Afrobella of the Month — Alison Hinds, The Other Barbadian Music Goddess

Rihanna is fly. Rihanna is beautiful. Rihanna is becoming quite sexy. I say becoming, because compared to Alison Hinds, the reigning queen of soca, Rihanna is still not yet a woman (despite her newly acquired penchant for voguing in fetish gear). Alison Hinds has that grown and sexy thing down pat, and she’s been one of the Caribbean’s most popular entertainers for over a decade now. She was the pride of Barbados back when Rih Rih was singing Hero in school. In case you’ve never heard of her before, allow me to introduce you to the amazing Alison Hinds.

Born in England, she moved to Barbados at age 11. From then, she was steeped in soca. According to Wikipedia, she joined the band Square One in 1986, and played just about every hot club and fete in Barbados and the Caribbean islands en route to fame and fortune — dropping hits like One For the Road in 1992. Square One’s star was rising in Barbados, but not throughout the island archipelago just yet. In Trinidad, the first I heard of Alison Hinds was with her monster hit, Raggamuffin, in 1996. That song won Alison Hinds her first road march victory at Crop Over — the first time a woman had won the honor in Barbados. Raggamuffin was a certified hit throughout the islands, and ushered in what Trinis referred to as “The Bajan Invasion.” After that, everyone waited with anticipation to hear what Alison and Square One was about to drop next. Her commanding voice became like a rally cry for the party to kick into high gear. She singlehandedly changed the face of soca and paved the way for the younger generation of female frontwomen to come. As she says in this feature in Vibe magazine — “Several female soca artists have told me, “You inspired me so I could do this too.” I feel like I’ve had a huge impact on young Caribbean women.” She really has. Her combination of strength and sexuality has become a blueprint for the genre. Every up-and-coming soca starlet dreams of being Alison.

Continue reading »

Afrobella of the Month — Najwa Moses, Styleaholic and Icon-in-the-making

Najwa Moses is striking. Najwa Moses is bold. Najwa Moses lives her life full speed ahead. She’s working hard towards making herself a brand, and from the interview we had a week or so ago, I’m convinced she knows what she’s doing.

She’s a podcaster, a videopodcaster, a writer, a fashionista, a marketing maven, a self promoter, a fashion do, and an unabashed fashion don’t all at the same time. And in this era of changing media, she’s one of my new heroines. I caught up with her in a fun phone interview recently, and we chatted about anything and everything.

One of Najwa’s first roles in fashion was doing business development for a not-for-profit organization through the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce. “My job was to help promote the work of local designers, helping them get to trade shows, helping them do numbers, PR, whatever whatever. One of the first things I created was called a shopping party. All these shopping parties — Shecky’s, Gen Art, all of them were quote-unquote “inspired” by the concept I came up with,” she declared proudly.

“Wow,” I interjected.

“I know, right! I don’t get credit for that? When you’re 20 years old or 21 years old and you don’t have a big company with lots of money behind you… when you put something out that’s a novelty idea, you’re really leaving it out there for other people to pick up. And that’s unfortunate. But I’ve learned, and you know what, they can’t take creativity away.”

That pick yourself up, dust yourself off attitude has taken her from strength to strength. Najwa’s shopping party was called The Closet, and it involved a lot of indie designers who weren’t aware of their potential. She started the event in 2001, and she learned as she went along. “I understand how things work a little bit better now.”

The last time they held the event was in 2005. At the time, she was also writing for NPR, covering New York Fashion Week, and immersing herself in the culture of style. Still, she found herself yearning to do her own thing. “That’s when I learned about podcasting. It was like — you want your own radio show? Come learn about podcasting. I was like, hell yeah! Jumped into it, did a bunch of great audio interviews, got a brand new website and I was like, oh no, this website must have video. I lost my mind, forgetting how expensive video is,” she laughs. Her website is Styleaholics, and it’s as fabulous as you would expect.

Najwa’s got a lot of personality, and she talks at the speed of traffic in New York City. For example, she had me cracking up when I listened to this Showbuzz podcast, where she recounts visiting Kutztown, Pennsylvania. Pioneering forms of new media doesn’t come cheap, but Najwa’s trying to be savvy about it. Now she has her own YouTube channel, where she features her videopodcast “The In List.” She’s interviewed fashion icons and fabulous celebrities including Diane Von Furstenberg, Kelis, and Marc Ecko (I don’t know what it is, but I find him completely fascinating). She’s starting to make some commercial inroads, too — check her out pimping the Toyota Camry at one of her fashion events. It’s all part of her brand-building master plan.

“I cross many worlds. I don’t just stick with the black fashionista world, or the fashionista world. I am also into the music scene, the food scene, very international high end stuff, or very underground scenes. I think I represent many different types of people and subcultures.” No kidding. In addition to the podcasts, videos, and writing for sites like AOL’s Styleist and Bluefly, Najwa is also the ambassador for Ugly Talent NY, a character model agency started in 1969 that exclusively traffics in “interesting” faces. Multicultural? Old? Tatted up? Obese? Or generally unusual? Ugly NY is looking for you. “The models range from a 300lb Sumo wrestler to a Styleaholic like myself-and I’ve personally have never been happier to be UGLY,” says Najwa.

Which brings me to another defining trait of Najwa’s. Her style. I had to ask her what’s up with that defining look. “My style is just really eclectic. I’m always a little left of fashion, and at the same time, I have to pay attention to that and understand that not everyone will look at me and say oh my God, that’s brilliant. For me, it’s about creating a statement and making sure everyone is noticing me. Because you want to make sure when you walk into an event, all eyes are on you. And in New York City, there’s a lot of people for eyes to be on.”

