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☆ Book bans are accelerating across the country amid right-wing pressure campaign
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-17 | by ( Oliver Darcy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

But, as they try to claim that mantle, many of those same forces in media and politics are behind a disturbing wave of book bans sweeping the nation. PEN America, a non-profit organization committed to protecting free expression, published an alarming report Tuesday indicating that the “book ban crisis” is only getting worse. “There were over 4,000 instances of book bans in the first half of this school year—more than all of last school year as a whole. In doing so, they have also disproportionately targeted books by women and nonbinary authors,” PEN America said. Ted Shaffrey/APSuch brazen book bans — unprecedented in modern American history — is at its worst in the red states of Florida and Texas.

Persons: New York CNN —, Nikole Hannah, Margaret Atwood’s, ” Amy Reed’s, Rupi, “, ”, ’ ‘, Ted Shaffrey, Ron DeSantis, Abdi Nazemian, I’ve, ” Nazemian, “ I’ve, ” Kasey Meehan, Read, we’re Organizations: New York CNN, PEN America, The New York Times, ” PEN America, Central Library, Brooklyn Public Library, PEN Locations: New York, USA, birthed, ’, New York City, Florida, Texas, In Florida, In Texas, Iranian, Iowa

☆ Kate DiCamillo Says ‘Paying Attention Is a Way to Love the World’
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-29 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

I’m happy to report that the books are now organized alphabetically by author, and the extra copies have been put into other people’s hands. What’s the last great book you read? For me a great book is a book that I want to make someone else read immediately. And, too, a great book is one that makes me want to tell a story back. The last story that made me feel that way was in the 2023 “Best American Short Stories.” It’s by Da-Lin.

Persons: Alice McDermott’s “, McDermott, Niall Williams’s “, Nehisi Coates, Gene Luen Yang, Carlo Rovelli, ”, Lin Locations: Gilead

☆ Obama shared his vision of America at his first inauguration. Some still believe
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-20 | by ( John Blake | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +18 min

It went across all visual types.”Elizabeth Alexander recites a poem during President Obama's swearing-in ceremonies at the US Capitol on January 20, 2009. She had grown up in DC, and that inauguration day was a homecoming for her. “I’m sure that some people expected too much,” says Wear, the former Obama campaign worker, of Obama’s vision. The fact of the matter is, that (inauguration) day happened, and millions of people were there. We will have a better idea on another inauguration day — in January of 2025.

Persons: Elizabeth Alexander, Barack Hussein Obama, Alexander, ” Alexander, Muhammad Ali, Aretha Franklin, Elie Wiesel, John Lewis, Colin Powell, ”, “, …, Obama's, Ron Edmonds, Obama, Obama’s, Martin Luther King Jr, Donald Trump’s, —, Trump's, Joe Biden, Jon Cherry, Ed Wolf, Wolf, Barack Hussein Obama —, Barack Obama, Alex Wong, ‘ Hussein, “ Wolf, Clifford L, Alexander Jr, George W, Bush, Laura, Michelle, Tannen Maury, Ronald Reagan, Trump, ” Vivek Ramaswamy, Donald Trump, Alexi J . Rosenfeld, Thomas Sowell, speck, it’s, Shepard, Robert Daemmrich, ” Obama, Michael Wear, John McCain, McCain, ” McCain, we’ve, Mandel Ngan, ” Trump, Nehisi Coates, Coates, Hope ’, ” Coates, ’, didn’t, ” Wolf, Emmanuel Dunand, “ We’re, hasn’t, Obama — we’re, Rebecca Solnit, John Blake Organizations: CNN, Yale University, Capitol, AP, Confederate, Trump, Rochester Institute of Technology, Metro, Washington, Army, Getty, United, White, Whites, GOP, Republican, Obama, Democratic, Mellon Foundation Locations: Washington ,, America, Russia, Japan, Kenya, American, New York, United States, AFP, Kansas, New York City, Balkans, Minnesota, Arizona, Washington, San Francisco, Michigan, Norfolk , Virginia, Hope

☆ Black and Jewish Activists Have Allied for Decades. What Now?
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-18 | by ( Daniel Bergner | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +5 min

The cover of that edition of S.N.C.C.’s newsletter called attention to police killings of Black men, with the headline: “Cops Run Wild. Where Will They Strike Next?” Black and Palestinian resistance to repression were bound together. The theology claims that an immense fraud has been perpetrated by Jews upon Black people. Yet in recent years, a new bond between Black and Jewish activists has emerged, catalyzed, in part, by the confluence of civil rights protests and attention to the Palestinian plight. The alliance is “growing and exciting,” Nyle Fort, a Black activist and assistant professor of African American and African diaspora studies at Columbia, told me.

