Black History Month: If You Could Meet Any Historical Black Figure Today, Who Would It Be?

This was tough for me to come up with a selected number of black prominent figures in the course of history, pioneers and ground breakers, who not only had a positive influence on the black community, but as well as the rest of the world.  Even as an African-American sits in powerful positions at more than any other time during the history of our nation, we have to ask ourselves, are we still in a crisis?

We also have to acknowledge that many of our Black heroes have gone unrecognized for their contributions, in which their significance to society is now being rediscovered.  Don’t view this post simply as a top ten list; instead, leave a comment below explaining if there’s any Black American on or off the list of photos I included in this post, in which you would have liked an opportunity to meet them, and why?  Regardless of who you choose, my overall point is that there’s never been a more critical time for us to turn our full on attention onto leadership in our community and recognizing the value we have on each other’s lives.

In Case You Missed It, Marvel Has Blessed Us With A New ‘Black Panther’ Trailer

I can’t say this enough.  It’s a wonderful time to be either a comic book creative, a fan or a little of both.  Technology has caught up and continues to advance at a rapid pace.  The things you can do with cinematography and filmmaking nowadays is incredible.  You can literally create stunning, virtual worlds on the movie screen, where it’s only limits is the extent of the creator’s imagination.  That concept alone, brings us to the world of Wakanda, which is an Afrofuturist fantasy land.  By the looks of the trailer, Black Panther is shaping up to be Marvel’s most ambitious, breathtaking film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Watching it for the 100th time now, I’m still blown away by the action sequences, the costume designs and the music choices.  Have you noticed the cast?!  This could be the most talented (and beautiful) group of people pulled together for a Marvel film!  Besides acting standouts Chadwick Boseman and Lupita Nyong’o, there’s The Walking Dead’s Danai Gurira (fellow fighter Okoye), Angela Bassett (T’Challa’s mother, Ramonda), Michael B. Jordan (T’Challa’s Wakandan rival Erik Killmonger), Get Out’s Daniel Kaluuya (T’Challa’s second-in-command, W’Kabi), recent Emmy winner Sterling K. Brown (the mysterious N’Jobu), Forest Whitaker (warrior Zuri), and Marvel returnees Martin Freeman (Everett K. Ross) and Andy Serkis (Ulysses Klaue/Klaw).

Black History Month: Annette Gordon-Reed, Pulitzer Prize-winning Author

Photo Credit:  Jerry Bauer

Creator spotlight to acknowledge and celebrate black history makers

“Love has been many things throughout history: the simple comfort of the familiar, having a person to know and being known by that person in return; a connection born of shared experiences, an irrational joy in another’s presence; a particular calming influence that one member of the couple may exert on the other, or that they both provide to one another. A combination of all these and myriad other things can go into making one person wish to stay tied to another. Anyone who is not in the couple–that is, everyone else in the world–will not understand precisely how or why it works for two people.” – Annette Gordon-Reed, The Hemingses of Monticello:  An American Family

American historian and law professor, Annette Gordon-Reed, was the first African-American to win a Pulitzer Prize for History in 2009 for her book, The Hemingses of Monticello:  An american Family.  She also won 15 other prizes for the work she’s done during that year.  In 2010, she received the National Humanities Medal and was named a MacArthur Fellow.  Gordan-Reed was educated at Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School.  She is a Professor of Law and History at Harvard, and the Carol K. Pforzheimer Professor at the Raddiffe Institute for Advanced Study.