Title:    Rising phoenix - character from dr michelle spry mkerrspry-

ink from shawn alleyne -

color from gizmobunny 
Artist: shawn alleyne < Pyroglyphics Studio > OR < https://www.deviantart.com/pyroglyphics1 >   

Prior post
https://aalbc.com/tc/profile/6477-richardmurray/?status=2635&type=status
Shawn Alleyne post
https://aalbc.com/tc/search/?q=shawn&quick=1&type=core_statuses_status&updated_after=any&sortby=newest

MY THOUGHTS AND THE ARTICLE

well i read the article, the argument by tyree is dysfunctional, the book was written in 2001, tyree admits the strategem would had been successful in 2010, so... saying it isn't how the industry operates in 2024 is dysfunctional. This is about a moment in the usa, this is not meant to be how the usa was before or after, but this was a real scenario. I wonder why everett had nothing to say. And the argument from some blacks against "urban lit" is no different than italians against italian mob movies . having people look like you represented in a way you don't like doesn't define you, but doesn't make it unreal. Some black people were and are step and fetchit's this doesn't mean I am or any other black person is one of them. Cord Jefferson's question shows he is either ignorant of black history or in denial about black experiences in the usa. For anyone who reads up to this point, let me say something that it seems isn't common knowledge in the usa. Most black people in the usa have always been unhappy or miserable, always. Yes from the colonial times to now a minority in the black populace in the usa has been happy. But, an overwhelming majoirty 95% to 75% of black people in the usa have been terrorized by whites in the usa or by the system of government in the usa designed or ruled by whites. I don't see how anyone black, non black or other can not accept that simple truth. Yes, obama exist, yes, michelle obama exist, yes oprah and the william sisters and lebron james exists. Ok most black people in the usa are miserable, are in pain, are unhappy, have dealt with trauma and they come from a centuries line of black people who felt worse. Said negativities are not the only things we have to offer to culture and have never been the only things. We made negro spirituals that uplift people today before the usa was founded. we made lues music that is utilized in so many asian animated works to characterize strong thoughtful characters. we made jazz that is considered world music and one of the utmost signs of improvisation. Cord Jefferson suggested black people's stories of pain or suffering or anguish or anger are too large in quantity, are too present. what? We made brer rabbit, which was referred to in positive fantasy star trek to save a bunch of defenseless humanoids from corruptions in and out of the fantasy united nations institution called the federation , with earth itself as its usa .saundra and others in the article's great flaw is speaking of the now. They can't get out of the now in assessing the film. Many black people in the usa  like to say , black folk need to forget the past, but does that mean we are to lie about it, or judge all only in the modern? 

ARTICLE

Some urban lit authors see fiction in the Oscar-nominated ‘American Fiction’

BY HILLEL ITALIE

Updated 10:41 AM EST, March 5, 2024

NEW YORK (AP) — Omar Tyree, author of such urban lit narratives as “Flyy Girl” and “The Last Street Novel,” recently went to see the Oscar-nominated movie “American Fiction.”

“I loved the emotions of the family,” Tyree said of the comic drama starring best actor nominee Jeffrey Wright as the struggling author-academic Thelonious “Monk” Ellison, Leslie Uggams as his ailing mother and supporting actor nominee Sterling K. Brown as his troubled and unpredictable brother. “I love seeing how Monk tries to bring the family unit together and just seeing Black people trying to work things out.”

But when asked about the film’s featured storyline — Monk finds unexpected success when he publishes a crude novel under the assumed identity of ex-con Stagg R. Leigh — Tyree laughed and gave a nod to “creative license.”

“The whole idea that he’s going to sell a lot of books by keeping it raw, in real life it doesn’t work like that,” he said. “That kind of book would have been stronger in the early 2000s.”

“American Fiction,” nominated for a best picture Academy Award and in four other categories, was adapted from Percival Everett’s “Erasure,” a 2001 novel that came out when a genre alternately called “urban lit,” “urban fiction,” “street lit” or “hip-hop fiction” was peaking, especially among young Black readers. Novels like Sister Souljah’s “The Coldest Winter Ever,” Shannon Holmes’ “B-More Careful” and Teri Woods’ “True to the Game” were selling hundreds of thousands of copies while major publishers, who had initially ignored the genre, were offering large advances in search of the next hit.

The urban lit genre dates back at least to 1967, and the release of the memoir “Pimp,” written by Robert Maupin, who was in jail when he began writing under the name Iceberg Slim and built a large word-of-mouth following. He inspired another street lit pioneer, Donald Goines, author of the Kenyatta urban crime series and other works from the 1970s that influenced such hip-hop stars as Tupac Shakur, who would famously declare, “Machiavelli was my tutor, Donald Goines my father figure.”

Urban lit is still around, but no new releases approach the heights of 20 years ago. According to Circana, which tracks around 85% of the print retail market, the genre sold around 380,000 copies in 2023, far less than the total sales for “The Coldest Winter Ever.” Many leading urban lit authors these days are either independently published — among them Black Lavish and Mz. Lady P — or released through Kensington Publishing Corp., which still has cut back over the past decade.

“At one point, the majority of the books on our list that were written by Black authors would have been categorized as urban or street lit,” says Vida Engstrand, Kensington’s director of communications. Because of changes in the “retail landscape and reader interest,” Kensington now offers a much broader selection, with “very few front list titles that fall squarely in the category of urban lit,” she says.

Everett, an award-winning author whose novels include “The Trees” and the upcoming “James,” was unavailable for comment, his publisher said.

Monk is inspired to write his pseudonymous book after looking through a bestseller titled “We’s Lives In Da Ghetto” and reading such sentences as “Momma says I be the ’sponsible one and tell me that I gots to hold thing togever while she at work clean dem white people’s house.” After failing to catch on as a literary author, he is offered a six-figure book deal and seven-figure movie deal for his profanely titled novel.

Stagg R. Leigh is praised by critics and even wins a prestigious literary prize. But few were calling Teri Woods or Shannon Holmes likely Pulitzer winners. The publishing community debated whether urban lit should be condemned for reinforcing stereotypes about Black life — stereotypes parodied by Everett in his novel — or welcomed for its blunt portraits of crime and poverty and for attracting new audiences.

“I’ve heard a lot of people within the Black community who have that viewpoint, that urban lit doesn’t reflect all of us,” says author Porscha Sterling. “And while it’s important to show the Black community in multiple ways, I do think it’s important to have a well-rounded view that includes everyone.”

“In my opinion, it was wrong to characterize these books as different from other Black literature,” says Malaika Adero, an author, agent and executive editor for AUWA, a Macmillan imprint led by Questlove. “We’ve had all kinds of classic books that dealt with the underground economy and the ghetto and weren’t classified as hip-hop lit.”

Monk’s novel has some parallels to a bestseller from the 1990s, Sapphire’s “Push,” an acclaimed and controversial novel about a pregnant teen from Harlem that begins in broken English, but becomes more traditional as the girl learns to read and write. At the time, Sapphire (a pen name for Ramona Lofton) was a little-known poet who received a large advance and attracted the interest of Hollywood. The book became the Oscar-winning movie “Precious.”

“American Fiction” director Cord Jefferson, nominated for best adapted screenplay, has said that reading “Erasure” reminded him of conversations he had with friends over the years.

“Why are we always writing about misery and trauma and violence and pain inflicted on Blacks? Why is this what people expect from us? Why is this the only thing we have to offer to culture?” Jefferson often wondered, he told The Associated Press last fall.

One urban lit author, Saundra, said she found “American Fiction” funny, but “a tad bit overdramatized,” adding she doubted a novel like the one Monk wrote would be so welcomed now. Sterling, whose novels include the series “Gangland” and “Bad Boys Do It Better,” said she identified with Monk’s frustration at not being understood and recognized, but also said the satire in “American Fiction” left her feeling “misunderstood”

“I don’t know any people who write like that in the urban lit genre,” she said.

Author K’Wan Foye, known as K’Wan, says he related well to the movie, even if it was “poking fun” at urban lit. He remembers being encouraged 20 years ago to write “something really ghetto,” what became his popular “Hood Rat” series, and showing up for a meeting at St. Martin’s Press wearing a Biggie Smalls-style suit.

“They thought it was some kind of persona, the way Stagg R. Leigh is in the movie,” K’Wan said. “And I was like, ‘No, this is who I am.’”

If “Erasure” had been published now, the protagonist would likely have chosen a different kind of book to parody the commercial market, authors and publishers say. Tyree thinks he would have been writing nonfiction, maybe working on a celebrity confessional like Jada Pinkett Smith’s “Worthy.” Shawanda Williams, who oversees the Black Odyssey imprint of Kensington, cites the 2022 bestseller “The Other Black Girl,” the surreal tale of a Black editorial assistant at a publishing house.

Saundra, whose novels include “Hustler’s Queen” and “It Ain’t About the Revenge,” says the urban lit market has faded enough that she’s trying a different kind of book. In 2025, Kensington will publish “The Treacherous Wife,” which she calls “domestic suspense.”

“Times are changing,” she says, “and I think readers are looking for suspense, something everyone can relate to.”

URL

https://apnews.com/article/american-fiction-urban-lit-oscars-9a6d0c044bc2bd94fe7e98217171973b?utm_source=copy&utm_medium=share 

Celebrating the Flickr x Black Women Photographers Grant 2023 Finalists and Recipient
NOVEMBER 22, 2023
We are delighted to announce the recipient and runner-ups of the the Flickr x Black Women Photographers [ https://blackwomenphotographers.com/ ] grant! The goal of this $2,500 grant is to help one photographer that is part of both Black Women Photographers and Flickr further their photography practice. Plus, ten more talented individuals are granted a one-year Flickr Pro membership and a one-year SmugMug Pro membership!

As part of their grant application, participants were asked to share a photo that aligns with the theme, “Light in Motion”. This theme was inspired by Edwina Hay [

Grant Recipient: Genesis Falls – “Children at Play”

Congratulations to Genesis Falls [ https://www.flickr.com/photos/199066659@N05/ ] – the recipient of this $2,500 grant! Genesis is a contemporary portrait photographer who lives and works in Chicago, Illinois. She uses her love for black/white film to demonstrate feelings and emotion through her lens. Capturing people at some of their purest moments.

When asked about the winning photo she says, “It stands out to me not only because of the subjects, but the visual way the light is streaming through the water.” We agree!

Runners-up:
So many amazing photos were submitted for the Flickr x BWP grant. Here’s our ten runners-up!

Ngadi Smart – “Family”

Ayesha Kazim – “Mirage”

Michelle Vinbaineashe – “Motheo”

Julia Holcomb – “Bubbles”

Melissa Joen –

Alexis Brown – “Road to the Phoenix” 

Gabrielle Morse – “In my motion” 

Kamerin Chambers – “Lost in thought” 

Bria Woods – “Fourth of July Fireworks” 

Marcia Williams – “Nura” 

On November 22nd, This Week in Photo’s [ https://thisweekinphoto.com/ ] Frederick Van Johnson and Edwina Hay, joined us for a very special episode of SmugMug Live [

] to celebrate everyone’s entries to the grant. Please take a moment to appreciate their work. If you’re interested in joining the Black Women Photographers community, we invite you to learn more [ https://blackwomenphotographers.com/ ] and request to join the group on Flickr. [

URL
https://blog.flickr.net/en/2023/11/22/celebrating-the-flickr-x-black-women-photographers-grant-2023-finalists-and-recipient/

Michelle Yeoh and opportunity

Silicon Valley Bank and risk in fiscal capitalism

Tiktok and the war over who owns the internet

Maternity Deaths in the usa

Londonium, the roman name for london

The live streaming former elected official in japan

Michelle Yeoh with her historic trophy. She has roles lined up but no starring ones.Credit...Sinna Nasseri for The New York Times

After Her Oscar Win, Will Michelle Yeoh Get to Lead Again?
The historic victory should mean opportunities to star again, but too often after such milestones, Hollywood doesn’t find central roles for women of color.

By Kyle Buchanan
Published March 15, 2023
Updated March 17, 2023

We’re conditioned to think of an Oscar win as the endpoint to a journey. For some actors, holding that trophy is the realization of a dream held since childhood. For others, it’s the culmination of a well-deserved comeback.

But what happens after that win? In our eagerness to treat Oscar victories as career capstones, do we pay too little attention to the opportunities that are supposed to come afterward, yet often don’t?

I’ve been mulling that over since Sunday night, when Michelle Yeoh took the best actress Oscar for “Everything Everywhere All at Once.” It happened at the 95th edition of the Academy Awards, the kind of big, tantalizing milestone that prods you to contemplate what has come before, and Yeoh’s win proved especially historic: The first Asian star to win best actress, she was greeted onstage by Halle Berry, the first Black woman to have pulled off that feat.

Asking Berry to announce the winner with Jessica Chastain (the previous year’s winner) was a gamble twice over. If Yeoh had lost to one of her four competitors — all of whom were white women — the ensuing photo op would have served as a stark example of a best-actress category that has been hostile to women of color for 95 years. And though Berry has returned to the Oscars several times since her 2002 win for “Monster’s Ball,” it has always been as a presenter and never as a nominee. To see her there is to be reminded that an Oscar win carries no guarantees when an actress is already liable to receive fewer scripts and career opportunities than her white counterparts.

So though Yeoh’s triumph was a long time coming, and I teared up as she addressed “all the little boys and girls who look like me watching tonight,” I also found myself worrying that it won’t be enough. The people in the Dolby Theater looked awfully proud of themselves after Yeoh’s win, but if they really want to do right by her, they have to keep writing lead roles for 60-year-old Asian actresses; otherwise, it’s just empty back-patting.

That, after all, was the real breakthrough of “Everything Everywhere,” Yeoh told me in October. We were at an awards event where, flanked by the “Everything Everywhere” directors Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, she reminisced about a Hollywood career that had mostly been filled with supporting parts.

“Look, I’ve been very blessed — I’ve continuously worked, and I’ve worked with great directors,” she said. “But for the first time, I’m No. 1 on the call sheet, thanks to these guys. I do meaningful roles, like in ‘Crazy Rich Asians’ and ‘Shang-Chi,’ but it was not my movie.”

Yeoh said she hoped that “Everything Everywhere” would not be a one-off, but more than a year after the film’s release, it’s unclear when, or if, she will have another lead film role. Coming projects — including the big-screen musical “Wicked,” the third “Avatar” movie, and the ensemble mystery “A Haunting in Venice” — all consign her to supporting parts. Though she is a headline-making superstar who led the hip studio A24 to its biggest ever worldwide hit, Yeoh is still too often treated as additional casting rather than the main event.

“Even you, Michelle Yeoh — on the top of the world — has struggled to find the right roles,” Kwan told her when we met in October. “I think that has taken a lot of people by surprise.”

Yeoh laughed ruefully. “I read scripts and it’s the guy who goes off on some big adventure — and he’s going off with my daughter!” she said. “I’m like, no, no.”

Few Hollywood movies are conceived with a woman over 50 as the central character, and the ones that are greenlit tend to offer those leads to a triumvirate of white women: Meryl if she’s older, Cate if she’s younger and Tilda if she’s weirder. To ensure that Yeoh can be first on the call sheet again, filmmakers must think more creatively, as Kwan and Scheinert did when they revamped “Everything Everywhere” for Yeoh after conceiving the film as a Jackie Chan vehicle. (And while they’re at it, can they find something juicy for last year’s best supporting actor, Troy Kotsur, similarly a boundary breaker — with “CODA,” he became the first deaf man to win an acting Oscar — who has been seen in little since?)

As momentum in the best-actress race swung from the “Tár” star Cate Blanchett to Yeoh over the last few weeks of awards season, I kept hearing a common refrain from voters: While Blanchett already had two Oscars and would surely be nominated again — she has eight nominations overall — this could be Yeoh’s only chance at gold. Though I understand the practicality of that argument, I hope those voters understand that their job isn’t done simply because of how they marked their ballot. Yeoh’s Sunday-night win is a big one, but the real victory will come when the lead roles that had long eluded her grasp start to become commonplace. If Hollywood can make that so, then instead of an endpoint, Yeoh’s historic Oscar will serve as a long-needed new beginning.

