American journalism.

Once upon a time (at least from the 1970s through the 1990s), it was the place for uncompromising political and cultural journalism. It was required reading for people who wanted to absorb (as readers) or master (as writers) the now-dying art of longform mass-media journalism.

The Voice was important to me because I read there important Black writers such as Thulani Davis, Lisa Jones, Greg Tate, Peter Noel and Joe Wood. (I never forgot Wood’s 5,000+ profile of Albert Murray in the paper’s famous annual Arts Supplement pullout.) The Voice essay that still shakes me to this day is Joan Morgan‘s “A Blackwoman’s Guide To The [Mike] Tyson Trial,” an article that introduced me to sexual harassment, misogyny and rape culture.

It was for people who wanted hardcore journalism. It showed me you didn’t have to be at The New York Times or The New Yorker to kick journalistic ass in New York! It made me want to be a real writer who wrote longform narrative journalism in nuance and detail. After I finish the book I’m writing, I’m going to do just that.