Believe it or not, being a plus size chick who dresses flamboyantly is working for her. “I’m not a size two. People well say oh my God, is that a detraction? But you know what, it actually helps me. Because it’s like, who is that curvy girl with those big ass boobs and that big ass hair coming in here? You can’t help but notice me. And I’m confident. And I believe in the designers I’m wearing, so it is what it is. Even this year, I’m like, how can I go crazier?”

Continue reading »

Afrobella of the Month — Nikki Giovanni

Brash, brilliant, brave, beautiful - Nikki Giovanni is all that and then some. You could run through a whole dictionary of adjectives on this proud afrobella of note. She was once known as “the princess of black poetry,” but now, she’s undoubtedly the queen.

Nikki Giovanni helped to pave the way for today’s generation of young black poets, she stood strong, fought, and won her battle with breast cancer, and when her peers, students, and coworkers needed a unified voice in the face of unspeakable grief, she rose admirably to the occasion. Nikki Giovanni is a long overdue Afrobella of the Month.

One of the things I admire most about Yolande Cornelia “Nikki” Giovanni is her refusal to play by the rules. She seems to revel in refreshing contradiction. She was born in 1943, in this fantastic and fun NPR interview, she laughingly describes herself as “a little old lady.” But despite any preconcieved generation gaps, she has a storied admiration of the late, great Tupac Shakur and to commemorate the spirit of the slain, controversial rapper, she proudly wears a “Thug Life” tattoo on her arm — which, in case you didn’t already know, was intended by Tupac to be an acronym. In that same NPR interview, she reveals her reason for loving ‘Pac the way she did. First she declares that it’s important to recognize genius. Then she adds, “I would always rather be with the thugs than the people talking about them.” Snaps to Bill Cosby. All kidding aside, as someone who definitely grew up as part of the hip hop generation (and as a big fan of Tupac’s), I appreciate her perspective. It makes me want to perk up my ears and listen to what else she has to say.

I think Giovanni’s admiration for Tupac can be partially attributed to her love for plain talk. She has never been a highfalutin poet-with-a-capital-P, even from youth she appreciated the magic of real, unpretentious storytelling. According to this Ohioana Authors article, family influence had everything to do with that –

“I come from a long line of storytellers,” she once explained in an interview, describing how her family influenced her poetry through oral traditions. “My grandfather was a Latin scholar and he loved the myths, and my mother is a big romanticist, so we heard a lot of stories growing up.” This early exposure to the power of spoken language would influence Giovanni’s career as a poet, particularly her tendency to sprinkle her verses with colloquialisms, including curse words. “I appreciated the quality and the rhythm of the telling of the stories,” she once commented, “and I know when I started to write that I wanted to retain that—I didn’t want to become the kind of writer that was stilted or that used language in ways that could not be spoken. I use a very natural rhythm; I want my writing to sound like I talk.”

I love that about her. She is a spoken word artist, but when Nikki Giovanni reads a poem, she doesn’t use that “I am a POET reading a POEM” voice. Y’all know what I’m talking about. She deliberately doesn’t memorize her work, so her readings have that unvarnished feeling. In this early interview, she accounts baldly for her meteoric rise to fame, traces her history as a self-published author, and ends on a very candid note — “Artists as a rule tend to think that somebody ought to do something for them. I don’t believe that. I think that as a rule it is your work, it is your responsibility to get it out.” The accessibility of her voice has taken her places that many traditional poets have not gone.

Nikki Giovanni’s poetry is universally acclaimed, but she has always spoken to African American culture. The influence of the civil rights and black power movements resounds in her first book, Black Feeling, Black Talk. Her books for children and young adults — Rosa, Ego-Tripping and Other Poems for Young People, and Grandmothers : Poems, Reminiscences, and Short Stories About the Keepers of Our Traditions, all aim to celebrate the accomplishments of ordinary black people, the people who endured daily hardships to help us get to where we are today. She reveals that she feels pretty good about the progress we’ve made in this CNN interview about the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr.

Despite all of her accolades — more than 20 honorary degrees, a list of keys to the city, book awards, and various recognitions as long as your forearm, Nikki Giovanni manages to keep it real. At least, she tries to not believe her own hype. She shrugs away cancer survivor tributes in this New York Times article: ”I get so sick of these people who talk about how cancer made them better people,” she says, sitting in the dining room of her brick ranch house in Christiansburg, Va., near Roanoke. ”I don’t think I’m any nicer or kinder. If it takes a near-death experience for you to appreciate your life, you’re wasting somebody’s time.”

Despite her modesty, Giovanni is a survivor of note and her vibrancy in the face of the disease is awesome. She recounts the difficulty of losing her mother and sister in this NPR interview, where the interviewer can’t help but notice the brightness of her personality, despite the pain of her recent loss. That appears to be her way. She keeps things simple, doesn’t want to be canonized, or depicted as more-than. In this interview with Black Press USA, she speaks to that — “I’ve had people who’ve been very complimentary, yes,” Giovanni responded in a telephone interview. “And I’m glad, but…I’m not a priest; I’m an acolyte. I’m not trying to do anything to anybody but bring a point of view.”

Giovanni continues to publish her point of view at a prolific rate, and she’s the rare kind of writer who appears to actually love teaching as well. She is practically an institution at Virginia Tech — she’s been teaching there since 1987. She taught shooter Seung-Hui Cho, and remembered him as “downright mean.” She admits she felt shaky about her words at the Virginia Tech Convocation, but she created a rallying cry for the Hokie Nation — in the wake of that terrible tragedy, the words “we are Virginia Tech” were heard around the world, giving reassurance to those who were shaken to the core. And isn’t that what a great poet should do? Rise to even the bitterest of occasions and give hope to those who might feel hopeless? We all can only hope for that kind of grace under pressure.
Nikki Giovanni proved the power of poetry that day, as she’s been doing every day for a long time. Like I said, she’s all that and then some. She’s complicated, bold, gritty, and honest. In one of her most famous poems, “Ego Tripping” she declares, “I am so hip even my errors are correct.” True that! Maximum respect to Nikki Giovanni, Afrobella of the Month!