Kyle Buchanan is a pop culture reporter and serves as The Projectionist, the awards season columnist for The Times. He is the author of “Blood, Sweat & Chrome: The Wild and True Story of Mad Max: Fury Road.” @kylebuchanan

ARTICLE
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/15/movies/michelle-yeoh-oscars-next.html

A bank official trying to reassure worried depositors in 1933. Credit...Associated Press

The Silicon Valley Bank Rescue Just Changed Capitalism
March 15, 2023

By Roger Lowenstein

Mr. Lowenstein is a financial journalist and author of “When Genius Failed: The Rise and Fall of Long-Term Capital Management.”

After a career of writing about bank failures, I wound up in the middle of one when my bank, Silicon Valley Bank, was seized by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. On Saturday, when I tried to pay a bill online, I was greeted by this not very reassuring missive:

“This page will be unavailable throughout the weekend, but will resume next week in accordance with the guidance provided by the F.D.I.C.” I wasn’t truly worried; small depositors like me had long ago internalized the rule that it made no sense to worry about your bank’s condition, since the risks of failure were borne by the F.D.I.C.

Federal deposit insurance was introduced 90 years ago during the heart of the Great Depression. Ever since then, small depositors within the F.D.I.C. limit of coverage have slept soundly. Now, in light of the bank failures of the last few days and the F.D.I.C.’s extension of coverage, why will any depositor worry about risk? Having bailed out depositors of two banks in full, how will the government refuse others?

Established as part of the landmark Glass-Steagall Act of 1933, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation initially provided deposit insurance up to $2,500, supported by premiums from member banks. The act was written by two Democrats, Senator Carter Glass of Virginia and Representative Henry Steagall of Alabama. Steagall wanted to protect rural banks, which had many small depositors, from contagious panics.

In that era, banking “progressives” were centered in the heartland. During the 1920s, low farm prices led to waves of bank failures. Various states adopted insurance, but the statewide systems failed. Scores of bills for federal insurance were also introduced.

The idea was controversial. The president of the American Bankers Association protested that insuring deposits was “unsound, unscientific and dangerous.” It was opposed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and by his Treasury secretary, William H. Woodin. Roosevelt opposed insurance because he thought it would be costly and also encourage bad behavior. If there was no need to mollify depositors, then banks would be free to take all sorts of risks. Today we call this “moral hazard.”

In 1933, an estimated 4,000 banks failed. Roosevelt took office in March, and declared a national bank holiday to prevent more failures. After a pointed debate, in June Roosevelt signed the Glass-Steagall Act.

The F.D.I.C. definitely prevented panics. From its creation until America’s entry into World War II, banks failed at a rate of close to 50 per year, not bad considering the economic depression in most of that period. And most of the banks that failed were small.

By the postwar period, deposit insurance seemed to have been created for an era that no longer existed. Bankers schooled in the 1930s tended toward prudence, and the industry was risk averse. The failure rate was exceptionally low. That all changed in the 1970s and ’80s. A combination of financial deregulation, revived animal spirits on Wall Street, and rising inflation led to financial instability and swings in interest rates. Voilà — bank failures returned.

In recent days, many have been reminded of 2008 and ’09 (165 banks failed in those two years alone). But for the most part, that crisis was not the result of depositors pulling funds. Bear Stearns, Lehman and others failed or sought bailouts because overnight funding from professional investors disappeared. It dried up for two good reasons: Banks like Lehman had too much leverage, and they were overexposed to a very weak and widely held asset, mortgage securities.

That was not the case with S.V.B.

This panic was a classic bank run, and it bears an echo to a different historical episode. In the 1980s, lenders known as savings and loans had invested their funds in long-term mortgages paying a fixed rate of interest. When the Federal Reserve, under pressure of rising inflation, began to jack up rates, S.&L.s had to pay higher rates to attract deposits.

The mismatch between the cost of their money and the (lower) rate that their mortgages earned sank the industry. Many switched to riskier assets to juice their returns, but as these investments soured, their problems worsened. Roughly a third, or about 1,000, S.&L.s failed. The F.D.I.C. was not (luckily for it) involved, because the S.&L.s were covered by a separate federal insurer. This agency, known as F.S.L.I.C., became insolvent, and the subsequent bailout was estimated to have cost taxpayers more than $100 billion.

Silicon Valley Bank’s failure looks a bit like an S.&L. crisis in miniature. Like its 1980s counterparts, S.V.B. grew extremely rapidly, had many assets parked in fixed, long-term bonds, and was done in when inflation caused the Fed to raise interest rates, raising the cost of keeping deposits.

Like the S.&L.s, Silicon Valley Bank was heavily concentrated. It catered to start-ups for whom an S.V.B. account was a matter of status. One tech savant who had recently changed jobs (aren’t they always switching jobs?) told me that in his experience, roughly two thirds of start-ups banked with S.V.B. (the bank claimed that nearly half the country’s venture capital-backed technology and life science companies were customers).

These crises provoked a widening of the federal safety net. Until the 1970s, the F.D.I.C. limit on deposit coverage increased only slowly. But in 1980, as banks came under pressure from soaring inflation, Congress raised the cap to $100,000, over the objections of the F.D.I.C. itself. In the 2008 crisis, the limit was raised to $250,000. And after the failure of IndyMac in 2008, the F.D.I.C., when possible, quietly protected uninsured depositors.

In the rescue of S.V.B. on Friday and of Signature Bank in New York two days later, the F.D.I.C. overtly ignored the cap and rescued all depositors, irrespective of size. This is a breathtaking leap.

Rescued seven-figure depositors were primarily venture companies steeped in the ideology of investing. The first plank of capitalism is that it entails risk. You cannot sensibly invest without assessing the chance for loss. If venture firms relied on groupthink rather than financial due diligence, that was their doing. In the case of Signature, which was exposed to the crypto industry, the rescue probably bailed out gamblers on speculative assets.

Federal officials have seized on a technicality to claim that it is not a bailout: Any required rescue payments will come from a special assessment on (private) banks, not the public. Prudent banks, which hedged their exposure to interest rates and suffered a competitive cost for doing so, will be hit with the added expense. Most likely, banks will pass along the rescue costs in the form of higher fees to consumers.

Strictly speaking, President Biden’s assurance that taxpayers are not on the line was accurate. However, in the sense that banking customers are a pretty big group, the “public” will be affected.

Moreover, the hazardous effect on behavior will be the same.

The regulators clearly failed to monitor S.V.B.’s unhealthy mismatch of assets and liabilities. Their job will be more difficult in the future, as risk taking on deposits has effectively become socialized. What if a bank opts to attract more funds by raising its interest rate on deposits? Can the regulators permit it? Wait a second, this is what all banks do.

Once you take risk out of a part of a bank’s operations, it is hard to let market principles govern the rest. We should expect, at a minimum, tougher standards on bank capital (as now exists at the biggest banks), more regulation and higher costs. As this newspaper’s DealBook newsletter has predicted, more loans will move away from F.D.I.C.-member institutions to so-called shadow banks such as hedge funds, outside the purview of regulators.

In past bank failures, uninsured depositors did not lose all — 10 to 15 percent was typical. And in this episode, there wasn’t any systemically bad asset à la mortgages in 2008. Given that the risk was contained, and that the Federal Reserve provides liquidity to banks facing runs (and provided emergency liquidity this week), allowing uninsured depositors of banks that fail to suffer a haircut might have been healthier for the system in the long run.

And the bailout does nothing to address the condition that fostered financial instability: inflation. It may even exacerbate it. This is not what Henry Steagall had in mind.

Roger Lowenstein is a financial journalist and the author of “Buffett” and, most recently, “Ways and Means:Lincoln and His Cabinet and the Financing of the Civil War.”

The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.

ARTICLE
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/15/opinion/silicon-valley-bank-rescue-glass-steagall-act.html

TikTok’s chief executive, Shou Zi Chew, in the ByteDance offices in Singapore. The White House is hardening its stance toward the Chinese-owned video app.Credit...Ore Huiying for The New York Times

U.S. Pushes for TikTok Sale to Resolve National Security Concerns
The demand hardens the White House’s stance toward the popular video app, which is owned by the Chinese internet company ByteDance.

By David McCabe and Cecilia Kang
March 15, 2023
阅读简体中文版閱讀繁體中文版
WASHINGTON — The Biden administration wants TikTok’s Chinese ownership to sell the app or face a possible ban, TikTok said on Wednesday, as the White House hardens its stance toward resolving national security concerns about the popular video service.

The new demand to sell the app was delivered to TikTok in recent weeks, two people with knowledge of the matter said. TikTok is owned by the Chinese internet company ByteDance.

The move is a significant shift in the Biden administration’s position toward TikTok, which has been under scrutiny over fears that Beijing could request Americans’ data from the app. The White House had been trying to negotiate an agreement with TikTok that would apply new safeguards to its data and eliminate a need for ByteDance to sell its shares in the app.

But the demand for a sale — coupled with the White House’s support for legislation that would allow it to ban TikTok in the United States — hardens the administration’s approach. It harks back to the position of former President Donald J. Trump, who threatened to ban TikTok unless it was sold to an American company.

TikTok said it was weighing its options and was disappointed by the decision. The company said its security proposal, which involves storing Americans’ data in the United States, offered the best protection for users.

“If protecting national security is the objective, divestment doesn’t solve the problem: A change in ownership would not impose any new restrictions on data flows or access,” Maureen Shanahan, a spokeswoman for TikTok, said in a statement.

TikTok’s chief executive, Shou Zi Chew, is scheduled to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee next week. He is expected to face questions about the app’s ties to China, as well as concerns that it delivers harmful content to young people.

A White House spokeswoman declined to comment, as did a spokeswoman for the Treasury Department, which has led the negotiations with TikTok. The Justice Department also declined to comment. The demand for a sale was reported earlier by The Wall Street Journal.

TikTok, with 100 million U.S. users, is at the center of a battle between the Biden administration and the Chinese government over tech and economic leadership, as well as national security. President Biden has waged a broad campaign against China with enormous funding programs to increase domestic production of semiconductors, electric vehicles and lithium batteries. The administration has also banned Chinese telecommunications equipment and restricted U.S. exports of chip-manufacturing equipment to China.

The fight over TikTok began in 2020 when Mr. Trump said he would ban the app unless ByteDance sold its stake to an American company, a move recommended by a group of federal agencies known as the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, or CFIUS.

The Trump administration eventually appeared to reach a deal for ByteDance to sell part of TikTok to Oracle, the U.S. cloud computing company, and Walmart. But the potential transaction never came to fruition.

CFIUS staff and TikTok continued to negotiate a deal that would allow the app to operate in America. TikTok submitted a major draft of an agreement — which TikTok has called Project Texas — in August. Under the proposal, the company said it would store data belonging to U.S. users on server computers run by Oracle inside the United States.

TikTok officials have not heard back from CFIUS officials since they submitted their proposal, the company said.

In that vacuum, concerns about the app have intensified. States, schools and Congress have enacted bans on TikTok. Last year, a company investigation found that Chinese-based employees of ByteDance had access to the data of U.S. TikTok users, including reporters.

Brendan Carr, a Republican on the Federal Communications Commission, said the administration’s new demand was a “good sign” that the White House was taking a harder line.

“There is bipartisan consensus that we can’t compromise on U.S. national security when it comes to TikTok, and so I hope the CFIUS review now quickly concludes in a manner that safeguards U.S. interests,” Mr. Carr said.

The White House last week backed a bipartisan Senate bill that would give it more power to deal with TikTok, including by banning the app. If it passed, the legislation would give the administration more leverage in its negotiations with the app and potentially allow it to force a sale.

Any effort to ban the app or force its sale could face a legal challenge. Federal courts ultimately ruled against Mr. Trump’s attempt to block the app from appearing in Apple’s and Google’s app stores. And the American Civil Liberties Union recently condemned legislation to ban the app, saying it raises concerns under the First Amendment.

David McCabe covers tech policy. He joined The Times from Axios in 2019. 

Cecilia Kang covers technology and regulation and joined The Times in 2015. She is a co-author, along with Sheera Frenkel of The Times, of “An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook's Battle for Domination.” @ceciliakang

ARTICLE
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/15/technology/tiktok-biden-pushes-sale.html

Tammy Cunningham with her son, Calum. She gave birth while hospitalized with severe Covid-19.Credit...Kaiti Sullivan for The New York Times

Covid Worsened a Health Crisis Among Pregnant Women
In 2021, deaths of pregnant women soared by 40 percent in the United States, according to new government figures. Here’s how one family coped after the virus threatened a pregnant mother.

By Roni Caryn Rabin
March 16, 2023
KOKOMO, Ind. — Tammy Cunningham doesn’t remember the birth of her son. She was not quite seven months pregnant when she became acutely ill with Covid-19 in May 2021. By the time she was taken by helicopter to an Indianapolis hospital, she was coughing and gasping for breath.

The baby was not due for another 11 weeks, but Ms. Cunningham’s lungs were failing. The medical team, worried that neither she nor the fetus would survive so long as she was pregnant, asked her fiancé to authorize an emergency C-section.

“I asked, ‘Are they both going to make it?’” recalled Matt Cunningham. “And they said they couldn’t answer that.”

New government data suggest that scenes like this played out with shocking frequency in 2021, the second year of the pandemic.

The National Center for Health Statistics reported on Thursday that 1,205 pregnant women died in 2021, representing a 40 percent increase in maternal deaths compared with 2020, when there were 861 deaths, and a 60 percent increase compared with 2019, when there were 754.

The count includes deaths of women who were pregnant or had been pregnant within the last 42 days, from any cause related to or aggravated by the pregnancy. A separate report by the Government Accountability Office has cited Covid as a contributing factor in at least 400 maternal deaths in 2021, accounting for much of the increase.

Even before the pandemic, the United States had the highest maternal mortality rate of any industrialized nation. The coronavirus worsened an already dire situation, pushing the rate to 32.9 per 100,000 births in 2021 from 20.1 per 100,000 live births in 2019.

The racial disparities have been particularly acute. The maternal mortality rate among Black women rose to 69.9 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2021, 2.6 times the rate among white women. From 2020 to 2021, mortality rates doubled among Native American and Alaska Native women who were pregnant or had given birth within the previous year, according to a study published on Thursday in Obstetrics & Gynecology.

The deaths tell only part of the story. For each woman who died of a pregnancy-related complication, there were many others, like Ms. Cunningham, who experienced the kind of severe illness that leads to premature birth and can compromise the long-term health of both mother and child. Lost wages, medical bills and psychological trauma add to the strain.

Pregnancy leaves women uniquely vulnerable to infectious diseases like Covid. The heart, lungs and kidneys are all working harder during pregnancy. The immune system, while not exactly depressed, is retuned to accommodate the fetus.

Abdominal pressure reduces excess lung capacity. Blood clots more easily, a tendency amplified by Covid, raising the risk of dangerous blockages. The infection also appears to damage the placenta, which delivers oxygen and nutrients to the fetus, and may increase the risk of a dangerous complication of pregnancy called pre-eclampsia.

Pregnant women with Covid face a sevenfold risk of dying compared with uninfected pregnant women, according to one large meta-analysis tracking unvaccinated people. The infection also makes it more likely that a woman will give birth prematurely and that the baby will require neonatal intensive care.

Fortunately, the current Omicron variant appears to be less virulent than the Delta variant, which surfaced in the summer of 2021, and more people have acquired immunity to the coronavirus by now. Preliminary figures suggest maternal deaths dropped to roughly prepandemic levels in 2022.

But pregnancy continues to be a factor that makes even young women uniquely vulnerable to severe illness. Ms. Cunningham, now 39, who was slightly overweight when she became pregnant, had just been diagnosed with gestational diabetes when she got sick.

“It’s something I talk to all my patients about,” said Dr. Torri Metz, a maternal fetal medicine specialist at the University of Utah. “If they have some of these underlying medical conditions and they’re pregnant, both of which are high-risk categories, they have to be especially careful about putting themselves at risk of exposure to any kind of respiratory virus, because we know that pregnant people get sicker from those viruses.”

Lagging Vaccination
In the summer of 2021, scientists were somewhat unsure of the safety of mRNA vaccines during pregnancy; pregnant women had been excluded from the clinical trials, as they often are. It was not until August 2021 that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention came out with unambiguous guidance supporting vaccination for pregnant women.

