Soul Power (Jeffrey Levy-Hinte, 2008, USA) [Film review]

This is a review of the 2008 documentary, Soul Power, that was published in Film International, Volume 8 Issue 6, December 2010. DOI: 10.1386/fiin.8.6.7

Kemetic consciousness: a study of ancient egyptian themes in the lyrics and visual art of Earth, Wind & Fire, 1973-1983, 2017

By the mid-1970s, Earth, Wind & Fire (EWF) became one of the most commercially successful pop music bands in the world. Their dynamic sound thrilled listeners and their elaborate concerts captivated audiences. EWF stood out from other artists with their philosophical messages and their use of ancient Egyptian symbols and imagery in their visual art. The ancient Egyptian themes intrigued fans but drew criticism from others. This study examines the ancient Egyptian themes incorporated into the lyrics of the songs recorded by the band. This study also examines the ancient Egyptian symbols used in the EWFs visual art, including album covers, music videos, and concerts. A content analysis was conducted to study the lyrics and identify themes related to ancient Egyptian spirituality. A content analysis was also used to study the visual art and decipher what the symbols may signify. This research was based on the premise that Earth, Wind & Fire used their artistry to be a positive influence. When the lyrics and visual art were examined, the researcher found that they both contain themes of ancient wisdom and universal truths. The conclusions drawn from the findings suggest that EWFs mission was to raise the consciousness of the world, and the way people responded is an indication that the mission was accomplished. The findings also suggest that the negative criticism EWF has received is unjustifiable. KEY TERMS: funk music, Egyptian symbols, Egyptian art, Maurice White, Arts and Humanitie

Finding Aid for the Blues Archive Poster Collection (MUM01783)

These blues posters, broadsides, and oversize printings, collected by various individuals and institutions, document the world of blues advertising

I\u27m Gonna Stay Right Here Until They Tear This Barrelhouse Down: Black Power and the Origins of Blues Tourism in Greenville, Mississippi

This dissertation connects and comments on the historiography of the black freedom struggle as well as studies of the blues and blues tourism. To blues studies, it recognizes the artists discovered by Worth Long as well as his field research and festival production in the 1970s. It moves away from the social constructions of authenticity and segregation of sound, and it emphasizes black agency. My dissertation also contributes to the historiography of the black freedom struggle by providing a much-needed examination of rural economic and community development in 1970s Mississippi. For studies of blues tourism, it announces a revisionist account of the development of blues tourism in Mississippi, tracing it back to the protests against the Bicentennial Celebration in 1976. This dissertation takes the long view to better understand the important efforts of organizers at Mississippi Action for Community Education (MACE), a Greenville-headquartered non-profit community action organization founded by several former SNCC leaders in 1967 to empower black communities and take action. MACE established an annual festival tradition that focused on cultural education and the preservation of the musical traditions of African Americans in the Delta. The Delta Blues Festival drew on the agricultural region’s harvest festival traditions and borroelements from earlier, black-organized music festivals, which celebrated the image of black progress and racial uplift. By organizing and staging celebrations, such as the Delta Cotton Maker’s Jubilee and the Delta Blues Festival, African American producers intended to not only fill a perceived cultural void, but also refute racist, stereotypical representations of blacks and replace them with positive images that inspired self-esteem and pride in the black communities in the Delta. MACE intended to regain control of the cultural and political identity of African Americans on stage at the festivals. Not merely black alternatives to white-dominated events, not purely recreational nor wholly radical in nature, they provided a forum for reshaping the image of the blues through black experience

MSS0495. Vertical files finding aid

The collection is composed of items collected by Special Collections on a wide variety of subjects including clippings, brochures, booklets, pamphlets and other publications

S.C.L.C. OPERATION BREADBASKET, FROM ECONOMIC CIVIL RIGHTS TO BLACK ECONOMIC POWER

Operation Breadbasket was a Southern Christian Leadership Conference project that was founded in 1962, and was dedicated to improving the economic conditions of black communities across the United States. This thesis shows how the economic agenda of the early Operation Breadbasket - to facilitate integration in the workplace - gave way to its later counterpart which embraced a friendlier attitude toward capitalism and was more solicitous of the black middle class. In particular, this thesis identifies the personalities and events responsible for this transformation while pointing to me broader trends in American capitalism that made the advocacy of workplace integration increasingly less important than access to capital and mass consumption. Since there is not a dedicated study on Operation Breadbasket, this thesis begins to fill that gap in historiography. Drawing on archival research and original oral histories collected through interviews with veterans, this thesis reconsiders Jesse Jackson's historical role in the success of Operation Breadbasket as an empowerment organization enlarging economic opportunities for black workers and entrepreneurs, In particular, it 'argues that Operation Breadbasket was a remarkable program that contributed to the convergence of me Black Church-driven Civil Rights Movement and the activist-based Black Power struggle in the economic arena. To fully appreciate the transformation of Operation Breadbasket's activities from a more traditional Civil Rights program pursuing job desegregation to a militant, innovative campaign addressing issues such as black business development, the more recent scholarly work on Black Power and its intersection with the Civil Right Movement has been taken into account.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Act as Lovers: Ethics of Love in James Baldwin’s Early Works

