Wanda's Picks Wandas Picks

This is a black arts and culture site. We will be exploring the African Diaspora via the writing, performance, both musical and theatrical (film and stage), as well as the visual arts of Africans in the Diaspora and those influenced by these aesthetic forms of expression. I am interested in the political and social ramifications of art on society, specifically movements supported by these artists and their forebearers. It is my claim that the artists are the true revolutionaries, their work honest and filled with raw unedited passion. They are our true heroes. Ashay!


My Cancer Journey Part 1

 

As the series kickoff, I start with my own Motherline Story. Here is a brief bio:  Ms. Wanda Sabir, is a poet, essayist, arts editor and retired professor. Wanda’s Picks column, podcast and YouTube channel are a local and national staple. Her interest is in Art for Social Change. A depth psychologist, Ms. Sabir’s area of research is on trauma and its impact on memory. Ms. Sabir served as board member for Legal Services for Prisoners with Children.  An advocate of Diaspora Citizenship for descendants of formerly enslaved Africans, Ms. Sabir is also co-founder and CEO of the San Francisco Bay Area Maafa Commemoration in its 28th year this October 2023. Her recent initiative is Wombfulness Gatherings (March 2021-present). Summer 2022 she launched “Souljourning for Truth Project,” a wombful pilgrimage from California to New York, MA and MI, inspired by the life and work of Sojourner Truth, formerly enslaved Black woman, preacher, womanist, abolitionist, suffragette. Here is a link to the film and interview. 

Presently, Ms. Sabir is at the beginning of her doctoral journey in the Women's Spirituality program at CIIS. We close with Nina Simone's "Take Me to the Water."

In these conversations over the next year, we will speak to Black women about their motherlines.


Our guest today is Kathryn Waddell Takara, Ph.D., who taught and developed the first Black Studies in the Ethnic Studies Department beginning in 1971. She transferred to Interdisciplinary Studies where she continued to develop new courses including Africana Studies. Her primary research was African American history, politics and culture. A winner of the (BCF) 2010 American Book Award, Kathryn Waddell Takara, PhD, poet, has published over 300 poems, 11 books of poetry and numerous academic articles. She is currently a writer and traveling performance poet since retiring from the University of Hawai’i (2007) after 31 years of teaching. She is recognized as a widely traveled professor, public scholar of ethnic and Africana Studies. She has travelled, taught and performed her poetry within the USA as well as in W. Europe, West and South Africa, and Eastern China. She was born and raised in Tuskegee, Alabama, educated at Quaker George School and Tufts University on the East Coast, and studied in France twice.  She earned a Fulbright scholarship, an M.A. in French from the University of California, Berkeley and moved to Hawai`i in 1968, where she earned a PhD in Political Science from the University of Hawai’i at Ma̵noa. She has been of service to the community as a coordinator and producer of many socio-political and cultural events.

We end with Nina Simone, "To Be Young Gifted and Black."

1. We are joined by the erudite playwright, musician, and scholar Ishmael Reed, Carla Blank, director, and an illustrious cast tospeak about The Shine Challenge online at The Nuyorican Poetry Cafe in New York.

Reservations and further information can be found at www.nuyorican.org


Reed says:  "In my grandmother’s brother’s house, the only painting on the wall was that of the Titanic. The sinking of the Titanic challenged the boasts of white supremacy. From the collective imagination of the Negro streets came the “toast” of “Shine,” who delivers a warning to the first- class passengers that the ship, thought to be invincible, was taking water. One might consider Shine to be the grassroots nomination for a member of the Black prophetic tradition."


Ishmael Reed has lengthened the 40 or so lines of the typical Shine rap into a 100-page script in which he expands on the issues addressed in the original toast: race, class, immigration, engineering, and Edwardian morality by putting Shine on trial, in which he is both the accused and his own defense attorney. 


One of the reasons Reed wrote the play was he found that members of three generations of Blacks had never heard the story of Shine. He calls the play, The Shine Challenge, 2024, because he expects that a future playwright will expand upon what he has accomplished.


Directed by Carla Blank, The Shine Challenge, 2024 cast includes Jesse Bueno, Maurice Carlton, Caridad De La Luz, Emil Guillermo, Rome Neal, Ishmael Reed, Tennessee Reed, Laura Robards, Monisha Shiva, and Brian Simmons as Shine.


2. We close with an interview with Lola Hanif, womanist scholar, healer, activist, writer (3/8/2012).


 

Part I proceeds Part III 

In querying the text, Sacred Pleasure: Sex, Myth and the Politics of the Body (1995) by Riane Eisler, Ph.D., I spend too much time wading through Western dominator theories. The land is too far from the shore for safety. I do not swim. I respect water, and its power to interrupt and separate my spiritual home from me. If I board the ship, I am stuck, so I keep my body safe and stay away from floating ideas (with muscles). Eventually, they--these ways predicated on fallacy or untruth, will all evaporate and I will walk free again. 


I didn't know until looking at the copyright information that Eisler and David Loye did create The Partnership Way, a workbook, which might answer some of my questions here. 



 

This is a black arts and culture site. We will be exploring the African Diaspora via the writing, performance, both musical and theatrical (film and stage), as well as the visual arts of Africans in the Diaspora and those influenced by these aesthetic forms of expression. I am interested in the political and social ramifications of art on society, specifically movements supported by these artists and their forebearers. It is my claim that the artists are the true revolutionaries, their work honest and filled with raw unedited passion. They are our true heroes. Ashay!


Today we speak to Dr. Cathy "Iyabeji" Royal about the annual Ancestral Souls Rising, Dec. 21, 2023.  Visit https://www.eventcreate.com/e/c4gar-asr  To learn more about the council, see the brochure.

We end the program with the song: "Hum" by Ayla Nereo.