White Latino Racism on the Rise: It’s Time for a Serious Conversation on Euro-Diasporic Whiteness

When TV show host Steve Harvey recently named Miss Colombia as the winner of the Miss Universe contest by mistake, thousands of tweets by Latinos (apparently most from Colombia) labeled Harvey a "Nigger." One person tweeted this response.

By William García

William García

William García

William García

A common misconnection that exists today rests on the notion that there are no racial hierarchies in Latin American countries or within the Latino communities in the United States. In other words, Latino (or Hispanic) is itself a race. For many, this conversation is a pointless squabble that halts the true need for unity amongst marginalized groups in the United States. Unfortunately, overlooking the importance of this issue has in fact delineated separation and a lack of interest in each other’s problems.

RELATED STORY: Afro-Brazilian Actress Taunted by Fellow Brazilians on Facebook After Revealing Her Natural Hair
RELATED STORY: Beautiful and Inspiring Photos from Brazil’s First Natural Hair Empowerment March

The shooting of unarmed African-American teenager Trayvon Martin by a half-Peruvian and half-White Jewish man named George Zimmerman, the rise of so-called Hispanic conservatives like Ted Cruz, Al Cardenas and Marco Rubio, and the examples of racist comments by Latinos in the media like Rodner Figueroa, have made it impossible to have a conversation of Latinos and race. It is becoming clear that Whites from Latin America, although marginalized by Anglo-Whites, have been able to pass as honorary Whites and benefit from the inequalities formed by White Supremacy. This is not new, and it has a history.

RELATED STORY: Why the US and Brazil Should Talk About Race

Many people who neglect to explore the history of Latin Americans in the United Sates fail to analyze people like the famous white Cuban Ricky Ricardo (Desi Arnaz), who penetrated the American television series “I Love Lucy” (1951) at a time when Black people were not even allowed to perform next to White actors. Lucy (Lucille Ball) was Arnaz’ real wife, and both enjoyed a long and prosperous career in the film industry. In 1954 Arnaz was even able to get a role as the famous Don Juan.

During this time, White Latin Americans were seen as foreign, inferior and exotic and yet many passed and enjoyed White Privilege. Even all three of John Wayne’s wives were from Latin America at a time when anti-Black and anti-immigrant sentiments were powerful hateful discourses. Less mentioned is the famous Afro-Puerto Rican actor Juano Hernández, who to date is considered was one of the most successful pioneering Black actors of the African-American film industry. Despite Hernández being from Latin America, he had to take Black roles precisely because he was Black and experienced the same segregation as other Blacks in the United States. This was also common in Latin America, where Blacks were not allowed to be actors while Whites enjoyed wearing blackface and dehumanized black people.

 Juano Hernández (left) and Desi Arnaz with his wife Lucille Ball (right). Although they were both actors from the Hispanic Caribbean, Hernández and Arnaz were separated by race during the development of the United States film industry.

According to Jill Lane, blackface was used as a way to create a Cuban identity independent from Spain. However, one can argue that Blackness was seen as a proxy for national discourse and not for racial democracy. Anti-Blackness was occurring transnationally between the United States and Latin America. A Euro-diasporic anti-Black establishment was taking place, a cruel phenomenon, which can be traced back to colonialism and African slavery. Arnaz was able to perform White roles and even marry Anglo-white actress, but the same could not be remotely fathomed for Hernández.

RELATED STORY: Afro-Colombian Areas Taking A Battering By Colombia's FARC Insurgents

While many invoke the idea of mestizaje (racial mixing) and the one-drop rule, it did not determine Latin American identity racially. The false idea that you were non-White if any of your ancestors was not White has been a common belief that undergirded racial categories and Whiteness as passing in the United States. Regardless if Arnaz was considered White or not, his Whiteness allowed him to pass and have access to Hollywood. Arnaz benefited from the system of White Supremacy. While Arnaz was able to remain Cuban (while also being marginalized), Hernández was not able to be Puerto Rican because he was Black.

The impossibility of Afro descendants from Latin America being able to play Latin American (or Latino) roles would be further marked after the Civil Rights Movement. Black people from Latin America were segregated and became part of Black communities in the United Sates. Eminent figures like Arturo Alfonso Schomburg, Carlos Cooks, Chano Pozo and Mario Bauza among others formed part of the Harlem Renaissance. From the 1950s through the 1970s, there was a rise and fall of an uneasy coalition between Latinos and African-Americans. A part from the internal conflicts and White backlash that resulted from the Civil Rights Movement, the most salient aftermath was the cementing of racial essentialisms. Blackness was seen solely as African-American and Latinos became “Brown” while Whiteness became Anglo-whites. These political racial constructions remained unquestioned until recently.

The rainbow coalition was an active coalition which consisted of many members such as Fred Hampton from the Black Panthers, William “Preacherman” Fesperan, Hy Thurman from the Young Patriots Organization, Jack (Junebug) Boykin, Jose Cha Cha Jimenez, the Puerto Rican founder of the Young Lords Party, among others.

The discussion of Latino Whiteness was rarely brought up and instead focused and few focused Latino Blackness. For example, Felipe Luciano’s “Jíbaro My Pretty Nigger” encouraged his Blackness and Puertoricaness.

[...]

Today We are Paying the Price

The killing of Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman caused many to revisit the notion of Latino Whiteness. The article published by Latino Rebels, The White Hispanic” Label: Yes, People, Racism is a Latino Thing, Too, actually made some good points at the need to revisit race and Latino identity while Cesar Vargas’ The Privilege of the White Hispanic: Leaving Out the Rest caused, to my amazement, a stir from White Latinos. Nonetheless, we also need African-Americans to begin embracing Afro-Latinos among other Black communities who do not conform to an African American nomenclature. Unfortunately, as I had predicted, anti-Black racism has reached their doorstep. Rodner Figueroa compared Michelle Obama to a simian from the Planet of the Apes and was fired from Univision.
- See more at: http://www.latinorebels.com/2015/12/21/white-latino-racism-on-the-rise-its-time-for-a-serious-conversation-on-euro-diasporic-whiteness/#sthash.LnCkrflg.dpuf

Today We are Paying the Price

The killing of Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman caused many to revisit the notion of Latino Whiteness. The article published by Latino Rebels, The White Hispanic” Label: Yes, People, Racism is a Latino Thing, Too, actually made some good points at the need to revisit race and Latino identity while Cesar Vargas’ The Privilege of the White Hispanic: Leaving Out the Rest caused, to my amazement, a stir from White Latinos. Nonetheless, we also need African-Americans to begin embracing Afro-Latinos among other Black communities who do not conform to an African American nomenclature. Unfortunately, as I had predicted, anti-Black racism has reached their doorstep. Rodner Figueroa compared Michelle Obama to a simian from the Planet of the Apes and was fired from Univision.