The rise, in the last decade or so, of political and social movements such as Black Lives Matter has coincided with a renewed attention and appreciation to the work of James Baldwin, notably, for his nuanced vision of race relations and his fundamental call to self-love and love. Author James Baldwin (1924-1987) wrote a large corpus of non-fiction and fiction works and was an outspoken civil rights activist, building personal relationships with important political and cultural figures of his time. In analyzing Baldwin’s fiction and non-fiction works, the aim of the following dissertation is, firstly, to pinpoint the author’s “Ethics of Love” and secondly, to understand how it translates to his first novels. This dissertation proposes in particular that Baldwin’s Ethics of Love is to be understood as a twofold movement: firstly disavowing hate as a force destroying the hater as well as the hated, and secondly, calling onto love, understood here as physical as well as mental engagement with the other, as the only viable solution to exit the spiral of hate. The following analysis focuses in particular on the novels Go Tell It on the Mountain (1952) and Another Country (1962), posing a reflection on themes such as: oppressive religion and religious symbolism, systemic racism and black masculinity, homosexual and interracial sexual desire, and suffering and interracial sympathy. This work will lead to the final observation that Baldwin’s work remains a relevant and nuanced portrait of American life even seventy years after its initial publication, providing radical answers to contemporary questions of race, gender, and sexuality.The rise, in the last decade or so, of political and social movements such as Black Lives Matter has coincided with a renewed attention and appreciation to the work of James Baldwin, notably, for his nuanced vision of race relations and his fundamental call to self-love and love. Author James Baldwin (1924-1987) wrote a large corpus of non-fiction and fiction works and was an outspoken civil rights activist, building personal relationships with important political and cultural figures of his time. In analyzing Baldwin’s fiction and non-fiction works, the aim of the following dissertation is, firstly, to pinpoint the author’s “Ethics of Love” and secondly, to understand how it translates to his first novels. This dissertation proposes in particular that Baldwin’s Ethics of Love is to be understood as a twofold movement: firstly disavowing hate as a force destroying the hater as well as the hated, and secondly, calling onto love, understood here as physical as well as mental engagement with the other, as the only viable solution to exit the spiral of hate. The following analysis focuses in particular on the novels Go Tell It on the Mountain (1952) and Another Country (1962), posing a reflection on themes such as: oppressive religion and religious symbolism, systemic racism and black masculinity, homosexual and interracial sexual desire, and suffering and interracial sympathy. This work will lead to the final observation that Baldwin’s work remains a relevant and nuanced portrait of American life even seventy years after its initial publication, providing radical answers to contemporary questions of race, gender, and sexuality

Fractured culture: The sociological poetics of the arts, participation and well-being

In different countries participation in the arts has become a significant theme of government policies which foster the instrumentalisation of culture; Yúdice (2003), Belfiore and Bennett (2010), Eagleton (2014). Increasingly it is claimed that the arts have positive effects on social, political and economic well-being. The emphasis on people changing the arts ― common in the political discourses of 1970s ― has been substituted by arguments about the power of the arts to transform people’s lives. This study tests these claims comparatively. The main questions asked are: what are the differences between instrumentalism from above or below in the political order; and how do the world of the arts and letters and the world of politics speak to each other today? Through extended interviews, life stories and discourse analysis, based on fieldwork in Britain and Venezuela, the study demonstrates the complex moral interdependency between European notions of aesthetic virtue and political or civic virtues. The political structuring of these virtuous relations is shown to be morally tenuous. It is argued they express the institutionalised but inadequate compensations associated with the ‘good-faith economy’ (Bourdieu 1977). Politically these relations are problematic; among other things they discursively separate the mind from the body which means that time and other basic needs tend to be neglected. It is argued that this complex relationship between aesthetic and political virtue is a significant factor in Statecraft, and in unmaking the militant role of the organised working class. It is suggested that these dynamics are a contributory factor in the ascendancy of the political far-right internationally. To counter the influence of the good-faith economy this study proposes greater public participation in the funding processes which support the arts

Legal Anarchism: Does Existence Need to Be Regulated by the State

This thesis asks does existence need to be regulated by the State? The answer relies on legal anarchism, an interdisciplinary, particularly criminal law and philosophy, and unconventional research project based on multiple methodologies with a specific language. It critically analyzes and consequently rejects State law because of its unjustified and unnecessary nature founded on unlimited violence and white-collar crime (Chapters 1-4), on the one hand, and suggests some alternatives to the Governmental legal system founded on agreement and peace (Chapter 5), on the other hand. It furthermore takes into account the elements of time and space, which means the ecological, local, national, regional, and international aspects of the legal system, in its analysis, critiques, and models