Poet Askia Toure, BAM Producer Kim McMillan and Marvin X. Toure addressed students in Kim's class at University of California, Merced. He received lifetime achievement award from PEN Oakland.Toure mentored LeRoi Jones, aka Amiri Baraka. He guided Marvin X on his first visit to Harlem, NY, 1968
photo Necola L. Adams
Professor
and poet Askia M. Touré was born on October 13, 1938, in Raleigh, North
Carolina, to Clifford Roland Snellings, Jr. and Nannie Lynette Bullock.
Growing up, Touré attended Willard and Wogaman elementary schools. In
1952, Touré won a Motion Poetry Association Award while attending
Roosevelt High School. Two years later, he participated in a successful
sit-in at Roosevelt. Touré graduated from high school in 1956, and
joined the United States Air Force. While serving alongside Robert
Green of the Flamingos and Little Willie John, Touré wrote a letter to
Congressman Adam Clayton Powell that resulted in a government
investigation of racism at Wordsmith Air Force Base in Michigan.
After being discharged in 1959, Touré took art classes at the Dayton
Art Institute. He then moved to New York City and joined the Art
Student League and the Umbra Poets. He and his associates Tom Feelings,
Tom Dent, David Henderson, and Calvin Herndon were mentored by Langston
Hughes. Touré participated in the Fulton (Street) Art Fair in Brooklyn
in 1961 and 1962, and the Black Arts Academy. Influenced by artists and
writers such as Ernest Crichlow, Jacob Lawrence, Leo Carty, Elombe
Brathe, Ronnie Braithwaite, Bob and Jean Gumbs, and Rose Nelmes of the
Grandessa Models, Touré became a poet who championed a black aesthetic.
In 1961, Touré joined Max Roach, Abby Lincoln, Alex Prempe, May
Mallory, and Maya Angelou at the United Nations to protest the
assassination of Congo’s Patrice Lumumba in 1961. In 1962, Touré became
an illustrator for Umbra magazine, a staff member with The Liberator magazine, and a contributor to Freedomways.
Touré was a part of the Atlanta staff of the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and joined the Revolutionary Action
Movement (RAM) in Mississippi in the Spring of 1964. In 1965, Touré
founded Afro World and organized the Harlem Uptown Youth
Conference. Touré also participated in the rise of the Black Panther
Party and co-wrote SNCC’s 1966 “Black Power Position Paper.”
In 1967, Touré joined the staff of Nathan Hare at San Francisco State
University and taught African history in the first Africana Studies
Program. Touré organized the 1984 Nile Valley Conference in Atlanta and
co-founded the Atlanta chapter of the Association for the Study of
Classical African Civilizations (ASCAC) in 1986. Touré authored
multiple books and received the 1989 American Book Award for Literature (From the Pyramids to the Projects) and the 2000 Stephen E. Henderson Poetry Award (Dawnsong);
other works include films and plays. In 1996, Touré was honored with
the Gwendolyn Brooks Lifetime Achievement Award from the Gwendolyn
Brooks Institute in Chicago, Illinois.
Ishmael Reed, founder of PEN Oakland
photo Marvin X
Askia Toure and Opal Palmer Adisa
photo Necola L. Adams
Askia Toure, Opal Palmer Adisa, Destiny Muhammad, devorah major, Marvin X
photo Necola L. Adams
Askia Toure, Opal Palmer Adisa, Destiny Muhammad, devorah major, Marvin X
photo Necola L. Adams
Today we have a Black president, what has changed, does having a Black man in the white house change the mentality of the beast. Hell no! Having a Black president is symbolic but power doesn't trickle down, the only thing that trickles down is piss. The social contruct is still white, many of us see things in over simplified terms, they think symbolism constitute change and transfer of power. This is what the media hyped but soon there after the reality curtain came down and nothing of any significance changed, you did not become empowered ,the song remained the same and you still have a majority in jails and you lead the nation in unemeployment, so can you tell me what changed?
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