Most of the pregnant women who died of Covid had not been vaccinated. These days, more than 70 percent of pregnant women have gotten Covid vaccines, but only about 20 percent have received the bivalent boosters.

“We know definitively that vaccination prevents severe disease and hospitalization and prevents poor maternal and infant outcomes,” said Dr. Dana Meaney-Delman, chief of the C.D.C.’s infant outcomes monitoring, research and prevention branch. “We have to keep emphasizing that point.”

Ms. Cunningham’s obstetrician had encouraged her to get the shots, but she vacillated. She was “almost there” when she suddenly started having unusually heavy nosebleeds that produced blood clots “the size of golf balls,” she said.

Ms. Cunningham was also feeling short of breath, but she ascribed that to the advancing pregnancy. (Many Covid symptoms can be missed because they resemble those normally occurring in pregnancy.)

A Covid test came back negative, and Ms. Cunningham was happy to return to her job. She had already lost wages after earlier pandemic furloughs at the auto parts plant where she worked. On May 3, 2021, shortly after clocking in, she turned to a friend at the plant and said, “I can’t breathe.”

By the time she arrived at IU Health Methodist Hospital in Indianapolis, she was in acute respiratory distress. Doctors diagnosed pneumonia and found patchy shadows in her lungs.

Her oxygen levels continued falling even after she was put on undiluted oxygen, and even after the baby was delivered.

“It was clear her lungs were extremely damaged and unable to work on their own,” said Dr. Omar Rahman, a critical care physician who treated Ms. Cunningham. Already on a ventilator, Ms. Cunningham was connected to a specialized heart-lung bypass machine.

Jennifer McGregor, a friend who visited Ms. Cunningham in the hospital, was shocked at how quickly her condition had deteriorated. “I can’t tell you how many bags were hanging there, and how many tubes were going into her body,” she said.

But over the next 10 days, Ms. Cunningham started to recover. Once she was weaned off the heart-lung machine, she discovered she had missed a major life event while under sedation: She had a son.

He was born 29 weeks and two days into the pregnancy, weighing three pounds.

Premature births declined slightly during the first year of the pandemic. But they rose sharply in 2021, the year of the Delta surge, reaching the highest rate since 2007.

Some 10.5 percent of all births were preterm that year, up from 10.1 percent in 2020, and from 10.2 percent in 2019, the year before the pandemic.

Though the Cunninghams’ baby, Calum, never tested positive for Covid, he was hospitalized in the neonatal intensive care unit at Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis. He was on a breathing tube, and occasionally stopped breathing for seconds at a time.

Doctors worried that he was not gaining weight quickly enough — “failure to thrive,” they wrote in his chart. They worried about possible vision and hearing loss.

But after 66 days in the NICU, the Cunninghams were able to take Calum home. They learned how to use his feeding tube by practicing on a mannequin, and they prepared for the worst.

“From everything they told us, he was going to have developmental delays and be really behind,” Mr. Cunningham said.

After her discharge from the hospital, Ms. Cunningham was under strict orders to have a caretaker with her at all times and to rest. She didn’t return to work for seven months, after she finally secured her doctors’ approval.

Ms. Cunningham has three teenage daughters, and Mr. Cunningham has another daughter from a previous relationship. Money was tight. Friends dropped off groceries, and the landlord accepted late payments. But the Cunninghams received no government aid: They were even turned down for food stamps.

“We had never asked for assistance in our lives,” Ms. Cunningham said. “We were workers. We used to work seven days a week, eight-hour days, sometimes 12. But when the whole world shut down in 2020, we used up a lot of our savings, and then I got sick. We never got caught up.”

Though she is back to work at the plant, Ms. Cunningham has lingering symptoms, including migraines and short-term memory problems. She forgets doctor’s appointments and what she went to the store for. Recently she left her card in an A.T.M.

Many patients are so traumatized by their stays in intensive care units that they develop so-called post-intensive care syndrome. Ms. Cunningham has flashbacks and nightmares about being back in the hospital.

“I wake up feeling like I’m being smothered at the hospital, or that they’re killing my whole family,” she said. Recently she was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

Calum, however, has surprised everyone. Within months of coming home from the hospital, he was reaching developmental milestones on time. He started walking soon after his first birthday, and likes to chime in with “What’s up?” and “Uh-oh!”

He has been back to the hospital for viral infections, but his vocabulary and comprehension are superb, his father said. “If you ask if he wants a bath, he’ll take off all his clothes and meet you at the bath,” he said.

Louann Gross, who owns the day care that Calum attends, said he has a hearty appetite — often asking for “thirds” — and more than keeps up with his peers. She added, “I nicknamed him our ‘Superbaby.’”

ARTICLE
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/16/health/covid-pregnancy-death.html

Two skeletons that were found last year as part of an archaeological dig in northern England.Credit...West Yorkshire Joint Services

A 1,600-Year-Old Coffin May Shed Light on Roman Britain
A lead-lined coffin that was discovered in northern England could offer clues about the area’s transition from the Roman Empire to its Anglo-Saxon period.

By Jenny Gross
Published March 15, 2023
Updated March 16, 2023
LONDON — British archaeologists have uncovered an ancient coffin in a 1,600-year-old cemetery in northern England, a discovery, they said, that could shed light on the end of Roman Britain and the establishment of Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.

Discovered during an archaeological dig in Leeds, the lead-lined coffin contained the remains of an aristocratic woman who most likely lived in the fourth century.

Archaeologists also found the remains of more than 60 people who lived in the area more than a thousand years ago. Some bodies were buried on their backs with their legs straight out, in accordance with late-Roman customs. Others adhered to the Anglo-Saxon tradition, within which burials often included items such as clothes fasteners and knives.

The archaeological dig was part of a consultation process for a company applying for permission to build on the site. Archaeologists had previously uncovered late-Roman stone buildings and a number of structures in the Anglo-Saxon architectural style in the area.

“Very quickly, we started finding burials,” said David Hunter, the principal archaeologist of the West Yorkshire Archaeology Advisory Service, which works with the West Yorkshire planning authorities. “The potential is there to give us much better information on how this transition from the Roman population to Anglo-Saxon England happened.”

Mr. Hunter said that the presence of both late-Roman and early-Anglo Saxon people on the same burial site was unusual. Whether the use of the graveyard had overlapped between the two eras would determine the significance of the find, he added.

The Roman occupation of Britain, from 43 A.D. to around 410, transformed the culture, as settlers from Europe, the Middle East and Africa arrived. Around the third century, market towns and villages were established, and Roman objects became more common even in poor, rural areas, according to English Heritage, which manages prehistoric sites, medieval castles and Roman forts in England.

After the Romans retreated from Britain, society became much more insular and parochial, Mr. Hunter said. A lot is unknown about the period, including how the area transitioned from being part of the Roman Empire in the early fifth century to part of the English nation in the 10th.

“Different people have different theories as to how this could have happened: It could’ve happened by cooperation, it could’ve happened by aggression,” he said.

These findings may add to knowledge about an era that is largely undocumented, Mr. Hunter said. Radiocarbon dating could help determine exactly when the remains were buried. Chemical tests could reveal the diets and ancestry of the people.

Researchers would also like to understand why there were a number of instances in which two or three people were buried in the same grave, as well as why there were multiple burial styles in the same cemetery.

Mr. Hunter said that the two different burial styles could be for reasons of practicality; Since the area was already recognized as a burial place by Roman Britons, it would have been easier for subsequent groups of people to have used the same site.

While the discovery was made in February 2022, the findings were only announced on Monday, in order to keep the site safe and conduct tests on some of the findings, the Leeds City Council said in a statement. The discovery of a lead-lined coffin is rare, with only a few hundred having been discovered in Britain, said Kylie Buxton, on-site supervisor for the excavations.

The council has not released the exact location of the dig. After the analysis is completed, the lead coffin may be displayed at the Leeds City Museum, in an exhibition on death and burial customs, officials said.

A correction was made on March 16, 2023: An earlier version of this article referred imprecisely to English Heritage. The organization manages prehistoric sites, medieval castles and Roman forts in England, not in the rest of Britain. (Other groups manage such sites in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.)
When we learn of a mistake, we acknowledge it with a correction. If you spot an error, please let us know at nytnews@nytimes.com.Learn more

Jenny Gross is a general assignment reporter. Before joining The Times, she covered British politics for The Wall Street Journal. @jggross

ARTICLE
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/15/world/europe/uk-roman-burial-leeds.html#:~:text=By Jenny Gross March 15%2C 2023 LONDON —,Roman Britain and the establishment of Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.

Mr. Higashitani, seen on a computer monitor, celebrating after winning his election to a seat in the House of Councillors in July 2022.Credit...Kyodo News, via Getty Images

How to Get Kicked Out of Parliament: Livestream Instead of Legislating
The upper house of Japan’s Parliament almost unanimously voted to expel an eccentric YouTuber who won a seat last year. The reason: He never showed up for work.

By Tiffany May and Hisako Ueno
March 15, 2023
Since he was elected to Japan’s Parliament in July, Yoshikazu Higashitani has spread celebrity gossip on his YouTube channel, explored the sights of Dubai and handed out snacks to children displaced by an earthquake in Turkey.

One thing he has not done is show up for work.

On Wednesday, he was expelled from Japan’s upper house of Parliament, the House of Councillors, making him the first elected lawmaker in the country to be removed from office in more than seven decades.

Before his short-lived career as a lawmaker, Mr. Higashitani, 51, was well-known for his lengthy livestreams during which he dished out salacious celebrity gossip under the alias “GaaSyy.” He ran for Parliament from Dubai, claiming that he could not return to Japan because the police were investigating him for fraud. While in self-imposed exile, he campaigned and promised to expose dozens of celebrity scandals.

To the surprise of many, he won — running as the candidate of the single-issue NHK Party, which is dedicated to making changes to how Japan’s national broadcaster is funded. But he has missed every session in the House of Councillors since then.

In the meantime, he has maintained diverse interests, balancing his lengthy rants about celebrities with breezy posts about touring La Sagrada Familia in Spain and playing water sports in Thailand, using the hashtag “#endlesssummer.”  Last week, he said he traveled to Turkey, and in videos posted online was seen distributing snacks to children in areas devastated by a February earthquake, in front of a camera crew.

The founder of the NHK Party, Takashi Tachibana, told reporters in January that the police had asked Mr. Higashitani, a fellow party member, to cooperate with investigations related to accusations of defamatory comments and threats he had made in his videos, and that the YouTuber would return to the country in March. (The police declined to comment.)

In February, the House of Councillors demanded that Mr. Higashitani apologize in an open session, a disciplinary act second only to expulsion. He had agreed to do so, only to backtrack on that decision last week, saying that he did not feel safe enough to return, despite having immunity from arrest as a lawmaker.

Mr. Tachibana said last Wednesday that he would step down as head of the party. “As party leader, I will take responsibility for GaaSyy’s failure to keep his promise that he would come back to the upper house to make an apology,” Mr. Tachibana said at a news conference.

He added that the party would be renamed “Seijika Joshi 48 To,” which translates to Politician Girls 48 Party, and that the actress Ayaka Otsu would replace him. Mr. Tachibana said that the party would broaden its goals and would also recruit only female candidates to run for upcoming local elections.

Koichi Nakano, a professor of comparative politics at Sophia University in Tokyo, said that the party’s rebranding was a response to a movement to increase the number of female candidates in elections.

“NHK Party must have thought that they can poke fun at that in a right-wing, misogynist way, by treating female candidates as if they were teen pop idols like AKB48,” Professor Nakano wrote in an email, referring to a popular female pop group.

He added that Mr. Higashitani’s notoriety and what he characterized as the populist appeal of his party got him elected. “It’s unusual, to a degree, but Japan has had its own share of media-celebrities who are complete amateurs of politics, including comedians, actors and pop singers, though none was as unserious as GaaSyy,” Professor Nakano added.

Jeff Kingston, a professor of Asian studies at Temple University’s Japan campus, wrote in an email: “The NHK party, despite rebranding, has achieved little except to register discontent with the establishment and unhappiness with the mandatory fees every household has to pay, even if they don’t watch NHK.”

Muneo Suzuki, who heads a key disciplinary committee in Parliament, told reporters on Tuesday that Mr. Higashitani had already been given ample time to correct his behavior, but that he had ultimately undermined the electoral process. “GaaSyy doesn’t understand what democracy means in principle,” he said.

Dozens of protesters, mostly members of the Seijika Joshi 48 Party, rallied in front of the legislature before lawmakers cast votes over whether to expel Mr. Higashitani. Among the 236 lawmakers who attended the session, all but one voted in favor of his ouster.

Mr. Higashitani could not be immediately reached for comment, but in a statement read on the House floor by Satoshi Hamada, a fellow lawmaker, Mr. Higashitani said that his removal was unjust.

“There will continue to be people like me running for office. If you do not want the world you have made to be destroyed, please exclude those people from candidacy from the very beginning,” he wrote in the statement. “I wish the same punishment upon lawmakers who leave their seats immediately after propping up their nameplates and ones who are asleep and don’t show up like myself.”

Tiffany May covers news from Asia. She joined The Times in 2017. @nytmay

Hisako Ueno has been reporting on Japanese politics, business, gender, labor and culture for The Times since 2012. She previously worked for the Tokyo bureau of The Los Angeles Times from 1999 to 2009. @hudidi1

Article
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/15/world/asia/japan-parliament-youtuber-expelled.html
 

Black taxpayers are at least three times as likely to be audited by the Internal Revenue Service as other taxpayers.Credit...Hiroko Masuike/The New York Times

Black Americans Are Much More Likely to Face Tax Audits, Study Finds
A new report documents systemic discrimination in how the I.R.S. selects taxpayers to be audited, with implications for a debate on the agency’s funding.

By Jim Tankersley
Jan. 31, 2023
WASHINGTON — Black taxpayers are at least three times as likely to be audited by the Internal Revenue Service as other taxpayers, even after accounting for the differences in the types of returns each group is most likely to file, a team of economists has concluded in one of the most detailed studies yet on race and the nation’s tax system.

The findings do not suggest bias from individual tax enforcement agents, who do not know the race of the people they are auditing. They also do not suggest any valid reason for the I.R.S. to target Black Americans at such high rates; there is no evidence that group engages in more tax evasion than others.

Instead, the findings document discrimination in the computer algorithms the agency uses to determine who is selected for an audit, according to the study by economists from Stanford University, the University of Michigan, the University of Chicago and the Treasury Department.

Some of that discrimination appears to be rooted in decisions that I.R.S. officials made over the past decade as they sought to maintain tax enforcement in the face of budget cuts, by relying on automated systems to select returns for audit.

Those decisions have produced an approach that disproportionately flags tax returns with potential errors in the claiming of certain tax credits, like the earned-income tax credit, which supplements low-income workers’ incomes in an effort to alleviate poverty. Those tax returns are more often selected for audits, regardless of how much in owed taxes the agency might recover.

The result is audit rates of Black Americans that are between three and five times the rate of other taxpayers, even when comparing that group to other taxpayers who also claim the E.I.T.C.

The I.R.S. does not detail how it selects returns for audit. But the researchers were able to isolate several apparent explanations for why Black taxpayers are targeted so much more frequently. One is complexity: It is much harder for the agency to audit returns that include business income, because that process requires expertise from individual auditors. Such returns appear to be audited less often than returns from otherwise similar taxpayers who do not report income from a business.

Black taxpayers are far less likely than others to report business income. And Black taxpayers appear to disproportionately file returns with the sort of potential errors that are easy for I.R.S. systems to identify, like underreporting certain income or claiming tax credits that the taxpayer does not qualify for, the authors find.

In effect, the researchers suggest that the I.R.S. has focused on audits that are easier to conduct and as a result, finds itself disproportionately auditing a historically disadvantaged group rather than other taxpayers, including high net-worth individuals.

“What the I.R.S. chooses to focus on when it conducts audits can either undercut or complement our progressive tax system,” said Daniel Ho, an author of the study who is the faculty director of Stanford’s Regulation, Evaluation and Governance Lab, known as RegLab, where the study originated.