Looking for a perfect holiday gift for that intellectual bella in your family? They’ll definitely be happy to unwrap a copy of Giovanni’s latest collection, Acolytes: Poems.

Afrobella of the Month* — Farai Chideya

NPR junkies are a dedicated lot. I’ve known some who lull their latchkey pets with A Prairie Home Companion on busy weekends. I’ve known others who are utterly obsessed with Ira Glass. NPR fanatics drive to work with Diane Rehm and come home with News and Notes, hosted by the razor-sharp Farai Chideya. If you’re not a regular NPR listener, you may not be aware of what a brilliant journalist or great interviewer Farai Chideya is. She’s an accomplished author, a compelling personality, and a strong-minded afrobella who does her part to keep America informed about politics, culture, and the issues that affect the black community. She’s become one of the key figures in new media, and is an inspiration to any young, smart journalist who is trying to find a place in the changing landscape of American media.

Farai Chideya is young still — she’s in her mid-thirties, and her drive is evident in the amazing range of her achievements. Let’s break it down by types of media, shall we?

In terms of print, Farai started out as a researcher at Newsweek magazine. She was a writer for MTV News from 1994 to 1996. She’s already published three books — 1995’s Don’t Believe the Hype is already in its eighth printing. 2001’s The Color of Our Future: Race in the 21st Century was named one of the best books for young adults by the New York Public Library. In 2004, she released the timely Trust: Reaching the 100 Million Missing Voters. In 1997, Newsweek named her to its “Century Club” of 100 people to watch.

In 1996, Chideya founded PopandPolitics.com, a brilliant site that combines music, film, international news, and political perspectives. The site has won beau coup awards and accolades, including a MOBE IT Innovator award. Chideya has been named one of Alternet’s New Media Heroes, and both her and the site were ranked in PoliticsOnline.com’s list of 25 Who Are Changing the World of Internet and Politics.

On television, she’s been a correspondent for ABC News, and anchored Pure Oxygen on the Oxygen channel. During the 1996 Presidential election campaign, she provided commentary on CNN. She’s also appeared on ABC News, Fox, and MSNBC. Before she found a home at NPR, she hosted a daily news and cultural call-in show on San Francisco’s KALW 91.7 FM.

And oh yeah, then there’s this from her official bio: “In 2001-2002, she was a Knight Fellow at Stanford University. She has published articles in newspapers and magazines including The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times Magazine, Time, Spin, Vibe, O, The California Journal, Mademoiselle, and Essence. Awards for her writing and broadcast work include a 2004 “Young Lion” award from the Black Entertainment & Telecommunications Association (BETA), a GLAAD Award for the Spin article “Hip Hop’s Black Eye,” and a National Education Reporting Award for work at Newsweek. She currently serves on the Journalism Advisory Committee of the Knight Foundation, which disburses over $20 million in journalism-related grants each year.”

Whew. Got all that?

In a remarkably short span of time, Farai Chideya has managed to rack up awards, publish books, start websites, and establish a stellar reputation within her myriad fields of expertise. On her daily program News and Notes, she delivers the kind of information that is meaningful to a listener like me — and quite possibly a reader like you. Just in the last month, Farai has interviewed soul singer Martin Luther, then tackled the Jena 6 case in a really refreshing way by reaching out to the community for their feedback. Most recently she hosted a sizzling discussion about old school vs. new school civil rights activism, addressed the extremely disappointing Marion Jones scandal, and hosted a great round table discussion on black journalists covering the world of black celebrity.

In this fascinating interview with PIP magazine, she explains why so many young Americans aren’t watching the news: “Younger Americans — and I speak here mainly of people in their 20s and 30s — are rarely seen in speaking roles on network news. The target audience is middle aged, middle-class, and white. The networks use people meters to test what stories those audiences like, and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy that that’s the kind of audience they get. Meanwhile, younger audiences have drifted away, and many people don’t watch the news at all. To change that, news editors will have to really respect the voices of their whole potential audience — younger and older, of all ethnicities.”

And she does just that on News and Notes every day. Chideya’s areas of interest intersect neatly with mine — hip hop’s surface level activism and its depiction of black women has been an issue she’s addressed boldly and bravely. She spoke out about opportunistic hip hop political posturing in her book, Trust, and her interview with Russell Simmons left the yoga master with his feathers ruffled after her questions about his role within the kingdom of pimps and hoes. (She addresses the interview further here). That notably uncomfortable interview set the stage for Chideya to further explore this issue with the rappers who help to perpetuate negative and limited female images. Recently she appeared as a panelist on BET’s Hip Hop vs. America, which gave her an opportunity to address materialism and ask Nelly about the portrayal of women in his infamous “Tip Drill” video. After watching the BET debate, I’m honestly not sure the rappers understood where the criticism was coming from, but the fact that there was a healthy discourse on the source of the issue is a good start towards positive change, I think. I hope.

I’d like to see more of that kind of enriching interdisciplinary discussion on TV. For now, I’m more than happy to get my fix on News and Notes. I respect Farai Chideya because she always speaks her piece intelligently, uses her power wisely, and isn’t afraid to ask the questions or make the statements that are sometimes unpopular. She’s a go-getter who is paving a path that others might follow. And besides all of that, she’s a beautiful and strong black woman who is setting an example that old media needs to learn from. She gives this afrobella a lot to aspire to. Hats off to you, Farai Chideya! You’re my very first Afrobella of the Month! *

Want to keep up with the news according to Farai? Check out the News and Views blog, which adds context to the on-air reporting that she and her co-workers do so well. Do you prefer to crank your tunes on the way home from work, rather than plug into talk radio? You can listen to all of NPR’s broadcasts online whenever you want.

