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U.S. Congress Member Marcia Fudge Confirmed as U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development

U.S. Congress Member Marcia Fudge Confirmed as U.S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development

By goodblacknews on March 10, 2021

The U.S. Senate voted 66-34 today to confirm President Joe Biden’s nomination of Rep. Marcia L. Fudge (D-Ohio) as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), according to the Washington Post.

Fudge, a congressional representative since 2008, won bipartisan approval to take over leadership of HUD from Ben Carson, who undermined fair housing enforcement and other civil rights protections during the Trump administration. Fudge is the second Black woman to lead the agency (Patricia Roberts Harris, appointed by President Jimmy Carter in 1977, was the first).

“The past year has reminded us just how important it is to have a safe and stable place to call home. But, right now — for millions of Americans — that sense of security and peace of mind is out of reach,” Fudge said in a video statement released after she was sworn in Wednesday evening.

Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) Chairwoman Joyce Beatty and the Members of the Congressional Black Caucus issued the following statement on Fudge’s confirmation:

“The Congressional Black Caucus congratulates former CBC Chair and our beloved sister Marcia Fudge on her historic confirmation as the 18th Secretary of HUD and the first woman to serve in that important role in forty years. Although she and her scholarly counsel will be sorely missed here in Congress, her command of the issues impacting our most vulnerable, at-risk Americans will undoubtedly have a life-altering impact on countless individuals and families,” the statement said.

“Secretary Fudge is uniquely aware of the critical importance of Housing in our constituents’ lives and to the American people. She will be an invaluable member of the Biden Administration and a fierce advocate for the American people. The CBC could not be more pleased by her successful confirmation.”

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/03/10/hud-secretary-marcia-fudge-confirmation/

Connecticut Becomes 8th State to Pass CROWN Act, Making Natural Hairstyle Discrimination Illegal in Schools and the Workplace

Connecticut Becomes 8th State to Pass CROWN Act, Making Natural Hairstyle Discrimination Illegal in Schools and the Workplace

By goodblacknews on March 7, 2021

According to NBC Connecticut, earlier this week the Connecticut state Senate officially passed the CROWN Act, which makes workplace discrimination against natural hairstyles illegal.

The bill, which stands for Create a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair, passed in the State senate in a near-unanimous vote and is now on its way to Connecticut governor Ned Lamont.

The bill is the same as those that have passed in New York, California, Virginia, New Jersey, Colorado, Washington and Maryland; it protects those wearing natural or protective hairstyles from discrimination at their workplace or school and makes said discrimination illegal.

Rep. Robyn Porter of New Haven, who sponsored the bill, told NBC Connecticut that she had been told to “settle on a hairstyle” when she first joined the Senate. “Many of us are judged, reprimanded, and passed over for promotion or even fired for the way we wear our hair to work,” she said. “Conformity is often a means of survival.”

Other members were equally passionate about the bill’s passing. “Unfortunately, when you have hair that isn’t straight and when you have skin that’s Black or brown, it isn’t simply hair. It’s judgment,” said Rep. Tammy Exum of West Hartford to NBC Connecticut.

“I look at the hair of those around me and just accept it as is. It doesn’t speak to their ability, their competency, their performance, or their knowledge.”

Governor Lamont is expected to sign the bill into law, and he shared his thoughts on Twitter, writing, “This measure is critical to helping build a more equitable society, and I look forward to signing it into law in the coming days.”

The CROWN Act passed the United States House of Representatives in September 2020, and now waits for a vote in the United States Senate.

If you want to see the CROWN Act passed in your state, you can contact your representatives or sign this petition.

MUSIC: “Fire & Desire” – Celebrating the Ballads of Late Soul Singer Teena Marie on Her 65th (LISTEN)

MUSIC: “Fire & Desire” – Celebrating the Ballads of Late Soul Singer Teena Marie on Her 65th (LISTEN)

By goodblacknews on March 5, 2021

by Jeff Meier (FB: Jeff.Meier.90)

With today’s Good Black News Spotify playlist, we salute a true ally of the Black musical community, the late Christine Marie Brockert a/k/a the one and only Teena Marie, on what would have been her 65th birthday.

[spotifyplaybutton play=”spotify:playlist:0jjGm6Tc5q8nUfVvjPdF1n”]

Teena Marie is a singularly unique presence in music – a white female artist who, over the course of an entire successful career, always felt most at home in Black music.