The I.R.S. could instead program its algorithms to target audits toward more complicated returns with higher potential dollar value to the government if an audit found errors. In that case, the discrimination in the system would vanish, the authors concluded.

“Historically, there has been this idea that if federal agencies and other policymakers don’t have access to data on race and don’t explicitly take race into account when making policy decisions and allocating resources, the resulting outcome can’t be structurally biased,” said Evelyn Smith, an author of the paper who is a University of Michigan economics graduate student and visiting fellow at Stanford’s RegLab.

One lesson from the study, she said, “is that absolutely is not true.”

On his first day in office, President Biden signed a series of executive orders seeking to advance racial equity in the federal government and the nation. One of them included a directive to the White House budget office to “study methods for assessing whether agency policies and actions create or exacerbate barriers to full and equal participation by all eligible individuals.”

That order inspired researchers at the RegLab, which uses machine learning and other advanced techniques to help governments improve policies. It eventually yielded the study, which the authors will present publicly on Tuesday. It was conducted by Stanford researchers including Ms. Smith, Mr. Ho and Hadi Elzayn, along with Thomas Hertz and Robin Fisher of the Treasury Department’s Office of Tax Analysis; Arun Ramesh of the University of Chicago; and Jacob Goldin of Chicago and Treasury.

The group wanted to use machine learning to improve the federal auditing process, and they wanted to know if that process was infused with racial bias. But they couldn’t easily observe it, because the I.R.S. does not ask taxpayers to declare their race on tax forms, or otherwise track race in any way.

Instead, the researchers built a way to essentially fill in the blanks on taxpayer race, through a partnership with the Treasury that gave them access to 148 million tax returns and 780,000 audits, primarily from 2014, but ranging from 2010 to 2018.

They used taxpayer names — first and last — and the census demographics of their neighborhoods to effectively guess the race of any given filer. Then they examined those results in a small sample of returns from taxpayers who had reported their race elsewhere, on state election forms, in order to be confident that their estimates were correct.

The eventual findings were stark and surprising, the authors said. They saw an immediate correlation between the racial composition of neighborhoods and the audit rates in those areas — vivid signs of significantly higher audit rates for Black taxpayers.

Black Americans are disproportionately concentrated in low-wage jobs. They are more likely than whites to claim the E.I.T.C. The authors wondered if that prevalence in claiming the credit might explain why Black taxpayers face more audits, because I.R.S. data show the agency audits people who claim the E.I.T.C. at higher rates than other taxpayers.

But as the research progressed, the authors found the share of Black Americans claiming the E.I.T.C. only explained a small part of the audit differences. Instead, more than three-quarters of the disparity stems from how much more often Black taxpayers who claim the credit are audited, compared with E.I.T.C. claimants who are not Black.

Treasury officials are aware of the findings. The department started an advisory committee last fall to help it focus on disparities faced by Americans of color. This month, researchers from the department published an analysis of racial disparities in the tax code. It found a wide range of tax advantages that largely help higher-income Americans, like the mortgage interest deduction and preferential tax rates for investment income, disproportionately benefit white taxpayers.

Department officials are in the process of increasing tax enforcement on high earners and corporations that do not pay what they owe, using money from a sprawling climate, health and tax bill Mr. Biden signed into law last summer.

Asked about the study this week, a Treasury spokeswoman pointed to a letter that the deputy Treasury secretary, Wally Adeyemo, wrote last fall to the I.R.S. commissioner on those enforcement efforts, which in effect prioritized cracking down on groups of high-income taxpayers.

“Historic challenges and underfunding have led to audit rates for those at the top of the distribution decreasing more than the correspondence audits of those at the bottom in the last decade, which should change,” Mr. Adeyemo wrote.

Representative Richard E. Neal of Massachusetts, the top Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee, said in a statement on Wednesday that the audit rates documented in the study were “unacceptable, but a consequence of algorithmic tools that exacerbate racial biases in our institutions.”

Mr. Neal said he was looking forward to working with the Treasury on the new enforcement measures — and funding levels — that Mr. Biden set in motion last year. “It’s clear we must address the discrimination at the I.R.S.,” he said.

<the article misses the simple truth, every program, from the one people use to make speeches to the one people use to make paintings to the one people use to calculate taxes are made by humans sequentially, the biases negative or positive in the humans is in the functionality of the computer program, it is very simple  > 

Jim Tankersley is a White House correspondent with a focus on economic policy. He has written for more than a decade in Washington about the decline of opportunity for American workers, and is the author of "The Riches of This Land: The Untold, True Story of America's Middle Class." @jimtankersley

Article source
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/31/us/politics/black-americans-irs-tax-audits.html

Muhammad Aziz spent two decades in prison before he was cleared of killing Malcolm X.Credit...Todd Heisler/The New York Times
<What I love is no one is asking who actually killed Malcolm X? who? I bet somebody know and I bet whomever know is a real can of worms, unless everybody who know is dead and media rather not speak on this to rile up passions>

New York Pays $121 Million for Police Misconduct, the Most in 5 Years
The total was driven up by a small group of very expensive cases, including a settlement with a man wrongly accused of assassinating Malcolm X.

By Hurubie Meko
Feb. 2, 2023
Police misconduct settlements in New York City last year were driven to their highest level since 2018 by six payouts over $10 million, including one for Muhammad A. Aziz, whose conviction in the assassination of Malcolm X was thrown out after he spent two decades in prison.

Those cases, with a total value of about $73 million, accounted for about 60 percent of the settlements the Police Department paid last year, according to an analysis of city data released on Tuesday by the Legal Aid Society, New York’s largest provider of criminal and civil services for indigent clients.

The $121 million in payouts last year was up from about $85 million in 2021.

“In recent years, district attorneys have moved to vacate many more criminal cases going back dozens of years which have led to an increase in the number of reverse conviction suits and related payouts,” said Nick Paolucci, a spokesman for the city’s law department.

The city is “promptly reviewing” cases to keep litigation costs down and to provide a measure of justice to those who were wrongfully convicted, Mr. Paolucci added.

The increase in payouts can also partially be attributed to lawsuits filed following Black Lives Matter protests in the 2020, said Jennvine Wong, a Legal Aid staff attorney with the organization’s Cop Accountability Project.

Last year, the city’s Civilian Complaint Review Board, the oversight body that examines police misconduct, recommended that 145 city police officers should be disciplined for misconduct during the demonstrations after the killing of George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man who died in Minneapolis after his neck was pinned to the ground by Derek Chauvin, a white police officer, in 2020.

During the weeks of protest, police officers and demonstrators clashed throughout the city, resulting in injuries and hundreds of arrests. The oversight body found evidence that supported 267 accusations of misconduct against the officers, recommending the highest level of discipline for about 60 percent of them.

Even outside the lawsuits that stemmed from the protests, the Police Department’s settlement amounts are “astronomically high,” Ms. Wong said.

“They make the payouts, they settled the lawsuits, but then they don’t pursue discipline,” she said.

Editors’ Picks

Philomena Cunk Is Weird Enough to Take on the World

As Energy Costs Bite, Museums Rethink a Conservation Credo

13 Easy Slow Cooker Chicken Recipes for the Busiest Days
Police departments throughout the country have money set aside to settle civil lawsuits and often pay settlements to avoid lengthy litigation, said Maria Haberfeld, professor of police science at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice. Settling a lawsuit for police misconduct doesn’t mean that a department will punish officers, she said, adding that a payout “has no correlation to internal discipline.”

For the New York Police Department, a settlement “does not signify immediately, automatically that the officer needs to be brought on disciplinary charges,” she said.

When there are internal charges filed over a police officer’s conduct, administrative trials can take months to years to be decided.

“The systemic lack of police accountability for officers who kill and abuse people is a decades-old problem,” said Yul-san Liem, a representative of the Justice Committee, an organization that works with families in New York City whose relatives have been killed by police officers.

“All of those families have actively been campaigning and calling for the officers who killed their loved ones to be fired and that still hasn’t happened,” she said.

A spokesman for the Police Department said the “decision to settle a lawsuit and for how much remains with the Law Department and the Comptroller.”

The president of the Police Benevolent Association, Patrick J. Lynch, said that the annual totals of settlements are “not a fair or accurate measure” of how police officers have performed in a given year.

“The city routinely settles cases in which police officers have done nothing wrong, and some of the largest payouts arise from decades-old cases that don’t involve a single cop who is still on the job today,” he said.

The data on misconduct payouts released by the city’s Law Department this week doesn’t account for all police settlements in 2022. All told, the city paid nearly $184 million, primarily for personal injuries, but also property damage, according to the Comptroller’s office.

The average settlement totals for lawsuits have also gone up since 2018, according to Legal Aid’s analysis. In both 2020 and 2021, only one settlement topped $10 million, while there were no payments over that amount in the two prior years.

In the past three decades, New York State has also had the third-most people exonerated in the country at 319, behind Illinois at 556 and Texas at 437. The average payouts for those exonerated in New York are also among the highest in the country.

Although the city’s data included the settlement for Mr. Aziz, whose 1965 conviction was thrown out in 2021, the $13 million settlement for Khalil Islam, whose conviction for the assassination was exonerated posthumously, has yet to be reflected.

A version of this article appears in print on Feb. 3, 2023, Section A, Page 19 of the New York edition with the headline: N.Y.P.D. Misconduct Costs at 5-Year High. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

Article source
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/02/nyregion/new-york-police-department-misconduct-settlements.html

Athenia Rodney at her new home in Snellville, Ga., with her husband Kendall and three children. They moved away from New York City last summer.Credit...Nicole Craine for The New York Times

Why Black Families Are Leaving New York, and What It Means for the City
Black children in particular are disappearing from the city, and many families point to one reason: Raising children here has become too expensive.

By Troy Closson and Nicole Hong
Published Jan. 31, 2023
Updated Feb. 3, 2023

Athenia Rodney is a product of the upward mobility New York City once promised Black Americans. She grew up in mostly Black neighborhoods in Brooklyn, graduated from public schools and attended a liberal arts college on a full scholarship. She went on to start her own event-planning business in the city.

But as Mrs. Rodney’s own family grew, she found herself living in a cramped one-bedroom rental, where her three children shared a bunk bed in the living room. It was hard to get them into programs that exposed them to green spaces or swim classes. As she scrolled through friends’ social media posts showing off trampolines in spacious backyards in Georgia, the solution became clearer: Leave.

Last summer, the family bought a five-bedroom home in Snellville, Ga.

“I felt like it became increasingly difficult to raise a family in New York,” Mrs. Rodney said.

The Rodneys are part of an exodus of Black residents from New York City. From 2010 to 2020, a decade during which the city’s population showed a surprising increase led by a surge in Asian and Hispanic residents, the number of Black residents decreased. The decline mirrored a national trend of younger Black professionals, middle-class families and retirees leaving cities in the Northeast and Midwest for the South.

<Yes, many blacks who are in or near the Black one percent have left New York City. This is true, but most black people of the millions of Black people in NYC have not left and have no reason to leave.>

The city’s Black population has declined by nearly 200,000 people in the past two decades, or about 9 percent. Now, about one in five residents are non-Hispanic Black, compared with one in four in 2000, according to the latest census data.
< Exactly, black people at the top of the Black financial scale>
The decline is starkest among the youngest New Yorkers: The number of Black children and teenagers living in the city fell more than 19 percent from 2010 to 2020. And the decline is continuing, school enrollment data suggests. Schools have lost children in all demographic groups, but the loss of Black children has been much steeper as families have left and as the birthrate among Black women has decreased.

The factors propelling families like the Rodneys out of the city are myriad, including concerns about school quality, a desire to be closer to relatives and tight urban living conditions. But many of those interviewed for this article pointed to one main cause: the ever-increasing cost of raising a family in New York.

<this article failed to mention this more simply, NYC had between guiliani and bloomberg  twenty years of White Elephant mayors. Guiliani started the attack on the black community by selling the buildings NYC owned, and starting the charter school movement. Both tactics served the purpose of splitting the black community and deleting the black majority in Harlem in particular. The buildings by the fact that in many buildings black people essentially did for themselves and hurt in one way or another other black people. I can personally tell you, in  many buildings Black people used Guiliani's program to kic other black people out of the building and scheme for their own profiteering passions in real estate. And then Charter schools is a simple strategy. Guiliani knew that in every community you always have those that are happy to have and don't give a damn about others. Anyone who knows about education in japan or france or in NYC historically knows what the charter school movements goal really is. The advertised goal is to give parents a choice but the functional goals are: hurt the teachers union which is a historic enemy of the party of abraham lincoln, hurt black laborers as most black people's upward mobility isn't in owning businesses but in working for municipal governments, in aiding whites entering the black communities by offering them jobs through the private managements of charter schools who get public school money, and finally by creating another educational tier in NYC. At the top is the styvesant/bronx science/brooklyn tech schools where many children from NYC's officials go to/ next is private jewish schools or other private white institutions that are not only free from the educational scrutiny of public schools but even upon learning that they have near complete failure at standardized test are not ridiculed in media as the following report which has gone quiet in nyc media [ https://aalbc.com/tc/profile/6477-richardmurray/?status=2064&type=status ] / and now where there was public school is charter schools for parents of color, non white european descent, or whites themselves who are too poor for styvesant or a private school , but through vouchers which is a lottery, the most unfair of all things, get to go to a school with certain amenities that public school funding stop allowing when the 1970s hit and black children were making strides in the public schools of nyc.  I truly despise charter schools because I comprehend their purpose was never the betterment of all children but adding another layer to make public schools the dumping ground and how do I know this. What media never tells you is all the children who are taken from charter schools for failing in one way or another and guess where they have to go, the public schools. The algorithm is clear, the three layers above public schools will gain the kids with most affluence and public schools will have the majority. Public schools will never go away. And charter schools are known to not provide on average better grades or in NYC's case show an uptake in charter school enrollment. Public schools are losing kids across all demographics based on all peoples, not just black leaving nyc and why, cause the rent's too damn high... and that brings me to Bloomberg. Bloomberg continued the guiliani selling of nyc owned property + charter schools focused on the Black community, but he added the real estate boom. Which aided a Black Minority in the Black populace. Bloomberg made a ton of money. But he also led minorities in every community involved or aspiring to the real estate industry to make money in their own community, often against the betterment to the whole. But Bloomberg wanted to make a white city, and he succeeded in starting on the path. It was meant to be faster but it didn't work out that way.>

Black families drawn to opportunities in places where jobs and housing are more plentiful are finding new chances to spread out and build wealth. But the exodus could transform the fabric of New York, even as Black political power surges. It has alarmed Black leaders, as well as economists who point to labor shortages in industries like nursing where Black workers have traditionally been overrepresented.

< In all earnest, this is the best for the black community in NYC. One of the great fallicies of fiscal capitalism is the myth of majority wealth. The most successful communities in the USA or the European colonies that preceded it are minorities. The WHite jewish community, the white catholic, the Black Caribbean, being small is the best way for a community to be affluent in fiscal capitalism. German americans is where most of the poor white trash come from/ Descended of Enslaved Blacks in the USA is where most of the commonly called by other black people lazy ignorant blacks come from, it is the chinese americans where most of the slave/low wage workers trapped in chinese communities come from. It is always the largest communities in fiscal capitalism who produce most of the poor, fiscal capitalism is best for the most minor minorities as the usa proves. Black New York City population becoming less will cause it to benefit more financially, not governmentally, not in exposure,  but financially. It will force black wealth to interact more as the numbers are just smaller.>

The filmmaker Spike Lee, a longtime New York booster, said he worries about the city becoming more expensive and less accessible to people of color in particular, who have contributed so much to the city’s culture, from the birth of hip hop in the South Bronx to artists like Alvin Ailey and Jean-Michel Basquiat.

