Online review platforms such as Yelp and Google operate on the premise that the average dining experience delivers the respect and grace consistent with hospitality mythos. This expectation, of course, operates under the default of a white perspective. While I am sure that those of my collective have encountered outstanding service at times, I am…
My Black is Brown: A Black Female Perspective in Prose
There are few phrases as triggering and colloquially violent as the term “black and brown.” The term typically precedes a discussion pertaining to some systemic or social wrong rooted in physiognomy. Moreover, the term suggests a similarity between the experiences of black and non-black people of color. The issues here are plentiful; however, the most…
My Black Is Brown
My black is brown My ancestor’s blood marks the ground on which many walk and talk over an obscured memory that separates wrong from right black from white and brown the silent sea speaks of stories unheard by the unseen stories that run like bleeding rivers black like the brown backs of those beaten niggerized…
Passing the Baton: Flo Jo, Sha’Carri Richardson and Inheriting “Runnin’ Space”
Al Joyner, after the untimely death of his wife, the woman affectionately known as “Flo Jo,” noted that she “passed the ultimate drug test.” In the late 80s, Flo Jo would become the fastest woman in the world, a title that rightfully revealed a lifetime of hard work but engendered predictable scrutiny from anti-black adversaries….
What The Cosbys Show Us: A Black Female Perspective
As a collective, black people are no strangers to sexual assault as a vindicating force to domestic terrorism. Sexual assault allegations that engendered the lynchings that ornament our past and present. We are also not strangers to how a racist society employs hyper-sexuality to stain the legacies of black greatness from Sam Cooke to Michael…
Chauvin and American Chauvinism
To offset this post, I wish to enlist a famous quotation from the late Toni Morrison’s expository catalog. In “The Nobel Lecture in Literature,” Morrison writes: “We die. That make be the meaning of life. But we do language. That may be the measure of our lives” (203). While this quotation speaks to death as…
Regarding Don Lemon’s Comments on Black Humanity
Don Lemon is the latest black public figure to articulate racial “insight” incongruent to the actions that engendered his relevance. I use the term “insight” loosely, as Lemon merely uses his popular platform to state unpopular views that predate his existence. The views I reference are Lemon’s recent comments that white people still do not…
Pessimism.
They call us pessimistic because we won’t smile for the optics Because if their representation Doesn’t yield a celebration In your heart Or mind You’re the pessimistic kind They quote Malcolm but lack the courage to truly implement his practice They hear the words of a revolutionary and like the sound but get gone when its finna…
Manifesting the Man
Manifest. A word and practice that has attained significant traction in the last few years or so. Whether it is “manifesting” your true love, dream career, or any other ideal status, the concept suggests a spirituality that, if tapped into, yields life-changing results. Despite its frequent presence in everyday dialogue, manifest, as a word and…
Stray Thoughts
I. Anti-black Altruism News stories that highlight “altruism” often maintain racist mythos. A recent news story featured a (black male) teacher who gave a young, black student the shoes off his feet. On the surface, the newsstory delineates community, but as an ornament of the racist media, this feature is violent propoganda. The gesture reinforces…
Whispers of a Womanist 