* I had to do it, y’all. The weekly pace was killing me!

Add This to Your Record Collection

My Afrobella of the Week needed more cookin’ in the kitchen. This is a woman I have a whole lot of respect for, so I want to come correct. And I want her post to kick off the week right, so I’m making the editorial decision to hold off on Afrobella of the Week this week. I say better it’s written well all the way through, than prepared and posted in haste. Actually, recently someone suggested to me that I change it to Afrobella of the Month. Any views on that, bellas?

On to the newness — You’re starving for some new music. But the existing landscape of the musical scene is so stale, you continually find yourself turning back to the classic soul tracks of the sixties and seventies. Look no further — I have the perfect new album for you that brings the sounds of the present and the past together in one fantastic  blend.

Former Afrobella of the Week, Sharon Jones has just dropped her latest album, 100 Days, 100 Nights. It’s beyond tight. I’m loving it!
It’s the kind of groovy, mellow album that you can listen to all the way through without skipping a track. Don’t believe me? The album is being screened in its entirety on AOL Spinner so you can listen for yourself.

If you enjoy Amy Winehouse but you’re sick of watching her eclipse her talent with shocking celebrity stunts, you’ll dig Miss Sharon even more. She’s worked hard to get where she is today, and she truly appreciates her fans. The Dap-Tones agree, as you’ll discover in this great MTV interview. Click here to check out a little video of Sharon and the Dap-Kings recording in the Dap-Studio. It kicks off with her combing out her fro, and features a little acapella singing towards the end. To hear Sharon’s version of Bob Marley’s It Hurts to Be Alone, click here for the Entertainment Weekly exclusive.

The title track is my favorite! 100 Days, 100 Nights makes great use of Sharon’s sweet, strong voice, and that horn section that I love so much. You need it in your life. Click here to enjoy it fully before you go on and buy the woman’s album. And if you love authentic soul, you should support her! It just dropped yesterday, so clicky click to get it on Amazon, and while you’re at it, show Sharon some love by adding her to your MySpace friends.

The group will be touring the US, Canada, and Europe, so check out Brooklyn Vegan for tour dates. It breaks my heart that they’re not coming to Miami. Oh well — I still have her killer new album to comfort me. And in case you’re wondering what kind of live performance this petite dynamo puts on, check out this video of her performing on popular French television show Canal Plus.

Sharon rocks!

Afrobella of the Week — Ayo

My appetite for new music is as insatiable as my appetite for makeup and hair products. Which is to say, I’m always on the lookout for the next big thing. I especially love female singers with spunk and sass and indisputable talent. Personality counts for a lot, and I admire a musician with style. But the kind of singers that steal my heart and become my instant new faves are more than just fresh and fly; they also radiate soul to the max. So in the vein of previous Afrobellas of the Week Chrisette Michele, Conya Doss, Janelle Monae, and the criminally slept-on Alice Smith, I present to you the enchanting pixie that is Ayo. She’s glowingly talented, and as refreshing as a glass of mint lemonade on a sweltering summer day. And she’s been making it big in Europe for a while now!

Ayo Olasunmibo Ogunmakin was born in Cologne, Germany, but she’s of Nigerian parentage — her father moved from Nigeria to Germany in the Seventies. Her mother is a gypsy. Her name means “joy” in Yoruba, and her debut album — the fittingly titled Joyful — went platinum in France in 2006. Ayo’s voice is sweetly nasal, kind of like a young Randy Crawford’s (OMG, love this song) , and her music can best be described in terms of her influences — she mentions Pink Floyd, Fela Kuti, Donnie Hathaway, Jimmy Cliff, and Bob Marley on her official MySpace page. I can definitely hear a bit of each of those artists in her music. She rides reggae-lite rhythms, upholds the lilting danceability of Fela Kuti, and often takes the Pink Floyd less-is-more spacey approach to her lyrics.

The first single from the album, Life is Real, is a breezy inspirational ditty that for some reason reminds me a bit of a modern-day Des’ree’s You Gotta Be. (it’s also an uptempo feel-good song that’s good for road tripping). The video’s filmed in Lagos, and features Ayo strumming her guitar all over the Nigerian countryside. These Days is a sad ballad that reminds me of Corinne Bailey Rae, and I love the soft, melancholy accordian break in How Many Times.

Help is Coming captures that island lilt, and her biggest hit, Down On My Knees, is built around a sweet and sad repeated refrain: “Down on my knees, I’m begging you. Please, please don’t leave me.” The theme of desperate abandoned love combined with the reggae bounce of the rhythm reminds me of Dawn Penn’s “No, No, No (You Don’t Love Me)”. If only “Down on My Knees” had a heavier bassline. (If you’re really feeling the track, enjoy this ten minute long live version).

Ayo’s adorable in every music video she’s released, but her personality just glows in her live performances. Her beautiful smile is infectious as she sings With A Little Help From My Friends in this live duet with Jude. And I love, love, love her live version of And It’s Supposed to Be Love, filmed in Athens over the summer. She’s one of those singers who sounds just as great live as she does in the studio — as evidenced by this live version of her song Only You. For those of you who would like to hear her sing a song you love, here’s her performance of Natural Woman, which is followed by an interview conducted mostly in French.

The video I’m about to share isn’t the best in terms of visual quality — you can see she’s gorgeous and wearing a beautiful dress, but there are no close-ups of Ayo and her pretty crown of natural curls in the video. I wanted to share it because of the message of the song. It’s dedicated to her father, who raised her and her siblings by himself when her mother became addicted to drugs. The song is just real and stark and stunning, in my opinion.

The lyrics speak from her soul: “You were always there for me. You are my best friend daddy, I know I was unfair sometimes. Now, with this song I apologize. Where would I be today without you being there for me all my life? What would I do today without you taking care of me all the time?” I am sorry that the video clip ends abruptly, but the song touched me enough to post it regardless.

