Harriet Tubman is finally set to grace the front cover of the $20 bill. For many it’s a dream come true, especially since folk been “dreaming of Harriet” for a minute.
Image: from a source I won’t name that seemed to be parodying black history with an allusion to “Harriet Tubman in space.” I am both jacking and subverting that sh*t.
It’s that time of year again, Black History Month. Every February in the United States, the country sets aside 28 (or 29 in a leap year) days to celebrate, discuss and engage Black History. Innocuous enough. And yet Feb. 1st seems to signal the beginning of a 28-day long ritual of whining (how come they get their own month?), misconceptions and endless micro-aggressive racial faux-pas. And this isn’t just from the usual sky boxes of white privilege; there are black people (looking in your general direction Stacey Dash) who wade into…well…the stupid. So here are a few tips to better understand the month, both for those who have to endure the stupid and for those who might be enticed to engage in the stupid.
This is just an updated list from an annual post I’ve done for the last two years. But guess what? It never gets old because the stupid never changes.
So to kick off the new year, and following in the footsteps of fellow writer Troy Wiggins over at AfroFantasy, looking back on 2015 in my creative life–and what I might hope for in 2016.
Originally written in 2013, this is the final chapter in a three-part installment on Christopher Columbus beginning with The Other Explorers and Hunting Prestor John in the End Times. This post ponders how the destruction of the Americas, and the accompanying legacies of colonialism and slavery, help shape the fears of our popular imaginings–including science fiction.
In the wake of a controversy over who the culture of an entire continent belongs to within the context of its far-flung descendants (many quite involuntarily flung at that), I revisit a set of blog posts I wrote several years ago regarding speculative fiction, world building, “appropriation” and the Africa of our imaginations. Can one appropriate the self?
Phenderson Djèlí Clark 