In fact, when Motown Records released her first album Wild and Peaceful in 1979, the cover consisted simply of a photo of clouds over an ocean – completely avoiding showing her racial identity so as not to bias listeners towards her soulful singing. (Interestingly, this was the reverse of a trick they had previously employed in the early ’60s, using random graphics instead of artist photos on album covers for Mary Wells and The Marvelettes down South to avoid showing Black faces.)

Along with Rick James‘ production, just focusing on Marie’s voice and not her image worked – by the time Black listeners learned Teena Marie was white, she had already won them over with her songs and commitment to Black music, and classic soul fans embraced her fully.

Growing up in the late ’70s, I first remember Teena Marie for her uptempo funk/dance hits – “Square Biz,” “I Need Your Lovin’, “and my personal fave, “Behind the Groove.”

But over time, I realized that Teena’s truest connection to R&B was in her ballads – dramatic, long, lushly orchestrated, poetic, sensuous.  She wrote and sang many bedroom classics over the course of a 30+ years, before her untimely death at the young age of 54 back in 2010.

Today’s playlist is entitled “Fire & Desire: Teena Marie’s 40 Best Ballads”. This playlist consists of hits and album tracks from across her career. “Deju Vu,” “Casanova Brown,” “Portuguese Love,” “If I Were a Bell,” “Out on a Limb,” “Aladdin’s Lamp” “Dear Lover,” “Irons in the Fire” – we’ve got them all here, along with her Rick James duets.

But we’ve also got stripped-down ballads like ‘The Greatest Love of All Time.” Released on the collection First Class Love: Rare Teena Marie, this acoustic ballad was one of the demo tracks Teena created prior to her first Motown album – and it’s clear to see that her talent was fully formed even then.

And we’ve got tracks you may not have heard from her end-of-career resurgence with the albums La Dona, Congo Square, Sapphire, and posthumous effort, Beautiful.

We hope you’ll check out our one-woman Quiet Storm session, and, in the process remember a true groundbreaker, musical innovator, and truly unique singer – a woman like no other – Lady T.

Happy Birthday in Heaven, Teena Marie.

Janet Jackson Two-Night Documentary Event to Debut on Lifetime and A&E Networks in 2022

Janet Jackson Two-Night Documentary Event to Debut on Lifetime and A&E Networks in 2022

By goodblacknews on March 4, 2021

by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)

Finally!

Internationally renowned, Grammy Award-winning, Rock N Roll Hall of Fame inductee Janet Jackson will be the focus of an upcoming documentary on Lifetime and A&E Networks in 2022.

The two-night, four-hour documentary will coincide with the 40th anniversary of Jackson’s first album – no, not Control – that 1986 juggernaut was her third LP and first collaboration with producers Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis – but rather 1982’s eponymous Janet Jackson, which was released on the A&M records label and offered her early R&B hits “Say You Do” and “Young Love.”

Jackson is an executive producer with Randy Jackson, and according to Variety.com, producing teams from Workerbee and Associated Entertainment Corporation already have been working on the project with Janet for over three years.

To quote Variety.com:

The doc follows Janet as her family is going through the loss of her father, Joseph, the patriarch of the Jackson dynasty who passed in 2018. Producers were granted exclusive access to archival footage and never-before-seen home videos while developing the documentary for the past three years.

“JANET” will also detail the most talked-about moments of her life, including her 2004 Super Bowl appearance with Justin Timberlake in which she inadvertently exposed a portion of her breast, sparking controversy that would hover for more than a decade. The docu will also explore Jackson’s reaction to the death of her brother, the legendary and also controversial Michael Jackson, and her process of becoming a mother.

It’s about time the impact of Janet Jackson and her legacy on popular music and culture will be realized in-depth and, as a major Janet stan since even before her first LP – I’m talking Good Times and Fame days, people – I can’t wait! And I’m sure I’m not alone.

But until then, we’ll always have THIS:

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to Produce Documentary on U.S. Protests for A+E Networks History Channel

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar to Produce Documentary on U.S. Protests for A+E Networks History Channel

By goodblacknews on March 4, 2021

Columnist and former NBA All-Star Kareem Abdul-Jabbar will be executive producing Fight the Power: The Protests That Changed America with Deborah Morales for the A+E Networks History Channel, according to deadline.com.