Figueroa’s excuse was that he was “mixed.” However, Univision, one of the most anti-Black television channels I’ve ever seen, made firing Figueroa seem like an oxymoron.

This Saturday, the Miss Puerto Rico winner for the Miss America pageant was suspended for anti-Muslim tweets.

Last night, the African-American actor Steve Harvey was attacked on Twitter from racist White Latinos (and other Latinos as well and Anglo-whites) who wanted Miss Colombia to win the Miss Universe contest. These profile used abhorrent language, as the tweets below show. All this hatred came as a result of Harvey mistakenly naming Miss Colombia the winner instead of Miss Philippines, the real winner.

Read More

A common misconnection that exists today rests on the notion that there are no racial hierarchies in Latin American countries or within the Latino communities in the United States. In other words, Latino (or Hispanic) is itself a race. For many, this conversation is a pointless squabble that halts the true need for unity amongst marginalized groups in the United States. Unfortunately, overlooking the importance of this issue has in fact delineated separation and a lack of interest in each other’s problems.
The shooting of unarmed African-American teenager Trayvon Martin by a half-Peruvian and half-White Jewish man named George Zimmerman, the rise of so-called Hispanic conservatives like Ted Cruz, Al Cardenas and Marco Rubio, and the examples of racist comments by Latinos in the media like Rodner Figueroa, have made it impossible to have a conversation of Latinos and race. It is becoming clear that Whites from Latin America, although marginalized by Anglo-Whites, have been able to pass as honorary Whites and benefit from the inequalities formed by White Supremacy. This is not new, and it has a history.
Many people who neglect to explore the history of Latin Americans in the United Sates fail to analyze people like the famous white Cuban Ricky Ricardo (Desi Arnaz), who penetrated the American television series “I Love Lucy” (1951) at a time when Black people were not even allowed to perform next to White actors. Lucy (Lucille Ball) was Arnaz’ real wife, and both enjoyed a long and prosperous career in the film industry. In 1954 Arnaz was even able to get a role as the famous Don Juan.
During this time, White Latin Americans were seen as foreign, inferior and exotic and yet many passed and enjoyed White Privilege. Even all three of John Wayne’s wives were from Latin America at a time when anti-Black and anti-immigrant sentiments were powerful hateful discourses. Less mentioned is the famous Afro-Puerto Rican actor Juano Hernández, who to date is considered was one of the most successful pioneering Black actors of the African-American film industry. Despite Hernández being from Latin America, he had to take Black roles precisely because he was Black and experienced the same segregation as other Blacks in the United States. This was also common in Latin America, where Blacks were not allowed to be actors while Whites enjoyed wearing blackface and dehumanized black people.
- See more at: http://www.latinorebels.com/2015/12/21/white-latino-racism-on-the-rise-its-time-for-a-serious-conversation-on-euro-diasporic-whiteness/#sthash.LnCkrflg.dpuf

A common misconnection that exists today rests on the notion that there are no racial hierarchies in Latin American countries or within the Latino communities in the United States. In other words, Latino (or Hispanic) is itself a race. For many, this conversation is a pointless squabble that halts the true need for unity amongst marginalized groups in the United States. Unfortunately, overlooking the importance of this issue has in fact delineated separation and a lack of interest in each other’s problems.
The shooting of unarmed African-American teenager Trayvon Martin by a half-Peruvian and half-White Jewish man named George Zimmerman, the rise of so-called Hispanic conservatives like Ted Cruz, Al Cardenas and Marco Rubio, and the examples of racist comments by Latinos in the media like Rodner Figueroa, have made it impossible to have a conversation of Latinos and race. It is becoming clear that Whites from Latin America, although marginalized by Anglo-Whites, have been able to pass as honorary Whites and benefit from the inequalities formed by White Supremacy. This is not new, and it has a history.
Many people who neglect to explore the history of Latin Americans in the United Sates fail to analyze people like the famous white Cuban Ricky Ricardo (Desi Arnaz), who penetrated the American television series “I Love Lucy” (1951) at a time when Black people were not even allowed to perform next to White actors. Lucy (Lucille Ball) was Arnaz’ real wife, and both enjoyed a long and prosperous career in the film industry. In 1954 Arnaz was even able to get a role as the famous Don Juan.
During this time, White Latin Americans were seen as foreign, inferior and exotic and yet many passed and enjoyed White Privilege. Even all three of John Wayne’s wives were from Latin America at a time when anti-Black and anti-immigrant sentiments were powerful hateful discourses. Less mentioned is the famous Afro-Puerto Rican actor Juano Hernández, who to date is considered was one of the most successful pioneering Black actors of the African-American film industry. Despite Hernández being from Latin America, he had to take Black roles precisely because he was Black and experienced the same segregation as other Blacks in the United States. This was also common in Latin America, where Blacks were not allowed to be actors while Whites enjoyed wearing blackface and dehumanized black people.
- See more at: http://www.latinorebels.com/2015/12/21/white-latino-racism-on-the-rise-its-time-for-a-serious-conversation-on-euro-diasporic-whiteness/#sthash.LnCkrflg.dpuf

Jazz Legend Ornette Coleman Transitions at Age 85: Visionary Saxophonist Pioneered "Free Jazz" and Won a Pulitzer Prize in 2007

By CBS/AP
...The Texas-born Coleman was only the second jazz artist to win the Pulitzer Prize in music when he was honored for his 2006 album "Sound Grammar."