In 2005, Ayo had a baby boy, and she named him Nile. His daddy is the amazingly talented and super-fine Afro-German reggae artist Patrice. She’s currently raising her baby, and touring around Europe.

I hope that she starts to get some more mainstream attention Stateside, I love a talented singer/songwriter who also plays guitar, and I know I’m not the only one! I’m feeling Ayo’s style, and I hope you do too. Congrats, Ayo! You’re Afrobella of the Week!

Big thanks and respect to regular reader and commenter NYC/Caribbean Ragazza for the intro to Ayo!

Afrobella of the Week — Afeni Shakur

No parent should have to bury their child. But on September 13th, 1996, Afeni Shakur had to do just that.

Her son Tupac Amaru was at the height of his career. That year he’d released All Eyez on Me, a Diamond status double album phenomenon that spawned easily a dozen influential hip hop classics. An astonishingly bright future in music, acting, and social activism stretched before Afeni’s endlessly talented son. It was snuffed out in a senseless drive-by shooting in Las Vegas. If the grief of Tupac’s legions of fans was enormous, just imagine the grief of his mother. That kind of grief has the weight to crush a weak soul. But Afeni Shakur has always been beyond strong, and that strength has withstood her through incredibly rough seas.

She grew up in North Carolina as Alice Faye Williams, named after the 30’s and 40’s actress Alice Faye. But her identity as a revolutionary was formed in New York City, when she moved there and joined the Black Panther Party. Website The Talking Drum tells the story of her history with the Panthers, and the beginnings of her attraction to the Nation of Islam. In that time she interacted with and was inspired by the likes of Malcolm X, Eldridge Cleaver, and Bobby Seale. She was given the name Afeni, which means “dear one,” or “lover of the people.”

Afeni was incarcerated for witholding information about The Panther 21, the eastern regional leaders of the party. In 1969, the Panther 21 were arrested and charged with conspiracy to blow up high traffic sites around the city, including the New York Botanical Gardens. The previously linked Hartford-HWP article recounts how it ended: “On May 13, 1971, after the longest political trial in New York’s history, all 21 New York Panthers are acquitted of all charges in just 45 minutes of jury deliberation.” According to Wikipedia, Afeni “…defended herself in court during a bomb conspiracy trial and was acquitted of 156 counts against her and other members of the Black Panther Party.”

The details of Afeni’s incarceration are known well by her son’s fans. She tells the story in her own words in his video for Dear Mama, a song that demonstrated how powerful and beautiful and important hip hop music can be. The video begins with her speaking. “When I was pregnant and in jail, I thought I was gonna have a baby and the baby would never be with me. But I was acquitted a month and three days before Tupac was born. I was real happy. Because I had a son,” she recalls. And she named that son after an Inca revolutionary, who led an indigenous uprising against Spain. The lyrics for that song are a love letter to strong parenting in the face of poverty, struggle, and strong odds.

Having a son like Tupac, who wore his heart on his sleeve and shared his truth with the world, meant that Afeni’s life became an open book to all who listened. We know that she raised her son alone, that she succumbed to the demons of crack cocaine, and that the family’s formative years were spent poor and sometimes homeless. Still, Afeni did the best she could. In this interview with Bean Soup Times, she thanks God for her trials and tribulations: “I am forever grateful to God that I was on that crack, because it made me completely broken so that I could examine my life.” Instead of destroying her world, that adversity made Afeni and her family stronger. Tupac grew up seeing his relatives charged with a battery of crimes, from murder to prison escape. His mother helped to steer him along the right path, encouraging his budding creativity by keeping him involved in acting and the arts. His experiences at the Baltimore School of the Arts proved to be life-altering. In 1988, the family moved to the Bay Area in California, where the seeds of Tupac’s rap career would finally begin to sprout. He was hired as a back-up dancer for Digital Underground in 1990, the same year Sex Packets and The Humpty Dance hit. He dropped 2Pacalypse Now in 1991, and Strictly 4 My N.I.G.G.A.Z in ‘93.

Afeni must have also been hitting her boy with a daily dose of “act right.” Handsome, intelligent, and with a growing celebrity status, Tupac made songs that revealed the whirlwind of fun and fame his life was becoming, but tempered that typical rapper machisimo with hard-hitting storytelling, like the haunting hood fable Brenda’s Got a Baby, followed by intelligent, timeless homages to female strength like Keep Ya Head Up (which is bar none, my favorite of all Tupac’s songs). Although Tupac spat sometimes venomous lyrics about his rivals, revealing bitter experiences with women and friendships gone awry, the core of his upbringing, the strength of his maternal bond, always prevented him from slipping completely into a mindless misogynist mentality as so many of his peers did, and as so many of his followers have done.

Afeni stuck by Tupac’s side during all of the controversies he helped to fuel. She stood by him through the charges that were brought against him, and in a full-circle moment, she supported her son through the prison sentence he served at Clinton Correctional Facility. She stuck by his side through the Death Row days, the increasingly thugged out reputation he was gaining, and the East/West coast rivalry which brought her son so much righteous criticism. She addresses the aftermath and puts the sad realities of that rivalry into context in this interview with Davey D: “…What I have known from the beginning is that I am not alone. And I am not alone does not mean that the only two people that got killed were Biggie and Tupac. I am so sorry, but every child’s death is painful. To me, it’s painful, because it’s this process that we have to stop. We are right back to the same thing which is about ration and reason..and about winning. And as I said, Tupac had 25 years and he did 25 years worth of wonderful work. What the next person needs to know in whatever years they are alloted to them, is what have they done? And I’m sure that Biggie’s mother must feel the same about her son. It’s no use in people trying to swage their own guilt for their own deficiency by debating or spending that much time on Tupac and Biggie.”

