I was talking to one of my best friends from high school, and she told me that she was annoyed with the students on the music committee for her community college graduation ceremony. She had suggested students walk across the stage to an inspirational Beatles song, Let It Be. My friend went to a school that was predominantly black in Maryland, so I immediately understood her peers’ reactions: “Who are they?!” “That song sounds stupid!”

Her story reminded me of growing up in a predominantly black area in Maryland and getting made fun of because I liked music that wasn’t “black”. I loved the Cranberries in middle school, and I got into rave, house and dance music before I was even old enough to go to an 18 and over DC club. I found myself making friends based on musical tastes; my close black friends started to fade into the distance once I befriended Asians, Hispanics, and Whites in school whose tastes in music, among other things, were more open. It became apparent to me that I was becoming “white” in my black schoolmates’ eyes.

I think its a pity when blacks limit themselves in their musical exploration. Ironically, most musical genres and songs out today are (or were) influenced by African Americans; our influence dates back to the early 19th century. I think expanding your taste in tunes–whether it be alternative, rock, country, etc.–is ultimately acknowledging how the contributions of our people have shaped the music industry. With that said, choose a genre you normally never listen to and find a billboard-topping artist. Preview their songs on Pandora.com… and who knows? Maybe you’ll discover some new music you never thought you’d like!

Here’s some of the artists I’m feeling now:

 Cicada, album - Cicada (dance genre)
The Killers, album - Day and Age (alternative rock)
PortisHead featuring Moloko, song - Fun for Me (acid jazz)
Samantha James - song, Rise, album - Rise (dance)
Stereophonics, song - Maybe Tomorrow, album - You Gotta Go There to Come Back (alternative rock)

Here’s Samantha James’ Rise:

Recently my father burned me a CD (okay, actually I burned it but it was his idea!) with his favorite pianist, Erroll Garner, who I did not remember ever hearing about before. I have only featured women on this blog, but I figured showing some love for our great black male artists doesn’t hurt every once and a while! I love Erroll’s music, and if you listen carefully, you can hear him humming while he plays in many of this tracks.

You could say that the lauded pianist and composer Erroll was a child prodigy; he started playing by ear when he was 3–he never learned how to read music. He was short, 5′2, so he always played while sitting on a stack of phone books. Erroll is most known for his composition, “Misty,” which was featured in the Clint Eastwood film, Play Misty For Me. Check out his tunes and watch the video below.

Recently, I was thinking about skin color and how cultures everywhere still treat people differently because of it. When I was living in Taipei, Taiwan, women shrunk from the sun in fear of turning too dark and being seen as “low class.” Many girls get “double eyelid surgery” to have full eyes like Westerners. I always thought to myself “when are people going to stop basing standards of beauty on European features?”

Now, I know you’re wondering what I’m getting at… Well I started thinking about the entertainment industry and black actresses. When you ask someone who the best black actress is today, who do they list? Maybe Halle Berry, Angela Bassett or Thandie Newton. But what about Alfre Woodard? I looked at her body of work recently—which is mostly TV work and small roles in films (with the exception of The Family That Preys) and I tried to figure out why she isn’t as popular. She may not be as hot as Halle but she is ten times for talented, and yet doesn’t receive the same opportunities. And I can think of plenty of white actresses—okay I’ll say it—who look like MEN, but continue to get plenty of work (Tilda Swinson, Jodie Foster, Cate Blanchett). There’s definitely something amiss and it isn’t about sex appeal.

Halle Berry, in my opinion, really isn’t that great of an actress, but she’s got Anglo-Saxon features and doesn’t mind getting naked. Alfre Woodard, on the other hand, has darker skin, African features, and wants roles that truly reflect her acting ability. Need an example? Check out Follow Me Home, a 1997 political independent film about racism in America through the lens of Mexicans, African Americans and Native Americans. Never heard of it? That’s because no major studio was willing to distribute it. When Alfre was tapped by the first time director to play Every, the lead, Woodard believed in the message so much that she did it for free. In the end, it was an award-winning film; plus Alfre was able to keep her clothes on. Take that Halle!

Here, a clip of Alfre reading Sojourner Truth “Ain’t I A Woman”

As a woman who grew up with a painter/percussionist for a father, I’ve always appreciated the arts. Recently I tried to think of some acclaimed black female visual artists—and I couldn’t think of one for our times. I know of a few black female artists personally who have been painting since the 50’s and 60’s—but they are mostly unknown in general. Then I tried to think of some women from the early 19^th century and I could only think of black men (Henry Ossawa Tanner and Ellis Wilson).

So what’s going on here? Maybe my memory is failing me, or our schools are more interested in highlighting black political leaders and performers. Or just maybe we live in a country that would rather applaud the creative efforts of the Andy Warhol’s and Jackson Pollock’s (I don’t know about you, but I really question their raw talent) Either way, I think it would be nice to know what women have contributed to the art world in America, and not just through song and dance.
 
One woman in particular who stands out for her achievements is Laura Wheeler Waring, a portrait artist. She was born in Hartford, CT in 1887 to a reverend father and a mother who was an amateur artist and teacher. Her oil paintings reflect the era romanticism, due mostly to her time in Paris where she studied on a scholarship in 1914. She was selected by the Harmon Foundation (an organization that promoted the work of African American artists, writers, educators, and scientists) to paint portraits of exceptional blacks like W.E.B. Du Bois and Marian Anderson.
 
Not only did she contribute her artistic skills to preserving the beautiful image of our great black leaders, she also dedicated her life to teaching art to blacks—a truly commendable accomplishment. 