His quartet shook up the jazz establishment when it burst on the scene in 1959 with the album "The Shape of Jazz to Come," which liberated musicians to freely improvise off the melody.

ORNETTE COLEMAN - Excerpts From the Documentary
1959 The Year that Changed Jazz

Coleman is regarded as one of the greatest innovators in jazz history along with Louis Armstrong and Charlie Parker. In the late 1950s, he originated "free jazz," challenging the bebop establishment by abandoning the conventional song form and liberating musicians to freely improvise off of the melody rather than the underlying chord changes. Coleman broke down the barrier between leader and sidemen, giving his band members freedom to solo, interact and develop their ideas.

Though largely self-taught, Coleman would create his own "harmolodic" concept of music, which also became a life philosophy. The music derived from a uniquely free interaction between the musicians, without being tethered to rigid meters and conventional harmonic structure. He referred to it as "removing the caste system from sound."

ORNETTE COLEMAN - The Shape of Jazz to Come (1959 -Full Album)

"I want everyone to have an equal relationship to the results," Coleman told the AP in a 2007 interview. "I don't tell them what or how to play. ... Sometimes the drum is leading, sometimes the bass is leading. ... I don't think I'm the leader, I'm just paying the bills."

In his later years, the jazz revolutionary became a respected elder statesman with the accompanying honors, including membership in the elite American Academy of Arts and Letters and a Grammy lifetime achievement award, even though none of his recordings ever won a Grammy.

But early in his career, Coleman's unconventional playing led him to be rejected by both the public and his fellow musicians who would walk off the stage when he showed up at jam sessions. One bandleader paid him not to solo; others simply fired him. Coleman was told he played out-of-tune and didn't know the basics of jazz improvisation.

One incident remained deeply ingrained in his memory: The night circa 1950 when the saxophonist was playing with an R&B band at a Louisiana road house and his solo stopped the dancers in their tracks. Coleman was dragged outside the club, roughed up and his horn was thrown over a cliff.

"One guy kicked me in my stomach ... and said, `You can't play like that!' He didn't even know what I was doing," recalled Coleman in the AP interview. "I think with dance music it's the rhythm that people like and I was just playing musical ideas. But I really did grow when I realized that all music uses the same notes whether it's classical or religious or funk. ... And when I realized that ... I decided to take my beatings until I can establish where people can say, `Oh don't beat him, listen.'"

[..]

Tired of rejection, Coleman moved to Los Angeles in 1952 where he got a job as a department store elevator operator, studying music theory on his breaks.

Coleman, who a decade before the Beatles had shoulder-length hair and a beard, soon found a like-minded group of musicians, including bassist Charlie Haden, who had performed in his family's bluegrass band back in Missouri; Don Cherry, who played a tiny pocket trumpet, and drummer Billy Higgins.

Read More

_____________

Randolph Denard Ornette Coleman (March 9, 1930 – June 11, 2015) was an American jazz saxophonist, violinist, trumpeter and composer. He was one of the major innovators of the free jazz movement of the 1960s, a term he invented with the name of an album. Coleman's timbre was easily recognized: his keening, crying sound drew heavily on blues music. His album Sound Grammar received the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for music.

Biography

Early life

Coleman was born in 1930 in Fort Worth, Texas, where he was also raised.[1][2][3] He attended I.M. Terrell High School, where he participated in band until he was dismissed for improvising during "The Washington Post."[4] He began performing R&B and bebop initially on tenor saxophone, and started a band, the Jam Jivers, with some fellow students including Prince Lasha and Charles Moffett.[5] Seeking a way to work his way out of his home town, he took a job in 1949 with a Silas Green from New Orleans traveling show and then with touring rhythm and blues shows. After a show in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, he was assaulted and his saxophone was destroyed.[6]

He switched to alto, which remained his primary instrument, first playing it in New Orleans after the Baton Rouge incident. He then joined the band of Pee Wee Crayton and travelled with them to Los Angeles. He worked at various jobs, including as an elevator operator, while still pursuing his musical career.

From the beginning of his career, Coleman's music and playing were in many ways unorthodox. His approach to harmony and chord progression was far less rigid than that of bebop performers; he was increasingly interested in playing what he heard rather than fitting it into predetermined chorus-structures and harmonies. His raw, highly vocalized sound and penchant for playing "in the cracks" of the scale led many Los Angeles jazz musicians to regard Coleman's playing as out-of-tune. He sometimes had difficulty finding like-minded musicians with whom to perform. Nevertheless, pianist Paul Bley was an early supporter and musical collaborator.

In 1958, Coleman led his first recording session for Contemporary, Something Else!!!!: The Music of Ornette Coleman. The session also featured trumpeter Don Cherry, drummer Billy Higgins, bassist Don Payne and Walter Norris on piano.[7]

The Shape of Jazz to Come

1959 was a notably productive year for Coleman. His last release on Contemporary was Tomorrow Is the Question!, a quartet album, with Shelly Manne on drums, and excluding the piano, which he would not use again until the 1990s. Next Coleman brought double bassist Charlie Haden – one of a handful of his most important collaborators – into a regular group with Cherry and Higgins. (All four had played with Paul Bley the previous year.) He signed a multi-album contract with Atlantic Records who released The Shape of Jazz to Come in 1959. It was, according to critic Steve Huey, "a watershed event in the genesis of avant-garde jazz, profoundly steering its future course and throwing down a gauntlet that some still haven't come to grips with."[8] While definitely – if somewhat loosely – blues-based and often quite melodic, the album's compositions were considered at that time harmonically unusual and unstructured. Some musicians and critics saw Coleman as an iconoclast; others, including conductor Leonard Bernstein and composer Virgil Thomson regarded him as a genius and an innovator.[9]

