There are times when you have to reach waaaaayyy back and grab some of that Black, Gulf State speech for a just right word.
This is a post that I have been meaning to put up for a very long time. It involves Zora Neale Hurston, the Gulf State South, and words. Zora Neale Hurston was a novelist Guggenheim Fellow, and folklorist. She collected hundreds of tales from the Gulf State South that remained in the basement of an institute for over 70 years. …
America is a schizophrenic country. We collectively attend churches dedicated to a savior from an impoverished background. Yet, we do not even have a language for white poverty. When and where we should talk about white poverty, we talk about race. And the consequences have been, are, and will continue to be disastrous.
White poverty. White. Poverty. Poor. White. Individual. Say that. Don’t say, “Poor white trash.” Say “poor white individual.” Say this. White underprivileged youth. Say, first-generation white college student. Say white working poor. Say affirmative action for white women. White poverty. White poverty. White poverty. white poverty whitepovertywhitepoverty…
For some strange reason, there is a misconception that Black people do not like or do science fiction. I am not sure where that stereotype came from, but if you follow Black popular culture, you know that Black folk do science fiction, but mainly through music. For the record, I do now own the copyrights to the music below and am not including the music so that I can make money. I actually teach with everything you are about to view!
Some stereotypes have a modicum of truth. Some are total fabrications. One of the fabrications that irks me is…
For almost 30 years, the GOP governing strategy has been “Just say no.” This makes for good sloganeering, but not alternative policies. As the GOP tries to regain power, they need voter suppression laws, because they are now a party without a platform.
Does anybody remember Nancy Reagan’s anti-drug campaign from the 1980s? It had a slogan, “Just Say No.” I was in elementary school and clearly remember our teachers warning us about drugs and how to say “no” to dealers. …
As a general education professor for fifteen years and counting, I have no hard numbers if that is what you are searching for. But I do know from experience that Black college freshmen are as intelligent as any other group, and they leave school for five simple reasons that can be corrected in a few lectures or with an adjustment to onboarding strategies.
I have been a general education professor for five years. And way back in the BCE (before the cell phone era) days, I was a college freshman. I was young, very attractive (okay, that has nothing to…
I declare that this is not just one more cheap plug for my book, but I wrote my first book painstakingly. It was a labor of love, because I had to show the Deep South and the publishing establishment that the Caribbean is more than Marley and Sandals resorts. It has a long literary history that has gone through several movements and it deserves study.
Do we know the Caribbean past Bob Marley’s music, references to marijuana, and Sandals Resorts? I fear that most Americans don’t. Moreover, I fear that most Americans in literature do not even notice or care…
While watching a recent news story, I was truly, truly disgusted at the pride some Southern lawmakers showed at “learning about Natural hair.” While I applaud their effort, is it really that serious? Really?
Just two days ago, I was visiting with my mother (read: sitting at my mother’s house surrounded by children and eating too much junk food), and a news story appeared. Okay, it was supposed to be one of those feel-good local stories in which no one was murdered, killed in a car accident, and no home was burned down. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that…
While the world knows her as a Civil Rights activist and author of Coming of Age in Mississippi (1968), I knew Anne Moody as an aunt, humanities consumer, and world literature nerd.
This is a very famous image of Civil Rights activist and author, Anne Moody. I simply downloaded it from the Internet.
Now, I have to confess something, reader. This was supposed to be my big Black history month posting. I am late, because I have a gazillion classes to teach, children, a husband, and a publication project that is behind schedule. And, this is going to be a…
Earlier this year, I wrote a plain and simple post about the plain and simple, authoritative nature of current GOP leadership desires. I was flagged by Medium and contacted via email. Being from Mississippi, I was immediately suspicious. After all, Mississippians aren’t supposed to have access to technology, according to popular culture, let alone know how to use it to critique our government and culture. However, I say this sadly, January 6, 2021 “proved” that everything I typed in that blog post was true.
Earlier this year, I posted about how Mississippians of color actually view the GOP. While it…
It is helpful to study other Black cultures in a comparative sense. No, I am not talking about learning a foreign language — as comparative studies are traditionally taught in the academy. I am talking about looking at the colonial situation throughout various points of the African Diaspora, and comparing those attempts to colonize gender divisions to African Americans.
One of the thorniest points in researching and presenting my book to potential publishers was how I classified African Americans. Let me just tell you, that my classification of African Americans alongside other, formerly-colonized Black populations garnered me raised eyebrows from…
LaToya R Jefferson-James
LaToya Jefferson-James has a Ph.D. in literature. She specializes in literature of the African Diaspora & cultural criticism. And her class never ends! Welcome.
