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GBN’s Daily Drop: “Black Girl Magic” – (Gen) Z is for Zendaya (LISTEN)

GBN’s Daily Drop: “Black Girl Magic” – (Gen) Z is for Zendaya (LISTEN)

By goodblacknews on February 19, 2022

by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)

Today’s GBN Daily Drop Podcast is based on the Saturday, February 19 entry in the “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day®️ Calendar for 2022 about the multi-talented former Disney Channel star, global box-office phenom and fashion icon Zendaya Coleman, in the category of what else… Black Girl Magic!

You can also follow or subscribe to the Good Black News Daily Drop Podcast through Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, rss.com or create your own RSS Feed. Or just check it out every day here on the main website (transcript below):

FULL TRANSCRIPT:

Hey, this Lori Lakin Hutcherson, founder and editor in chief of goodblacknews.org, here to share with you a daily drop of Good Black News for Friday, February 18th, 2022, based on the “A Year of Good Black News Page-A-Day Calendar” published by Workman Publishing. Today’s category? Black Girl Magic. The person? Zendaya.

“Euphoria” must describe the feeling Zendaya Coleman has on the regular. Not only did she become the youngest person ever to win a Primetime Emmy for Best Actress in a Drama Series in 2020 for her performance in HBO’s Euphoria, the multi-talented performer has landed Top 40 hits as a musical artist, starred in blockbusters such as Spider-Man: Homecoming, Spider-Man: Far From Home and The Greatest Showman—she can even do a convincing trapeze act!

The Dune and Malcolm and Marie star also claimed fashion icon status with various magazine covers, red carpet arrivals and the 2019 launch of her Zendaya x Tommy collection with Tommy Hilfiger.

To learn more about Oakland native Zendaya, check out the links to sources provided in today’s show notes or in the episode’s full transcript posted on goodblacknews.org.

This has been a daily drop of Good Black News, based on the “A Year of Good Black News Page-A-Day Calendar for 2022,” published by Workman Publishing, and available at workman.com, Amazon, Bookshop and other online retailers. Beats provided by freebeats.io and produced by White Hot.

For more Good Black News, check out goodblacknews.org or search and follow @goodblacknews anywhere on social.

Sources:

(paid links)

Will Smith and David Oyelowo Partner to Produce and Adapt “Oneyka and the Academy of the Sun” for Netflix

Will Smith and David Oyelowo Partner to Produce and Adapt “Oneyka and the Academy of the Sun” for Netflix

By goodblacknews on February 16, 2022

According to Variety.com, Will Smith’s Westbrook Studios and David Oyelowo’s Yoruba Saxon have partnered with Netflix to produce the film adaptation of the upcoming book Onyeka and the Academy of the Sun by British-Nigerian author, journalist and hair care educator Tọlá Okogwu. Ola Shokunbi is set to write the film adaptation.

To quote variety.com:

Onyeka and the Academy of the Sun tells the tale of a teenager who learns she has powers and travels to Nigeria to learn more about her origins, where she discovers a threat to her newfound magical community.

Described as Black Panther meets X-Men or Percy Jackson, the book is the first in an action-packed series for middle-grade children and will be published by Simon & Schuster in the U.S. and U.K. this June.

In 2021, Westbrook Studios produced the Academy Award-nominated film King Richard and most recently debuted the series Bel-Air on Peacock, the dramatic reboot the 1990s comedy series Fresh Prince of Bel Air that starred Smith.

Read more: https://variety.com/2022/film/news/will-smith-david-oyelowo-netflix-movie-1235183223/

GBN Daily Drop Podcast: Black Lexicon – What “The Drinking Gourd” Means (LISTEN)

GBN Daily Drop Podcast: Black Lexicon – What “The Drinking Gourd” Means (LISTEN)

By goodblacknews on February 11, 2022

[Image via National Park Services; nps.gov]

by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)

Today’s GBN Daily Drop podcast is based on the Friday, February 11 entry in the “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day®️ Calendar for 2022 that explains the term “The Drinking Gourd.”