Tupac died at age 25, with so many more dreams left unfulfilled. Afeni Shakur has dedicated her life to making sure her son’s legacy remains as fully dimensional as he would have wanted it to be. She’s been the one overseeing his unreleased material and working alongside some of hip hop’s finest rappers and producers on posthumous albums that have been incredibly successful. In 2003 she oversaw the production of the incredible Academy Award nominated documentary Tupac: Resurrection, which allowed the eloquent rapper to tell his life story in his own words. In concordance with her son’s ambition to establish “thug heavens” in several cities throughout America, she’s created and runs the Tupac Amaru Shakur Foundation, which provides lessons in creative writing, vocal technique, acting, stage set design, dance, poetry, and the business of entertainment to kids who are thirsty for education and inspiration. The foundation sponsors essay contests, charity fundraisers, runs a performing arts day camp for teenagers and offers undergraduate scholarships. And her work continues, eleven years after her son’s death.

Afeni is loved worldwide as Tupac’s mother and the keeper of his flame. At age 60, she makes herself accessible to her son’s fans through her official MySpace page. Her own noteworthy life and remarkable strength has been celebrated in Jasmine Guy’s book, Evolution of a Revolutionary, and now HollyHood Films has acquired the rights to the film Dear Mama: The Life Story of Afeni Shakur. I for one can’t wait to see this woman’s story brought to life. Peace and respect to Afeni Shakur for being a strong woman who continues to do great works in the name of her son. Afeni, your son said it best. You are appreciated.

Afrobella of the Week — Alek Wek

I’m a sucker for a great biography. Give me any kind. I love the sex-drugs-rock-n-roll kind, (Anthony Kiedis’ Scar Tissue is enjoyable, I’m thumbing my way through Motley Crue’s The Dirt, and Lesley Arfin’s Dear Diary was one of the quickest, craziest, most addicting reads I’ve enjoyed in a while). My favorite kinds of biographies are inspirational. They can make you see history from a fresh perspective. The best biographies have a unique voice. They hiss with anger, or speak in staccato fragments or mumble raunchy tales from a life rich with experience. Currently, I’m reading John Perkins’ Confessions of an Economic Hit Man.

Next up will be Alek: From Sudanese Refugee to International Supermodel. I couldn’t be more excited to read about the marvelous life of the beautiful Alek Wek.

“I look like any other Dinka girl from the Sudan,” she told Hello magazine. “I never imagined that somebody would ever look at me and recognise me and think I’m beautiful.” Drinking in her luminous skin and stunning, bright eyes, it’s amazing to think that there was a time when people may not have done so.

She was born in Wau, in the southern Sudan. In 1991, her family fled to escape the roiling civil war. That story is told on the WCPRC website, and it reads almost like the dark beginning of a fairytale: “When the civil war began and the soldiers came to her village, Alek was a little girl. Her mother told her: ’Alek, you can’t stay here. The soldiers have killed many of our neighbours, and they are kidnapping children.’ The next day, Alek’s uncle came and fetched her. She took with her some clothing and a little bag of maize… Alek cried when she said goodbye to her mother.” Alek’s father became sick and died before he could join the family abroad, in the safety that England provided.

To hear Alek tell it to Tavis Smiley, even the story of her discovery is out of a fairytale — life in England was completely devoted to learning how to read and write. Then she was discovered by model agents while she was at a street market in London. And just like that, a supermodel was born.

Alek made her first splash on the scene in Tina Turner’s video for Goldeneye. She’s eye candy, lounging in atmospheric shadows. But that video helped to launch her to international stardom. Later that very year, she was lovingly showcased in Janet Jackson’s Got Til It’s Gone video. (that could quite possibly be my favorite Janet vid. Just gorgeous and different and so refreshing).

On the runway, Alek proved her star power. Her pure, striking ebony complexion and short no-nonsense hairstyle made her stand out from among her peers, and she ushered in a new era of black beauty in the fashion industry. Embraced by the most notable designers, Alek Wek has been the star of runway shows for the likes of John Galliano, Donna Karan, Calvin Klein, and Diane Von Furstenberg.

Wek recognizes her place as groundbreaker in an industry that still marginalizes and stereotypes women of color, and now that her place in fashion is assured, she’s in a great position to point out fashion’s flaws and to possibly make strides towards change. She speaks about that in her book, part of which is excerpted in this AOL Black Voices blog. “Whether I like it or not, my skin defines me. The first thing many people notice about me is how dark my skin is. Not just in America and Europe but also, to a lesser extent, in Sudan. In Khartoum, my skin marked me as a southerner, probably a Dinka, and many lighter-skinned residents of the city looked down on me. Racism exists everywhere.” “I’ve noticed that journalists often liked to say that I’d been discovered in “the bush,” in Africa. As if I had been a primeval innocent afoot in the forest when the great model agent plucked me from the muck and tamed me, without destroying my savage beauty.”

The very feature that helped propel her to stardom — the rich and stunning hue of her skin — has also led to her being regarded as “exotic” and consequently depicted in stereotypical images. Alek spoke out against Italian coffee company Lavazza. From Page Six: “In “Alek,” just out from HarperCollins’ Amistad imprint, Wek writes how she posed nude inside a “gigantic white espresso cup bigger than a car . . . My skin was to be the espresso.” While she calls the images “beautiful,” Wek adds: “I can’t help but compare them to all the images of black people that have been used in marketing over the decades. There was the big-lipped jungle-dweller on the blackamoor ceramic mugs sold in the ’40s; the golliwog badges given away with jam; Little Black Sambo, who decorated the walls of an American restaurant chain in the 1960s; and Uncle Ben, whose apparently benign image still sells rice.” I want her to keep pointing that kind of thing out to the world, the slow progress of the depiction of all shades of beauty. Through highlighting the lack of change, here’s hoping that companies like that will be forced to think outside of the box of typical, done-to-death imagery.

