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R.I.P. James Hood, Student Activist Who Fought Segregation at University of Alabama

By goodblacknews on January 21, 2013
FILE - In this June 9, 1963 file photo, James A. Hood and Vivian J. Malone of Alabama pose in New York. Alabama Gov. George Wallace said he would personally bar them from registering at the University of Alabama despite a restraining order. (AP Photo/John Lindsay, File)
In this June 9, 1963 file photo, James A. Hood and Vivian J. Malone of Alabama pose in New York. Alabama Gov. George Wallace said he would personally bar them from registering at the University of Alabama despite a restraining order. (AP Photo/John Lindsay, File)

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — One of the first black students who enrolled at the University of Alabama a half century ago in defiance of racial segregation has died. James Hood of Gadsden was 70.  Officials at Adams-Buggs Funeral Home in Gadsden said they are handling arrangements for Hood, who died Thursday.
Then-Alabama Gov. George Wallace made his infamous “stand in the schoolhouse door” in a failed effort to prevent Hood and Vivian Malone from registering for classes at the university in 1963.  Hood and Malone were accompanied by Deputy U.S. Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach when they were confronted by Wallace as they attempted to enter the university’s Foster Auditorium to register for classes and pay fees.

Condoleezza Rice joins CBS News as Contributor

By goodblacknews on January 21, 2013

Former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice
Former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice

WASHINGTON (AP) — Just in time for inauguration coverage, former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has joined CBS News as a contributor.
Rice, who served as secretary of state during President George W. Bush’s second term, made her debut on “Face the Nation” Sunday and will be included in inauguration coverage on Monday.
CBS News Chairman Jeff Fager and president David Rhodes made the announcement Sunday, saying Rice “will use her insight and vast experience to explore issues facing America at home and abroad.”
Rice was the first African-American woman to serve as secretary of state, following Colin Powell in the office. She was Bush’s national security adviser during his first term and worked on the National Security Council under his father, President George H.W. Bush.

Barack Obama Sworn In to Second Term as US President

By goodblacknews on January 20, 2013
President Barack Obama is sworn in by Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. in the Blue Room of the White House during the 57th Presidential Inauguration January 20, 2013 in Washington, D.C. Obama and U.S. Vice President Joe Biden were officially sworn in a day before the ceremonial inaugural swearing-in. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski-Pool/Getty Images)
President Barack Obama is sworn in by Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. in the Blue Room of the White House during the 57th Presidential Inauguration January 20, 2013 in Washington, D.C. Obama and U.S. Vice President Joe Biden were officially sworn in a day before the ceremonial inaugural swearing-in. (Photo by Brendan Smialowski-Pool/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Stepping into his second term, President Barack Obama took the oath of office Sunday in an intimate swearing-in ceremony at the White House, the leader of a nation no longer in the throes of the recession he inherited four years ago but still deeply divided.

The president, surrounded by family in the ornate White House Blue Room, was administered the brief oath of office by Chief Justice John Roberts. With Obama’s hand resting on a Bible used for years by Michelle Obama’s family, the president vowed “to support and defend the Constitution of the United States,” echoing the same words spoken by the 43 men who held the office before him.

UCLA Adds Two Jazz Greats To Its Faculty

By goodblacknews on January 20, 2013

 

Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter
Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter

 
The Herb Alpert School of Music at the University of California at Los Angeles has announced that jazz greats Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter have joined the faculty of the Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz Performance. The institute is a two-year graduate program for jazz performing artists. There are currently seven students enrolled in the program. Hancock and Shorter will work with the seven students individually and as a group on composition, improvisation, and artistic expression.
Professor Hancock stated, “Wayne and I look forward to working with and guiding the new class of Monk Fellows. These exceptionally gifted young artists are destined to become some of the most influential jazz musicians of their generation. The mentoring experience will be profound for us, as well. The gift of inspiration in the classroom that develops from the master-apprentice relationship enhances our personal creativity on the bandstand and in the recording studio.”
article via jbhe.com

Actress Vanessa Bell Calloway Endows Jackson State University To Aid Foster Care Youth with Tuition

By goodblacknews on January 19, 2013

Vanessa Bell CallowayJackson State University in Mississippi has announced that foster care youth from outside the state of Mississippi can now enroll at the university and pay substantially lower in-state tuition. Actress Vanessa Bell Calloway has established an endowed fund at Jackson State to help these students pay for college.
Many students from the foster care system have great difficulty paying for college because once they reach the age of 18, they lose government benefits from the foster care program. Jackson State President Carolyn Meyers stated, “We want to remove as many barriers as possible so that students from all walks of life get the opportunity to succeed.”
In-state tuition for certain population groups outside of Mississippi was made possible by a new state law enacted last year. In addition to the new program for foster youth, Jackson State offers in-state tuition packages to high achieving students from urban schools outside of Mississippi, STEM majors, children of military families, and children of alumni donors.
article by jbhe.com

New President at Tennessee State Starts Job by Making a $50,000 Contribution to the University

By goodblacknews on January 19, 2013

Glenda Baskin GloverAs her first act of business after becoming president of Tennessee State University on January 2, Glenda Baskin Glover presented the university with a check for $50,000 to establish an endowed scholarship fund in her name. She hopes the gesture will propel other alumni to financially support the university. “I want our alumni and everyone to get involved in financially supporting our institution, so I am beginning the process with my contribution. I challenge each alumni chapter to match my gift or follow my lead in giving to TSU.”
Before taking over as the eighth president of Tennessee State University, Dr. Glover was dean of the College of Business at Jackson State University in Mississippi. She had been at Jackson State since 1994. Previously, she was chair of the department of accounting at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Glover is a certified public accountant. In addition to her bachelor’s degree in mathematics at Tennessee State University, Dr. Glover holds a law degree from Georgetown University, an MBA from Clark Atlanta University, and a Ph.D. in business economics and policy from George Washington University.
article via jbhe.com

Black Arts Movement Works Acquired by Brooklyn Museum

By goodblacknews on January 18, 2013
UrbanWallSuitJae Jarrell’s “Urban Wall Suit,” from 1969, recently bought by the Brooklyn Museum.