(Btw, GBN’s Page-A-Day®️ Calendar for 2022 is 50% off at workman.com with code:50CAL until 2/28/22!)

You can also follow or subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, rss.com or create your own RSS Feed. Or just listen every day here on the main website (transcript below):

SHOW TRANSCRIPT:

Hey, this Lori Lakin Hutcherson, founder and editor in chief of goodblacknews.org, here to share with you a daily drop of Good Black News for Friday, February 11th, 2022, based on the “A Year of Good Black News Page-A-Day Calendar” published by Workman Publishing.

It’s in the category we call “Lemme Break It Down,” where we explore the origins and meanings of words and phrases rooted in the Black Lexicon and Black culture. Today’s phrase? “The Drinking Gourd.”

“The Drinking Gourd” is a term from African American folklore used by enslaved people to reference “The Big Dipper” constellation. Thus, instructions along the Underground Railroad to “follow the Drinking Gourd” meant to follow the North Star as a guide on the path to freedom.

The term also referred to the hollowed-out gourd used by enslaved people and indentured workers to hold drinking water. The folksong “Follow the Drinking Gourd” was first published in 1928 and has been sung and recorded over the decades.

Right now you are listening to a taste of singer/songwriter Richie Havens’ version from the 1991 album, Songs of the Civil War.

Several children’s stories also employ the phrase and its lore, such as Jeanette Winter’s 1992 illustrated book Follow The Drinking Gourd and the 1993 Morgan Freeman-narrated and Taj Mahal-scored half-hour visual audiobook illustrated by Yvonne Buchanan also titled Follow The Drinking Gourd, which is currently available on YouTube. Links to these sources are provided in today’s show notes.

This has been a daily drop of Good Black News, based on the “A Year of Good Black News Page-A-Day Calendar for 2022,” published by Workman Publishing, and available at workman.com, Amazon, Bookshop and other online retailers.

Beats provided by freebeats.io and produced by White Hot. For more Good Black News, check out goodblacknews.org or search and follow @goodblacknews anywhere on social.

(paid links)

GBN Daily Drop Podcast: Classical and Opera Singer Marian Anderson – “The Voice of Freedom” (LISTEN)

GBN Daily Drop Podcast: Classical and Opera Singer Marian Anderson – “The Voice of Freedom” (LISTEN)

By goodblacknews on February 8, 2022

by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)

Today’s GBN Daily Drop podcast expands on the Tuesday, February 8 entry in the “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day®️ Calendar for 2022, which offers an inspirational quote from famous contralto Marian Anderson.

I include that, as well as a bit more historical context and links to sources, which can be found in the show’s transcript below.

(Btw, GBN’s Page-A-Day®️ Calendar for 2022 is 50% off at workman.com with code:50CAL until 2/28/22!)

You can also follow or subscribe to the Good Black News Daily Drop Podcast through Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, rss.comor create your own RSS Feed. Or just check it out every day here on the main website (transcript below):

SHOW TRANSCRIPT:

Hey, this Lori Lakin Hutcherson, founder and editor in chief of goodblacknews.org, here to share with you a daily drop of Good Black News for Tuesday, February 8th, 2022, based on the “A Year of Good Black News Page-A-Day Calendar” published by Workman Publishing.

Today, on #OperaDay, we offer an inspirational quote from famous contralto Marian Anderson, the first Black performer to sing at the Metropolitan Opera.

In addition to her commanding voice, Anderson is widely known for singing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on Easter Sunday in 1939 after the Daughters of the American Revolution enforced their segregationist beliefs and denied Anderson the opportunity to sing to an integrated audience at Constitution Hall in Washington D.C.

First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt and President Roosevelt supported Anderson, and over 75,000 people showed up to watch her outdoor concert.  To quote Anderson:

“Leadership should be born out of the understanding of the needs of those who would be affected by it.”