Persons: Huey P, Newton, Louis Farrakhan, Satan ”, ”, Ye, “ I’m, Kyrie Irving, Jacob, Henry Ford, Mumia Abu, Jamal, Rather, Fort, Fort’s, “, ” Fort, Nehisi Coates, Coates, Abraham, zealots, Jim Crow, Morgan Bassichis Organizations: Black Panther Party, Black Power, Washington, ”, America, Columbia, West Bank, Dream, Israel, Fort, Jewish, Peace, Union Theological Seminary, Jewish Voice Locations: Black, Jersey City, Ferguson, United States, Palestinian, Israel, Washington, Manhattan, Aqsa, Jerusalem, Hebron

☆ Opinion | The War in Gaza Is Splintering the Democratic Party
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-17 | by ( Michelle Goldberg | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +15 min

Should a few members of the Squad lose their primaries, the blow to Democratic unity could be severe. “And they’ll either stay at home or they’ll go to a third party.”Already, there are signs that the party is fracturing over Israel. Advocates for the freedom and safety of Palestinians, horror-struck by more than 10,000 civilian deaths in Gaza, believe that the Democratic Party is giving its approval to atrocities. These big-footed donors, who are overwhelmingly targeting representatives of color, are going to exacerbate the fissures in the Democratic Party. Diana Lovett, a Democratic Party district leader who held a fund-raiser for Bowman last year, said polarization over the congressman was tearing apart local Democrats.

Persons: Ryan Grim, Alexandria Ocasio, Cortez, Bernie Sanders, she’d, ”, Ilhan Omar, who’ve, Tlaib, “, Omar, Mark Mellman, Israel, ” Mellman, Bowman, Eliot Engel, Grim, he’d, George Floyd, Giddins, —, Don Samuels, Cori Bush, Wesley Bell, Summer Lee, Bhavini Patel, Bowman doesn’t, George Latimer, imploring, Latimer, hadn’t, Waleed Shahid, Ocasio, imploring Biden, they’ve, He’s, ” Bowman, I’m, haven’t, hasn’t, Shahid, Ta, Nehisi Coates, Coates, Isaac Herzog, Weinberger, Sam Bankman, Nina Turner, Andy Levin, Republican megadonors, Bernie Marcus, “ I’ve, Mark Pocan, Mellman, Diana Lovett, Lovett, who’d, dreading, “ He’s, we’re Organizations: Israel, ”, Democratic, American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Times, New, New York Democratic, The New York Times, Minneapolis City, Missouri Democrat, Pittsburgh Democrat, Squad, Justice Democrats, Democratic Party, Democratic Socialists of America, West Bank, Democratic Socialists, U.S, Westchester Jewish Council, New York Democratic Socialists of America, Jewish, Politico, United Democracy, AIPAC, Jewish Democrat, Republican, Home Depot, Wisconsin Democrat, Congressional Progressive Caucus Locations: Israel, Palestine, Gaza, New York, Minneapolis, Missouri, Louis County, Hebron, “, Manhattan, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin

☆ Calida Rawles: The painter submerging viewers into hyperrealistic water worlds
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-13 | by ( Suyin Haynes | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

CNN —Calida Rawles has been thinking a lot about light and darkness, in her artwork and beyond. The artworks are newly on display at Lehmann Maupin in New York, marking Rawles’ first major solo exhibition on the East Coast. “If I’m upset and I get to go to the ocean, I do sit back and feel more connected to something larger when I’m there," the artist Calida Rawles told CNN. Calida Rawles' cover artwork for "The Water Dancer." “But it’s all in the name of art!”And yet while the importance of water remains central to Rawles’ work, “A Certain Oblivion” also plays with different themes, in terms of form, process and subject matter.

Persons: Calida Rawles, Roe, Wade, ”, Rawles, Lehmann Maupin, “, ” Rawles, Marten Elder, Françoise Vergès, they’re, ” “ We’re, Skye, Sage, I’m, Lilith, Adam, “ We’re, you’re Organizations: CNN Locations: Los Angeles, New York, East, Sienna, Hong Kong, Seoul, London, Eden

☆ A South Carolina teacher had her AP lesson shut down after students snitched that she planned to have them read Ta-Nehisi Coates' memoir
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-14 | by ( Chris Panella | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A South Carolina teacher's lesson was shut down after students complained they were uncomfortable. The AP English lesson included reading Ta-Nehisi Coates' 2015 memoir on racism "Between the World and Me." This past spring, Chapin High School English teacher Mary Wood included Coates' book in her lesson plan before the AP English Language exam, according to lesson plans and documents obtained by The State. Wood said in the documents that she had taught Coates' memoir the prior academic year with no issue, The State added. Young compared the situation to the AP African American Studies course debacle in Florida, which also involved the removal Coates' writing from lesson plans.

Persons: Nehisi Coates, Coates, —, Mary Wood, AP Lang, Wood, Jeremy C, Young, doesn't, that's, hasn't Organizations: PEN America, Service, Carolina teacher's, Chapin High School English, The State, AP, Chapin High School, AP African American Studies, South, South Carolina Republicans, Associated Press, GOP Locations: Carolina, America, South Carolina, The, Florida

☆ Opinion: For women, it’s past time to give up the ghost of equality
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-06 | by ( Opinion Marcie Bianco | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +11 min

CNN —The Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), which states that equal rights under the law cannot be denied on account of sex, has been in a perpetual state of limbo for 100 years. And worldwide, those dreaming of gender equality will have to wait another 300 years, according to the latest United Nations estimates. Arguably, billionaires will land on Mars before we achieve gender equality. With odds like those, it’s well worth asking: What does “achieve gender equality” even mean? It’s past time to give up the ghost of equality and pursue a goal that has hope of transforming women’s lives for the better: freedom.