Coleman's quartet received a lengthy – and sometimes controversial – engagement at New York City's famed Five Spot jazz club. Such notable figures as the Modern Jazz Quartet, Leonard Bernstein and Lionel Hampton were favorably impressed, and offered encouragement. (Hampton was so impressed he reportedly asked to perform with the quartet; Bernstein later helped Haden obtain a composition grant from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.) Opinion was, however, divided. Trumpeter Miles Davis famously declared Coleman was "all screwed up inside" (although this comment was later recanted) and Roy Eldridge stated, "I'd listened to him all kinds of ways. I listened to him high and I listened to him cold sober. I even played with him. I think he's jiving baby."[10]

Coleman's unique early sound was due in part to his use of a plastic saxophone. He had first bought a plastic horn in Los Angeles in 1954 because he was unable to afford a metal saxophone, though he didn't like the sound of the plastic instrument at first.[11] Coleman later claimed that it sounded drier, without the pinging sound of metal. In later years, he played a metal saxophone.[12]

On the Atlantic recordings, Coleman's sidemen in the quartet are Cherry on cornet or pocket trumpet, Haden, Scott LaFaro, and then Jimmy Garrison on bass, and Higgins or his replacement Ed Blackwell on drums. The complete released recordings for the label were collected on the box set Beauty Is a Rare Thing.[7]

Free Jazz

In 1960, Coleman recorded Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation, which featured a double quartet, including Cherry and Freddie Hubbard on trumpet, Eric Dolphy on bass clarinet, Haden and LaFaro on bass, and both Higgins and Blackwell on drums. The record was recorded in stereo, with a reed/brass/bass/drums quartet isolated in each stereo channel. Free Jazz was, at nearly 40 minutes, the lengthiest recorded continuous jazz performance to date, and was instantly one of Coleman's most controversial albums. The music features a regular but complex pulse, one drummer playing "straight" while the other played double-time; the thematic material is a series of brief, dissonant fanfares. As is conventional in jazz, there are a series of solo features for each member of the band, but the other soloists are free to chime in as they wish, producing some extraordinary passages of collective improvisation by the full octet. In the January 18, 1962 issue of Down Beat magazine, in a special review titled "Double View of a Double Quartet," Pete Welding awarded the album Five Stars while John A. Tynan rated it No Stars.[13]

Coleman originally intended "Free Jazz" as simply an album title, but his growing reputation placed him at the forefront of jazz innovation, and free jazz was soon considered a new genre, though Coleman has expressed discomfort with the term. Among the reasons Coleman may not have entirely approved of the term 'free jazz' in that his music contains a considerable amount of composition. His melodic material, although skeletal, strongly recalls the melodies that Charlie Parker wrote over standard harmonies, and in general the music is closer to the bebop that came before it than is sometimes popularly imagined.[14] (Several early tunes of his, for instance, are clearly based on favorite bop chord changes like "Out of Nowhere" and "I Got Rhythm".) Coleman very rarely played standards, concentrating on his own compositions, of which there seemed to be an endless flow. There are exceptions, though, including a classic reading (virtually a recomposition) of "Embraceable You" for Atlantic, and an improvisation on Thelonious Monk's "Criss-Cross" recorded with Gunther Schuller.


1960s

After the Atlantic period and into the early part of the 1970s, Coleman's music became more angular and engaged fully with the jazz avant-garde which had developed in part around his innovations.[7]
His quartet dissolved, and Coleman formed a new trio with David Izenzon on bass, and Charles Moffett on drums. Coleman began to extend the sound-range of his music, introducing accompanying string players (though far from the territory of Charlie Parker with Strings) and playing trumpet and violin (which he played left-handed) himself. He initially had little conventional musical technique and used the instruments to make large, unrestrained gestures. His friendship with Albert Ayler influenced his development on trumpet and violin. Haden would later sometimes join this trio to form a two-bass quartet.

Between 1965 and 1967 Coleman signed with Blue Note Records and released a number of recordings starting with the influential recordings of the trio At the Golden Circle Stockholm.

In 1966, Coleman was criticized for recording The Empty Foxhole, a trio with Haden, and Coleman's son Denardo Coleman – who was ten years old. Some[who?] regarded this as perhaps an ill-advised piece of publicity on Coleman's part and judged the move a mistake. Others, however,[who?] noted that despite his youth, Denardo had studied drumming for several years. His technique – which, though unrefined, was respectable and enthusiastic – owed more to pulse-oriented free jazz drummers like Sunny Murray than to bebop drumming. Denardo has matured into a respected musician, and has been his father's primary drummer since the late 1970s.

Coleman formed another quartet. A number of bassists and drummers (including Haden, Garrison and Elvin Jones) appeared, and Dewey Redman joined the group, usually on tenor saxophone.

He also continued to explore his interest in string textures – from Town Hall, 1962, culminating in Skies of America in 1972. (Sometimes this had a practical value, as it facilitated his group's appearance in the UK in 1965, where jazz musicians were under a quota arrangement but classical performers were exempt.)

In 1969, Coleman was inducted into the Down Beat Jazz Hall of Fame.

Later Career

Coleman, like Miles Davis before him, took to playing with electrified instruments. Albums like Virgin Beauty and Of Human Feelings used rock and funk rhythms, sometimes called free funk. On the face of it, this could seem to be an adoption of the jazz fusion mode fashionable at the time, but Coleman's first record with the group, which later became known as Prime Time (the 1976 Dancing in Your Head), was sufficiently different that it had considerable shock value. Electric guitars were prominent, but the music was, at heart, rather similar to his earlier work. These performances have the same angular melodies and simultaneous group improvisations – what Joe Zawinul referred to as "nobody solos, everybody solos" and what Coleman called harmolodics – and although the nature of the pulse was altered, Coleman's own rhythmic approach did not.[citation needed]

Some critics[who?] have suggested Coleman's frequent use of the vaguely defined term harmolodics is a musical MacGuffin: a red herring of sorts designed to occupy critics overly focused on Coleman's sometimes unorthodox compositional style.