“It’s really sad because the reality is New York City is not affordable anymore,” Mr. Lee said. And if Black people can’t afford to live in the city, “you could seriously say New York City isn’t the greatest city in the world,” he said.
<a lie, greatness in NYC has nothing to do with the presence of Black people. Spike lee simply doesn't like the fact that the dream of stronger vibrant black communities in NYC is dead. The Black new york city community will become more a minority, and will become something it hasn't been since before the >

Eric Adams, New York’s second Black mayor, has vowed to create a more affordable city to stem the “hemorrhaging of Black and brown families.” Mr. Adams’s own bid for mayor was partially built on a biography that reflects the Black community’s roots in the city: His parents traveled north from Alabama during the Great Migration, climbed their way from poverty in Brooklyn to middle-class homeownership in Queens and relied on public schools and colleges to lift their children to greater success.
<He can't do that cause he nor any mayer in my lifetime in NYC has the courage and it will take hear tto take on the real estate industry of New York City, the project of BLoomberg will get its result>

Younger Black families say that trajectory has become more elusive. High inflation and a turbulent rental market as the pandemic has subsided have hurt New Yorkers across the board. But Black families lag far behind white families in homeownership and in building wealth. Black households have a median income of $53,000, compared with roughly $98,000 for white households, according to the most recent census data.
<NYC was never a pot of gold for black people, black people left the south not for jobs or betterment, they left the south because white people were burning our homes our people, the problem with the migration of DOSers in the USA is people, including black people, try to frame it as a financial affair, it was militaristic, whites burned black children alive as public entertainment and black people had to leave. This wasn't invite to work.  > 

Ruth Horry, a Black mother who bounced through cockroach- and rodent-infested Brooklyn apartments for years, has repeatedly been priced out by rising rents. Eventually, Ms. Horry, 36, and her three daughters, landed in the shelter system. At a shelter in Queens, the sink was so small Ms. Horry washed her children’s hair in the bathroom at a nearby McDonald’s.
< The article doesn't mention who owned those buildings, NYC white community never wanted the black community, it was a situation at the federal level, either the federal government protect black people from whites in the south or they don't, they chose not to, so either black people go to war against whites in the south or black people leave, black people chose to leave. but where could they go? North /West/Northwest was all 90% white and did not want black people and worked against black people from then to now. Black people make it seem like some sort of opportunities was waiting in the northern states > 

“The conditions for what you could afford were mind-blowing,” she said. “I was just so tired of that.”
<Again, your relatives were in the north for militaristic reasons not financial, nyc never tried to make a welcome mat for black people>

In late 2019, Ms. Horry moved to Jersey City through a New York City voucher program, known as the Special One-Time Assistance program, which relocates vulnerable families into permanent housing with a full year’s rent upfront. The drop in living costs has been life-changing, Ms. Horry said, and she is considering moving to the South to save even more.
<Again, that shows NYC's relationship. NYC is trying to help black people leave nyc and yet black people complain about nyc:)>

“I have no food stamps, no welfare, no rental assistance,” said Ms. Horry, who now lives in a two-bedroom apartment and pays the $1,650 monthly rent through her earnings at a nonprofit that helps families in Brooklyn’s Brownsville neighborhood. “I don’t qualify for those programs, and that is an amazing feeling.”
<This is the problem with black people in the usa , being poor isn't a symbol of yourself. but the individualist culture in the USA which is deeply entrenched among black people based on black forebears actions creates these illogical positions. If you are poor then having voucing or welfare is necessary. Black people living in nyc being assisted shouldn't be ashamed, you want the street or a place to live. you can chose live in the street and not have to deal with welfare/food stamps/rental assistance>

New York City’s loss of Black residents has been a gain for the South especially. The region’s economy has boomed as newcomers from the city and other urban areas in the North flock there.
<another lie, the south's economic growth is not related to blacks moving south , it is about the movement of industries to the south where wage cost are lower than north east or west coast. it is not about the movement of blacks.>

Still, Regine Jackson, a professor at Atlanta’s Morehouse College who studies migration patterns, said that as more Black Northerners make what is often a bittersweet decision to leave, it remains unclear whether the South will ultimately provide the greater opportunities they seek.
< the one bit of truth in the article. I know black people who went south, some like the highlighted people in the article come with money, but many are working poor folk who simply have a lower financial need in terms of cost of living but are not in a land of gold>

They may have become disillusioned with life in the North, said Ms. Jackson, but in the South, “there’s still problems.”
<truth>

“There’s been a lot of progress since the civil rights movement, yet there’s still a lot left to do,” Ms. Jackson said.
<truth, but i will say this, frederick douglass is getting his wish. The Black community, especially the Descended of enslaved, has basically lived side whites in majority since the end of the war between the states. First Black people were being burned alive in the south, then black people were put in caves in the north, and now 2023 the black community is split between the south and the not south and is more internally multiracial than ever and has only known living side whites in either situation. Is the black community better for it? Time will tell>

As New York’s housing shortage persists and rents stay high, Gov. Kathy Hochul recently pledged to build more than 800,000 new units of housing statewide over the next decade, double what went up in the past 10 years. In his own housing agenda, Mr. Adams has stressed expanding several programs to make homeownership more affordable for families of color.

While the Black homeownership rate — roughly 27 percent in New York — rose slightly during the pandemic, it has far to climb to catch up with other demographic groups. That is partly because of historical disparities, including racial biases that have held back Black homeownership. The national foreclosure crisis hit many middle-class Black families especially hard, and Black households still often face discrimination and the devaluation of their properties.

The departures have transformed neighborhoods across New York. In Southeast Queens enclaves like Jamaica and St. Albans, more Latino and South Asian residents are moving in. Harlem and Bedford-Stuyvesant, two iconic Black neighborhoods, have grown in population even as they experienced steep declines in the number of Black residents.

Harlem, for example, lost more than 5,000 Black people over a decade, while nearly 9,000 white people moved in, according to census data analyzed by The New York Times. Bedford-Stuyvesant lost more than 22,000 Black residents while gaining 30,000 white residents.

Christie Peale, the executive director of the Center for New York City Neighborhoods, a nonprofit that promotes affordable homeownership, said more aggressive efforts are needed.
< I repeat this was bloomberg's plan set on guiliania's , it took time to settle but it was inevitable. When the City government led by those two opened their properties which were gained by the 1970s when the real estate industry in nyc collapsed to the real estate industry again, it was bound to harm the black community especially > 

“Our fear is that the city will become whiter and wealthier, and the only opportunities for realizing the upside of a strong market will be for investors, people with high-income jobs,” Ms. Peale said. “It really will be that tale of two cities.”
<NYC was already like this not to long ago, again, people assess place absent an honest historical view. during the gilded when the great gatsby was written whites themselves in NYC felt the rich whites were, and I quote fitzgerald, the wicked rich. What she means by fear is really silly. Cities, all cities are like living beings, they change over time, they never remain the same. >

Citywide, white residents now make up about 31 percent of the population, according to census data, Hispanic residents 28 percent and Asian residents nearly 16 percent. While the white population has stayed about the same, the Asian population grew by 34 percent and Hispanic population grew by 7 percent, according to the data.
<Again when people use the word white, they usually mean white european, but white people are also white latinos/white asians as black latinos or black asians exist. So NYC if you think of white as more than white european but including white muslim/white asian/white latino was always mostly white. IT was false assessment that suggested it wasn't>

The loss of Black families has already had major implications for the education system. Some schools have shrunk, and teachers have had to be moved around to account for drops in enrollment. Overall, the public schools have lost more than 100,000 students in the past five years, a crisis facing other urban districts like Boston and Chicago. In 2005, Black children comprised 35 percent of K-12 students in New York City; they now make up closer to 20 percent.

Just since 2017, about 50,000 Black students have left K-12 district schools, a decline of nearly 22 percent. The drop among white children in the same period was 14 percent, while the overall Latino and Asian student populations declined at lower rates. Some Black students enrolled at charter schools, but many more left the city altogether. About one in four Black children at district schools who left last year moved to the South, Education Department data shows.
<I quote: Some Black students enrolled at charter schools, but many more left the city altogether. About one in four Black children at district schools who left last year moved to the South, Education Department data shows. So when people say public schools are being influenced by charter schools you can say yes> 

School enrollment has also been affected by a steady drop in birthrates, another national trend. Black women accounted for more than 30 percent of citywide births in 2000; their share was below 20 percent in 2019, state data shows.
< again, when people say public schools are being encroached by charters you can say , again, no . Charter schools isn't public schools problem, big urban cities is public schools problem and charter schools have for many successfully created a false narrative about their option having potency> 

Some of the Black families that left the city were seeking better educational opportunities for their children.

Michelle Okeke moved from Bedford-Stuyvesant to Mansfield, Texas, in 2021 to be closer to relatives who could help raise her two children. But she also worried about obtaining a good education for them in what she called New York City’s “insane” and complex system. Selective academic programs and top middle and high schools accept few Black children each year. Stuyvesant High School, the city’s crown jewel, made offers to just 11 Black students for its freshman class of more than 750 this academic year.

“There was always a part of me that was like, ‘How are we going to deal with schools?’” Ms. Okeke, whose children are 2 and 4, said. “It was a looming consideration: Should we move to Jersey? Do we go to another area where there’s more opportunities?”

The administration has sought to increase access to selective pathways like the city’s gifted and talented program. But parents worry that schools serving primarily Black children in a deeply segregated system could face larger losses in future rounds of school budget cuts, and that shrinking resources and cuts to programs may prompt further departures.

The continuing loss of Black New Yorkers may also disrupt the city’s job market. Melva Miller, the chief executive of the nonprofit Association for a Better New York, pointed to labor shortages in industries that have long relied on a disproportionate share of Black employees, like the building trades and civil service.

Some families who have left say there are things they miss about the city, but that the opportunities they have found elsewhere have made the move worth it.

Alisha Brooks, 36, a Bronx native, had always envisioned raising her children in the city, clinging to her identity as a New Yorker. But as a young Black mother, she sometimes felt out of place in her Brooklyn Heights neighborhood, which is predominantly white and higher income.

Her oldest son’s Brooklyn Heights school was largely white. In his final year there, fewer than 5 percent of the students and only a small number of teachers were Black. She noticed him growing increasingly insecure about his natural hair; classmates would sometimes try to touch it.

“He was starting to feel different,” Ms. Brooks said. “He needed to be around more diversity and see more kids who looked like him.”

After a trip to North Carolina in the spring of 2020 revealed how much cheaper life could be elsewhere, the Brooks family chose to move to Charlotte, where a growing Black population makes up more than a third of residents. Most of her sons’ new teachers, and more of their classmates, are Black.

Mihir Zaveri contributed reporting. Susan C. Beachy contributed research. Robert Gebeloff contributed data analysis.
< these individual examples are just that individual and I think have no place in the article really, communal issues are not revealed by individuals> 

Audio produced by Parin Behrooz.

Troy Closson is a reporter on the Metro desk covering education in New York City. @troy_closson

Nicole Hong is a reporter covering China. She previously worked for The Wall Street Journal, where she was part of a team that won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting. 

SOURCE ARTICLE
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/31/nyregion/black-residents-nyc.html
 

Title: Blackity Black February
Artist: Coco Michelle Illustration < https://www.cocomicheleillustrations.com/ >

Post from coco michelle
https://aalbc.com/tc/search/?&q=coco michelle&type=core_statuses_status&quick=1&author=richardmurray&search_and_or=and&sortby=newest

The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra has announced Endea Owens as its 2023 MAC Music Innovator. Owens is an award-winning bassist known for her vibrancy and international array of musical projects and collaborations. Endea is the bassist for singer Jon Batiste’s band Stay Human, house bassist for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and creator of The Community Cookout initiative, which brings hot meals and free music to communities in need.

Learn more about Endea and the MAC Music Innovator residency with the following article

Announcing Endea Owens as our 2023 MAC Music Innovator

CINCINNATI, OH (November 10, 2022)—The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra (CSO) announced Endea Owens as its 2023 MAC Music Innovator. Owens is an award-winning bassist known for her vibrancy and international array of musical projects and collaborations. Endea is the bassist for singer Jon Batiste’s band Stay Human, house bassist for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and creator of The Community Cookout initiative, which brings hot meals and free music to communities in need.

The Orchestra’s MAC Music Innovator is a year-long music residency that works to showcase and highlight Black leaders of classical music. Selected musicians embody artistic innovation and a passion for community engagement and education. With support from the Multicultural Awareness Council (MAC), a volunteer group that supports audience engagement initiatives with the CSO, the MAC Music Innovator will collaborate closely with the CSO’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DE&I) and Learning departments to create a distinctive residency with educational and community engagement programs. During her time as the MAC Music Innovator, Owens will engage with area students, community partnerships, chamber performance opportunities, and a culminating orchestra performance with the CSO.  

“We are excited to have Endea Owens as our 2023 MAC Music Innovator,” said Jonathan Martin, President and CEO of the CSO. “Her musicianship and heart for community, as evidenced by her work as the founder of The Community Cookout, are admirable. She is already a role model to young people who dream of carving a path for themselves in music, and we look forward to seeing the impact that Endea will bring to students in our schools and the greater community.”

“I am deeply honored to be chosen as the 2023 MAC Music Innovator by the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra,” said Owens. “The CSO's dedication towards both music and community is nothing short of amazing, and being selected as a MAC Music Innovator is something that I hold very dear to my heart. Growing up, I rarely had the opportunity to see live performances of any kind due to many variables. Now with the help of the CSO, I can be a part of the change that I've always wanted to see. I am excited to perform alongside so many incredible musicians and bring classical music, jazz, free meals, and joy to people from so many communities. The true spirit of music always begins with the people.”

Endea Owens is the 6th MAC Music Innovator since the residency’s creation in 2018, following violinist Kelly Hall-Thompkins (2018), pianist Michelle Cann (2019), composer and drummer Mark Lomax (2020), composer and pianist William Menefield (2021), and conductor Antoine Clark (2022). 

ENDEA OWENS

Known as one of jazz’s most vibrant emerging artists, Endea Owens is a Detroit-raised recording artist, bassist, and composer. She has been mentored by jazz icons such as Marcus Belgrave, Rodney Whitaker, and Ron Carter. She has toured and performed with Wynton Marsalis, Jennifer Holliday, Diana Ross, Rhonda Ross, Solange, Jon Batiste, Jazzmeia Horn, Dee Dee Bridgewater, Steve Turre, and many others.

In 2018, Endea graduated from The Juilliard School, and joined The Late Show with Stephen Colbert as a member of the house band, Stay Human. Since then, Endea has won an Emmy, Grammy Award, and a George Foster Peabody Award. Endea’s work has appeared on Jon Batiste’s Grammy Award-winning album We Are, the Oscar-nominated film Judas and the Black Messiah, and H.E.R’s widely acclaimed Super Bowl LV performance.

Endea has a true passion for philanthropy and teaching. She has taught students across the United States, South America, and Europe. In 2020, Endea founded the Community Cookout, a non-profit organization birthed out of the Covid-19 pandemic, that provides meals and music to underserved neighborhoods in New York City. To date, Endea’s organization has helped feed close to 3,000 New Yorkers, and has hosted over a dozen free music concerts.

In 2022, Endea composed an original piece about the life of Ida B. Wells entitled “Ida’s Crusade” for the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, which was also performed by the NYO Carnegie Hall Orchestra. Endea has also written for brands such as Pyer Moss and Glossier. Endea is set to premiere a newly commissioned work with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and will serve as the 2023 MAC Music Innovator with the organization. In addition to her work with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Endea is the curator for the National Arts Club and also a fellow for Jazz is Now! with the National Jazz Museum in Harlem, where she presents original compositions, curates series, and headlines performances for the 2022-2023 season. Endea’s debut album “Feel Good Music” is set for release in early 2023.

Article

 https://www.cincinnatisymphony.org/about/press-room/press-releases/announcing-endea-owens-as-our-2023-mac-music-innovator/

Endea Owens and The Cookout: Tiny Desk Concert from NPR videos

Clara Schumann and Florence Price Get Their Due at Carnegie Hall
Two works by these composers have been marginalized in classical music, but they were never forgotten, as their histories show.

By Sarah Fritz and A. Kori Hill
Oct. 27, 2022
Two composers marginalized by history will take center stage at Carnegie Hall this week.

On Friday, the Philadelphia Orchestra will perform Florence Price’s Symphony No. 3 and Clara Schumann’s Piano Concerto, which is making its Carnegie debut with Beatrice Rana as the soloist 187 years after its premiere.

Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the Philadelphia ensemble’s music director, called the concert, which sandwiches those two pieces between classics by Ravel, an example of varying artistic perspectives. “A work of art is a viewpoint from an artist,” he said in an interview. “And if you have only one part of society that always gets their viewpoint heard, we constantly hear one viewpoint. It’s so important to have different viewpoints.”

