Come Back, Chester Himes

Come Back, Chester Himes
by Mark Anthony Neal

Unavailable for nearly three decades, the original motion picture soundtrack for Come Back Charleston Blue was recently released. The re-issued recording not only serves as a reminder of the era of Blaxpolitation--the moment in the late 1960s that marks the beginning of mainstream America's fascination with under/other-worldly blackness--but highlights the work of an often overlooked genius of black expressive culture, Chester Himes.

Read the full essay CRITICAL NOIR @ Vibe.com

Aishwarya Rai

Aishwarya Rai Profile

Name - Aishwarya Rai

Nick Name - Aishu

Born - November 1, 1973, Karnataka, India

Family - Mother-Brindya, Brother-Aditya

Star - Scorpio

Height - 5 ' 7 "

Eyes - Green

Family - Mother Brindya, Brother Aditya

Languages - English, Hindi, Kannada, Tamil

Aishwarya Rai Biography

Aishwarya Bachchan Rai (born November 1, 1973), is an award-winning Indian actress. Rai, who won the Miss World title in 1994, made her film debut in Mani Ratnam's Iruvar (1997) and had her first critical and commercial success with Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam (1999), with whom she repeated this success with Devdas (2002). Since then, she has acted in nearly forty Hindi, Tamil, Bengali and English films. Today, she is considered to be one of the most popular actresses in India and the best-known Indian actress in the world. Rai is married to Indian actor Abhishek Bachchan and is daughter-in-law to Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bachchan.

Rai was born in Mangalore, in the South Indian state of Karnataka, to Krishnaraj Rai, a marine engineer, and Vrinda Rai, a writer. Her ancestors are from the Bunt community of Mangalore. Her family relocated to Mumbai (Bombay) after her birth. Rai has one elder brother, Aditya Rai who is in the merchant navy. Rai attended the Arya Vidya Mandir at Santacruz, Mumbai, then entered Jai Hind College, Churchgate, Mumbai for one year and then moved to Ruparel College, Matunga, Mumbai to finish her HSC. She was an A student and was on track to become an architect. Her mother tongue is Tulu. She also speaks Hindi, English, Kannada, Marathi and Tamil.

Rai began modeling on the side while pursuing for studies in Architecture, which did not materialise. In the 1994 Miss India contest, she was placed second behind Sushmita Sen, and went on to win the Miss World title that same year and the Miss Photogenic award. After the one year reign as Miss World in London, she then worked as a professional model, in advertising and Indian fashion magazines and later got into the Indian film industry.

Reminiscing by the Dock of the Bay

from Popmatters.com

A Blues for Otis: The Life and Legacy of a Soul Legend
[7 December 2007]
by Claudrena N. Harold

Forty years ago on the frigid afternoon of December 10, 1967, a Beechcraft plane carrying the legendary soul singer Otis Redding plunged into the icy waters of Lake Monona, Wisconsin. Of the eight passengers aboard the twin-engine aircraft, trumpeter Ben Cauley of the Bar-Kays was the lone survivor. News of the crash and Redding’s death spread quickly across the country. Feelings of loss and grief were particularly strong in the South. To thousands of blacks living below the Mason-Dixon Line, Redding was a cultural hero who personified the promise of the New South and the revolutionary possibilities of the ‘60s.

Over the five year period between his signing with Stax in 1962 and his unfortunate death, Redding had become a permanent fixture on black radio, amassed enough money to provide his wife and family with a respectable lifestyle, and gained international recognition as one of the most amazing singers of his generation. Success, however, never diluted Redding’s soul. Coming off at times as the quintessential race man, Redding was firmly rooted in the cultural rhythms of the black South. An incredibly gifted singer-songwriter possessed of the rare combination of supreme intelligence, unwavering ambition, and emotional depth, the Macon, Georgia, native brilliantly synthesized the evangelical fervor of the black church, the rambunctious vibes of rock ‘n’ roll, the plaintive cries of the blues, and the rhetorical brilliance of Southern black vernacular culture.

But the reason Redding stands out as an immortal soul icon is rooted in much more than his broad musical palette. Intensely emotional on record and on stage, Redding unhesitatingly bore witness to pain, exposed his own vulnerabilities, and expressed emotions at odds with conventional and emergent notions of black masculinity. Tearjerkers like his “Pain in My Heart”, “Try a Little Tenderness”, “My Lover’s Prayer”, and the criminally underrated “You’re Still My Baby” spoke honestly and profoundly on the power of love, forgiveness, and reconciliation. To a degree underappreciated then and now, Redding’s music presented an image of black domestic life and gender relations more complex and more humane than many sociological musings on the purported perils of black family life.