To learn more about Anderson, you can check out her 1956 autobiography, My Lord, What a Morning, the book about her landmark performance called The Sound of Freedom: Marian Anderson, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Concert That Awakened America by Raymond Arsenault or the 2011 award-winning children’s book The Voice That Challenged a Nation: Marian Anderson and the Struggle for Equal Rights by Russell Freedman.

You can also watch Voice of Freedom, the 2021 PBS documentary about Anderson. Links to these sources provided in today’s show notes.

This has been a daily drop of Good Black News, based on the “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day Calendar for 2022, published by Workman Publishing, and available at workman.com, Amazon,Bookshop and other online retailers.

Beats provided by freebeats.io and produced by White Hot. For more Good Black News, check out goodblacknews.org or search and follow @goodblacknews anywhere on social.

(paid links)

GBN Daily Drop Podcast: Carter G. Woodson – “The Father of Black History” (LISTEN)

GBN Daily Drop Podcast: Carter G. Woodson – “The Father of Black History” (LISTEN)

By goodblacknews on February 2, 2022

by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)

Here is GBN’s Daily Drop for Wednesday, February 2nd on Carter G. Woodson, “The Father of Black History” (transcript below):

SHOW TRANSCRIPT:

Hey, this Lori Lakin Hutcherson, founder and editor in chief of GoodBlackNews.org, here to share with you a daily drop of Good Black News based on the “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day Calendar published by Workman Publishing. This is Wednesday, February 2nd, 2022.

Known as “The Father of Black History,” author and historian Carter G. Woodson was born in 1875 to formerly enslaved parents who were never taught to read and write. To make ends meet, Woodson often had to forgo school for farm or mining work, but he was encouraged to learn independently and eventually earned advanced degrees from the University of Chicago and Harvard.

In 1915 he helped found the Journal of Negro History, then in 1926, he began promoting the second week of February as Negro History Week. This holiday led to the month of February officially becoming Black History Month in 1976.

Additionally, Woodson wrote and published The Mis-Education of the Negro in 1933, which is now available for free download in the public domain. This collection of articles and speeches became a classic touchstone for educators, as Woodson advocated for excellence in the education of Black students and demanded that school systems across America eliminate curricula designed deliberately to “mis-educate” Black children and promote the fallacy of white supremacy.

To learn more about Carter G. Woodson, check out articles on him at history.com and biography.com, or pick up the full-length biography published in 2014 called, Carter G. Woodson in Washington, D.C.: The Father of Black History. Links to all of these sources are provided in today’s show notes.

This has been a daily drop of Good Black News, based on the “A Year of Good Black News Page-A-Day Calendar for 2022,” published by Workman Publishing, and available at workman.com, Amazon,Bookshop and other online retailers. Beats provided by freebeats.io and produced by White Hot. For more Good Black News, check out goodblacknews.org or search and follow @goodblacknews anywhere on social.

________________________________________________________

Follow or subscribe to the Good Black News Daily Drop Podcast through Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, rss.com or create your own RSS Feed. Or just check it out every day here on the main website.

“A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day Calendar for 2022 is Now 35% Off and… a Daily Podcast! (LISTEN)

“A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day Calendar for 2022 is Now 35% Off and… a Daily Podcast! (LISTEN)

By goodblacknews on January 12, 2022
by Lori Lakin Hutcherson, Good Black News Editor-in-Chief

Thank you to everyone who so far has purchased, gifted and supported GBN’s A Year of Good Black News, the Page-A-Day Calendar for 2022 we’ve done  with Workman Publishing. Your appreciation has made it more than worth it.

Even though 2022 has officially started, if you or someone you know is still looking to get A Year of Good Black News, it is now available for 35% off at workman.com with Code: CAL35 until January 31st!

It’s also still available at Amazon, Bookshop, Barnes & Noble and other online retailers.

I’m also excited to share that we’ve broadened the calendar’s accessibility recently by launching Good Black News: The Daily Drop.

