When the Choir Preaches Back

"I don't want to be told
what to write
I can excavate my own content
I want to be pushed into
digging deep wells
in unheard of lands.
I want you to give me eyes
in the back of my head.
Be a thunder clap
and rouse me.
Be an earthquake
make me tremble
Be a river raging rampant
in my veins.
Shock me shitless."
~ Gloria Anzaldua (1974)*

If you find Gloria Anzaldua quoted in the Foreward to a book you just began reading (as I did when I began reading the one this post is about), you should probably pause to buckle the seat belt of your psyche or you might find yourself suddenly flying into the air and free-falling down whatever personal mountain you're currently on. Gloria Anzaldua is no one to play with. And Deborah Santana, author/editor/film producer and philanthropist, who believes that people of gentleness and faith can change the world, is no one to play with either. The latest proof of this is a hugely important new anthology of short essays by Women of Color representing a range of ages, ethnicities, backgrounds, and experiences.

Launched in January of this year, All the Women in My Family Sing: Women Write the World ~ Essays on Equality, Justice, and Freedom, edited by Santana, hit the ground running, its cover and first few pages decorated with blurbs from the likes of Isabel Allende, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., and Alfre Woodard, among others. Invited to speak with Santana myself(!) before adding my review to such dignitaries' comments would have been daunting indeed had I not already been shocked shitless by the essays and very excited by the opportunity.

Assata Shakur: "To My People" (1973)

After a couple of months of dividing my time between attention to my teaching position and attempts to restore my badly decomposed physical and emotional well-being after trying to do way too much for way too long, I slipped quietly onto my blog site the other day and discovered that -- while I was among the missing -- Why Am I Not Surprised? crossed the line into its second million pageviews. It now stands at 1,034,127 hits in 200 countries. I am grateful that the Universe moved me to take on this task twelve years ago. I am inspired to imagine that there are so many "out there" who share my passion for justice. And I am humbled by your support.

We all share in this remarkable feat because I could write till the cows come home, but if you don't care, there's no point. We are engaged in a daily practice of living our commitment to change the world. Thank you for being a part of my life and letting me be part of yours.

To celebrate this remarkable feat, I'm posting the stirring statement Assata Shakur recorded from jail in 1973. She had been shot, tortured, brutalized, vilified, humiliated, held incommunicado, and finally locked in solitary confinement. Nevertheless, despite the possibility of dire repercussions for such a bold act, she and her lawyer recorded this statement and released it publicly to those who were waiting -- breathlessly -- for a word from one of their most fearless leaders.

The day I discovered that you and I had crossed the million mark together, I was listening to Assata's Autobiography while I drove around in my car. Suddenly, I felt so connected to her and to the struggle to overcome White Supremacy, a struggle that has continued since the first European took it into his head that "White" people are superior to everyone else on the planet. Assata Shakur's words are just as powerful, just as true, and just as reasonable as they were 35 years ago. May they burn themselves into our consciousness as we read them over and over that we might honor her ongoing sacrifice and earn our own place in history.

African American Policy Forum: Breaking the Silence

I thought I was going to post these various things in some kind of rational order, but after watching this video from the website of the African American Policy Forum, I see it's not going to be that kind of party. There is truly beautiful, truly important, truly well conducted work that is being done around the world every moment that we breathe. We each have our place in that world. My place, apparently, is to sometimes speak and sometimes listen; sometimes be on the stage and sometimes be in the audience or even providing the stage.

Watch this film. Then watch it again. And keep on watching it until you have no more tears left, until your sadness is overtaken by rage and your rage burns off like alcohol, leaving only the raw power with which we are all born, power that has been waiting all this time for us to understand from the depths of our souls that we do not need anyone's permission to feel it.

Shenita Ann McLean: "Politics of Black Superwoman Otherness"

After focusing on the plight and struggle of Black men this past week, I'm going to spend the next few days focusing on Black women. This is not a topic I've addressed specifically on this blog as much. It's not because I don't think about and teach about it. I'm aware that Black women -- and women of color, in general -- have two burdens: White Supremacy and the patriarchy (the system that puts men in the dominant power position in the world on the premise that men deserve it). I teach entire separate courses in gender and sexuality, as well as race. And in doing that, I often bounce back and forth to demonstrate that oppression is oppression.

But the intersectionality that will ever bind race, class, gender, sexuality and all other forms of oppression makes the situation of women of color so painful and so nuanced and so close to my woman's heart that I haven't felt confident to present it as fully as it deserves to be presented. I have to change this and the way to do so is to give women of color and Black women, in particular, more regular and specific attention on this blog. The only way I feel able to adequately do this is by taking the opportunity to give Black women the space to make their own voices heard. This has been too long in coming and for that I apologize.

For starters, I'm re-posting (with permission) Shenita Ann McLean's essay entitled, "Politics of Black Superwoman Otherness." It was originally posted on January 1, 2014, at RedSociology.com. Buckle up. This one's gonna take you for a ride.