As a result of rediscoveries and shifting approaches to programming, works by Schumann and Price have migrated to classical music’s mainstream in recent years, with attention from major orchestras, especially Philadelphia, and recordings on prestige labels like Deutsche Grammophon. But they were never truly forgotten, as their histories show.

Schumann: Piano Concerto in A minor

In 1835, the piano concerto by Schumann (then Clara Wieck, not yet married to the composer Robert Schumann) premiered at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, Germany, under the baton of Felix Mendelssohn. She was just 16, but already famous as a composer and virtuosic performer. The work earned ovations, and later, the Viennese demanded three performances in one season. But after Robert Schumann’s journal, Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, among others, reviewed it as a “lady’s” composition, she shelved it.

The concerto’s second edition didn’t come about until 1970, according to Nancy B. Reich’s biography “Clara Schumann: The Artist and the Woman.” (The pianist Michael Ponti is believed to have made the first recording in 1971.) Decades of work by musicians and musicologists culminated in Schumann’s widely celebrated 200th birthday in 2019. But despite new recordings by Ragna Schirmer and Isata Kanneh-Mason, who recently debuted the concerto with the Baltimore Symphony and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, major orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, continue to ignore it.

Some artists have shrugged off the concerto, which Schumann completed when she was 15, as the work of a teenager. But it has had a long-ranging influence on some of the most beloved piano concertos that came after it.

“It was written at a pivotal point in the history of the genre,” Joe Davies wrote in “Clara Schumann Studies,” published by Cambridge University Press last year. “It invites a powerful reimagining of what the concerto can be and do. Stylistically and expressively, she put her own stamp on the genre.”

In an interview, Rana, who called the concerto “a genius work in many ways,” said: “I think that it’s very, very underestimated — the intellectual value of this concerto in the history of music.” Schumann’s nontraditional, through-composed form, seamless without breaks between movements, Reich has noted, bears the influence of Mendelssohn’s First Piano Concerto. Rana called it as revolutionary as concertos by Liszt and Robert Schumann, both of which it predates by over a decade.

The concerto’s powerful march opening, deceptively simple in its orchestral unison, contains the five-note motif that unites the themes across its three movements. In its transformative second movement Romanze, a tacit orchestra listens to the piano sing an exquisite love duet with a solo cello — an instrument that both Robert Schumann and Brahms featured in their concerto’s solo movements. Its final, longest movement displays the full breadth of Clara’s pianistic prowess and personality.

Alexander Stefaniak, the author of “Becoming Clara Schumann,” writes that Robert emulated her form and improvisatory style; Robert also inverted Clara’s piano entrance in his piano concerto (also in A minor). Based on that, you could consider her reach extending to Grieg’s and Rachmaninoff’s first concertos, which echo Robert Schumann’s. Brahms might even have been inspired by her third movement Polonaise in his First Concerto’s third-movement Hungarian dance.

“You can see she was a great virtuoso because what she writes is very challenging for the piano,” Rana said.

At Carnegie, Nézet-Séguin intentionally avoided the cliché of programming Schumann with her husband’s work. For him, she and Price stand on their own. As composers, they had “the self-confidence to believe in what they wanted to bring to the world,” he said. “They are works that have no equivalent.”

Price: Symphony No. 3 in C minor

Price’s Third Symphony is a work rooted in the traditions of symphonic Romanticism and classical Black composition, simultaneously adding to and expanding the expectations of orchestral technique. “A cross-section of Negro life and psychology” is how she described it in a letter to Sergei Koussevitsky, the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s music director, in 1941. That was a year after the symphony’s premiere, with Valter Poole and the Michigan W.P.A. Symphony, which was positively received in the Detroit press and even earned a mention in Eleanor Roosevelt’s syndicated column, “My Day.”

Price’s music, Nézet-Séguin said, is “like a great wine that really ages very well.” He and the Philadelphia Orchestra released a Grammy Award-winning recording of her First and Third Symphonies last year. Since then, he added, “We keep exploring all the finesse and the detail and the language.”

Philadelphia’s recording of the Third is the most high-profile, though not the first. (That was by Apo Hsu and the Women’s Philharmonic, released in 2001.) The album comes after decades of artists championing Price’s work, including luminaries like Marian Anderson and Leontyne Price, as well as present-day virtuosos like Michelle Cann, Samantha Ege and Randall Goosby, whose live recording of the violin concertos with the Philadelphia Orchestra will be released on the Decca label next year.

Rae Linda Brown, in her book “The Heart of a Woman: The Life and Music of Florence B. Price,” described the Third Symphony as a reflection of “a maturity of style and a new attitude toward Black musical materials.” Rather than applying African American music idioms through melody and harmony alone, Price incorporates conventions of form, texture, rhythm and timbre, an approach she also used in her Concerto in One Movement (1934), Violin Concerto No. 1 (1939) and Violin Concerto No. 2 (1952). Her percussion section calls for snare drum, cymbals, triangle, orchestral bells, castanets, wood blocks and sand blocks, to name a few; and she expands the brasses and woodwinds beyond the sets of twos from her earlier works. The first and final movements feature more contrapuntal motion and tonal ambiguity.

Nézet-Séguin said that during a rehearsal, a Philadelphia Orchestra member mentioned that Price probably played a lot of Bach, and that the third movement Juba-Allegro’s melody seemed to be a reference to Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 3. That speaks to another core aspect of her style: her use of the African American musical procedure of signifyin(g), in which older works and forms are referred to and transformed in new, unexpected directions.

The juba dance movement of Price’s Third features asymmetrical phrasing, rhythmic complexity and interaction between sections. The cool trio section, with habanera rhythms and a muted trumpet, and her use of a modified jazz progression for the main theme, reflects a creative palette that crosses time, region and culture.

UNLIKE SCHUMANN’S CONCERTO, Price’s symphony is not making its Carnegie Hall debut. But it has been performed there only once before — by the Gateway Music Festival Orchestra this year. By contrast, according to the hall’s archives, the Ravel works on Friday’s program, “Le Tombeau de Couperin” and “Boléro,” have been performed there 48 and 114 times.

“We’ve had too much of the white European male for too long,” Nézet-Séguin said, adding that it was time to aim “for a certain kind of balance in terms of what we see on our concert stage.”

Nézet-Séguin is an established Price champion by now; he and the Philadelphians brought her works to five European cities this summer alone. And Rana can say the same about Schumann, having toured the concerto with Nézet-Séguin, and having prepared a recording to be released in February.

“The only way to give dignity to a piece is to listen to it,” Rana said. “It needs to be played. It needs to be heard.”

Sarah Fritz, a musicologist who is writing a book about Clara Schumann, teaches at the Westminster Conservatory of Music at Rider University.

A. Kori Hill is a musicologist, freelance writer and staff member of the nonprofit ArtsWave. She lives in Cincinnati.

ARTICLE
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/27/arts/music/clara-schumann-florence-price-philadelphia-orchestra.html
 

My Thoughts

Enjoy

The tweet in question mentioned 6 things: Keke palmer's career/Zendaya's career/Colorism/Hollywood/Comparing two thespians careers/former child stars careers... The suggestion made in the tweet is that the two child stars have different careers at the moment with zendaya being more and Palmer less, and that contrast is an example of colorism in hollywood. And lastly, that said point warrants a deep inspection to their careers. ... I will start with the point. No two thespians ever have the same careers. Hollywood has never provided two thespians with the same careers. Boris karloff didn't have the same career as bela legosi. Billie D Williams didn't have the same career as James Earl Jones. No two thespians ever have the same career in the film industry anywhere. Jackie Chan didn't have the same Career as samo hung, and that is hong kong cinema. Alec Baldwin doesn't have the same career as Harrison Ford. What is my point? Suggesting that two thespians careers can be defined as different based on a negative bias is a simplicity of how the film industry works. Sharon stone didn't have the same career as Meryl Streep who didn't have the same career as Michelle Pfeiffer. The film industry never is the same for any two thespians. Now, is colorism real. I will define colorism as biases based on skin tone. To the issue in question. The skin tone closer to the average of white europeans is given a positive bias while the skin tone closer to the average of black africans is given a negative bias. Based on my definition of colorism, it is real. But, are the careers of Palmer side Zendaya an issue of said bias or hollywood reality? Based on that logic, Angela Bassett overcame colorism and Vanessa Williams didn't gain enough from it. But is that true? If you look into any two thespians careers the reality is simple. A thespian is lucky if they are involved in fiscally profitable work at a higher rate. Why did Val Kilmer's career, before his illness, not be greater than Tom Cruise? Colorism is real. All biases are real. But are biases the key to success or perceived success in a given space? Not always. The main point of the original tweet, which is a reply, is an assumption, absent any way to be proven. As Palmer correctly stated, Keke palmer's career is keke palmer's. I add, Zendaya's career is Zendaya's. Comparing artist careers based on negative biases in any industry isn't acceptable unless it is an industry normal. For example, Judy Garland was born the same year as Dorothy Dandridge. Both are well known singers. Both played in well-known roles. Was dorothy dandridge blockaded from roles as a black person in hollywood that Judy Garland wasn't as a white person in hollywood? yes. But that was an industry standard at that time, in all areas. Black characters were intentionally not written. Black writers were intentionally not hired. Black producers only existed in the independent system, not hollywood. Colorism like all biases is real and still exists, throughout all aspects of humanity. But, a bias must be universally applied in an arena to claim its potency, not existence but potency, absent strict proof. Lastly... the tweet that is the source of the article's debate is a reply. In the original tweet, linked below, Keke PAlmer is praised. Zendaya isn't mentioned. And, the viewpoint that Keke Palmer is a recent star is challenged as historically inaccurate using the posters life. 

Why do I say this? I argue the BET article is dysfunctional. If you simply go to the original post. You will see the source post. They are not even connected in theme. And, I argue that Keke Palmer in replying to the colorism point has either bad media management, cause many stars do not make their own tweets, or enough people she cars about mentioned this that she felt she needed to speak. I will also add, in modern times, sometimes making negative issues loud is a way to become more popular. 

THE ARTICLE

https://www.bet.com/article/mkptst/keke-palmer-zendaya-colorism-twitter

the tweet in question, THE REPLY

https://twitter.com/NBAgladiator/status/1550912209668153348

the original tweet, THE SOURCE

https://twitter.com/aiyanaish/status/1550873544850014209

AMERICAN BLACK FILM FESTIVAL ANNOUNCES 2022 TALKS, PANELS AND TOP LINE TALENT FOR 26TH ABFF JUNE 15-19, 2022

Following is the schedule of 2022 ABFF talk series events to date.

Live Events
Thursday, June 16, 2022
The NFT Masterclass for Creative
NFTs have risen as one of the hottest topics in the entertainment industry. Understanding the intellectual property issues in NFTs is essential to our protection and advancement. This session will address the ABCs of NFTs, including copyright, trademark, publicity issues and tax matters surrounding NFTs. Instructed by Kimra Major-Morris, attorney at law.

Leading From Within 
Presented by Prime Video

From the suffrage movement to the civil rights movement, history has shown us we all win when Black women lead. Join three Black women executives from Prime Video for an intimate discussion on how they are leading the charge to create content across series and features that all audiences will love.

Moderators: Latasha Gillespie (head of diversity, equity and inclusion, Prime Video)

Panelists: Amber Rasberry (senior executive development, Movies – am*zon Studios),

Lauren Anderson (co-head Content and Programming, am*zon Freevee) and Larissa Bell (development executive, am*zon St.)

The Black Beauty Effect Panel 
Presented by Black Experience on Xfinity

An intimate discussion on the global impact of Black Beauty in the upcoming docuseries, The Black Beauty Effect. This discussion will highlight black women and their overall impact in the beauty industry, despite its historical exclusion and oppression of black women.

Panelists: Andrea Lewis, series creator, Kahlana Barfield Brown, beauty expert, Whitney White, natural hair entrepreneur, CJ Faison, executive producer

Funding Your Story: The Nuts and Bolts of Film Finance
Presented by the Motion Picture Association

You can be a great storyteller and writer of words that captivate the masses. However, you can’t share that story with the world without having a financing plan in place to get the story made! In this panel, representatives from major studios and a lead film finance company will provide an overview of the variety of ways content creators can finance their production. As each panelist has a unique background in the film finance world, this panel will provide filmmakers with a basic understanding of what to expect when putting together a financing package.

Moderator: John Gibson, vice president, External and Multicultural Affairs, Motion Picture Association

Panelists: Donyelle Marshall, LATAM business and tax analyst, Florida Office of Film and Entertainment; Chiquita Banks, Esq., senior vice president, TPC; Graham Lee, Esq., vice president, Tax Counsel-Production, Paramount; Brian O’Leary, Esq., senior vice president Tax, NBCUniversal (Invited)

Bel-Air: Clips and Conversations  
Presented by Comcast NBCUniversal

Peacock presents an intimate conversation with the cast members from Bel-Air about celebrating Black on-screen characters and discussing story themes such as love, family and relationships.

Moderator: Scott Evans

Panelists: Rasheed Newson, Adrian Holmes, Cassandra Freeman, Coco Jones, Akira Akbar, Jimmy Akingbola and Jordan Jones

Bust Down in Laughter with NBCU’s Comedy Crew
Presented by Comcast NBCUniversal

Join talent from NBCU’s hit comedies for a lively conversation about celebrating and shaping Black culture through stories of family, friendships, love and joy on TV.

Moderator: Danielle Young, journalist and host of Real Quick

Panelists:  Nicole Byer, Phil Augusta Jackson and Carl Tart from NBCU’s “Grand Crew” and Sam Jay, Langston Kerman, Jak Knight and Chris Redd from Peacock’s “Bust Down”

Shoot Your Shot
Presented by ALLBLK

ALLBLK, the first and largest streaming service for Black TV and film from AMC Networks, is partnering with the American Black Film Festival (ABFF) to kick off a nationwide casting call for the co-star of its latest original production, “Judge Me Not.” A new hour-long psychological/legal drama created by TV icon, Judge Lynn Toler.

“Judge Me Not” focuses on a millennial Black female attorney navigating mental health issues, a rocky romantic relationship and a volatile family, who shocks everyone when she wins a judicial seat at 31. Once there, she fights her demons while managing the chaos of a busy court.

25th Annual HBO Short Film Award Showcase
Presented by Warner Bros. Discovery and HBO

Five finalists will compete in ABFF’s HBOÒ Short Film Award. The prestigious showcase will celebrate 25 years of HBO’s commitment to recognizing the next generation of diverse, artistic and creative talent at ABFF.  This year’s groudbreaking directors with diverse style of filmmaking are: Sherif Alabede (Another Country), Elisee Junior St. Preux (Aurinko in Adagio), Gia-Rayne Harris (Pens & Pencils), Destiny J. Macon (Talk Black) and Rebecca Usoro (The Family Meeting)

Friday, June 17, 2022
Masterclass: Legal Aspects of Indie Filmmaking
Presented by Arrington and Phillips

This seminar will introduce filmmakers to the legal and business aspects of independent filmmaking. From conception to distribution, attendees will learn all the basics needed to make, produce and distribute their own independent film. Instructed by Marvin Arrington and Vince Phillips.

Johnson: Clips and Conversations
Presented by Bounce TV

Join the cast and producer of Johnson for a conversation around the anticipated return of season two. Johnson focuses on life-long best friends and their sometimes-complicated journey of love, friendship, heartbreak and personal growth as told from the Black male perspective.  The show is executive produced by Eric C. Rhone and Cedric The Entertainer’s A Bird and A Bear Entertainment.

Moderator: David J. Hudson, head of Original Programming for Scripps Networks

Panelists:  Deji LaRay (series creator and show runner); Thomas Q. Jones (show runner, “P- Valley,” “Luke Cage”); Philip Smithey (“Switched at Birth,” “The Rookie”); and Derrex Brady (“NCIS,” “First”) with Earthquake (“The Neighborhood,” “Chappelle’s Home Team – Earthquake: Legendary”) and Eric C. Rhone (executive producer)

Finding Happy: Clips and Conversations
Presented by Bounce TV

Meet the cast of Bounce’s newest series, Finding Happy, a show created about, for and by Black women. The dramedy follows Yaz Carter as she navigates her loving-but-complicated family, her stagnant career and a merry-go-round of unrequited love as she looks to find her happy. The show is executive produced by Eric C. Rhone and Cedric The Entertainer’s A Bird and A Bear Entertainment.

