Filter Commentaries
17 commentaries found
Page 1 of 1
Black August
This Bilal Abdul Salaam-Bey, also known as Charley Hughes, an inmate at the Hutchinson Correctional Facility in Hutchinson, Kansas. This piece is on Black August. Black August commemorates George Jackson and the other victims of… Full Transcript
The American Way of Fascism
Look at the crowds savaging the walls and halls of the U.S. Capitol.Who are they? Where did this mob come from? Well over a decade ago, an American journalist saw them and wrote about them.… Full Transcript
UCSC Prison Narrative with Mumia
Interviewer: I’m honored to have this opportunity to ask you this question, and nd this question stems from your book, Jailhouse Lawyers, and in the book you, I quote, you wrote about how we often… Full Transcript
A Literal Matter of History
When I was a young man (a boy really), I found barber shops to be fascinating places, for there, men gathered in an air of relaxed familiarity, and discussed things they didn’t do elsewhere. I… Full Transcript
My Ghetto Thesis On The N-Word
Joadanus Olivas, “My Ghetto Thesis On The Word Nigga.” There’s much controversy over the word “nigga.” As a black youth myself, I’m more than familiar with this word. Those from black conscious groups argue that… Full Transcript
Frances Goldin: Housing Activist, Radical, and Literary Agent
“Francis Goldin: Housing Activist, Radical, and Literary Agent.” Who knows the name, “Francis Goldin?” The better question may be: “Who doesn’t know her?”. She had spent a long and colorful life on behalf of the… Full Transcript
Sister Marpessa, A Griot Passes
“Sister Marpessa, A Griot Passes.” In African traditional societies, the griot was one who held in memory the history of the tribe, its kings, its wars, its great events that mark it as a community,… Full Transcript
Thanksgiving Must Die
“Thanksgiving Must Die.” Every year, for what seems like an eternity, the bane of my existence appeared like a banshee in the night: Thanksgiving. Haunting me, taunting me, like some sort of curse upon my… Full Transcript
Homage to Howard (For Howard Zinn Book Fair 12/08/19)
“Homage to Howard.” Years before we worked together, my co-author Steven Vittoria and I talked about Howard and his masterpiece, The People’s History of the United States. We both were admirers of Howard, and we… Full Transcript
Sag
Sag. How do I hold my temper, keeping my grace, and not become bitter, stuck in this infamous place? I remember even at seven, I dreamed of a better place, in a better race. Stuck… Full Transcript
Radical Politics
“Radical politics.” I’m often amused when I read, hear, or see a politician criticize his opponent as radical. That’s meant to isolate his opponent somehow weird, but guess what? Radicals are as common as crabgrass… Full Transcript
The Rise That Couldn’t Be
“The rise that couldn’t be.” In 1952, a political scientist named Richard Hofstadter published a book that would become a classic, The Paranoid Style in American Politics. In the preface, former U.S. president Dwight Eisenhower… Full Transcript
Book Review: Kelley’s Hammer and Hoe
“Book Review: Kelly’s Hammer and Hoe.” Noted historian and public intellectual Robin D.G. Kelley is brilliant, productive, and talented. But all this could be seen in the beginning of his career a quarter of a… Full Transcript
Murder Inc. Excerpt: American Holocaust
“American Holocaust.” In his in-depth and exhaustive work on the American Holocaust entitled A Little Matter of Genocide, author and political activist Ward Churchill distills the narrative of the embryonic American empire. In his 1782… Full Transcript
Is the Religious Political?
“Is the religious political?” In the academy, one is confronted with a plethora of departments, disciplines which, while ostensibly united under the aegis of the institution we call the university, these very sectional divisions betray… Full Transcript
May 13
It has been eight years now since the massacre, eight years since the carnage on Osage Avenue, eight years since an urban Holocaust which stole eleven human lives, eight years since the unjust encagement of… Full Transcript
Anatomy of America’s wasteful prison-industrial complex. America, America, land of the free. The society filled with justice and equality. This is a clear example of hypocrisy, unless they forgot to include me and millions of… Full Transcript