Academic

Barack Wins - The Work Continues

By Sherrilyn Ifill

So much to reflect on the last week. I wept like many others last Tuesday night, wrote a piece for a Canadian news service http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2008/11/04/f-vp-ifill.html and woke-up Wednesday feeling like I was in a dream.  Then I hit downtown Baltimore City and, well, like War sang decades ago, ?The World is a Ghetto.?  Folks were just trying to make it, like every other day.  A luta continua.  I cut the celebration.  Barack went to work on Wednesday and that was a lesson for us all.  Let?s get to work.

But first a moment to acknowledge the passing of ?Mama Africa,? — the great Miriam Makeba.  I met her in 1998 in South Africa and she was a mesmerizing and brilliant presence.  We talked about television and film imagery in the ?new? South Africa, where the hyper-blond American soap opera ?The Bold and the Beautiful? had just made its debut.  I remember dancing to Makeba?s ?Pata, Pata? song as a little girl in New York and had to pinch myself during our talk (I?m talking with Miriam Makeba!).  Makeba was a real artist who used her music to express the life and spirit of those living at the margins.  She recognized the complicated voices within simple melodies and sounds.  Her voice always transported me to an imaginary place where struggle was a way of life, inextricably intertwined with the joy of loving your community.  Makeba stood by her principles and remained committed to using her gift to aid freedom struggles around the world, even as she lived for decades as an exile from her beloved South Africa.  

Back to the work.  Schools and gangs.  A series airing on Morgan State University?s public radio station has been exploring the critical issue of school truancy and the path from “school suspension to jail” for so many of our City’s youth.  In the first show, the reporter explored the issue of truancy and gangs in Baltimore City?s schools.  You can?t help but be chilled when a police officer who works with at-risk youth describe gang recruitment in our middle schools as a kind of ?pyramid scheme? in which ?you have a 12 year-old who knows 12 12year-olds, who knows 12 12-year-olds.? You can read the transcript http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/weaa/news.newsmain?action=article&ARTICLE_ID=1400335&sectionID=1 . Like I said, back to work.  

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Full post as published by BlackProf on November 12, 2008 (boomark / email).