Jerry Garcia played guitar on three tracks from Coleman's 1988 album Virgin Beauty: "Three Wishes", "Singing in the Shower", and "Desert Players". Coleman joined the Grateful Dead on stage once in 1993 during "Space", and stayed for "The Other One", "Stella Blue", Bobby Bland's "Turn on Your Lovelight", and the encore "Brokedown Palace".[15][16] Another collaboration was with guitarist Pat Metheny, with whom Coleman recorded Song X (1985); though released under Metheny's name, Coleman was essentially co-leader (contributing all the compositions).

In 1990, the city of Reggio Emilia in Italy held a three-day "Portrait of the Artist" featuring a Coleman quartet with Cherry, Haden and Higgins. The festival also presented performances of his chamber music and the symphonic Skies of America.

In 1991, Coleman played on the soundtrack for David Cronenberg's Naked Lunch; the orchestra was conducted by Howard Shore. It is notable among other things for including a rare sighting of Coleman playing a jazz standard: Thelonious Monk's blues line "Misterioso". Two 1972 (pre-electric) Coleman recordings, "Happy House" and "Foreigner in a Free Land" were used in Gus Van Sant's 2000 Finding Forrester.

The mid-1990s saw a flurry of activity from Coleman: he released four records in 1995 and 1996, and for the first time in many years worked regularly with piano players (either Geri Allen or Joachim Kühn).

2000s

In 2004 Coleman was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life."[17]

In September 2006 he released a live album titled Sound Grammar with his newest quartet (Denardo drumming and two bassists, Gregory Cohen and Tony Falanga). This was his first album of new material in ten years, and was recorded in Germany in 2005. It won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for music, Coleman being only the second jazz artist to win the prize.[18]

On February 11, 2007, Coleman was honored with a Grammy award for lifetime achievement, in recognition of this legacy.

On July 9, 2009, Coleman received the Miles Davis Award, a recognition given by the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal to musicians who have contributed to continuing the tradition of jazz.[19]

On May 1, 2010, he was awarded an Honorary Doctorate in Music from the University of Michigan for his musical contributions.[20]

Jazz pianist Joanne Brackeen (who had only briefly studied music as a child) stated in an interview with Marian McPartland that Coleman had been mentoring her and giving her semi-formal music lessons in recent years.[21]

Coleman continued to push himself into unusual playing situations, often with much younger musicians or musicians from radically different musical cultures. An increasing number of his compositions, while not ubiquitous, have become minor jazz standards, including "Lonely Woman", "Peace", "Turnaround", "When Will the Blues Leave?", "The Blessing", "Law Years", "What Reason Could I Give" and "I've Waited All My Life". He has influenced virtually every saxophonist of a modern disposition, and nearly every such jazz musician, of the generation that followed him. His songs have proven endlessly malleable: pianists such as Paul Bley and Paul Plimley have managed to turn them to their purposes; John Zorn recorded Spy vs Spy (1989), an album of extremely loud, fast, and abrupt versions of Coleman songs. Finnish jazz singer Carola covered Coleman's "Lonely Woman" and there have even been progressive bluegrass versions of Coleman tunes (by Richard Greene).

Personal Life and Death

Coleman married poet Jayne Cortez in 1954. The couple divorced in 1964. They had one son, Denardo, born in 1956,[22] who became a notable jazz drummer.

Coleman died of a cardiac arrest at the age of 85 in New York City on June 11, 2015.[23]

___________
SOURCE: Wikipedia

Michael Jackson's 'Moonwalk' — Who Was The First To Do It? (Video)

These "Old School" Dancers Put Most of Today's Dancers To Shame

Natural Hair Controversy in Barbados Schools: Grooming Standards, Prestige and Race in the Caribbean

A selection of Instagram photos under the hashtag #kolijnatural. Via findgram.com

By Matthew Hunte
Some female students at Harrison College, one of the most prestigious schools on the island, were reprimanded for sporting hairstyles which were deemed inappropriate for school, to the surprise and outrage of many.

Elva Mary Tudor, a mother of one of the students, expressed her concerns on Facebook:

My daughter's hair style was considered too flamboyant and unsettling for school.
At assembly yesterday the students were told twist outs are not appropriate for school.
She will be 18 in a couple weekes [sic] and over the last 2 years she has been quietly developing her sense of style of which I am quite proud. She has leaned to a natural look.

She has been subject of negative comments about her hair and has stood her ground. I understand clearly that school must have rules and they must be followed. But I find the negativity towards natural hair sad and backward. We seem to dislike the look of tightly coiled strong hair.

With a few months to go before the end of sixth form, this is not battle I am prepare [sic] to get anxious about. My concern really is for her to concentrate on unit 2 of cape and to proceed to UWI, where hair will no longer be an issue.

Harrison College, which was founded in 1733, is the alma mater of five of Barbados’ seven prime ministers, as well as many other prominent citizens. It was an all-boys school for much of its history before becoming co-ed in 1980. The current principal, Juanita Wade, assumed her post at the beginning of this school year and is the first woman principal in the school's history.

Such controversy is not new to the region. There was a similar incident in Saint Lucia two years ago, when a student at St. Mary's College was prevented from attending classes until he cut his plaits.
Tonya at gender justice blog Code Red argued that such attitudes were colonial holdovers and evidence of self-hate:

Elite secondary schools in the region share a history of colonialism, racism, sexism, classism and anti-blackness.

Sometimes teachers think that they are doing students a favor when they socialize them into white supremacy, self-hate and respectability.  They believe they are preparing them for the world of work. Preparing them for survival in a globalized world that is anti-black. Making somebody out of them despite their blackness or working class roots or countrified accent. These teachers are in need of consciousness-raising. They need to learn better so that they can do better.

When I was at secondary school I distinctly remember our principal asking all the girls with natural hair to stay behind after assembly for a talk on tidiness and appropriate hairstyles. This is gendered and racialized policing of black girls’ bodies that is usually classist as well. It also communicates just who legitimately is supposed to occupy these elite spaces.