Good Black News: The Daily Drop is a podcast based on the calendar that offers an audio version of each entry that is posted daily, in addition to one new bonus episode every weekend (Saturdays and Sundays of the physical calendar share an entry). Check out the trailer here:

Our latest bonus episode:

And today’s episode:

Good Black News: The Daily Drop is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Google Podcasts and rss.com. Or you can subscribe by the rss feed via any platform you like.

Enjoy!

(paid links)

Happy New Year and Congratulations to January Winners of “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day® Calendar 2022!

Happy New Year and Congratulations to January Winners of “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day® Calendar 2022!

By goodblacknews on January 1, 2022

First and foremost, Happy New Year 2022! Congratulations on the perseverance it has taken to make it to another year during such challenging times.

Secondly, we’d like to congratulate the January winners of our “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day® Calendar for 2022!  As a thank you for your readership and support, GBN has selected not one, not two, but five winners for December!

Congratulations to Sheila Collins, Fenesha Hubbard, William Walters, Charlotte White and Carla Brown! We will be contacting you each shortly via email to arrange delivery of your free calendars.

Thank you to everyone who entered the GBN Page-A-Day® calendar giveaway, and we hope our upcoming giveaways in the coming months will inspire you to do so again.

A Year of Good Black News for 2022 is filled with facts, history, bios, quotes, jokes and trivia in easy-to-read entries delivered on the daily, and if you still want to buy it for yourself, your family, children, friends, teachers or loved ones, use code: YAY21 at Workman.com to receive 25% OFF until January 3.

Or, if you prefer, you can also order from the retailers below:

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1523514299?tag=goodblacknews-20

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/9781523514298

Books-A-Million: http://www.booksamillion.com/p/9781523514298

Bookshop: https://www.bookshop.org/a/368/9781523514298

IndieBound: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781523514298?aff=workmanpub

Because interest in the calendar was high but not all who want it can win or by it, GBN is offering it in audio form day by day as Good Black News: The Daily Drop:

Good Black News: The Daily Drop is on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Soundcloud, Google Podcasts and rss.com. Or you can subscribe by the rss feed via any platform you like.

Onward and upward… and thank you for your support!

(paid links)

R.I.P. bell hooks, 69, Acclaimed Author, Activist and Poet

R.I.P. bell hooks, 69, Acclaimed Author, Activist and Poet

By goodblacknews on December 15, 2021

[bell hooks at The New School. Photo: Spencer Kohn, 2013]

Professor, author, and activist bell hooks, who explored and dissected social, political, gender and interpersonal issues in addition to intersectionality in works such as All About Love, Bone Black,  Ain’t I a Woman, The Will To Change: Men, Masculinity & Love,  Feminist Theory and Communion: The Female Search for Love, died today at 69.

She passed at home in Berea, Kentucky after an extended illness, according to a family statement from William Morrow Publishers and Berea College in Kentucky, which houses the bell hooks Institute.

Named Gloria Jean Watkins at birth, hooks was internationally known by her lowercase pen name ever since she published her 1978 collection of poems, And There We Wept. hooks took the name to honor her great-grandmother, Bell Blair Hooks. (She was told often as a child that her quick thinking and outspokenness was like that of “Granny Bell.”)

To quote from Los Angeles Times:

She attended segregated schools in Kentucky’s Christian County, then went to Stanford University. She later earned a master’s degree in English at the University of Wisconsin and a doctorate in literature at the University of California at Santa Cruz.

She also founded the bell hooks Institute at Berea College, which “celebrates, honors, and documents the life and work” of its namesake. hooks also served as a distinguished professor in residence in Appalachian studies there.

In 2017, she dedicated her papers to Berea College so that future generations would know her work and the impact she had on the intersections of race, gender, place, class and sexuality, the school said. The following year, she was inducted into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame.