At age 30, Alek Wek is a designer — I absolutely adore her Alek Wek 1933 purses (and the MUSIC she uses on her site! Love the drumming. That’s totally my kind of thing). She is a member of the U.S. Committee for Refugees’ Advisory Council and raises awareness about the plight of her countrymen, and now, she’s an author. She talks about the inspiration for her autobiography in this Showbuzz interview. And in this next video, she sets the scene for her return home.

Alek Wek has overcome her tribulations and made her dreams come true. Now she’s using her stardom to provide for her homeland. She says of her return home, “It was very emotional. But it was a closure, and also in a way, an open book. That’s why I’m starting a foundation, that’s gonna be Wek foundation, Working to Educate Kids. Which I would never have thought about before, but it all makes sense now.” I can’t wait to see what she does next. Congrats, Alek! You’re Afrobella of the Week. Keep on doing your thing. You make us very proud!

And back to the topic of books — I already have another memoir lined up for after this one. Edwidge Danticat’s Brother I’m Dying looks like the kind of book that I know will hurt, and haunt me with images. I can’t wait to dive in.

Afrobella of the Week: Odetta

If you’re a regular reader, you already know that I’m crazy about Afrobellas with guitar skills, who play music outside of the limiting circles of hip hop and R&B. In the vein of my Sister Rosetta Tharpe post, I’d like to pay homage to another legendary afrobella who laid the foundation and inspired legions of artists. Odetta Holmes Felious Gordon — simply known around the world as Odetta. She’s widely considered a musical mother to Janis Joplin, Tracy Chapman, and Joan Baez. Her career as a folk music pioneer is over fifty years long and still going strong.

Born in Birmingham Alabama, Odetta’s earliest beginnings in musical theater took place when her family moved to California. After a trip to San Francisco, she discovered the folk music scene and she took to it like a duck to water. She called her wood bodied guitar “Baby,” and began performing in the early 1950’s. Her first album is called The Tin Angel, after the San Francisco cafe where she and Larry Mohr recorded and performed together from 1953 to 1954. Even in the Fifties when it wasn’t the norm, she wore her hair in an elegant afro.

The tracks on the album range from treasured gospel classics (Wade in the Waters, I’ve been ‘Buked and I’ve Been Scorned, He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands) to bluesy numbers like Another Man Don’ Gone, and Old Cotton Fields at Home.

By the late Fifties, she was performing in Greenwich Village nightspots alongside Harry Belafonte and Pete Seeger. Her 1958 album, Odetta Sings Ballads and Blues is famously credited for inspiring a young Bob Dylan to trade his electric axe for a Gibson acoustic guitar. Her influence on Dylan is recognized by Martin Scorsese in the documentary No Direction Home. This clip of her singing The Waterboy reveals her enormous voice and its operatic power, and her regal bearing. She returned Dylan’s compliment by recording Odetta Sings Dylan in 1965.

While she often sang in a deep register, Odetta’s voice also could soar like an angel. Lo, this brief clip of her crooning What a Friend We Have in Jesus with Tennessee Ernie Ford. At the heyday of folk music, Odetta was celebrated as the genre’s best. Her albums, At the Gate of Horn and Odetta Sings Folk Songs, were among 1963’s most popular folk albums.

In the early Sixties, Odetta aligned herself with the Civil Rights movement and often marched and sang alongside Dr. Martin Luther King. He called her the “Queen of American folk music.” In this phenomenal NPR interview on the occasion of her 75th birthday, she sets the scene of the movement in that era. She starts out with tales of growing up as a black girl in the Jim Crow era, setting a context for her passion and conviction. “In the Fifties, there were people who were interested in improving life’s situation in this country. And many of them heard of what my work was, and I was called upon to be of assistance — to bring either attention, or to do concerts to make money for people to do the job that they had to do …I was much too shy of a person to say anything more than “how do you do” to all those people at the top there, and just to sit at their feet and listen to what they had to say. I was always like a student, and always like someone who was looking in,” she says. Despite the strength of her voice and the power of her presence, she was always humble.

The interview continues, and Odetta explains why she hadn’t released a “Christmas style album” in forty five years. In her own words, her 2005 Christmas spiritual album, Gonna Let it Shine was inspired by the burden of history and the modern plight of children with AIDS in Africa. “This record to me, represents the determination that me and my folks had and came through within this country while this country’s foot was on our throat. We lived in spite of, we found ways to get over, around, and through - to get stuff done.” Much of Odetta’s music is political, and she wrote a song on that album, “Keep On Moving it On,” with a powerful message. I found her response about that song to be so inspiring. “Any old way you can make it, baby - keep on moving it on. That many times we feel that we can’t do much of anything. But in our own way, within our own neighborhood our own family, we can stand up for what it is we believe in.”

In the Seventies and Eighties, Odetta changed musical gears and focused on jazz and blues. Check out the range of her discography here. A great starting point is The Essential Odetta, a live album that captures her strong pipes. This really honest and interesting article reveals the writer’s original balking at Odetta’s delivery, and the albums that brought him to love her music. I agree with him — Livin’ With the Blues is a phenomenal album. If you just want to drink in her voice first before you buy an album, I encourage you to listen to this Words and Music podcast that showcases friends and contemporaries Odetta and Maya Angelou, singing and performing spoken word poetry. Odetta and Maya have been friends for years, and Maya has said “If only one could be sure that every 50 years a voice and a soul like Odetta’s would come along, the centuries would pass so quickly and painlessly we would hardly recognize time.”

Odetta’s vocal strength appears to be undiminished, as you can see in this live version of The Midnight Special. She looks as beautiful and regal as ever as she delivers this haunting and stately live version of House of the Rising Sun. At 76 years old, Odetta’s still delivering musical power. Check out this clip — filmed earlier this year — of her performing Rock Island Line.

