Transatlantic Slave trade and culminating

Check out the handouts for the end of the year detailing the Transatlantic slave trade and our year end culminating activity.

Roots

Once again we watched Roots in the class. I agree with many of the  students in class, it is difficult to watch, especially as a Black man. Even though it is difficult it is necessary because it really defines the reasons why our community has taken a 180° turn from their more ancient and earlier historical beginnings. Slavery was the conditioning that created a mentality of subservience and limitations. Most slaves didn't run.

We see that even Kunta, as strong as he was eventually bowed to the pain of the whip, superficially, but the urge to run away never left. Freedom was in his soul and burned. As he grew up string this need to be free intensified eventually leading to another attempt. Unfortunately Kunta was caught by slave catchers who, by cutting the front of his foot off, ensured that he would never run again.
Kunta 's need for freedom is akin to our need to compete in this world. To be as good of everyone else. How hard are you working to be free? Are you ok with existing in a mental slavery shackled by ignorance?

What happened to change it?

We recently looked at pre-European Africa and examined the idea of families the study of Agriculture and civilization. The intricate societies, languages and culture. The idea of African religions and their impact on culture, hierarchies and the development of infrastructure.

We deconstructed the term Eurocentric and the idea that Europe developed Education, history, progress, beauty, religion advancements in science and the idea the anything good and normal comes from Europe.
The idea that Europe means Power.

We agreed to look at the Atlantic African slave trade and when the indoctrination of African began and the powerful slave mentality initially impacted Africa and Africans.

Roots and the story of Kunta Kinte was a powerful example of the history above. His village had strong social infrastructure and culture. Kunta had a strong family with a mother and a father. He had to complete a 'Rite of Passage' into manhood. He eventually was captured and taken to a Slave ship sailing to the United States. He saw what happened to those Africans who had become sick and died along the way. He was also involved with an unsuccessful rebellion aboard the ship. Eventually he landed in the new world and was sold into slavery.
Fiddler was an African who was strutted by the master to socialise Kunta into Plantation life. He soon realised that the desire to be free was powerful for those who had tasted it before.

Notes from class May 27th to May 31st

Examining John Henrick Clarke

Please see an earlier post about ancient Africa and a discussion by John Henrick Clarke.

Agriculture and the birth of civilization

This is the handout. Be aware that you'll need this information for the next quiz thus week.

Jamaica's Global debt issue

You should review the information from the 'outslip' I gave you last week. It'll help you with the test coming up this week. Yesterday's class was about global economics and it's effect on developing countries. We went through some of the issues from the Life and Debt documentary such as the devaluing of currency, IMF loans and their stipulations, Free Zones and the like. We also discussed political systems and their effect on populations and the world.
Remember the questions regarding the decisions a leader might have to make to stop the downward financial spiral their country might fall into after social or economic global trauma.

Quiz today on 'Life and Debt', the IMF, World Bank and Jamaica's economic distress

Today we had a quiz on the documentary 'Life and Debt', it covered issues pertaining to the situation countries find themselves in when borrowing money from these entities. The quiz was basically multiple choice, true and false and matching. This quiz tested you on what you don't know about a subject rather than what you know. Hopefully everyone was present and ready to take the quiz.
-DW

Jamaica's life and debt

Watching the video Life and Debt allows us the opportunity to examine how economics can create an almost slave like dependency situations for developing countries.
The shackles of debt through the devaluing of currency, loan restrictions, and unequal trade balances created by the IMF places Jamaica in the center of a spiral of despair.
Jamaica isn't the only country caught in this negative relationship. Many of the poorer developing countries throughout the world are in similar circumstance.
The question asked was, 'Why are you here?' The answer is becoming more evident as we explore how the living conditions in many countries makes it nearly unlivable.

Why are you here? Life and Debt

With many of the Harvey students coming from 'developing countries' it is important to understand why you're here in Canada today? What were the 'Push and Pull' factors that forced your parents or grandparents to leave home to come to a new country?
The documentary 'Life and Debt' examines Jamaica's economic problems from the time of their independence. These factors may be the cause of many people leaving home to come to Canada for a better life. The documentary is an example of what many developing countries experience when dealing with the IMF and the World Bank.

The Grand Bargain / More Time

Since it seems that the class has been working hard on their rough drafts, I'm offering the extension of the due date until Tuesday. This offer is only valid if the class continues working on their rough drafts as diligently as they were today. The essays must be handed in at the beginning of class on Tuesday in a package including the brainstorm, game plan and rough draft. All of the rough drafts must be ok'd by me by the end of class tomorrow.