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Angelina Jolie : Wallpaperz

Angelina Jolie Profile

Name: Angelina Jolie

Birth Name: Angelina Jolie Voight

Height: 5' 7"

Sex: F

Nationality: American

Birth Date: June 4, 1975

Birth Place: Los Angeles, California, USA

Profession: actress, model

Education: Lee Strasberg Theater Institute (enrolled at age 11)
New York University (majored in Film; attended night classes, 1997)

Husband/Wife: Billy Bob Thornton (actor, director; b. August 4, 1955; married on May 5, 2000; divorced on May 27, 2003), Jonny Lee Miller (actor; b. November 15, 1972; married on March 28, 1996; separated on October 1, 1997; filed for divorce on February 3, 1999)

Relationship: Brad Pitt (actor; born on December 18, 1963; rumored to have a relationship during filming Mr. And Mrs. Smith - 2004), Timothy Hutton (actor; born on August 16, 1960; dated 1998-1999)
Father: John Voight (actor; born on December 29, 1938; married on December 12, 1971; separated in 1976; divorced in 1978)

Mother: Marcheline Bertrand (former actress; born on May 9, 1950; died of cancer on January 27, 2007)

Brother: James Haven Voight (director; born on May 11, 1973)

Uncle: Chip Taylor (aka James Wesley Voight; musician)

Son: Maddox Chivan Jolie-Pitt (Cambodian; adopted; born on August 5, 2001), Pax Thien Jolie-Pitt (adopted from an orphanage in Vietnam)

Daughter: Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt (born on May 27, 2006 in Namibia; via Caesarean section and weighed in at a healthy seven pounds; Shiloh means Messiah), Zahara Marley Jolie-Pitt (Ethiopian; adopted; born on July 6, 2005)

Celebrating C. Vivian Stringer; Celebrating Women

Rutgers Coach C. Vivian Stringer Should be Celebrated
by Mark Anthony Neal

Durham, NC -- Eight months ago, when former CBS radio jock Don Imus directed the now infamous phrase “nappy headed hos” at the Rutgers University women’s basketball team, the country was again pressed to confront the issue of race. Within this maelstrom of ignorance and misinformation, C. Vivian Stringer, the coach of the Rutgers University women’s basketball team, emerged as one of the real voices of reason, displaying the integrity and wisdom that comes from 30-plus years of professional coaching . In the process, Stringer gave form and substance to the real lives that black women live.

On Thursday, Stringer and her women’s basketball team come to Durham to play against Duke. Coincidentally, this occurs on the same week that Don Imus returns to the airwaves on WABC-radio in New York City. In recent weeks. Stringer has complained about the connections that continue to be made between her student/athletes and Imus. The stain is one of the many difficulties black women like Stringer face in their efforts to be considered as competent as their peers.

Black women, as a group, remain at the margins of American consciousness, easily caricatured as “baby mamas,” strip club dancers, welfare queens, domestic workers and, well, “nappy headed hos.” Stringer is the antithesis of this caricature.

She began her head coaching career at historically-black Cheyney University of Pennsylvania, a year before Title IX took effect. When the NCAA held its first national tournament for women’s basketball in 1982, Stringer’s team advanced to the Final Four -- a rare accomplishment for a historically black college or university in any Division I collegiate sport. Stringer repeated the feat when she turned the dormant University of Iowa into a women’s basketball powerhouse, taking them to the Final Four in 1993.

Yet when Rutgers hired Stringer two years later, much was made about the fact that she would make more than the school’s white male football and basketball coaches. (By the way, two of Stringer’s Rutgers teams have reached the Final Four, including last season when the Scarlet Knights knocked off then top-ranked Duke along the way.)

As a scholar of black culture, I find Imus’s mean-spirited and misogynistic attack frustrating because it reflects the inability of our larger society to give serious consideration to the unique position that black women such as Stringer occupy in American society. They experience the brunt of two dynamics: racism and sexism -- what UCLA law professor Kimberle Crenshaw calls the “intersectionality” of black women’s experiences.

The specificity of “nappy-headed ho” speaks to this. Regardless of her level of educational attainment or the size of her bank account, a hairstyle can render a black woman socially disposable. Because hair texture is integral to a black woman’s identity, the term “nappy-headed” carries almost as much potency as the “n” word. And this is perhaps what stung many black women in the aftermath of Imus’s comments because both racism and sexism were at play. It was another reminder that black women, once again, are not thought to possess the traits -- physical, spiritual and intellectual -- that their white peers do.

Like Stringer, I too think it’s time to disassociate Imus from the story of the Rutgers women’s basketball team. We all should take the opportunity presented by Rutgers basketball to celebrate women’s athletics and all those young women for which sticks and stones may break their bones, but for whom spirits will never waver.

***

Mark Anthony Neal is a professor of African and African-American Studies at Duke University.