Moderator: Keisha Taylor Starr, chief marketing officer for Scripps Networks

Panelists: B. Simone (MTV’s “Wild ‘n Out”); Kim Coles (“Living Single”); Marketta Patrice (“Black Jesus”); Angela Gibbs (“Hacks,” “The Fosters”); and Kendra Jo (series creator and show runner)

A Champion of Independent Black Film: Celebrating the Legacy of Michelle Materre
Presented by Meta

Michelle Materre, prolific film distributor, professor, curator and fervent supporter of women and BIPOC filmmakers, passed away in March. To honor her decades as a champion of independent film and her mission to lift the voices of underrepresented people in cinema, ABFF and Daughters of Eve Media will present a roundtable discussion featuring trailblazing and renowned women filmmakers.

Moderators: Terri Bowles and Dr. Michele Prettyman

Panelist: Ayoka Chenzira

Fierce Female Filmmakers of TriStar Pictures
Presented by Sony Pictures Entertainment

Join three trailblazing fierce, female, filmmakers — Gina Prince-Bythewood (Love & Basketball), Kasi Lemmons (Eve’s Bayou), and Nicole Brown (TriStar Pictures President) for an intimate sit-down conversation as they open up about their highly anticipated Sony Pictures releases: The Woman King starring Viola Davis, and the Whitney Houston biopic I Wanna Dance with Somebody starring Naomi Ackie. This conversation will dive into the importance, power and future of Black film while providing a sneak peek of what audiences can expect in their upcoming releases via exclusive content.

Moderator: Brett King, vice president, Creative Programming, Diversity and Inclusion for Sony Pictures Entertainment

Panelists: Nicole Brown, president of TriStar Pictures; Kasi Lemmons, director, I Wanna Dance with Somebody; Gina Prince-Bythewood, Director, The Woman King

Flipping the Script: Defining your own Path to Success presented by Warner Bros. Discovery Equity and Inclusion
Presented by Warner Bros. Discovery

Over the last few decades, the road to stardom and success in Hollywood has changed significantly. With the emergence of the digital age, social media and waves of new talent, many are finding success, their own way and on their own terms. This engaging and motivating panel discusses the impact of breaking into the entertainment industry both traditionally and non-traditionally; and ways to stay relevant in an ever-changing production landscape that is no longer one size fits all.

Moderator: Karen Horne, senior vice president, Warner Bros. Discovery, Equity and Inclusion

Panelists: Salli Richardson-Whitfield (Winning Time and The Gilded Age, HBO), Carlos King (Love & Marriage Franchise, OWN), Ashley Blaine Featherson-Jenkins (Trials to Triumphs Podcast, OWN), Bashir Salahuddin (South Side, HBO Max), Diallo Riddle (South Side, HBO Max). Networking Reception to follow. RSVP and COVID vaccination required.

“This Is Us”: From Script to Screen
Presented by Comcast NBCUniversal

Go behind the scenes of NBC’s beloved drama “This Is Us” with actress and writer Susan Kelechi Watson, writer and producer Eboni Freeman and producer Christiana Hooks. Delve into a poignant conversation about the final season and the episode “Our Little Island Girl: Part Two” that is centered on Beth Pearson and was co-written by Susan and Eboni. Learn about the show’s unique approach to bringing multidimensional narratives to life by reflecting on the past, inspiring the future, and creating beautiful stories that transcend generations.

Moderator: Danielle Young, journalist and host of Real Quick

Panelists: Susan Kelechi Watson, actress and writer; Eboni Freeman, writer and producer; Christiana Hooks, producer

Life Of A Showrunner 
Presented by UPS

This panel examines the road to becoming a television showrunner, the duties and demands it entails, career strategies to be considered, the parameters of creative control as well as the freedom it affords and what running a writers room looks like.

Panelists: Robin Thede (A Black Lady Sketch Show), Rikki Hughes (The Hype), Randy Huggins (BMF)

ABFF Comedy Wings Showcase
Presented by Warner Bros. Discovery and HBO

A night of laugher hosted by Aida Rodriquez and introducing: Marshall Brandon, Cherie Danielle, Shanna Christmas, Rob Gordon and Alan Massenburg

Saturday, June 18, 2022
Academy 365
Presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is a 95-year-old organization that has long been known for the Oscars, often called “Hollywood’s biggest night.” But what goes on the other 364 days of the year? In this panel, key leadership shares how the Academy engages their membership of over 10,000 members on a year-round basis and leads industry initiatives that celebrate the history of film, amplifies its global community of artists and advocates for increased representation across the industry.

Moderator: Scott Evans, Access Hollywood

Panelists: DeVon Franklin, governor-at-large; Christine Simmons, chief operating officder, Academy; Shawn Finnie, executive vice president, Member Relations and Awards, Academy; Meryl Johnson, vice president, Digital Marketing, Academy

Best of ABFF Awards Presentation 
Hosted by Dondré Whitfield

Join us for the announcement of the festival winner of this year’s competitions including: Best Narrative Feature, Best Director, Best Screenplay, John Singleton Award for Best First Feature, Best Documentary, Best Web Series and HBO Short Film Award. This event will be live-streamed on ABFF PLAY.

Cocktails, Conversations, and Financial Facts with LisaRaye McCoy
Presented by Prudential Financial

Actress and Entrepreneur LisaRaye McCoy will share her journey with money, finances, and setting financial goals from her life on the South Side of Chicago to her life in the film industry. Prudential financial professionals will be available to answer financial questions.

Moderator: Delvin Joyce (Prudential Financial Planner & Founder of Prosperity Wealth Group)

The Leading Man
Presented by Cadillac

A panel of esteemed male actors examine the images of Black men in film and television, share stories about their journeys to success and discuss the messages they wish to convey to boys and young men in the community.

Moderator: Malinda Williams

Panelists: Trevante Rhodes, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Michael Ealy

Critter Fixers: Clips and Conversation
Presented by Disney+

Join veterinarians Dr. Terrence Ferguson and Dr. Vernard Hodges as they discuss some of their most unique animal cases and provide great tips and techniques to help care for your pets.

Moderator: Jill Tracey, Morning Show co-host on WHQT Hot 105 Miami

Panelists: Dr. Terrence Ferguson, Dr. Vernard Hodges

Closing Night Screening   
Rap Sh!t

Courtesy of Warner Bros. Discovery and HBO Max

Rap Sh!t follows two estranged high school friends from Miami, Shawna and Mia, who reunite to form a rap group.
Cast: Aida Osman (Shawna), KaMillion (Mia), Jonica Booth (Chastity), Devon Terrell (Cliff,) RJ Cyler (Lamont), Executive Producer and Writer: Issa Rae (for HOORAE); Executive Producer and Showrunner: Syreeta Singleton; Executive Producer: Montrel McKay (for HOORAE); Executive Producers: Dave Becky and Jonathan Berry (for 3 Arts Entertainment); Executive Producer: Deniese Davis

Hip hop duo Yung Miami and JT of City Girls serve as co-executive producers, along with Kevin “Coach K” Lee and Pierre “P” Thomas for Quality Control Films and Sara Rastogi for HOORAE. Sadé Clacken Joseph directed the pilot. Rae’s audio content company Raedio will handle music supervision for the series.

Sunday, June 18, 2022
ABFF Community Day
Sponsored by the Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau (GMCVB)

The festival, in partnership with the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau, presents a day of entertainment curated for family audiences.

Virtual Events available on ABFF PLAY https://abffplay.com/

Life As Entrepreneurs
Presented by Morgan Stanley

A discussion exploring what it takes to build a family brand, the importance of being financially literate, and the value of building generational wealth.

Panelists:  Husband and wife team DJ Envy and Gia Casey

Mathis Family Matters
Presented by Comcast NBCUniversal

E! Entertainment presents an intimate conversation with the cast of E!’s new docuseries, “Mathis Family Matters” about representation, the black family on television today, their personal experiences and perspectives around diversity both in front of and behind the camera. To further the dialogue regarding unscripted television, they will exchange thoughts on the importance of Black producers ensuring that our stories aren’t overlooked and we are represented equally in today’s diverse culture.

Moderators: Ebony Magazine  

Panelists: Judge Greg Mathis, Linda Mathis, Jade Mathis, Camara Mathis, Greg Mathis Jr., Amir Mathis

Universal GTDI’s Five Years of Creative Impact 
Presented by Comcast NBCUniversal

In celebration of Universal’s Global Talent Development & Inclusion (GTDI) five-year anniversary, this panel spotlights friend-of-GTDI director Jude Weng, accompanied by four incredible alumni who have participated in GTDI’s flagship programs. Moderated by Rotten Tomatoes Awards Editor Jacqueline Coley, this panel aims to highlight the participants’ journeys towards establishing a career in the industry, as well as provide their perspective on how they view representation and access in the industry.

Moderators: Jacqueline Coley

Panelists: Jermaine Stegall, Juel Taylor, Jude Weng, Marielle Woods

Gate-Opening: Black Exec Round Table
Presented by Lionsgate and Starz

A candid conversation with Black development executives at Lionsgate and Starz demystifying the studio system, providing helpful guidance and insight into the initial development stages to support rising Black filmmakers.

Moderator: Kamala Avila-Salmon — head of Inclusive Content at Lionsgate

Panelists: Kathryn Tyus-Adair, senior vice president of Original Programming at Starz, Jade-Addon Hall, vice president of Current Series at Lionsgate TV, Aaron Edmonds, vice president of Production and Development at Lionsgate

ABFF 2022 sponsors and partners to date include Warner Bros. Discovery & HBOÒ (Founding); Cadillac, City of Miami Beach, Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau (GMCVB), Sony Pictures Entertainment, Prime Video (Presenting); American Airlines, Comcast NBCUniversal, Meta, Bounce TV, Black Experience on Xfinity, UPS, IMDb (Premier); ALLBLK, Prudential Financial, Variety, TV One, Netflix, Starz, Disney+, Onyx Collective (Official); Accenture, Motion Pictures Association (MPA), A&E, The SpringHill Company, The Boston Globe, Color Of Change, Confluential Films, Arrington & Phillips, Fulton Films, BET Her, Morgan Stanley, Miami Beach VCA, Frankfurt Kurnit Klein & Selz, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (Supporting); Endeavor Content and DC Office of Television (Industry).

https://www.blackenterprise.com/american-black-film-festival-announces-2022-talks-panels-and-top-line-talent-for-26th-abff-june-15-19-2022/

Audiobook Stylistics: Comparing print and audio in the bestselling segment
Karl Berglund
 , 
Mats Dahllöf
November 02, 2021 EDT

The Study is from Sweden, but consider it for your region

STUDY LINK
https://culturalanalytics.org/article/29802-audiobook-stylistics-comparing-print-and-audio-in-the-bestselling-segment 

Hollywood Loves Books

By Kate Dwyer 13 Days Ago

When author and illustrator Ariella Elovic drafted her book proposal for Cheeky: A Head-to-Toe Memoir, she never considered that the graphic memoir about body acceptance might one day become a television series. Growing up, her biggest insecurities were her visibly hairy arms, sideburns, unibrow, and upper lip hair; as a young adult, she created an illustrated alter-ego to help her process all of the ways her body was changing. When she signed with literary agent Meredith Kaffel Simonoff of DeFiore and Company, the agent offhandedly noted that she could see the world of Cheeky expanding on a streaming service such as Netflix or Hulu. After the book was finished, Simonoff’s coagent at United Talent Agency (UTA)—one of the four major Hollywood talent agencies—presented Cheeky at a general meeting where talent agents brainstorm creative partnerships between their clients. Throughout the summer of 2020, Elovic, 30, took the resulting one-on-one phone calls with actors, directors, and showrunners looking for a partner with whom she clicked creatively. She hit it off with an established comedian. “It basically felt like what we would create together would be a really strong combination of our two brains,” Elovic says. Though the partnership has yet to be announced, the pair are working with a production company on a “mini-pilot” to pitch to streaming services. A few weeks ago, the author quit her day job as a project manager at Paperless Post. It’s a big commitment, she says, but “I figured at some point, I [would] have to quit my job to help prep material. I’m going to want to give it my all.”

Cheeky was not a bestseller, celebrity book club pick, or runaway hit at launch. It received positive reviews and a decent amount of attention. Its Hollywood prospects are not noteworthy because of being extraordinary, but rather, increasingly ordinary. In 2020 alone, streamers produced 532 new television shows. Their appetite for content is fueling a golden age of adaptations, according to Michelle Weiner, head of the books department at Creative Artists Agency (CAA), which includes the book-to-film department and the publishing group. “The volume of film and television being produced has increased dramatically,” she says. “A book is one of the greatest story bibles”—what TV producers use to track details about characters, plots, and more—“that a television show or a film can have. It has a fully-fleshed-out plot, highly sophisticated characters, and, often, a very inventive world.” As a result, there is more opportunity than ever for authors who wish to adapt their work for the big (or small, or even pocket-sized) screen.

Every year, the streaming industry becomes even hungrier for intellectual property to adapt. “What Hollywood needs is more and more content because of all the outlets,” says Knopf editor-at-large Peter Gethers, who previously ran Penguin Random House’s book-to-film department and now co-produces projects for Universal Studios, STUDIOCANAL, and Food Network. But in many cases, before studios buy the rights to a book, they “need some form of validation, so they know something is good.”

Of course, production companies, like readers, can make judgements via reviews and The New York Times bestseller list. But increasingly, producers look to celebrity book clubs to help figure out which titles could become blockbuster streaming hits. CAA—an agency that represents not only authors but also screenwriters, directors, and some of Hollywood’s top actors—has worked with clients such as Reese Witherspoon and Emma Roberts to create those book clubs. Weiner calls the platforms “a win for every aspect of our business,” because the featured authors increase their audience sizes, while their projects become attractive to film and television buyers who then feel like they’re investing in a project that has a larger, built-in viewership. (It sounds like a circular system because it is.)

Some of these high-profile book clubs shepherd projects directly into the adaptation pipeline. Reese’s Book Club produces adaptations through Witherspoon’s production company, Hello Sunshine, and Roberts’ book club, Belletrist, is working on Victoria Schwab's teen vampire drama “First Kill” for Netflix, among other projects. “The exact role the author plays differs in every situation, but we always do our very best to make sure the original storyteller feels gratified by the way his or her material is adapted,” says Lauren Neustadter, Hello Sunshine’s President of Film and Television. “In the case of Little Fires Everywhere, Celeste Ng handed off the adaptation to Liz Tigelaar and our writers room and cheered them on. In the case of From Scratch, Tembi Locke was intimately involved in the adaptation and her sister Attica was the showrunner.”

Obviously, authors make money if their book is optioned, but sometimes factors—like celebrity hype, great reviews, and a place on the bestseller list—combine to create the kind of deal literary dreams are made of. Take Brit Bennett’s number-one New York Times bestseller The Vanishing Half, which landed a splashy seven-figure deal at HBO, with Bennett attached as executive producer. The Vanishing Half rights were the subject of a heated 17-way auction. Other high-profile examples of authors signing onto their adaptations include Lisa Taddeo producing her number-one New York Times-bestselling nonfiction debut Three Women for Showtime (following a hot bidding war for the rights) and Taffy Brodesser-Akner spearheading the FX adaptation of her novel Fleishman Is in Trouble (also following a 10-way scramble to own the rights).

Taddeo, who is mid-production on Three Women and in development on a handful of other projects, admits to experiencing a steep learning curve when she first started working in Hollywood. There, the author is just one more voice in the room. “Writing books is a solitary enterprise, and then an editor is involved, but the experience is much more author-focused,” she says. “On a TV show, there are many pluses to having lots of brains on a project, but there is also a dissipation that happens. Sometimes the force of a single voice can be weakened by the ideas of many. Other times the opposite is true. It depends, project to project, partners to partners. There are just so many more variables.”