Essay Deadline Approaches

Be aware that the essay Deadline is on Thursday and you have to get your rough draft (edited) approved before you start your final copy on the computer. Really this means that you have to have your rough draft finished by tomorrow's class. The will be no extensions for this assignment.

Essay process and mark break down.

Today I showed the class the mark breakdown for the essay. The preproduction (brainstorm, game plan and rough draft) is worth 30% of your mark. The final edited copy is worth 70%. You cannot begin the word processing until the rough draft is ok'd by me. The rough draft is hand written.
See the breakdown of the writing process to be followed in the green board pictures below:

Cliff Washburn

Our special guest today was Cliff Washburn. Cliff was a four year scholarship basketball player at the Citadel, a military school in South Carolina. In his fifth year he played football after which he went on to become an NFL journeyman playing for a number of teams. Following his NFL career he played in the CFL with Saskatchewan, Calgary and Toronto.
After his football career was over he worked as a sales person here for a large corporation in the city.

We were lucky enough to have him as a guest speaker where he talked about his life, his motivations and his convictions. Cliff stayed long after the bell and 'hung out' with many of the Harvey gang discussing many of the things he spoke of in the auditorium.

On behalf of George Harvey and staff and students I'd like to thank Cliff for offering his time, energy and experience and hope he can return and be a part of the class again.

Frame of reference FOR

What is a Frame of Reference? It's the total of all your memories and experiences, all of who you are. It's the bank or database from which you pull from to make decisions.
The smaller that FOR, the smaller the pool is for decision making and of course vise versa.
My job is to expand your FOR so that your decisions come from an informed base rather than making decisions about life from a small uninformed platform.

Mid-term Assignment

Based on all of the work completed in class as well as the information contained in this Blog you have to demonstrate understanding of what's been studied in the class to date.
See the assignments attached:

Modern Minstrel Show

Watch "Minstrel Show" on YouTube
Watch this video. Are these parallels real or constructed? How do you feel about the images shown in the YouTube video?

Step n Fetchit / this is an example of one of his movies.

Watch "Excerpt from "Miracle in Harlem" (1948)" on YouTube
During the height of the depression Step n Fetchit made more money than the President of the United States portraying the stereotypical Black man.
Was he a sell out, our was he just getting paid?

Being White in Philly / what do you think of this?

Check out this article written in Philadelphia.
What do you think about it. Does anything ring true?

ENOUGH by Juan Williams

This is one of the most critical books we will study in the class. Juan Williams' book Enough is a careful study of the present day Black experience. We will be examining the chapters on Hip Hop and Crime and Punishment and their impact on the Black community. I highly recommend this book for any of my students who wish to read it and have an extra copy specifically for those who want to.

Chocolate High

Watch "India.Arie - Chocolate High ft. Musiq Soulchild" on YouTube
Just a nice song with two Black people that didn't make me cringe when I watched it.

Rhymes and Punishment

Rhymes and Punishment is a dynamic and engaging expose on the lives of successful Hip Hop artists whose decisions have landed them in prison with all of the trappings and consequences of the prison lifestyle.
The opulent life of a rap star is soon juxtapose to that of a convicted criminal. The extremes of incredible choice  versus being completely controlled are examined by director Peter Spirer and narrated by Hip Hop legend KRS 1.

See link to the YouTube trailer below :

Who are the real phonies?

How do you feel about people who aren't really genuine about who they claim to be?
Is someone who's made it out of the traps and negative aspects of the Black community and become successful in today's world say, as a doctor, yet, has animosity towards those within the community who remain better than someone who has made their money as a rapper delivering stereotypical images of Black people to the world, yet doesn't live that life anymore?
Are they both phony?
Both exhibit the symptoms of a slave mentality, the self hatred that allows for the direct hurting of your people versus the dismissal and abandonment of that same group.
I personally believe that the acknowledgement of a slave mentality and the conquering of it wouldn't allow for either mindset. There would be an obligatory sense that you must uplift the community and support it. Success breeds a mindset of sacrifice and creates an atmosphere of education and even rescue. One would neither damage or leave the ones who need one's understanding.
When you create an environment of self awareness, self-definition will follow.

Bottling Manhood and the Concept of Cool

We read from Cosby's book 'Come on People', and discussed his 'concept of Cool'. How the detachment of emotions was and is necessary to avoid the negative consequences of conflict when dealing with a discriminatory world. But, when that detachment causes a suppression of all emotions the situation becomes dangerous to that person and those around them. When you cool becomes hot and all of those bottled emotions are unleashed, hot becomes unmanageable.
It questions what the Black community considers 'manhood'?
That being said, what happens when young people within our community realise that they've been fooled and manipulated for the sake of a dollar; when they figure out that many of their artists are unwilling, or worse, willing puppets for people, from outside the community, to slowly destroy and exploit it.
Are our youth willing to give up the comfort of ignorance to embrace the discomfort of truth?

