I’ve done a million and three recaps tonight but I want to get up another black history month spotlight. I have more than 28 I want to share. I love this James Baldwin poem on aging…
My progress report
concerning my journey to the palace of wisdom
is discouraging.
I lack certain indispensable aptitudes.
Furthermore, it appears
that I packed the wrong things.
— From Inventory / On Being
I too packed all the wrong things. It makes total sense to me. I promise to stop picking poets, maybe. I just love so many poets.
I did much more diverse Black History Month posts in previous years .Check them out in the link below. I’m just all in my poetry during Covid.
Click Here For More Black History Spotlights
“Why must you always concentrate on color?”
“Why must the Supreme Court justice be a Black woman?”
As always, this answer from James Baldwin is what you were looking for. Must watch.#BlackHistoryMonth
pic.twitter.com/p80F8CNCrd— Qasim Rashid, Esq. (@QasimRashid) February 1, 2022
Sadly, nothing much has changed. Churches remain the most segregated place on earth. James Baldwin was a prophet, a poet and author who left his mark on the is world. And we will all forever indebted to him for speaking the truth.
I love James Baldwin. Thank you for sharing.
Thank you, Thank you, THANK YOU TAMARA TATTLES for this. I’ve never seen it before and it speaks so poignantly to where I am right now in my life and what I’m feeling. This video has blessed me.
You are welcome Cecelia. I used to get in trouble teaching elementary school ALL THE TIME in February for sharing Black History comments. Hell, one time all I did was use some really great photos of black authors and have my kids write about the photos. I was accused of “teaching about slavery” (as if that would have been a bad thing), though that was not what I was doing at all, but the black parents of a girl who was malnourished and I was very worried about, who were in some sort of a cult. Anyway, the whole lesson plan that I have mentioned several times here and I used from second grade to college was to write about the photo you are given. It was all kinds of black authors. In the second grade instance, I gave no context. I gave no information. My direction was to write about what you think is happening in this photo. The black family who was part of a local cult, and somehow got kicked out of the school they were supposed to be going to brought their malnorished child to me and I LOVED HER. Her name was Miracle. I think about her all the time. She was always hungry. So we (all the teachers saw it) would feed her and the parents raged about her getting to eat Pop Tarts. It was a whole thing with my principal. She was never on time for breakfast! Since she was out of district, he kicked her out because he hated me and because he could. I was the closest thing to a parent she had. Sorry, I still think about her all the time and wish for a Miracle. I still feel like that principal kicked her out to hurt me. If so it worked. And it still hurts.
Bless you for this. I pray that Miracle is somewhere healthy, happy, safe, and strong. You will carry her in your heart forever. If that principal moved her to spite you then I hope wherever he is he is being “reimbursed” for his evilness.
Sounds like your the type of teacher all children need. Cheers to Black History Month. So much to say, but settle on, I’m thrilled my 10 yr old child is confused about why people would be racist etc (we talk a lot about history – so he knows the past and the reasons). He’s the hope for future. Mommy brag
I feel like I read this story about the project last year or a year prior. It still makes me sad.
Probably so. It still infuriates me to this day. Every teacher in the school loved that Black History Month assignment that I dutifully displayed in the hallway. I want to say that Dr. Suess’s wife Theo? I can’t recall at the moment was the photographer and I somehow interviewed her at some point. Somewhere around here I have at a second copy of those photos because they were getting a bit frayed from overuse.The photos were very compelling, like a biography in one shot.
My second graders were actually more imaginative than my college students who did the assignment. I forgot who the male author was but I remember one essay vividly. It was off a man sort of looking off into the distance. The second grader said he was waiting for his wife to come home because she had been away and was returning on a big ship.
There was no mention of slavery. I don’t think I even mentioned race at all I just passed out the photos and told them to write about what they saw in the photo. Miracle loved me, mostly because I fed her and hugged her. Two things she was not getting at home. I hope she made it and has a happy life now.
On my street there is a big house, with a big lot and another house behind it… maybe two. It’s a very large Mexican family. They are really nice and I used to get the dad to help me with things like shutting off water to the house in an emergency. Anyway I taught two of the their daughters in second grade. They look exactly the same now, but are grown and probably have kids of their own. I IS OLD PEOPLE.