When I was in grade school, I always had butterflies in my stomach on the first day. Why? Because I was worried the teacher was going to butcher my name during roll call. I’m sure some of you can relate. You always knew when your name was about to be called because the teacher takes a long pause, and then there’s a look of panic on their face before saying, “Um…now, I hope I get this right…” Teachers called me “New-by-uh,” “Nuhh-be-ah,”and even “New-bah (totally forgetting the fact that there is an “I” before the “A” in Nubia). Giggling in the classroom always surmounted while I raised my hand, and said, “It’s Nubia (new-be-uh).”

Once the giggling died down, the teacher’s usual response was, “Oooh! What a beautiful name. Where is it from?” And my normal schpeal was: “It’s the name of an Egyptian Queen…blah, blah, blah.” And all of this, unfortunately, made me a little ashamed of my name.

Fast forward 20 years later, and you couldn’t force me to feel anything but pride when I say my name, see it in print, or hear it. And 20 years later, I am still asked the same questions, and it normally doesn’t annoy me—until one day recently. I started a new job a few months ago and a fellow new employee approached me to ask, “Nubia. What is that? Where are you from?”

“It’s Egyptian. I’m from America,” I replied, matter-of-factly.
“What about your parents then, where are they from?”
“Washington, DC, and they are American too,” I said a little annoyed. But I tried to be polite, because I figured she wasn’t trying to be rude.

Why is it that when someone doesn’t have a name like, “Sara” or “Lisa” it means you have to be from another country—that you can’t POSSIBLY be American? I love it when Americans label these “non-generic” names as “ethnic”. What does that really mean anyway? My name isn’t generic, it’s not ethnic; it’s just beautiful and unique. If I had a choice, I would pick that over an “American” name any day.

Four years out of college (and finally having most of my books in one place), I am rediscovering some of the great literature I was exposed to at Barnard. For one of my senior thesis classes, I took this amazing class, Black Images and Stereotypes in Literature and the Arts. A few months ago I was looking at my bookcase and came across an author we touched on briefly in class: Nella Larsen.

Nella Larsen was part of a group of female Harlem Renaissance authors whose work was considered ‘lost’ before the 1970’s—and even after re-discovery, Larsen’s novels are often overshadowed by major players. Larsen was the first black female creative writer to be honored with a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1930 to do research on a novel in Spain and France. The characters and story lines she penned are direct reflections of herself and her upbringing—this was a woman who was not afraid to pour her personal life into her fictitious novels.

Nella Larsen, born in Chicago in 1891, was the daughter of a Danish woman and a black West Indian man who died when she was young. She spent most of her life interacting within Danish and German social circles until she was introduced to Harlem’s literary elite in 1919 when she married Elmer Samuel Imes, a successful black research physicist.

During the 1920’s, Larsen was encouraged to publish her writing by many influential movers and shakers in New York’s art scene—especially Carl Van Vechten who introduced the to his publisher, Knopf. Larsen’s first novel Quicksand (Knopf, 1928) catapulted the talented author into a huge success, earning her a Bronze Medal in recognition of Distinguished Achievement Among Negroes in Literature from the Harmon Foundation.

Quicksand is a story about Helga Crane, a bi-racial teacher living in the South who has a restless nature. Helga was born to a black man and a Danish woman; her parents separated during her childhood, leaving her to be raised by her mother. Struggling to navigate within the stifled black culture of the south, Helga finds herself leaving her job and fiancé behind to start a new life in Chicago.

I really like Larsen’s descriptive and fluid writing style. She uses Helga’s character to portray the conflicted life of a bi-racial woman who attempts to live in both the black and white world. Larsen wrestles with wanting to portray Helga as sexually liberated without turning her into a sexually exploited woman via loss of social status, domination in marriage, or pregnancy—common devices inflicted on black women since slavery times.

If you want to read her novels, I would recommend purchasing the reprint by Rutgers University Press, which combines Quicksand and Passing. The introduction highlights Larsen’s life and dissects the complexity of black women’s sexual identity (from slavery to the Harlem Renaissance) and how female authors grappled with these stereotypes in their literature.

It’s a shame most of us have never heard of Edmonia Lewis. She used her talent to replicate life through clay. In the 1840s she was born in a wigwam to a Chippewah woman and an African American man, she became an orphan at age four. Through the financial support of her older brother, Edmonia attended boarding school and was accepted to Oberlin College to study music in 1859. While there she endured some racial tension (and was later forced to leave Oberlin), but came out of that experience with a love for sculpture. She relocated to Boston to hone her talent.

From carving a little foot to a life-like bust of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw (the leader of the all black 54th Massachusetts Regiment during Civil War), Edmonia proved her natural sculpting ability. In 1865, her highly acclaimed bust of Shaw enabled her to commission work in Europe, later venturing to Italy to hobnob with one of America’s most famous sculptors, Hiram Powers.

After working in Rome for two years, she completed the famous marble sculptor, “Forever Free” (1867-68). She had difficulty surviving and covering her costs at that time, and her greatest fear was that people would say she was not the creator of her works. Instead of shrinking in her fear, she gained strength from it and persevered, taking on all the heavy work as a female sculptor. Her works were exhibited all over America, including Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco.

Before passing away in 1909, Edmonia crafted almost a dozen breath-taking pieces. If you’re wondering how much Edmonia’s work is worth—in 2007 a private collector purchased ‘Veiled Bride of Spring’ for $138,000. Her sculptors can be viewed at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and various galleries in Scotland, England and Germany.