The one-hour documentary will examine the effect key protests have had over time on the evolution of America to explore the question: Does the arc of the moral universe bend toward justice when pressure is applied?

This collaboration is the second between the NBA legend and the History Channel, having previously paired up on 2020’s one-hour documentary Black Patriots: Heroes of the Revolution.

Fight the Power is produced by Six West Media with Abdul-Jabbar and Morales exec producing via Iconomy Multi-Media & Entertainment.

“The history of protest in America is also the history of social progress,” Abdul-Jabbar said.

Read more: https://thegrio.com/2021/03/04/kareem-abdul-jabbar-social-progress-documentary/

(paid links)

Artist Sonya Clark’s “Tatter, Bristle, and Mend” Exhibition on View at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in D.C. from March 3 to May 31

Artist Sonya Clark’s “Tatter, Bristle, and Mend” Exhibition on View at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in D.C. from March 3 to May 31

By goodblacknews on March 3, 2021

[Above image: Sonya Clark, Nap, 2012; Glass beads and board, 16 x 20 x 5 in.; On loan from the artist; © Sonya Clark; Photo by Taylor Dabney]

Sonya Clark: Tatter, Bristle, and Mend will be on view at the National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA) in Washington D.C. today, March 3 through May 31, 2021. Confronting themes of race, visibility and Blackness, it is the first museum survey of the acclaimed textile and social practice artist’s 25-year career, exploring the social and cultural impacts of the African diaspora.

The exhibition will feature nearly 100 works, including Clark’s sculptures made from pocket combs, human hair and thread as well as works from flags, currency, beads, sugar, cotton plants, pencils, books and more.

(Sonya Clark (b. 1967); Photo by Nicholas Calcott)

The artist changes these everyday objects with a vast range of techniques: she weaves, stitches, folds, braids, dyes, pulls, twists, presses, snips or ties within each work. By stitching black thread cornrows and Bantu knots onto fabrics, rolling human hair into necklaces and stringing a violin bow with a dreadlock, Clark manifests ancestral bonds and reasserts the Black presence in histories from which it has been pointedly omitted.

Throughout her 25-year career, Clark has become renowned for her application of fiber art techniques to human hair, combs, currency, hair salon chairs and other everyday materials to explore the social and cultural impacts of the African Diaspora.

The exhibition features nearly 100 works that reflect the breadth and depth of the artist’s practice. Illuminating the central themes of Clark’s art—including heritage, labor, language and visibility—the show aims to reveal Clark’s radical ability to combine an intensity of handwork and subject matter with an economy of form.

“This timely exhibition affirms Clark’s prowess as both maker and visionary,” said NMWA Deputy Director for Art, Programs and Public Engagement/Chief Curator Kathryn Wat. “She uses concept, process and participation rather than didactic imagery to reflect questions and truths back to us.”

Clark describes “mining” common objects, particularly those bound to identity and power, because “they have the mysterious ability to reflect or absorb us.” The artist transmutes these objects through the application of a vast range of fiber-based processes: weaving, folding, braiding, trimming, pulling, rubbing, twisting, pressing, snipping, dyeing, tying or stacking her diverse source materials.

By stitching black thread cornrows and Bantu knots onto flags, rolling human hair into necklaces, or stringing a violin bow with a dreadlock, she reasserts the Black presence in histories from which it has been pointedly omitted.

(2010; Five-dollar bill and thread, 4 x 6 in.; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Gift of Heather and Tony Podesta Collection; © Sonya Clark; Photo by Lee Stalsworth)

For example, Clark’s Afro Abe II (2010)—a five-dollar bill embellished with black threads that form an Afro for President Abraham Lincoln—is witty, poignant and provocative. The stitched intervention induces a sharp, penetrating moment of recognition and connection and infuses the currency with new, layered meaning.

Clark’s use of currency-as-canvas evokes personal, cultural and historical associations with money, including freedom, self-determination and property ownership. As Clark observes, “It’s crowning the emancipator with the hair most associated with Black liberation and black power,” simultaneously embodying the historical absence of Black political agency as well as the promise of it. That liminality—the creation of objects that simultaneously denote humankind’s capacity to suppress as well as persevere—is the formidable essence of Clark’s practice.