There was a hashtag #kolijnatural where alumni of Harrison College (“Kolij” is a colloquial name for the school) showed that their natural hair has not held them back professionally:

Was happy to see this #kolijnatural campaign. It's great to see black women taking pride in their #naturalbeauty. Feeling real #KolijPride right now.

One alumnus of Harrison College directly addressed the issue of race and made the point that the college was not always so uptight about natural hair:

I am aware that twist outs were not the only hair style deemed inappropriate for school. However, I do take issue with the principal's comment about members of staff having to ask if the hair was combed or not. In a predominantly black country, you mean we STILL do not know what maintained black hair looks like? That a twist out style can still, by some people, be mistaken for unkempt black hair? Come on man. At best, that speaks to an inter-generational rift of knowledge about black hair care. I'm not even going to talk about what it means “at worst”. [...]

Another thing that has interested me as well about this issue, is the amount of shots being taken at the school and alumni. To hear it told, Harrison College is a perpetuator of elitism. It's anti-black. One person went as far as to say the alumni are making an issue out of this because the principal is a woman AND because she's not an alumni. What? I went to HC for 7 years. At least 5 of those I was natural. Girls wore puffs when I was there, and mine was pretty big. I don't recall getting told off about it. When I started plaiting my hair at 12, I never got dragged up about my awkward styling. If my twists and plaits used to look rusty, I never got told about it. I even used to go to school to get my hair plait. My experience is not everyone else's, but it's valid all the same.

Shout out to my fellow #kolijnatural #naturalistas #naturalhair #kinkyhair peeps! #whatsuccesslookslike Proud of
my natural hair and grateful to all those who encouraged me and gave me advice on my natural hair care journey
like @sunsetsealy @blondebombshellings, @jennzone and @ellehumpfree.

Even non-alumni got in on the action:

Not a #KolijNatural but I can still support the movement. Wearing my natural hair at work. #WhatSuccessLooksLike pic.twitter.com/ljTn6cUqPU
— Risée (@Zaouri) January 12, 2015

Kim Roberts at Bajan Beauty Blogger argued that people who choose to go natural should be prepared to face some opposition — but still be true to themselves:

If you are a brown body in this world you are not ‘allowed’ to privilege your ‘nappy, hard’ loose hair. You aren’t allowed to say to the world, I like my hair this way, and I find it appropriate in every way.

Go natural anyway!  Prepare yourself mentally for these persons. Prepare your words appropriately for these persons. Teach your self to ignore these persons and seek the counsel of your parents as necessary, if you are in the school system.
And do it anyway!

Reprinted with permission from Global Voices.

Trailblazing School in Haiti Teaches Younger Kids in Creole, Not French

A 5th grade class at the Matenwa Community School in Haiti. Credit: Amy Bracken (Used with permission)

This article and a radio report by Amy Bracken for The World in Words originally appeared on PRI.org on December 22, 2014 and is republished as part of a content-sharing agreement.
Frandy Calixte is an 11-year-old boy who lives in a small village on the drought-prone island of Lagonav, Haiti. Sitting outside his house with his mother and teacher, he tells me he wants to be a nurse when he grows up, but his mother corrects him.

By Public Radio International@PRI

“Doctor,” she says, and he amends his answer.

Almost everyone here is a small farmer; higher education is virtually unheard of. But Calixte is bucking the trend by going to a different kind of school: The Matenwa Community School, just down the rocky road from Calixte’s house.

Matenwa is also bucking the norms of Haitian education. At the start of an all-school assembly, students stand up and share what’s good and bad — a lesson they enjoyed, or how they didn’t like the behavior of other students or even teachers. In class, students sit in a circle, following the school’s philosophy that children should be seen, heard and treated with respect.

There's another essential part of the school's method, the staff says: teaching in the students’ native language, Creole, instead of French.

Only an estimated 5 percent of Haitians are fluent in French, but it's still the language of government-funded textbooks. “When I was in school, I never really learned French,” says Calixte’s mother, who calls herself Madame Frantz Calixte. When I ask how she succeeded in school, she laughs. “I didn’t really pass my exams,” she says.

But of her sons? ”They’re learning better than I did,” she says.

Abner Sauveur, who grew up in the village of Matenwa, was also taught entirely in French, despite not being able to understand everything. When teachers got frustrated with the language barrier, he says, they lashed out — literally — at their students.

“The way they beat me in school, I knew the system was bad,” he says. “People can’t learn like that.”

Sauveur never finished high school. But, in 1996, he and American teacher Chris Low co-founded the Matenwa Community School to provide “education that allowed people to reflect and share their ideas,” he says, “education that lets them learn better.” Using Creole was a necessity.

Matenwa uses Creole in all its instruction and textbooks through the third grade, when French is introduced as a second language. After that, textbooks for subjects like geography and history are all in French, simply because such books still aren’t available in Creole.

Matenwa’s co-founders hope that one day all books will be in both French and Creole. For earlier grades, the administration raises money to buy Creole books, and students make their own.

Fifth-grader Kervenson Succès reads a student-authored book, “A Cure for Being a Pest,” printed in Creole, French and English. Credit: Amy Bracken (Used with permission)

But many parents still believe French is the language of education, even in the earliest grades. They believe its spelling and grammar are more established than Creole, and that the earlier children are exposed to French, the better off they’ll be — even if they don’t understand at first.

“When the Matenwa school started, it was very difficult,” Sauveur says. ”There were parents who would withdraw their students from school because we were teaching in Creole.” But he says those parents have returned their kids to Matenwa. Now political leaders from the prime minister on down are calling for more Creole education, and some are calling Matenwa a model.

Jonès Lagrandeur, the superintendent for the more than 200 schools on Lagonav Island, was also against Creole instruction at first. “Of course! Because of the way we were raised,” he says. “But then we came to better understand it. I was a skeptic, but now I’m a die-hard fan. Since Matenwa came along, we’ve turned a page in history.”

Matenwa also offers ”mother tongue” training to educators around the country, but mostly works with neighboring schools. Lagrandeur claims that’s why national exam scores on the island this year were the highest ever.

