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For a picturesque moment, Kenyan president Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga stood inches away from one another with hands clasped. Directly behind the two men stood former United Nations Secretary General, and current Chair of Eminent Persons, Kofi Annan, beaming with appreciation. For that picturesque moment it seemed as if Kenya could be made whole again after nearly a month of being torn apart. For a picturesque moment, everything seemed well. Since that picturesque moment (and two handshakes later), Kenyans have been killed, Kenyans have been displaced and Kenyans have had their lives indelibly altered.
It wasn’t supposed to happen here. The machete welding… the raping of women…the burning of homes…the brutal and inhuman taking of life… the suppression of human rights, it wasn’t supposed to happen here. Not in Kenya. Kenya had stood as one of the most stable of the African nations since differing forms of sovereignty swept the continent in the middle of the 20 th century. From an outside perspective, Kenya appeared to be one of the more tolerant of the nations that have to deal with deep and entrenched divides in its republic. Its sizable middle class was thought to be a bulwark against the viscidities and extreme shifts of fortune that make many republics so susceptible to violent instability. But the fact is that 800 Kenyans have been killed and 600,000 Kenyans have now been displaced and the illusion of stability has been blown into tiny little shreds of national identity. continue
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| nat creole introduces |
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| welcome to nat creole. you're right on time. |
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+ profile. jo burg art fair
johanesburg, south africa
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+ profile. cat on a hot tin roof on broadway
phillip harvey
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| The first-ever art fair devoted exclusively to art from Africa will be held in the Sandton Convention Centre in Johannesburg. On sale will be the largest collection of African and South African contemporary art ever, covering 5000 square metres of space. Twenty-three galleries from the United States, Europe and Africa will showcase works. more |
It is press day for the ground breaking production of Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and there is a more than a modicum of anticipation in the air. After all it is the first time that Williams’ take on the ambivalent, at best, and combustible, at worst, nature of family, class and sexual relations is being staged on the Great White Way with an all black cast. more |
+ essay. barack obama for president
phillip harvey
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+ questions. answers. above ground
study of aging artists. joan jeffri
research center of arts & culture |
Obama nails it perfectly when he argues that it is not only important to end the Iraq war but make certain that the mindset that allowed the war to happen in the first place ends as well. That is the kind of sentiment that the United States desperately needs to have in the White House if it is to repair its tattered image. It is about judgment. more
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The positioning of artists as models for society—tenacious in their work, with a strong lifelong engagement (which gerontologists cite frequently as having health benefits), most of whom never retire from their art—is something the baby boomers, now
of retirement age, can learn from. more |
+ profile. recognize: hip hop and contemporary portraiture
national portrait gallery
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+ in memoriam. oscar peterson
musician. statesman
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Every major musical movement has been driven by the magic of its iconography. From stylized album covers to re-imagined artistic interpretations to editorial photographs, every powerful musical movement has been buoyed by the mythos that surrounds the images of its greatest practitioners. more
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Oscar Peterson was a large man. His broad shoulders seemed big enough to carry the aspirations of the entirety of Canada, his home nation, balanced securely from blade to blade. And often times they did. Peterson traveled the world carrying the Canadian flag full mast without ever letting a thread touch the ground. more |
+ excerpt. shes gone: a novel
kwame dawes
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+ respect. james earl jones
actor |
| They came across the border like a band of bearded outlaws, eight reggae rockers in a black tour bus that smelled of chewstick, garlic, and marijuana, three months after starting a U.S. tour, three weeks away from going home to Kingston. more |
“When I first came to the theater, I followed Sidney Poitier's generation, which is not far ahead of mine, a couple of years. He had established the height of what young black actors could do, the rest of us were there to establish the breadth." more |
+ editor's note. kenya
phillip harvey
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+ profile. women writers of color
brook stephenson |
| It wasn’t until the actual vote count began that it became obvious that the fix was in. Mysteriously, Kibaki’s vote count began increasing after polling closed and what was a sizable Odinga lead was transmogrifying into a slim Kibaki win. On the third day of tallying votes paramilitary police stormed the Kenyatta International Conference Center where the count was taking place. Minutes later Kibaki was declared the winner and was sworn in the same day. Kenya exploded. more |
The challenge for this installment of the Short List is to make a list of noteworthy women writers of color based on style, storytelling, and social political commentary. When it came time to write about these authors, well, it was just like everything else worth doing, difficult to pin down to a short list of a few authors in a few words and a few works. more
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