About Sonya Clark

Born in 1967 in Washington, D.C., Sonya Clark is professor of art and the history of art at Amherst College, and formerly a Distinguished Research Fellow in the School of the Arts at Virginia Commonwealth University. She earned an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art and a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She also holds a BA from Amherst College, from which she received an honorary doctorate in 2015. She is the recipient of the Rappaport Prize, James Renwick Alliance Distinguished Educator Award, United States Artists Fellowship, Anonymous Was a Woman Award, ArtPrize Juried Grand Prize, Pollock Krasner Foundation award and The 1858 Prize, among others. Clark is one of 16 international artists selected to participate in the inaugural Black Rock Senegal residency program (2020) in Dakar, a project launched by artist Kehinde Wiley. Clark’s art has been presented in more than 350 museums and galleries around the world and reviewed in publications including Artforum, The Art Newspaper, The Los Angeles Times and The New York Times.

R.I.P. Civil Rights Leader and Former National Urban League President Vernon Jordan, 85

R.I.P. Civil Rights Leader and Former National Urban League President Vernon Jordan, 85

By goodblacknews on March 2, 2021

Vernon Jordan, a civil rights movement activist and leader, former National Urban League president and adviser to former President Bill Clinton, died yesterday evening according to CNN. He was 85. His cause of death has not yet been released.

To quote cnn.com:

Born on August 15, 1935, Jordan grew up in the segregated South and graduated from DePauw University in Indiana in 1957, the only Black student in his class.

He then studied law at Howard University and began his career fighting segregation, starting with a lawsuit against University of Georgia‘s integration policy in 1961 on the behalf of two Black students, Hamilton Holmes and Charlayne Hunter. Jordan accompanied the two students to the UGA admissions office that year through an angry mob of White students.

He worked as a field director for the NAACP and as a director of the Southern Regional Council for the Voter Education Project before he became president of the National Urban League. In 1980, he survived an assassination attempt on his life.

“Today, the world lost an influential figure in the fight for civil rights and American politics, Vernon Jordan. An icon to the world and a lifelong friend to the NAACP, his contribution to moving our society toward justice is unparalleled,” NAACP President Derrick Johnson said in a statement Tuesday. “In 2001, Jordan received the NAACP’s Spingarn Medal for a lifetime of social justice activism. His exemplary life will shine as a guiding light for all that seek truth and justice for all people.”

To read more about Jordan:

Naomi Campbell Welcomes Pharrell Williams on Limited-Time YouTube Series “No Filter With Naomi” Today at 3PM EST (VIDEO)

Naomi Campbell Welcomes Pharrell Williams on Limited-Time YouTube Series “No Filter With Naomi” Today at 3PM EST (VIDEO)

By goodblacknews on March 2, 2021

International supermodel, activist and philanthropist Naomi Campbell welcomes musician, record producer, songwriter, singer, fashion designer and entrepreneur Pharrell Williams for an iconic conversation on “No Filter with Naomi,”  a limited-time series under her “Being Naomi” YouTube channel, live today at 3pm EST / 12pm PST.

With more than 500,000 views, the web series has invited fans to #stayhome during this pandemic to save lives and has focused on intimate conversations on multiple topics between Naomi and a diverse collection of her friends, including a variety of designers, musicians, activists, actors and media personalities. Recently, during Black History Month 2021, Campbell used her platform to highlight the “New Black Talent You Need to Know in the Fashion Industry”:

The series debuted on April 6, 2020 and has since featured guests Tracee Ellis Ross, Demi Moore, Mariah Carey, Chelsea Handler, Cameron Diaz, Lenny Kravitz, Whoopi Goldberg, James Charles, Charlamagne Tha God, Mary J. Blige, Gabrielle Union, Kate Hudson, Cynthia Erivo, Cindy Crawford, Marc Jacobs, Nicole Richie, Ashley Graham, Pierpaolo Piccoli, Lee Daniels, Christy Turlington, Adut Akech, Sharon Stone, Paris Hilton, Serena Williams and Venus Williams, Karlie Kloss, Anna Wintour, and Sean “Diddy” Combs.

The “No Filter with Naomi” series returned after hiatus on June 23rd and featured a select group of episodes focused on impactful conversations dedicated to #BlackLivesMatter, social justice issues, racial and human inequalities. These critical conversations included featured guests: Opal Tometi, Rev. Al Sharpton, Alphonso Reed, Cleo Wade, Bethann Hardison, Tyler Mitchell, Indya Moore, Chase Strangio and Tori Cooper.