As the curator of American art at the Brooklyn Museum began work on an exhibition to coincide with next year’s anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, she happened on a trove of works from the Black Arts Movement, the cultural arm of the black power movement of the 1960s and ’70s, the New York Times reported.

Noticing that the collection bridged two generations of works already among the museum’s holdings — by earlier African-American artists like John Biggers, Sargent Johnson and Lois Mailou Jones, and by their contemporary successors — the curator, Teresa A. Carbone, persuaded the museum to acquire it.

“Even at a time when people are more aware of the established canon of black artists,” Ms. Carbone said, “these artists are only now gaining the recognition they deserve.”

The collection — 44 works by 26 artists — was assembled by David Lusenhop, a former Chicago dealer now living in Detroit, and his colleague Melissa Azzi. About a dozen years ago the two began buying pieces they felt were prime examples of the Black Arts Movement.

President Barack Obama's Profound Visual Argument for Gun Control

By goodblacknews on January 18, 2013

Barack Obama, gun control

President Barack Obama, accompanied by children who wrote to the president about gun violence following last month’s school shooting in the US, signs executive orders. Photograph: Charles Dharapak/AP
Barack Obama signs a series of executive actions in favour of gun control, flanked by children who wrote to him after the killings at Sandy Hook. Their parents or guardians stand behind them. While the children reflect the president’s solemnity, the supervising adults are finding it hard not to grin with pride at their kids’ involvement in this historic occasion.
It might look cynical. It might seem a bit obvious. The imagery here is so crystal clear they might as well have had a big sign saying “Children! Future!” (as they sing at The Simpsons’ Springfield elementary school).
But if you think that you probably haven’t got a child. Or perhaps you rationalised the US’s horror at the shootings that led to this photograph as colossal hypocrisy in the face of alleged massacres of non-American children by military drones. For some on the left it seems Obama is little better than a child murderer himself, while for the gun-toting right, his desire to restrict gun access is an assault on freedoms defined in the 18th-century political discourse that is the Constitution of the United States:

“A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to bear Arms shall not be infringed.”

And this is the point of Obama’s photo opportunity with America’s children. The debate about gun control is a debate about history and its burdens. When that amendment was added to the constitution in 1791, the authors surely did not think they were setting down the Ten Commandments of national identity, to be preserved unaltered forever. Or if they did, well … they are dead.

Anna Deavere Smith Wins $300,000 Gish Prize

By goodblacknews on January 18, 2013

Anna Deavere Smith.
Anna Deavere Smith (Photo: Evan Agostini/AP)

One of the largest prizes awarded in the arts, the $300,000 Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, is going to the actress and author Anna Deavere Smith.
The prize, now in its 19th year, was established by Lillian Gish’s will and is awarded “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.” Ms. Smith, a familiar figure on stage, television and film, was chosen from a list of 30 finalists.
Darren Walker, vice president for education, creativity and free expression for the Ford Foundation and a member of the selection committee, credited Ms. Smith with creating “what is in some ways a new art form,” and using her position as an artist and educator “to address today’s major social issues.”
Ms. Smith, who burst onto the theater scene in the 1990s with one-woman shows like “Fires in the Mirror” (about the 1991 riot in Crown Heights) and “Twilight: Los Angeles” (about violence that erupted in 1992 after the acquittal of police officers in connection with the beating of Rodney King), is now a regular presence on television in the Showtime series “Nurse Jackie.” In addition to writing books and appearing in films, she is also a professor at New York University’s Performance Studies Department.
“The Gish Prize provides credibility and recognition for artists who invented a new path for themselves and their work,” Ms. Smith said. The prize will be formally presented in a private ceremony on Feb. 13th.
article by Patricia Cohen via nytimes.com

Oprah Winfrey's OWN Channel Finally Set To Make Profit

By goodblacknews on January 18, 2013

Oprah WinfreyLast Tuesday afternoon, Oprah Winfrey called the co-presidents of her cable channel OWN with some jump-on-the-couch-with-joy news. “Lance wants to talk,” she said, referring to Lance Armstrong, whom she had been courting for a confessional interview about his long-denied use of performance-enhancing drugs.

Ms. Winfrey conferred with the co-presidents, Erik Logan and Sheri Salata, about booking a trip to Mr. Armstrong’s hometown, Austin, Tex., reserving airtime for Thursday night and announcing the “get” to the press.

What no one said on the call was that this interview — maybe Ms. Winfrey’s biggest since her 1993 sit-down with Michael Jackson — could be a turning point for OWN, which has been low-rated since its birth two years ago.

Another turning point — perhaps even bigger — came this month when OWN started to pocket substantial per-subscriber fees from some of the biggest cable and satellite operators in the country.

Some of these deals were made before OWN even had its premiere. The operators agreed to pay just a penny or two per subscriber a month until January 2013, and then start paying nearly 20 cents a month on average, according to people with direct knowledge of the deals who asked for anonymity because the details were confidential. The fees increase over a span of several years.

Multiply those dimes and quarters across most of the 83 million homes in which OWN is available (but not all — at least one deal is still pending) and the value for Ms. Winfrey and Discovery Communications is plain. Discovery, OWN’s other owner, has said that the channel will turn a profit for the first time in the second half of 2013. Discovery has invested more than $400 million to date.