« Travel Scams & Other Forms of ID Theft | Main | Mosing Thru Online Adverts & Marketing Posts »
July 23, 2006
random distractions and important debate
"Cape Fear: Superheroes and male anxiety in My Super Ex-Girlfriend." by Dana Stevens is spot on. Describes perfectly the revulsion that the movie's preview caused. I have no intentions of seeing the "film," and I don't think I need to - since I saw so much of it in the damn preview. Amen, sister!
Syd Barrett, co-founder of Pink Floyd, died this week. Rest in peace.
Amiri Baraka led a hip hop workshop Friday night here in Chicago.
He spoke primarily about the need for a united from against war and fascism based on a front against imperialism. He spoke strongly about the need to fully incorporate cultural output into the heart of the resistance: that art cannot be reduced to mere entertainment at a political gathering. He stated that reactionary culture is made to seem normal by reactionary art.
Two other men were on the panel - Sam Lewis from the Elastic Arts Foundation in Logan Square (Chicago) and Andre Mill from the Southwest Youth Collaborative and its University of Hip Hop.
After the lecture, Baraka and his wife Amini Baraka read a bit of poetry. The final poem of the night was the one that got Baraka fired as New Jersey Poet Laureate, "Somebody Blew Up America." While I had difficulty with the line about 4000 Israelis leaving the WTC ahead of the terrorist attack, it makes more sense in the context of his explanation. But more importantly, the many other lines of the poem were extremely powerful and his delivery was mesmerizing.
More interesting than the Wikipedia entry for him is the Discussion of the Wikipedia entry.
Brief bio from University of Michigan. (Part of a course on the Black Arts Movement.)
Posted by cj at July 23, 2006 09:14 PM