Michel DeGraff, a Haitian linguist who works at MIT, says tests already show the Matenwa students’ Creole reading skills are almost three times the average score for 84 mainland schools tested by the World Bank.

DeGraff says he can tell French-based education isn’t working just by hearing people study. “It’s this sing-along type of tone, where often they break the sentence in the middle,” he says, “which means that they don’t understand what they’re studying.” It's the same kind of studying he did as a child, when Creole was disdained at his schools.

Now, as a member of the new Creole Academy, DeGraff is now tasked with promoting the language in all areas. But his main focus is education, including tools to help teachers teach science in Creole, and the translation of 21 math computer games into Creole.

Back at Matenwa, I visited on a Friday, when educators gathered for mother tongue training. They got pointers and books, and they discussed how they'd go back and train more people themselves.

“In the beginning it was just us who were teaching in Creole,” says Abner Sauveur, the school's co-founder says. “Now there are 10 schools who come here for training, every month. When I look at that experience, I believe that after 15, 20, 30 years, I might be dead already, but it’s possible that the system will be completely changed in Haiti.”

But at the training session, Sauveur distributes manuals that seem to have nothing to do with how to teach in Creole. They’re about stopping corporal punishment, communicating productively with students and protecting kids from sexual abuse. So is Matenwa a model because of Creole, or because of that attention to the rights of children?

I ask the teachers: Wouldn’t this school be influential even if all the classes were in French?

Their response? This could never happen in French.
_________________
The World in Words podcast is on Facebook and iTunes.
Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said that the spelling rules and grammar of Creole are not well-established. That is the opinion of some Haitian parents, but is not established fact. The story has been changed to reflect that

Reprinted with permission from Global Voices.

Anti-Censorship Play Receives Surprise Approval From Lebanon's Censors

Lucien Bourjeily’s headshot

By Jess Holland
A play that examines Lebanon’s censorship system has been approved by the country’s office in charge of artistic permits, a decision that could point towards a more open future for the country’s writers and performers.

“La3younak Sidna,” (“Sir Yes Sir”) was written by Lucien Bourjeily and will be produced by March, an NGO that campaigns for free speech in Lebanon. Billed by Bourjeily as the theatrical version of a documentary, it chronicles the team’s own struggles as they tried and failed to get a permit for their previous work, “Bto2ta3 aw ma Bto2ta3” (“Will it Pass Or Not?”).

The expectation was that this play would be censored as well, but to their surprise, the permit was granted after a month’s wait.

Jubilant messages from the team flooded social media. “After almost 2 years of banning, ill-treatment, and unlawful passport confiscation by the authorities comes today's amazing SUCCESS,” reads Bourjeily’s Facebook status on 16 October. Gino Raidy, a member of March’s advisory board, began a blog post with the words: “Flabbergasted would best describe our reactions at this unexpectedly positive decision.”

Bourjeily is a longstanding critic of Lebanon’s lack of free expression protections. His last play “Bto2ta3 aw ma Bto2ta3” was a fictional farce about bumbling General Security officers decimating the scripts of weary playwrights. There was a long wait after he submitted it to the bureau last year, and it was finally denied on the grounds that it was poorly written and inaccurate.

Lebanon’s laws allow censors to cut anything that might inflame political or religious tensions, but the system lacks oversight, and there is wide scope for individual officers to interpret laws as they see fit.

“We wanted to show that [the censors] can manipulate the law as much as they want,” Bourjeily told me in January, “and this is the biggest proof. They say ‘we’re protecting people,’ but they are only protecting themselves.” He vowed that he was committed to a long fight, and his perseverance earned him a spot on the shortlist for the NGO Index on Censorship’s 2014 Freedom of Expression Award, who also featured text from the play online and in their magazine.

Later in the spring, Bourjeily’s passport was confiscated by General Security just before he was due to fly to the UK to take part in the London International Festival of Theatre. The explanation? “You know what you did.”

Bourjeily spoke out about the incident online, sparking an international outcry, and the passport was returned a couple of days later.

Undeterred by all these setbacks, Bourjeily decided to poke fun at General Security by taking them at their word. If they deemed his fictional play about censorship too unrealistic, he’d write a play that documented his own experiences trying to get a theatrical permit, using real names and repeating conversations verbatim.

“There’s a saying in Arabic,” he told me. “Follow a liar to his doorstep.” There wasn't much hope that the play would get approved, but Bourjeily saw the process as an effective awareness campaign, and he relished the chance to include scenes that were even funnier and more bizarre than anything he could have dreamed up, like the time he walked in to see a copy of Playboy magazine on an officer’s desk – to censor it, of course.

He imagined that once the permit was once again denied, he might perform the piece online via a live-streaming service, and then he’d write yet another sequel. In an interview with the Lebanese newspaper the Daily Star, he joked, “maybe one day the tenth sequel of ‘Will It Pass or Not?’ will be accepted and then we’ll throw a great party.”

So when the permit finally arrived, granting permission for the new play “La3younak Sidna” to be performed in Lebanon, Bourjeily and the March team could hardly believe their eyes.

The permit stated that the play was approved, pending one change. The censor board requested the playwright replaced the term “General Security” with “Censorship” throughout the text. The head of general security’s signatures on the request suggested that the text went all the way to the top of the chain before the request was granted. (General Security could not be reached for comment.)

Bourjeily’s Facebook post was full of wild enthusiasm. “Many times in Lebanon we’ve given up on our homeland just moments before we reach a better country,” he wrote, “just moments before we succeed in breaking the chains of oppression and corruption… this time we won’t & we shouldn’t!! … THANK YOU… each & everyone of you for standing up against censorship & supporting freedom of speech! One small strategic battle WON: hopefully many others will follow!!”

Raidy’s response was more measured. He noted on his blog that, “since our last attempt, the chief of the bureau and most of the team have been replaced and the new chief and team seemed far less intent on censoring free speech.” He added that the shift in attitude only confirms what the group have always argued, that the law is too vague, and that he hoped “that this will be the first of many steps towards a more pragmatic stance on censorship from the government.”

The play debuted at the American University of Beirut on October 23.

