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7:03
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Black Looks
No one speaks of Biafra but scrape the surface and half of the yellow sun still rises. This short story published in 234NEXT goes some way to break the silence.
Going Home by Chika Unigwe
She said it started with the wife of the Igbo headmaster who was hacked to death in her own [...]
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6:55
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Black Looks
It is August 2009 and the people of Haiti are once again bracing themselves for the hurricane season. Last year the country was devastated by four hurricanes in just one month….
“The four tropical storms, ending with September’s Hurricane Ike, turned Haiti into a wasteland…Nearly 800 people died, about 60% of the country’s harvest was destroyed [...]
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11:35
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Black Looks
**LESBIAN MOVEMENTS: RUPTURES & ALLIANCES is a collection of experiences from those involved in lesbian, civil society and human rights movements worldwide.
Lesbians have always been present in various civil society movements, with gay men’s organizations, in feminist groups, as well as in the artistic sphere and in the fight for decolonization and independence of [...]
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5:20
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Black Looks
woke up this morning
bumped my head
fuzzed out, lights stars and wizzy things
trying to remember who am I?
looked into the mirror
and saw two eyes, good for seeing
one nose, good for smelling
two ears, good for listening
one mouth and one tongue,
good for licking, sucking, munching, smiling and much more
so I must be me
voices [...]
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7:11
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Black Looks
Part of the Big Debate series broadcast of South African TV, this is Part 3 of the Sex & Culture programme which discusses same sex relationships.
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4:35
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Black Looks
After 15 months of organising and calling for justice in the murder of lesbian soccer player, Eudy Simelane the accused will begin their defense today.
In these months evidence presented before the courts has consistently failed to address gender stereotyping that might have aggravated her attack and subsequent murder.
From tomorrow, 26 August, Khumbulane Magagula, [...]
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6:30
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Black Looks
Well worth taking the time to listen.
There are only two tribes in Kenya [Africa], the Haves and the Have Nots
I look at Kenya, at Africa through the eyes of ordinary person. I measure development not from the view point of those who are at the top of the mountain but from the standpoint [...]
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6:22
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Black Looks
49 Mean Ness Street
I woke up.
Opened the door.
Shut the door and there they were.
The beggars feasting on the remains me the day.
Blind legless armless lepers and assorted deformities assaulted my walled enclave of iron.
49 Mean Ness street had become a beggars banquet.
Beggars eating, drinking, laughing, dancing, loving.
Blind looked at me and spat,
I was [...]
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3:54
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Black Looks
Caster Semenya and – the ‘elephant in the room’
We write in response to the controversy surrounding the 800 m women’s world running champion, Caster Semenya and the flurry of articles surrounding this sad saga.
Some of those championing Caster’s cause accuse those wanting to sex-test Caster of imperialism and racism (as well as sexism). Others [...]
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5:27
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Black Looks
Julius K Kaggwa, Ugandan intersex activist comments on Caster Semenya
I have been following the story of Semenya and the controversy that has arisen from her outstanding achievement at the world games simply because her athletic ability and appearance are too masculine for her to be a woman.
One of the greatly disturbing details is the [...]
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5:42
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Black Looks
“Harriet” is a choreopoem by Zhana which explores themes around the sexual exploitation of African American women during enslavement.
“Harriet” tells the true story of Harriet Jacobs, author of Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, and portrays an imaginary meeting between her and Harriet Tubman. Harriet [...]
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5:37
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Black Looks
On the 21st August 2008 around 8.30pm Sean Rigg, a 40 year old Black man from Brixton, died in the custody of Brixton Police Station. Sean is one of a long line of Black males who have died whilst in police custody yet not one single member of the police has ever been made [...]
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7:44
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Black Looks
1. What’s your relationship to poetry? How do you interact with it?
I talk to my pet rabbit in rhymed couplets. Apart from that, I read it and think about it a fair bit. I make up songs in my head, to borrowed tunes.
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2. Do you work on just one poem at a time, or do [...]
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12:04
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Black Looks
The IAAF’s decision to force Caster Semenya to undergo a “gender verification test” is an example of erroneous spectacle based on binary fixations which feed into the misappropriation of a person’s actual gender identity. This should not be used as an indicator of what a persons identity is. The Guardian report [...]
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9:11
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Black Looks
One of the greatest omissions of 20th century European and African history are African soldiers who fought in World War I and II. Whilst we are repeatedly reminded of the role of the Gurkhas it is only now that these forgotten soldiers are being remembered as in a new BBC documentary which traces Nigerian [...]
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6:09
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Black Looks
Dear Frisker,
So why the frisking, my darling frisker?
You size me up as I approach your citadel;
Your mind cannot withstand my masculine;
You frisk me as rough as I have ever experienced
How could you then question racist next door?
So why the frisking, my darling frisker?
Did you enjoy yourself while you were at it?
You were no better [...]
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8:09
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Black Looks
How about the representation of Blackness in children s toys not the 50s, 60s, 70s but in 2009. These two dolls, one black one were white were found on sale in Costco – the images speak for themselves.
I’m black and a lil monkey
I’m white and a pretty panda
The report states that the [...]
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7:52
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Black Looks
Invisible Universe: a history of blackness in speculative fiction, is a work in progress documentary exploring the representation of blackness in horror and science fiction literature and film, and the response by “Black creators” in creating “their own universe”.
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6:52
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Black Looks
The Crime of Being Poor
With all the socialist accusations being made,
We do well to face the needy status and plight.
Homelessness: infraction with fine to be paid,
For loitering and begging. (Keep them out of sight.)
Having no habitation to drink in privacy,
A beer in public is a ticket to the clink.
The poor have [...]
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8:51
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Black Looks
I have become increasingly addicted to poetry particularly where it is concerned with notions of identity, the politics of location and universal struggle. HERE Joyoti Grech answers that familiar and so loaded question “Where are you from“ and other questions which constrict one’s being and becoming more than…..
In Answer to some questions
In answer to some [...]
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7:25
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Black Looks
You won’t hear of mermaids in folklore
Not to mention in naijan
Daily life. “It a western thing. It’s not for us,”
Said my naija nymph
Sweet as fleshly harvested honey. I smiled.
If only that were true?
“Naija isn’t impervious to
Evolution like the West it
Will break free of itself,” I
Said savouring sanity over delusional desires to
Be pure, secure, never ever [...]
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7:40
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Black Looks
Slavery has always been a near-taboo topic of discussion between Africans and Blacks in the Diaspora. In discussions about slavery, inevitably, the issue of sharing blame always arises. Did Africans because of greed, jealousies, stupidity, and or the lure of cheap gin and beads offered by Europeans gladly sell off their own people to a [...]
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7:24
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Black Looks
Feminism is an activism
In the service of equal
Rights for all women with
-out exception; all of us.
Congratulate yourself
When you hear echoes of
The gunshots pow, pow followed by a ring, ring,
Hits concrete or metal,
Setting my nerves on end.
Don’t call yourself a
[...]
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7:52
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Black Looks
Friday 31 Aug; Delmas: The state today closed its case against the three men accused of robbing, raping and murdering lesbian soccer star Eudy Simelane in April 2008. Activists, still reeling from the shocking happenings on day one in which state witness Thato Mphiti recanted his previous testimony and took sole responsibility for the crime, [...]