Read more:

Authors Jason Mott and Tiya Miles Win 2021 National Book Awards for Fiction and Non-Fiction

Authors Jason Mott and Tiya Miles Win 2021 National Book Awards for Fiction and Non-Fiction

By goodblacknews on November 18, 2021

The National Book Foundation announced the 2021 National Book Awards winners list yesterday. Author and poet Jason Mott won the fiction prize for Hell of a Book, while author and historian Tiya Miles garnered the nonfiction prize for All That She Carried: The Journey of Ashley’s Sack, a Black Family Keepsake.Mott’s Hell of a Book tells the story of an author on a promotional tour and his haunted past and present in a surreal, narrative style.

“I would like to dedicate this award to all the other mad kids, to all the outsiders, the weirdos, the bullied,” he said in his acceptance speech. “The ones so strange they had no choice but to be misunderstood by the world and by those around them. The ones who, in spite of this, refuse to outgrow their imagination, refuse to abandon their dreams and refuse to deny, diminish their identity, or their truth, or their loves, unlike so many others.”

Miles’ All That She Carried traces the history of an American family through a cotton sack an enslaved ancestor gave to her daughter in the 19th century as they were about to be separated and sold apart.

In her acceptance speech, Miles thanked her editor Molly Turpin for championing her decision to write a book about “an old bag.” “Your face lit up,” Miles said. “You were so curious. You were so receptive. You were the perfect editor for this project.”

Other winners include Malinda Lo for young people’s literature with Last Night at the Telegraph Club — a story of same-sex, cross-cultural love set in the 1950s.

Martín Espada took the poetry prize with Floaters, and best translation went to Elisa Shua Dusapin‘s Winter in Sokcho, translated from French by Aneesa Abbas Higgins.

Winners in competitive categories each receive $10,000.

Established in 1950, the National Book Awards are intended to celebrate the following core beliefs:

  • Books are essential to a thriving cultural landscape
  • Books and literature provide a depth of engagement that helps to protect, stimulate, and promote discourse in American society
  • Books and literature are for everyone, no matter where the reader is situated geographically, economically, racially, or otherwise

Judging panels looked through more than 1,800 submitted books. This year’s judges included  acclaimed authors such as Eula Biss, Ilya Kaminsky and Charles Yu, winner in 2020 of the National Book Award for fiction.

[Photos: Tiya Miles via tiyamiles.com; Jason Mott via jasonmottauthor.com]

GBN Giveaway: “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day® Calendar 2022 – Congratulations to November’s Winner!

GBN Giveaway: “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day® Calendar 2022 – Congratulations to November’s Winner!

By goodblacknews on November 13, 2021

In celebration of our “A Year of Good Black News” Page-A-Day® Calendar for 2022, as promised, GBN has selected November’s winner of a free copy.

Congratulations to Ife Jacobs! We will be contacting you shortly via email to arrange delivery of your free calendar.

Thank you to all who have entered so far – and you are still in the running as we will continue to announce one winner a month until January 2022. To those who have yet to enter – it’s not too late!

For a chance to win, send your name and email address with the subject heading “A Year of Good Black News Giveaway” to goodblacknewsgiveaways@yahoo.com from now until December 31.  One entry per email, and we will continue to choose at random one winner per month and announce their names here.

Already the #1 new release in Multicultural Calendars on Amazon, A Year of Good Black News is filled with facts, history, bios, quotes, jokes and trivia in easy-to-read entries delivered on the daily.

If you want to buy copies for gifts to family, friends, teachers or loved ones, from 11/16-11/21 ONLY use the code: CYBER2021 at Workman.com to receive 30% OFF site-wide, plus Free Shipping over $20!

Or, if you prefer, you can also order from the retailers below:

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1523514299?tag=goodblacknews-20

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/9781523514298

Books-A-Million: http://www.booksamillion.com/p/9781523514298

Bookshop: https://www.bookshop.org/a/368/9781523514298

IndieBound: https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781523514298?aff=workmanpub

Onward and upward… and good luck!

(paid links)