This journal was started in 1999 at the dawn of the 21st Century It was aimed at providing leading edge thinking on Africa and the diaspora issues at a time when a stale orthodoxy ruled the Black academy. At the time I had a full time role as partner in a City firm and the journeying around the world consequent on the launch of the first issue made a second issue impossible! However the need for an independent and…
exhibition title: «when a stone cracks we don’t stitch.» -5 Oct 19 artist: larry amponsah gallery: 50 Goldbourne Went to Larry Amponsah’s latest exhibition at 50 Goldbourne on Saturday 5 Oct 2019. This exhibition covered works done in the past year which show considerable development in his artistic trajectory or his practice as he prefers to call it. His command of visual language has increased remarkably. What we have now is beautiful, layered images suffused with a quality of…
Strolled along to Zak Ove’s exhibition at Somerset House. It was advertised as ‘A major new exhibition celebrating the past 50 years of Black creativity in Britain and beyond.’ Zak who curated the exhibition described it as: ‘a review and a celebration of our Caribbean and African culture that has permeated and contributed to British society». His publicist describes it as: ‘taking its starting point as the radical work of his father Horace Ové,’ Somerset House wrote:” Beginning with the…
We have received, dated 12 July, a warm reply from the director of Boston MFA, Matthew Teitelbaum. A clear and concise explanation of the appropriate steps being taken to remedy matters and a clear statement that the audio track was unacceptable. It is not always we can say an effort was worthwhile but also a great thank you to Matthew for taking these matters seriously.
Attended the unveiling of a blue plaque to Phyllis Wheatley. This famous African poet had to come to London from the US in 1773 to find a publisher for her poetry. She was born in The Gambia and by the age of 15 was fluent in Latin, Greek and English and was publishing her poetry in her teens. No publishing house in US would touch her work. She met Granville Sharp among many British dignitaries and also Benjamin Franklin….
Michelle Goa writes in Harvard Crimson: ‘It bemuses me that some absolve non-white people of racism. They declare point-blank, “It’s literally impossible to be racist to a white person.” “Racism against white people doesn’t exist.” “Because there’s no scenario in which racism is not a bad thing. If some extremists won’t engage in good faith, we can’t force them. But at least among the rest of us, we can do better. We shouldn’t need to compare how a possible…
Boston Museum appears not to have learnt anything or taken steps to root out racism in its institution since our earlier commentary. We had thought our previous report of their absurd commentary that ancient Royal Egyptians got their dark skins from working outside in the sun may have been a one-off to be dealt quietly and circumspectly. We now learn that racism is rather endemic at the Museum. A teacher took her class to the Museum only for them…
Nigerian passengers are very profitable for many airlines. However that does not always translate into due respect. There is some silly behaviour that in my original opinion was due to rogue staff. they would harrass African passenger who were in transit over their passports. Remember these passengers are not seeking entry into Turkey. These are passemgers who have already been checked for the final destination at their port of embarkation by Turkish airlines staff. In one case I heard…
It was predictable that after the crash of Ethiopian airlines some Western commentators would be insinuate that it was due to poor African pilot skills. However FT reports 4 April 19 : ‘ Ethiopian minister of transport Dagmawit Moges said that the crew of the Ethiopian Airlines flight from Addis Ababa to Nairobi on March 10 “performed all the procedures repeatedly provided by the manufacturer but were not able to control the aircraft”. ‘ Note 1 Much to my…
We have written about Candace Owen before Brenton Tarrant has written a manifesto (note 1) which has been largely misdescribed by the US/UK media. In particular, most of the manifesto appears to be mainstream ‘Trump’. So it was well advised of Trump by his media team to get his disavowal out early. His statement that only a small number of people follow Brenton Tarrant’s manifesto sounded entirely hollow. Trump’s base fundamentally agree with Brenton Tarrant’s manifesto. These are indeed…
On 8 Feb we went to a private screening of ROMA. This was a visually enchanting film which was quite magnetic and held one’s attention. At the private screening the director, producer, cine-photographer, and the main stars came on stage for a Q&A after the film. For once the Q&A was utterly rivetting. Alfonso Cuaron, the director/producer described his unusual way of producing/filming in that everything was shot in sequence. He also confessed that the final scene in the…