Despite her fame in the Fifties and Sixties, having performed for presidents and celebrities and audiences all over the world, many younger people today are like “Odetta who?” Odetta’s a living legend and a national treasure. She’s a proudly natural afrobella from the beginning, who stands strong in her beliefs and beauty to this day. So if you don’t know, now you know. Congratulations, Odetta! You’re Afrobella of the week!

Afrobella of the Week — Michelle Obama

While I certainly have my own political leanings, my goal with this post isn’t to sway anyone. Although I do work for the “liberal media,” I actually have friends of all affiliations. So I know how bloody obnoxious it can be when someone tries to shove their beliefs down your throat, and I never want to be that person.

However, regardless of your political affiliation, I think everyone can agree that we’re living in interesting political times. The two most-talked-about democratic candidates are a white woman and a black man. No matter how you slice it, the upcoming American presidential election will be historic.

The democratic party nomination race is in a dead heat and I’ve been soaking up all the coverage like a sponge. Now’s a great time to educate yourself about the candidates by watching the debates. I’m a sucker for a great orator and I’m wary of political dynasties, so Barack Obama piqued my interest early on. I think the senator is a charming and fascinating enough gentleman on his own. But there’s something undeniably special about his wife, Michelle. The more I see and learn about her, the more I love this lady! She’s totally a friend-in-my-head and there are three compelling reasons why I had to name this bella Afrobella of the Week - regardless of the way she wears her hair.

1. Because she keeps it real. I completely buy Michelle and Barack’s relationship. I don’t detect a whiff of “this will look good on camera,” or “this’ll play in the red states” about it. Michelle has been criticized for deflating her husband’s ego with witty-yet-loving put-downs about his housework shortcomings and fashion flubs. But I personally love her depreciating humor towards her husband’s new-found fame — with the ego-stroking that’s coming from all corners, I think having someone remind him that he is just a man is a good thing. I also think she dealt gracefully with the Obama girl phenomenon — I might not have responded as eloquently to that kind of come-on.

Many have criticized her decision to leave her six-figure-salary dream job in order to support her husband’s campaign — witness this searing Salon.com putdown of Mrs. Obama as yet another top-tier, well educated woman who abandons the world of work to stand by her man and raise her children. As someone who’s been married for five years, I know the crossroads Barack and Michelle Obama likely found themselves at — that age-old “marriage is compromise” crossroad where the ambitious prospects of one supersedes that of the other. It’s not a fun juncture, and I am sure that their decision came after many sleepless nights and a lot of deep thought and serious conversations. It isn’t my place to judge their relationship or their career decisions, just as it’s nobody’s place to judge mine. I can’t pretend to have walked a mile in their shoes. As this great compilation of reactions on Racialicious reveals, everyone’s looking to Michelle Obama to make a misstep, and her every move will be analysed under the microscope of race, gender, and feminism. But despite that pressure, Michelle is doing a great job of maintaining grace under pressure, and unlike some of the other nominees’ wives, there’s no question so far that she could make a phenomenal first lady.

2. She’s thinking about the kids. Barack and Michelle’s two daughters, Sasha and Malia, are beautiful little angels. Check them out on the official Obama Christmas card. Michelle based her decision for leaving her job on her children, and in this interview with the Chicago Tribune, she admits that at times she feels like a single mother. I think having someone who has dealt with those particular life-balancing struggles, whose little girls are at an impressionable age, and who knows the reality African American families are going through from having seen it up close and personal, be the first lady and the would-be president’s closest adviser, could lead to the kind of change that this country needs. I hope that the next president will give the education system the attention it demands, instead of just another pithy slogan. I hope that the family focus on health care translates into a real, achievable plan that can help the people who need it the most. Michelle is described as Barack’s rock, and as a strong, smart, experienced woman with opinions and values of her own, I hope she can bring her expertese to the table, in order to help to effect positive change if the Obamas are elected into the White House.

3. She’s an effortlessly elegant, low-maintainance beauty. In fact, in a recent Chicago Sun-Times nterview I learned about via 55 Secret Street, Michelle explains why she avoids the pre-appearance makeup routine. “I love girly makeup and stuff, but my view is that’s a lot of work,” she said, explaining her decision to routinely skip the makeup chair. “I want people to get used to my face more naturally so that I don’t have to do that every day. Who’s got time to put eyelashes on and all that?” Most women don’t. I don’t even have kids, and I’ve pared down my daily beauty regime to a tight ten-minute application. Michelle Obama’s figured out what works for her — classic clothing styles, beautiful and clear skin, tasteful accessories — and she wears it all with confidence. As this Chicago-Tribune article reveals, that’s because of the essence of her character.

“The poise that you see is genuine,” says her older brother Craig Robinson. “She is quite comfortable in all situations.” David Mosena, who hired her to be his deputy chief of staff when he worked for Mayor Richard Daley in the early ’90s, says, “She has her feet solidly on the ground, both of them. There’s not a bone of superficiality in her. She is the real deal. … She is very comfortable with herself.” That comes across to me, and in turn inspires my confidence in her and her husband.

Michelle Obama struggles, like many of us do, to juggle all of the balls that life has handed her. And I think she’s doing a great job so far. Maybe you don’t know much about Michelle. Maybe haven’t heard her speak yet, or you’ve only read the criticism about her. If you’re interested in learning more, check out this brief getting-to-know-you clip from Countdown With Keith Olbermann, in which former Afrobella of the Week Alison Stewart introduces Michelle Obama.

I’m in agreement with Essence magazine, I think Michelle Obama is one of the most inspiring women around right now. I’m proud to name her Afrobella of the Week, and I wish nothing but good things for her, her family, and her husband’s campaign. Congratulations, Michelle! Keep on being yourself. You make this Afrobella very proud.