______________
This story was commissioned by Freemuse, the leading defender of musicians worldwide, and Global Voices for Artsfreedom.org. The article may be republished by non-commercial media, crediting the author Jess Holland, Freemuse and Global Voices and linking to the origin.

Reprinted with permission from Global Voices.

Pioneering Trinidad & Tobago TV Personality Hazel Ward-Redman Remembered

Screen grab of Hazel Ward-Redman, taken from a documentary about the 50 most
influential people in Trinidad and Tobago.

By Janine Mendes-Franco
This week, Trinidad and Tobago got news that Hazel Ward-Redman, a veteran television personality who encouraged the musical and artistic talents of generations of youth, had passed away after a long battle with cancer.

Her television programmes Twelve and Under and Teen Talent showcased the abilities of kids from all over the country – poetry, dance, music and singing were all standard fare – and launched the future careers of many who were passionate about the arts. Contestants went on to become writers, musicians and filmmakers. In 2006, when Trinidad and Tobago Television (the national broadcaster that produced Ward-Redman's shows) finally closed its doors, her colleague Neil Giuseppi reminisced:

And there was Auntie Hazel Ward whose cultural programmes set standards of excellence I attempted to follow in later years [...]

Over the years, ttt became the breeding ground for many of this nation’s cultural icons. Programmes like Scouting for Talent, Mastana Bahar, Teen Talent, Twelve and Under, Mainly for Women and Indian Variety, continuously unearthed the great wealth of talent that resides in our twin-island Republic. Several of the country’s top artistes got their first public recognition through the screens of ttt.

Trinidad and Tobago will forever owe a debt of gratitude to people like Hazel Ward-Redman [...] for their tremendous contributions to the development of the nation’s culture.

“Auntie Hazel”, as she was called, was honoured in a television documentary as one of the 50 most influential people in Trinidad and Tobago:

Tributes soon began to pour in via social media. On local radio station 96.1 WEFM's Facebook page, Ward-Redman was acknowledged for her work in television broadcasting. Commenters on the thread had fond memories of growing up watching her on television and commended her encouragement of young people. Anthony Brooks called her a “pioneer and trailblazer”, while Roma Sinanan described her this way:

Beautiful and exuberant spirit, so infectious that her personality was reflected on all who loved her and appreciated her tremendous contribution to our children of our land. Thank you and many blessings on your journey to the Source from which you came.

The Independent Media Producers Association of Trinidad and Tobago noted:

We have lost a valuable Icon today. Please stop for a moment and remember the light that was Aunty Hazel. May she rest in peace.

On Twitter, Patricia Worrell felt as if something significant had come to an end:

'End of an era' talk has become a bit of a cliché. But #HazelWard is dead, and it feels like the end of an era to many. RIP Aunty Hazel
— Patricia Worrell (@bytesdog) October 27, 2014

People who knew her personally or professionally flooded Facebook with tributes of their own – I was one of them:

Auntie Hazel Ward, thank you for understanding young people and encouraging their talent. I appeared (along with my guitar) as a guest artiste on one of the 12 and Under shows; Auntie Hazel always had a way of making you feel special. Farewell and God speed to a woman who did yeoman's service for music and the arts in this country.

Writer Lisa Allen-Agostini shared this anecdote:

I remember being on Teen Talent a million years ago. I auditioned at Newtown Girls and the accompanist Maurice Connors was so puzzled at my (ahem) unique vocal ability that he stopped halfway through and asked what I was singing. Aunty Hazel kindly asked me whether I had another talent. She let me return after half hour's practice in the yard, and loved my poetry. Not exactly a star is born but still. RIP Aunty Hazel.

My colleague, filmmaker Danielle Dieffenthaler, summed up her influence like this:

For a generation of us, she was the inspiration.

Hazel Ward-Redman's funeral is scheduled for this Saturday in San Fernando, the main city in south Trinidad.

Being Gullah or Geechee, Once Looked Down On, Now a Treasured Heritage

The Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor links historic African-American communities in four southern coastal states.

Screen capture from National Geographic video.

By Ken Otterbourg for National Geographic

Emory Campbell remembers growing up Gullah on Hilton Head Island, before the golf courses and the resorts. He remembers hunting in the forests and roaming free in the marshes. He remembers an island where white people were a rarity and his family was part of a close-knit community of African-American farmers and fishers, of teachers and preachers. He remembers the curse and blessing found in the island's isolation, of having to take a ferry to get to the outside world.

And he remembers the year it all changed: 1956, when the first bridge opened and the developers poured in. Campbell was 15. Today, the cemetery where his ancestors are buried is corralled by vacation homes set back from a fairway at the Harbour Town Golf Links. To visit, he needs to get waved through at a guardhouse.

Gullah Geechee -- the me I tried to flee:
Ron Daise at TEDxCharleston

"This part of the South used to be too hot for anybody to care about before mosquito control, before bridges and air conditioning," said Campbell. "We were the ones that endured, and ironically, it is us who is now suffering."

Most Threatened Places

The Gullahs or Geechees are descendants of slaves who lived and still live on the coastal islands and lowcountry along the coast of the southeastern United States, from the St. John's River in Florida to the Cape Fear River in North Carolina. (Gullah tends to be the preferred name in North and South Carolina, Geechee in Georgia and Florida.) Their communities dot the 400-mile strip, and they are slowly disappearing, casualties of progress and our love affair with coastal living.

In 2004, the National Trust for Historic Preservation placed the Gullah/Geechee Coast on its list of most threatened places. "Unless something is done to halt the destruction," the trust said, "Gullah/Geechee culture will be relegated to museums and history books, and our nation's unique cultural mosaic will lose one of its richest and most colorful pieces." (Read "Lowcountry Legacy" in the November issue of National Geographic magazine.)

Congress created the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor Commission in 2006, and the agency published its first management plan in 2013. With limited funds and authority, it is working at the grassroots level across the region. It has teamed up with transportation departments in the four states to place road signs informing motorists when they are in the corridor. And it's also getting involved with public policy.

Read More