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December 3-9, 2008 ™ Vol. 13 Issue 44
TEXAS’ Widest Circulated and Read Newspaper with a Black Perspective
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America’s Battle Against HIV/AIDS
African-American
LIVING LEGEND
CARMEN WATKINS
African-American News&Issues
Dr. Tyrone Bledsoe’s segment, “Black Makes: Cultivating Passion for Excellence,” was well-received by over 400 attendees. Photo by LSCS
Dr. Alvia Wardlaw: Curator of African & AfricanAmerican Art Dr. Alvia Wardlaw, Curator of 20th Century Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston and Director, University Museum, Texas Southern University, has organized a number of exhibitions on African and African-American art. Author of The Art of John Biggers: View from the Upper Room and co-author of Black Art: Ancestral Legacy: The African Impulse in African-American Art, Wardlaw is a Yates High School graduate and attended Wellesley College where she earned a B.A. in Art History in 1969. A string of exhibitions and publications followed for venues throughout the country. She was awarded the M.A. in art history from The Institute of Fine Arts, New York University Institute of Fine Arts in 1986. In 1989, Wardlaw was recognized as one of the leading African-American art historians in the country when she was co-curator with Barry Gaither and Dr. Regena Perry of the watershed exhibition Black Art Ancestral Legacy: The African Impulse in African American Art for the Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Texas. In 1995, she organized The Art of John Biggers and in 1996, she became the first African-American to receive the Ph.D. in Art History from the University of Texas at Austin. She has received a long list of honors and awards. Wardlaw is Associate Professor of Art History at Texas Southern University and Director/ Curator of the University Museum at Texas Southern University. She serves as Curator of Contemporary and Modern Art at The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston and is currently organizing an exhibition of the art of Kermit Oliver and an exhibition surveying the quilting tradition of African-American women in Gees Bend, Alabama. This week AAN&I salutes Dr. Alvia J. Wardlaw as our Living Legend.
Quote of the Week: “We need to go home into our communities, into our churches and get tested now.” -Barbara Lee
Black Male Summit Seeks to Develop Men of Distinction MARVIN D. CLOUD
African-American News&Issues
HOUSTONWhen President-elect Barack Obama appeared in St. Petersburg, Florida, while on the campaign trail, three Black males stood up, and held up a banner that said, “What about the Black community, Obama?” Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, (the same Jackson who said ‘I wanna cut his n**s out,’) seen crying like a ... well, little girl, at Obama’s victory speech after he soundly trounced Republican rival John McCain, had complained that Obama seemed to be “talking down to Black people” at times and should broaden his message. Obama who initially was described as not being Black enough and later, too Black was in the classic catch 22 situation. His own people, although hopeful that his chances were much better than Jackson’s 1984 and 1988 runs for Democratic nominee and Al Sharpton’s 2004 run, were hesistant to waste their vote and White
people, who make up 74% of the U.S. population, and Hispanics who make up 15.1%, professed to having angst concerning a “Black Man in Charge.” What is certain is that in the wake of Obama’s successful and extraordinary campaign, Black young men finally can have a real aspiration to the nation’s highest office. And the success is not in the abstract, although proponents believe he is sent from God and opponents believe he is the antiChrist. The bottom line is, Obama is the epitome of the old saying, “Success happens when preparation meets opportunity.” After graduating high school from Punahou School in Hawaii, Obama attended Occidental College for two years, then received his B.A. from Columbia University. He later received his law degree from Harvard Law School becoming the Harvard Law Review’s first Black president), graduating magna cum laude. On the heels of his presidential campaign which is destined to change America’s politics forSee BLACK MALE page 3
President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS hailed by both parties as a significant accomplishment Recently, the House of Representatives voted in favor of reauthorizing the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). The reauthorization includes allocating $48 million for prevention and treatment of HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria in poor countries. The current $15 billion program has put 1.7 million people on
AIDS drugs and provided care and support to nearly 7 million. PEPFAR has been hailed by Democrats and Republicans alike, as one of the most significant accomplishments of the Bush presidency. PEPFAR’s goals and purpose are to prevent 12 million new HIV infections, providing antiretroviral treatment to more than 2 million, overall supporting care for 12 million people infected with the HIV/ AIDS. This legislation authorizes the spending of $2 billion next year for a Global Fund to fight AIDS. President Bush, who proposed doubling the program to $30 billion, later, accepted the $50 billion bill that was passed in April, 2008. The Senate inserted a mandate that more than half the money for HIV/AIDS go toward treatment and care. In the U.S., Americans continues to keep pressure on the fight against HIV/AIDS. But abroad, more than 40 million people suffer See HIV/AIDS page 3
Pernessa Seele, founder and CEO of Balm in Gilead, works to improve the health status of people of the African Diaspora by building the capacity of faith communities to address life-threatening diseases, especially HIV/AIDS.
Should HBCU degrees be complemented by those from a PWI? Justifying Blackness is a prescription to destruction of our own institutions WILLIAM A. FOSTER IV Contributing Writer
As I contemplate my decision to obtain my PhD a question continues to be raised. Have I spent too much time at HBCUs? Do I need to go to a PWI (pre-dominantly White institution) to prove I can compete with the best? For most of us, coming out of a HBCU, this is always a begging question. Yet for me it’s a slap in the face. There is a belief that too much exposure to one thought process in academia is a bad thing. This is called academic in-breeding, if you will, when all of your degrees come from the same institution. I truly subscribe to this belief. I am firmly against someone obtaining too many degrees from one in-
stitution. A change of scenery injects new thoughts and new ideas and offers a break from a homogenous thought process. However, I reject the notion that ALL HBCUs think alike. Anyone who has serious knowledge of HBCUs knows this not to be true. Like everything in society there are subcultures of an overall culture. The notion that all HBCUs are alike is to imply that all African-Americans think alike. We know this to not be true. Southern African-Americans think differently than our Northern counterparts. There are conservative African-Americans and liberal African-Americans each making up a very diverse culture that is the American portion of the African Diaspora. All of this comes back to my
point of HBCUs. Why would we assume then that all of their mindsets and ideas are the same? Having attended three different HBCUs, I have first hand knowledge that this statement is false. Each had foundational similarities, however so do most institutions of a certain culture. Once you are past that point, other things come into play as to shaping those subcultures like region, financial ability, social landscape, and many other factors. If this is the case then again I ask why do so many of us believe we have to justify our HBCU degrees with a PWI degree? The logic that we are a homogenous culture of thought is based on stereotyping and faulty premises. I dare say that at no point would a student from University of Texas or Texas A&M University be told they have had too much PWI exposure and they really should go to a HBCU. Instead, they may simply be directed to another PWI. In reali-
ty, all that really happens when we start to believe that we must justify our own Blackness in mainstream (or White America to be blunt) is a subscription to the destruction of our own institutions. I call this the Jackie Robinson Effect by way of what happened to the Negro Leagues as a result of the success of Jackie Robinson in the Major League Baseball (MLB). Most will say that’s a good thing because it was progress. I say do not believe such tomfoolery. The MLB realized where to find the better product—the Negro Leagues. They had the better talent. They played the more exciting brand of baseball. More importantly it provided a wealth accumulation for African-Americans because they owned the teams and the league. None of this would be true once Black players began leaving for the MLB. Wealth was utterly destroyed because there was no welcoming See HBCUs page 3 TX-1