The latest novel of Alexandra Kleeman, a critically-acclaimed author and professor at The New School, Something New Under the Sun, follows an author who flies out to L.A. to work on the adaptation of his novel, and then gets relegated to the role of production assistant. This would never happen in real life. “I don’t know if I would say that authors have more control, but I would say that authors seem to be more visible in Hollywood,” she says. Featuring authors so prominently in the media, Kleeman believes, “offers a guarantee of artistic merit and announces the prestige quality of the project.” Influencer book clubs and brand collaborations like Warby Parker x The Paris Review deal in this same brand cross-pollination. In exchange for a brand giving the author a wider platform, an author gives the brand a deeper sense of authenticity or cultural cachet. “I’m like an artisanal baker or jam maker or something, making stories in the slowest possible way,” Kleeman says.

Weiner says well-regarded partners, like the famed comedian Elovic is working with, are key for authors looking to make the jump to screenwriting. “There are a great number of established screenwriters who are incredibly open to mentoring authors to adapt their work,” she says. (To clarify, those experienced screenwriters are also paid by the studio.) “We've seen authors who start as producers on their first book, and then learn and absorb as much as they possibly can, and then end up writing and producing on their next [book’s adaptation].”

For every author like Taddeo who had the clout to maintain significant creative control over her project, there are many other authors who aren’t as lucky. “Screenwriters are not given the same amount of respect by the studios and by the directors that book authors are given by their editors and publishers,” says Gethers. “So they ultimately, in screenwriting, have much less control, except for very few who have a good amount of control, but there are very few of them.”

Still, authors are scrambling to join the supposed gold rush of TV or film writing. “I’ve heard friends in the writer community say, ‘I think I wrote that book because I thought it would make a good movie,’” says Kleeman. “I see Hollywood picking up options on things that wouldn’t seem very Hollywood before, things that are difficult to film,” she says. “It’s become very common to talk to another writer about [the status of] their project in Hollywood as a catching-up sort of question, when it used to feel rarer and more exceptional.”

As for the money? “The TV-writing money can be really fantastic,” says Will Watkins, Literary Agent at ICM Partners. “Because if you get a show on the air, you can make well in excess of a million dollars. You can even make that if you don't get a show on the air, if it's the right deal.” Writing a pilot script can garner “at least” six figures, he says, and options for even not-so-competitive titles could run in the low-to-middle five digits. The upside for those lucky authors is that this “can kind of liberate them from having to do all these other things [podcasting, teaching, copywriting] to make ends meet, depending on what's going on on the publishing side.”

Midlist authors (i.e. authors whose books get less of a marketing push, therefore garnering fewer readers) are not necessarily set for life when their film rights sell. Sure, the pay is “better than books,” says Maris Kreizman, publishing-world insider and host of “The Maris Review” podcast, but “it’s not that every person who writes for TV is wealthy and set up and doesn’t have to worry about money.” Most adaptations in development don’t even get made. Of the ones that do, it’s ever harder for a show to become a hit, explains Kreizman. “How many of them get made and get lost? It’s almost as if Netflix is inventing a midlist again. There are so many shows, not all of them can rise to the top.”

Authors have historically tended to also be teachers or professors and vice versa. Many writers share their tradecraft in Masters of Fine Arts (MFA) programs, which boomed in the late 20th Century and are still going strong. “I don't think [exclusively] writing books ever was a way to make a living,” says Gethers. “I mean, in the old days, authors were doctors and lawyers and had real jobs. Writing was rarely considered a full-time job. The difference is now, there are so many other opportunities for authors to write.” Many full-time writers operate similarly to startup founders or gig workers, writing across podcasts, journalism, books, even video games, to make ends meet as professional storytellers. Before Taddeo went into production on Three Women, every workday was a balancing act. She started her career as a freelance writer juggling articles for a range of New York publications, and sold a novel that was never published. Flash forward to June 2021, and her day might include a book interview for her novel Animal, a Zoom meeting with a director for the Three Women TV series, another Zoom meeting with a producer for Animal (which is in development for TV), and an interview with a reporter for a women’s glossy magazine. Then, she might sit down to write an article, since she’s still a practicing journalist. “It feels like I never have my feet in one area,” she says.

Sweetbitter author Stephanie Danler, who co-wrote and executive-produced two seasons of a Starz series based on her book, is now a prolific screenwriter and co-founder of Desierto Alto, the wine store and specialty shop near Joshua Tree, California. “Scripts are very creative and I feel lucky that I get to write as a day job,” she says. “I’m still thinking about characters and momentum and pacing and story and plot.” In her experience, a novel can take years of mostly solo work, while a script is more collaborative (with actors, directors, other writers). “I think being an author is sacred in a way,” she says; it’s more of a vocation.

The Hollywood book boom comes at a time when corporate consolidation in the publishing world threatens authors’ abilities to profit off their work, making TV writing a necessary second career. “Penguin and Random House merged, and if they end up acquiring Simon & Schuster as well, there will be one behemoth where you can publish and three other smaller places and many other micro places that absolutely can’t compete,” says Kreizman. Say the merger does go through and a book doesn’t find a home at Penguin-Random House-Simon & Schuster, an author would automatically be looking at a smaller advance elsewhere, since the monopoly would give authors and their agents less negotiating power. Regardless of whether the merger happens, midlist advances against royalties (authors’ up-front paychecks) are dropping across the board, so authors who don’t have full-time jobs face greater pressure to generate multiple revenue streams through storytelling. “It's harder to make a living as a [genre] book writer or midlist book writer probably than it's ever been before,” Gethers says. [On November 2nd, the Biden administration sued Penguin Random House to prevent the deal from happening.]

Agents also play a vital role in setting their authors up for success in Hollywood. “There are those of us that feel very strongly that authors can and should stay on their own projects, as long as they have the interest to do so,” Weiner says. “There are many authors who have successfully done it, which also paves the way for others.” Think: Gone Girl author Gillian Flynn, Stephen King, Cormac McCarthy, and The Hunger Games author Suzanne Collins.

“I want the author as involved as they possibly can [be], as much as they want to be,” echoes Heather Karpas, a former publishing agent who spent nearly a decade representing authors at ICM Partners, and now leads scripted development at Richard Plepler's Eden Productions, which has an overall deal with Apple TV+. “Authors often know more about the topic than anybody else in the room,” she says. “There's a wealth of knowledge there that ought to be tapped into."

But not every author is suited to the adaptation process, where style and nuance is often sacrificed for story. Gethers knows some writers who “shy away from [screenwriting] because it can be heartbreaking,” he says. “It's much harder to let go of your darlings—to kill your darlings in a book—if you're the actual author of the book. And often that's what has to happen in a movie.” Others are not interested in the politics and compromise of Hollywood, and their agents encourage them to take the money and run. In book publishing, Karpas says, “there is one person's name on that cover, and it is the author's name. That is the closest to complete control is as you're going to get. In Hollywood, that's just not the nature of the beast.”

ARTICLE LINK
https://www.marieclaire.com/career-advice/a38172712/book-author-hollywood-screenwriter-transition/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Lit Hub Daily: November 10%2C 2021&utm_term=lithub_master_list 

What If We Taught Writing the Way We Teach Acting?
Jaime Green
Nov 10, 2021

Actors studied movement, script analysis, emotional connection, our bodies, our voices. In my writing MFA, we got . . . workshop.

READ THE REMAINDER IN THE ARTICLE LINKED IMMEDIATELY BELOW

ARTICLE LINK
https://catapult.co/dont-write-alone/stories/jaime-green-acting-writing-training-pedagogy?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Lit Hub Daily: November 11%2C 2021&utm_term=lithub_master_list 

REFERRAL LINK
https://kobowritinglife.com/2021/11/12/spotify-audiobooks-library-audits-and-a-bestseller-study-this-week-in-book-news/ 
 

My father love pop williams. I can see similarities between pop williams and my father. But the biggest question I have is, where are black parents? I remember as a kid people asking me, who do I idolize, and my answer was and still is, my parents. they are the finest people I know. I like or love pele, HArriet tubman,  fred hampton,  malcolm, shirley Chisholm, fannie lou hamer, Akhenaton... I like Lewis Hamilton, the williams sisters, Simone Biles, tiger woods, michelle obama.  but I don't idolize any of them. I am not inspired by them. And I think that is what black people need, we need to be inspired by our parents to a level in which we do not need others

a question, what does being a champion mean? 

The Flash on Twitter: "What does being a champion mean to @candicepatton and who inspired her to achieve her dreams? Stream #TheFlashArmageddon premiere free only on The CW and watch #KingRichard in theaters today. https://t.co/RaE8s8fYvY" / Twitter

serena williams, venus williams, will smith cover shoots

Luis. on Twitter: "Serena Williams, Venus Williams and Will Smith for Entertainment Weekly's cover shoot portraits. ❤❤❤ #KingRichard https://t.co/bDOZ52gamQ" / Twitter

Venus in the dress, stills

Chad on Twitter: "Venus Williams at the premiere of "King Richard" in Hollywood. #VenusWilliams #KingRichard : Getty/Emma McIntyre https://t.co/2BJLT0JDN3" / Twitter

Video Venus williams in that dress:)

kyle on Twitter: "Venus Williams looks STUNNING #KingRichard https://t.co/uQzAGLKh29" / Twitter

the mermaid storm
A LOWCOUNTRY LEGEND

‘The Mermaid Storm’ is a collaboration between painter Julyan Davis and poet Glenis Redmond, begun when Davis was artist-in-residence at the Gibbes Museum in Charleston, South Carolina (2018). 

The collaboration depict a narrative: that of the Cymbee, the Kongo Water spirit who crosses the Middle Passage, bearing witness to summoning events in the history of American slavery. The story depicts her capture, and Charleston’s subsequent Mermaid Riot. It culminates in the Cymbee’s place in the South today. The most recent product of this joint venture has been the creation of a vinyl record of Glenis’s poetry, recorded, produced and pressed at Asheville’s own Citizen Vinyl.

The project owes its inspiration to several historical studies on Afro-Christian Syncreticism and its reflection in folk and religious art, but primarily to Ras Michael Brown’s excellent ‘African-Atlantic Cultures and the South Carolina Lowcountry’ (Cambridge University Press 2012).

‘Simbi there. Cymbee here. Name her.
People of the Congo know her well.
Simbi’s spirit must be honored and fed
With each drink, food, dance and treasure.
Without ceasing, she finds reasons to mother.
Wrap her long arms around her people
Across either side of the deep Atlantic.’

Glenis Redmond (poem for Station X)

If the African slave could successfully smuggle one thing across the Middle Passage, it was their oldest faith. This heritage had survived Portuguese colonialism and would flourish in the Carolina Lowcountry, remnants of it enriching the hush harbors and lasting to this day. The Simbi, or water spirit, was not left behind.

As with so much in the New World, one culture would knot itself around another. The Kongo Simbi meshed with the white man’s mermaid. The resulting Cymbee was no variant of the decorative creature of Western Art, however, but remained an elemental force, and one to be feared and left alone at all costs. Provoke her wrath and the skies would darken. If captured, the water spirit of the Lowcountry had the power to draw hurricanes out of the Cape Verde waters, beckoning them to her rescue. The Simbi (or Carolina Cymbee) was a manifestation of outrage, existing to right the world’s balance through catastrophe.

‘The Mermaid Storm’ is an emancipation myth, but it also raises questions about the ways Christianity (whether Portuguese Catholicism in the Congo, or American Protestantism in the South) has disconnected mankind from nature.

Glenis Redmond travels the world as a Road Poet. She divides her time between two posts: as the Poet-in-Residence at The Peace Center for the Performing Arts in Greenville, SC, and at the State Theatre in New Brunswick, NJ.

She has served as the Mentor Poet for the National Student Poets Program. In both 2014- 2016 she prepared student poets to read at the Library of Congress, the Department of Education and for the First Lady, Michelle Obama at The White House. She traveled to Muscat, Oman to present poetry workshops and readings for Black History Month sponsored by the State Department.

Glenis is a Cave Canem Fellow and a North Carolina Literary Fellowship Recipient and a Kennedy Center Teaching Artist. She helped create the first Writer-in-Residence at the Carl Sandburg Home National Historic Site in Flat Rock, NC.

http://www.julyandavis.com/mermaid/

THIS MILLENNIAL BOUGHT EBONY AND JET FOR $14M WITH PLANS TO BRING THE MAGAZINES INTO THE DIGITAL ERA
by Dawn OnleyAugust 11, 2021 
Founded in 1945 by John Johnson, Ebony struggled under declining advertisements, financial troubles, and controversy a few years ago. It was quite a shift from the magazine’s heyday, when Ebony and sister magazine, Jet, were the go-to publications for people interested in reading about Black culture, notable Black leaders, and issues impacting Black people.

The company eventually filed for bankruptcy, and by 2019, both Ebony and Jet had stopped printing. This was an opportunity for Bridgeman and her father, former NBA player and entrepreneur Ulysses Junior Bridgeman, to discuss the magazine with the family to gauge interest in purchasing.

Bridgeman told Business Insider she jumped at the opportunity. The family purchased the legendary pubs for $14 million — and Bridgeman began talking with Michelle Ghee, a former executive at CNN and BET, about serving as CEO. Together, they relaunched Ebony on March 1 and are planning a relaunch of Jet later this year.

Ebony’s new mission is to be bold, brilliant, and beloved. Both magazines are now fully digital with no plans on reprinting physical copies.

According to Business Insider, Ebony has at least a dozen people on staff. Bridgeman’s role has been all-encompassing — from calls with advertisers to meetings with potential partners and magazine contributors.

“You have to understand every aspect within the business,” Bridgeman told BI. “You show up in a way that people feel they can approach you. They feel that they can work with you, not only just for you.”
Bridgeman’s strategy has seen her touting the power of the Black dollar to potential advertisers. “You are going to want to tap into that power,” she tells them, according to Business Insider. 
https://www.blackenterprise.com/this-millennial-owner-bought-ebony-and-jet-for-14m-with-plans-to-bring-the-magazines-into-the-digital-era/

I respect his journey in improving his process to create. I think it is valuable to read. But I like the following quote from him best
"Toward the end, a recommendation from Eliezer Yudkowsky (author of the fan-fiction novel Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality) gave me a big shot in the arm, almost doubling my readership overnight. "
I have said countless times, how many book authors have been boosted by Beyonce/Oprah/Michelle Obama/JK Rowling... the modern currency is following and when those who are nearer to Cristiano Ronaldo level of followers give your work a wink, it is a boost unlike any other. I am not suggesting that any artwork is less or greater than any other, but the reality is, exposure matters and nothing is more potent in advertising in exposure than when the heavily followed pick an artists. I must add, it has always been that way.
What are the medici's? but the kardashians of their day from a media perspective. What are the Pharoahs? but the presidents of their day from a media perspective.
Artists are always blessed when those who have eyes on them, speak to their art.
Good segment on PAtreon. Thinking on ecurrencies , I think the business model of patreon fits well with the ecurrency market better than strict payment. Whether that is functional long term financially? we will see:)
The reality is, most of the artwork in any art movement isn't remembered or survived well. Does it mean that which is not today was poor? no. Does it mean that most artist must have another way to make money? yes. HAving another way to live comfortably, even if it means less art produced is mandatory.
One thing he didn't say about working as a fiction author, in particular serials, is having a confined plan. I will give an example. One of the books I read this year that I like is the Dungeons and Burglars series. I mention it cause it ended. It is a series, a comic book series. But it ends. One of the problems with writers in my view, is too many of us assume a story has to go on to part 9. No shame exist in a story ending. Yes, a serial means a thing that is in a series, ala a sequence. But, the sequence can end. Does that mean the following to the serial may be upset? yes. But, if that is all you have OR if that is all you can afford to do , then do it! No shame exists in saying, I have a full year to work on a serial and I will give 3/4 to submitting it. And when done, it is done.
I quote the article
"If you find a fandom for your own work, you will discover there are people who make community drama their thing. As much as you wilt in the face of the sort of stuff above, they get their kicks from it, they will stir it up, they'll seek it out, they'll put hours a day into it and to answer it or stay on top of it you'll have to match them in the same number of hours."
That is very true. The entire internet is that way. Some people love negativity.
Article link

https://ellegriffin.substack.com/p/wildbow