I probably do need therapy for all the shitty principals alone. 🙂
I believe being a teacher is the most honorable profession there is. How infuriating it must have been for you; I wish that you had the principal you deserved and deserved YOU. You could make posts about your experiences in teaching and I would read them all day long, as I will look at the posts with the poetry.
Thank you so much for spotlighting these amazing people! Really appreciate all the extra work, we still need you to teach US!
Thank you for these posts. I appreciate being exposed to people / subjects that I may have not paid enough attention to in the past.
Agreed
OMG. Thank you
James Baldwin is my absolute favorite.
I knew you would like this. I’m a bit shocked that there are people who are unfamiliar with James Baldwin. I almost didn’t include him because of that. But the current backlash from some over picking a black female supreme court justice needs to be addressed. And he does it so well. He’s still an important activist years after his death.
I watch his old interviews on you tube constantly. Brilliant perspective on all things that matter the most to me & other humane human beings. There will NEVER be another James Baldwin !
Black history month is important. As is realization that Semites represents a race.
Please educate yourself. And your readers.
6 million of us ask this of you.
Sara, have you ever completed a Census report? Have you ever seen Semites on it? You have not. Here is an educated person on the topic introducing the subject as part of his work.
This collection of essays explores the now mostly extinct notion of “Semites.” Invented in the nineteenth century and essential to the making of modern conceptions of religion and race, the strange unity of Jew and Arab under one term, “Semite” (the opposing term was “Aryan”), and the circumstances that brought about its disappearance constitute the subject of this volume. With a focus on the history of disciplines (including religious studies and Jewish studies), as well as on lingering political, theological, and cultural effects (secularism, anti-Semitism, Israel/Palestine), Semites: Race, Religion, and Literature turns to the literary imagination as the site of a fragile and tenuous alternative, the promise of something like a “Semitic perspective.”
Just because Hitler called Jews and inferior race, in his stupidity and evilness does not make it so.
Also, the dictionary definition of Semite. Note the word RACE is not used.
Definition of Semite
1a: a member of any of a number of peoples of ancient southwestern Asia including the Akkadians, Phoenicians, Hebrews, and Arabs
b: a descendant of these peoples
2: a member of a modern people speaking a Semitic language
Were you homeschooled, Sara? Because most of us learned about the Holocaust, eugenics, and racism in middle school. JFC /bangs head.
I’ve asked her to take this to the Whoopi Goldberg comments. She keeps trying to post here telling me to educate myself. Something about “black is not a color and Jew is not a star.” It’s kind of a nonsensical response.
I’d appreciate it if we could get back on topic. 🙂
Hi Tamara!
Have you read the book, “Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and Its Urgen Lessons For Our Own” by Eddie S. Glaude, Jr? Mr. Glaude also examined America today by James Baldwin’s writings It was an excellent and thought-provoking work. I recommend it highly.
Thanks. I haven’t read books since this site caught on. There is sadly not enough time in the day. Hopefully, if I am able to travel again I’ll catch up on a plane to somewhere. My mental health is REALLY BAD and my physical health is not much better so even when the bad thing happens I am not sure I can travel. I’m already worried about getting my suitcase into the overhead compartment and in the past flight attendants refuse to do it. So I had to rely on the kindness of strangers.
I had anxiety dreams this morning…afternoon. I worry if I can travel. I worry about paying my insurance premiums which are astronomical because I smoke. I worry that I keep forgetting to fund my Roth. I worry about Banjo leaving me. I’m just worried and ready for a blissful hour of Big Brother and then Project Runway tonight. And I am grateful to all of you for being there.
Sorry, that went off topic quickly.
And the trees. I am anxious about the trees because it’s been monsooning for days.
That’s ok; you will get to it in due time. Take care of yourself and Banjo! That’s the most important thing! BTW: I mistyped one of the words in the title. It should be “Urgent” not “Urgen.” Sorry again.
I have. Loved it ! Great recomendation indeed !
I AM NOT YOUR NEGRO is a documentary constantly shown on PBS its a brillant biography of James Baldwin & his work. All of his books are worth reading ( over & over & over until I pass ) & he is so OVERLOOKED in History. He is HISTORY.