WHERE: Streaming live on Naomi Campbell’s YouTube Channel. View all “No Filter with Naomi” episodes here.

BHM: Good Black News Celebrates Fannie Lou Hamer, Sharecropper, Senate Candidate, Voting and Civil Rights Activist

BHM: Good Black News Celebrates Fannie Lou Hamer, Sharecropper, Senate Candidate, Voting and Civil Rights Activist

By goodblacknews on February 28, 2021

by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)

This is Fannie Lou Hamer. A Mississippi plantation worker turned activist in the 1960s, who, from her own personal desire to claim her constitutional right to vote, was fired from her job, threatened by white supremacists and beaten while in police custody.

Hamer never stopped – she worked with other activists in her church and volunteers from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and traveled county to county to register other Black people to vote.

Hamer formed the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and demanded to represent her state at the 1964 Democratic Convention.

Hamer fought for voting rights, education rights, economic rights (she formed the Freedom Farm Collective to fight for redistribution of wealth from usurious sharecropping) and even ran for Senate.

She was not rich or traditionally educated or well-connected — Fannie was a person who saw injustice, got active and got involved. Among other microcosms of actionable wisdom, she is famous for the quotes, “I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired” and “Nobody’s free until everybody’s free” – the latter of which I proudly wear on my Fannie Lou Hamer T-shirt.

Hamer passed in 1977 after years of dealing with serious health issues, but her legacy as an outspoken and effective activist, organizer and champion for equal rights will never be forgotten.

In fact, it was announced a few days ago that rapper and activist Common is producing a biographical movie on Hamer based on her 1967 autobiography To Praise Our Bridges and the book God’s Long Summer by Charles Marsh, which chronicles of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.

You can also read more about Hamer here: https://snccdigital.org/people/fannie-lou-hamer/ and here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fannie_Lou_Hamer or read her speeches: https://bookshop.org/books/the-speeches-of-fannie-lou-hamer-to-tell-it-like-it-is/9781617038365

#blackhistorymonth #gettheknowledge
Black Lives Matter Foundation Expands $3 Million Survival Fund to Help Those Struggling Financially During Pandemic

Black Lives Matter Foundation Expands $3 Million Survival Fund to Help Those Struggling Financially During Pandemic

By goodblacknews on February 26, 2021

The Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation is formally expanding a $3 million relief fund it launched earlier this month to help people struggling financially during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Associated Press.

The foundation, which grew out of the creation of the Black Lives Matter movement nearly eight years ago, plans to give 3,000 microgrants of $1,000 each to people who it believes need it most.

The BLM foundation has already begun asking recipients to apply for the Survival Fund grants as it builds out its philanthropic arm. Those approved can have the money is deposited directly into their bank accounts or made available on prepaid debit cards, the foundation said — no strings attached.

As of Thursday afternoon, the foundation reported the response had been overwhelming and it was no longer accepting applications for the initial round of the fund.

To quote the Associated Press:

Patrisse Cullors, the foundation’s executive director, said that so far the Survival Fund’s first recipients have included the families of people killed by police or who died while incarcerated, grassroots community organizers, people who identify as transgender, single parents and formerly incarcerated individuals.

“This came from a collective conversation with BLM leadership that Black folks are being hurt the most financially during the pandemic,” Cullors said.“I believe that when you have resources, to hoard them is a disservice to the people who deserve them.”

During that time, mutual aid and direct assistance programs like BLM’s Survival Fund have increased in popularity. According to the nonprofit Town Hall Project, which created the Mutual Aid Hub to track various collective efforts last March, the number of mutual aid groups in the U.S. grew from 50 to more than 800 in 48 states by last May.

Black mutual aid efforts date back to antebellum times, when enslaved Americans pooled their money to buy each other’s freedom from bondage. In the 1960s, the Black Panther Party for Self Defense created programs in several stated where members provided groceries and breakfasts to the elderly and schoolchildren, as well as health care screenings through community clinics.

Cullors said the Survival Fund is a tribute to that legacy.

To read more: https://apnews.com/article/black-lives-matter-survival-fund-ad6c0c0777b3fdc44a4cd3aec8e09ccc