☆ U.S. African American studies does not include material targeted by Florida governor
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-01 | by ( Brad Brooks | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Feb 1 (Reuters) - An African American studies course for U.S. high school students that was released on Wednesday does not include material that Florida's conservative governor said pushed a liberal agenda, the latest development in a fierce debate about politics, education and censorship. Henry Louis Gates Jr., director of Harvard University's Hutchins Center for African and African American Research, was among scholars who praised the curriculum in the College Board statement. On Tuesday, more than 200 African American studies faculty members from dozens of universities published an open letter defending the course and expressing their "outrage at the efforts of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to delegitimize the AP's pilot curriculum in African American Studies." "We categorically reject DeSantis's autocratic claim to knowing what college-level material should be available in an AP African American Studies course." DeSantis and other Florida officials accused the lessons of being "indoctrination" for including Black queer studies, Black Lives Matter, reparations, and the abolishment of prisons.

Despite a rich stable of characters from Batman to Wonder Woman, the DC film and television studio has failed to match the success of Walt Disney Co's (DIS.N) Marvel hit factory. Also in 2025, DC Studios will release "Batman - Part II," a sequel starring Robert Pattison, a darker, more adult tale that is not part of Gunn's newly envisioned "DC Universe." While Marvel has become the highest-grossing film franchise in history, DC Studios has had mixed results. Four DC film projects that were completed before Gunn and Safran took over the studio will be released to theaters this year, "Shazam! Zaslav cut some costs by scrapping a third "Wonder Woman" film and a "Batgirl" movie that was headed to streaming.

☆ 'Black Panther' director Ryan Coogler emotionally recalls his last conversation with Chadwick Boseman
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-04 | by ( Randi Richardson | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +3 min

“Black Panther” director Ryan Coogler recently described his last conversation with Chadwick Boseman “a couple weeks” before the actor’s death in 2020. “I could tell he was tired.”Director Ryan Coogler and Chadwick Boseman on the set of "Black Panther" in 2018. Coogler and Boseman on the set of "Black Panther" in 2018. ©Walt Disney Co. / Courtesy Everett CollectionTwo days after Boseman died, Coogler wrote a heartfelt note about Boseman and sent it to media outlets. Angela Bassett played Boseman’s mother, Ramonda (affectionally called Queen Mother), in “Black Panther” and is reprising her role in the sequel.

☆ Chadwick Boseman didn’t read the ‘Wakanda Forever’ script before he died
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-04 | by ( Marianne Garvey | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +1 min

CNN —Chadwick Boseman did not read the script for “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” before his death in 2020, according to the film’s director. Ryan Coogler told “Wakanda Forever: The Official Black Panther Podcast” that he offered Boseman a chance to read the script, but, at the time, the actor declined. And she didn’t wanna leave him. But they were joking and laughing.”On the script, Coogler said Boseman “didn’t wanna read it because he didn’t wanna get in the way of whatever notes the studio might have. So he was like, ‘It’s better if I can read it later.’ But I found later that he was too tired to read anything.”

☆ DC's movie and TV division has finally found its own version of Marvel's Kevin Feige
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-25 | by ( Travis Clark | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

The pair inherit a baggage-heavy DC film universe. Discovery has finally found an executive to lead its DC movie and TV franchise — well, executives, plural, that is. Warner Bros. Since Discovery and WarnerMedia merged earlier this year, Zaslav has been looking for someone to lead DC's movie and TV efforts. Gunn jumped to Warner Bros. and DC after getting temporarily fired from the third "Guardians of the Galaxy" movie in 2018.

☆ DC wants to better compete with Marvel movies, but its plan is already facing severe roadblocks
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-20 | by ( Travis Clark | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Warner Bros. Discovery wants to rebuild the DC universe in the mold of Marvel movies. Warner Bros. confirmed a sequel to "Joker," which exists outside the universes of any of those other projects. The search for such an executive put DC movies president Walter Hamada on the outskirts, and Deadline reported on Wednesday that he had exited. Warner Bros.

Yet, in “Till,” filmmaker Chinonye Chukwu offers viewers a different window into Emmett’s life through the perspective of his poised and graceful mother, Mamie Till-Mobley (Danielle Deadwyler). But for Black mothers like Mamie, this is a different sort of anxiety. Through Deadwyler’s powerful performance, viewers will feel the palpable fear of Black mothers knowing they can never fully protect their Black children in white America. It is a manic fury that destroys Black lives and inflicts irreparable harm on our community, especially on the psyches of Black mothers. But for Black mothers like Mamie, this is a different sort of anxiety.

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