Misogyny in our community.

Why is it ok for Black women in our community to be treated the way they are? Why does the community allow women to be treated as objects? We treat them as though women are lesser while at the same time we praise our mothers and act as though we protect our sisters.
Do we forget that every women is someone's daughter, maybe sister, cousin, possibly a mother, grandmother?

Shouldn't every woman be special and important? Why do we have to be related to a woman before we can respect them?

Questioning Hip Hop

We can now start to examine the Hip Hop genre. Using the question sheet I drew up use the documentary as reference to answer some of the more difficult questions that come up when discussing Hip Hop.
Is there an excuse for some of what comes out of the music. What are the pros and cons of a music that defines so much of what the Black community represents?

Dismantling Hip Hop

Because Hip Hop is such a part of Urban Black culture in 2013 I feel it is necessary for us to dismantle the genre to better understand how it began, how it's evolved, and how it has affected the Black community.

The documentary 'Hip Hop' beyond the beats and rhymes ', is a great way to begin this process. It is an expose on the music and those who create and perform it.

It examines the state of Hip Hop and why it's evolution had become, for the most part, detrimental to the community. The emphasis on violence, misogyny, homophobia, and consumerism permeates the music. The misguided and misplaced images of manhood, power, sex and success are constants and promoted in Hip hop.

The values of the Slave Mentality are reinforced and substantiated when aspiring young Black male rappers are rewarded for perpetuating the stereotypes that are demonstrative of the worst of the Black community.

They are being paid by those outside of the community to slowly destroy their own.

Lil Poopy?

We watched and discussed a music video that I was hipped to on CNN. The artist was a young child by the name of 'Lil Poopy'... What? The discussion spanned from questioning whether the video was child abuse, okay, a true reflection of our society to whether it was the worst thing a child has done in the name of Hip hop.
The Cosby speech took a bank seat to this discussion. I had originally thought that the blatant sexualization of women, the drug connotations, the references to violence and overt display of bling and crass consumerism was passe in the age of Obama. I was obviously wrong.
The questioning of this little boy's ethnicity came up as well as whether that changed things. The definition of' Urban ' was brought up. As the class strives to define Black a lot came to light as the discussion continued.

Great Class in Friday

Another great class, another great presentation. The class went very well. Even with the technological issues, the last presentation was very well done and well constructed. The presentation 'dovetailed' with the introduction of Bill Cosby's speech on Brown v the Board of Education.
Many important points were exposed and ready to be debated in the next class. Please review Cosby 's speech which is available in an earlier entry in this blog.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Gh3_e3mDQ8

Visible Knapsack Presentations

I was quite happy with yesterday's presentations. All of them were effective and impactful and presented in differing formats. Some dealt specifically with statistics, while others were creatively crafted short anecdotal stories that were well prepared and engaging. The PowerPoint presentations were well laid out and all of them were informative.
Good job to all of the groups who  presented.

Why do we think the way we do?

Today we discussed the process of reconditioning Africans who were taken slaves. Why these people are taken as slaves, as well as a little about what happened when they reached the new world.
How do you condition the Africa out of the African? The process began from the time that they were captured. The helplessness of captivity. Being led to the coast. Crammed in the belly of the slave ship for up to three months. They were then brought to the new and unfamiliar world where they were further conditioned to rid themselves of whatever made them African. They lost their culture, their religion, their name and their history. The African wasn't allowed to fill this void themselves rather this empty was filled with a slave mentality based on the value system geared towards the benefit of one group at the expense of another. The slave mentality was created as a way to control Black people without chains or bonds.
Look at earlier post in this blog for more information on the slave mentality and is effect on the Black community.

Malcolm and Martin

We had the opportunity to watch a great play about the relationship between Malcolm X and Martin Luther King. Although fictional the play did highlight the differing approaches to solving the same problem of Black oppression during the 1960's.
Malcolm's 'By Any Means Necessary' is balanced against approach of Martin's 'Non-violence'.
I felt it was a fair representation of each ideal but, what do you think?

CAS 331 George Harvey semester 2

Welcome to the African Studies course. Use this Blog as a reference and resource guide for assignments, tests, and exams. Feel free to post comments whenever you need to. This will be open to anyone taking the course throughout the TDSB.