© 2007 Office of News & Communications/Duke University

Kelly Brook - Red Carpet Pics

Kelly Brook Profile

Name: Kelly Brook

Birth Name: Kelly Ann Parsons

Height: 5' 8''

Sex: F

Nationality: British

Birth Date: November 23, 1979

Birth Place: Rochester, Kent, England, UK

Profession: Actress, Model, TV presenter, Producer

Education: Attended the Italia Conti stage school, London, U.K.
Thomas Aveling, Rochester

Relationship: Billy Zane (actor; born on February 24, 1966), Jason Statham (British; actor; born on September 12, 1972; 2002-September 2004)

Father: Ken (scaffolder)

Mother: Sandra (cook)

Brother: Damian (younger)

Half Sister: Sasha

Claim to fame: Model for the UK national tabloid newspaper, The Star

Kelly Brook Biography

Kelly Brook (born Kelly Ann Parsons on 23 November 1979) is an English model, actress, and occasional swimwear designer and television presenter.

After leaving school in Rochester, Brook studied at the Italia Conti stage school in London for three years before becoming a professional model.

Brook's modeling career began at 16 after winning a beauty competition, her early work was in a range of advertising campaigns, including for the new "Bravissimo" company that specializes in bras and lingerie for big breasted women, and for Foster's beer. Brook is 5 feet, 6 inches (168 cm) tall, and her voluptuous figure caught the eye of the editorial team of the Daily Star who began featuring her as a Page Three girl.

She then appeared in a Pulp video 'Help the aged' with Huck Whitney of the cult band The Flaming Stars, in a slow dance sequence.

Brook's picture soon began appearing in other lad mags such as FHM (repeatedly landing in its list of the "100 Sexiest Women of the Year") and Loaded. She topped the 'FHM 100 Sexiest Women in the World 2005' list, which was said to have polled 15 million people. In a poll over 5,000 women in April 2005 for Grazia magazine she was considered to have the best British female body. She ranked 5th at 'FHM 100 Sexiest Women in the World 2006' list.

Brook has also done a large amount of commercial swimwear, sportswear, and hosiery modelling, and a limited amount of nude & semi-nude modelling. Some modelling work for Triumph Bras caused quite a stir because of specially commissioned 50-foot high billboards of Brook's bust.

In 2005, Brook shot a ten page, mostly nude black and white portfolio with photographer David Bailey. The shoot featured in British design magazine November 2005 issue of Arena magazine.

In 2006, she released successful ranges of swimwear and lingerie at New Look stores nationwide.

In February 2007, it was announced that Kelly had signed a contract, reported to be worth £1m, to be the new face and body of Unilever's Lynx body spray, known as Axe in the US and on continental Europe. Kelly has been on billboards, in newspapers and online as part of the advertising campaign.

Love Letter to a Daughter

For the Littlest One
by Mark Anthony Neal

It’s really hard to believe that it has been five years. And for you those five years have been nothing but constant change—the first eight months you spent in New York, eleven months in Texas and the last three years here in North Carolina. You might end up being the most cosmopolitan of us all. But I really wanted to talk to you—leave you something that you can go to when you’re older, so that they’ll always be an index of how a I feel about you—at this moment, in this place. I wasn’t home for your birthday—yes, that was me that rolled that bike into your bedroom as I headed to the airport before dawn—and I wasn’t there for the birthday cake and the tiara and the singing and all the pictures. That you don’t hold it against me, perhaps is the measure of how much daddy’s comings and goings/goings and comings are part of the regular rhythm of your life—when you need your own daddy time, you always find a way to get it. But in truth, November 15th may have been the day that you were born, but it’s the day that you came into our lives that really matters.

Of course I got to tell your sister’s story in a book—and I’m sure that one day there’ll be a book filled with the spirit of you, though, there’s been nary a day since December 1, 2002 that your spirit hasn’t filled every moment and every breath that we’ve shared. I can still remember the overnight trek to Buffalo—through the requisite Syracuse/Rochester snowstorm—to await your arrival at Uncle Julius and Aunt Carmen’s house. It was only hours into that trip that we told your then four-year old sister that she was gonna have a baby-sister (and in some ways, years later she’s still trying to process that). That first moment we saw you, you were just a lump of baby—there was no indication of the hearty spirit that was to come. It was the day before my 37th birthday—a birthday that we spent snowed-in—getting much needed time to consider our growing little family.

The thing I always remember about your early days, was the sense of intimacy that you demanded from your daddy. Even as an infant, you needed to touch my face—memorize its contours, as if you already knew that God had some plans for your daddy, that even he was unaware of, and that there would be so many days in which you only got a glimpse of daddy. I often lament that I don’t get to spend as much quality time with you and your sister, as I did during the first two years of her life. But truth be told, I spent more time with you during the first six months of your life than I ever did at any point in your sister’s life. Unlike your sister—who was born interactive—you were always self-contained. So I could literally spend hours with you at that Wolf Road Starbucks in Albany (still my favorite place to write after all these years)—your carry-all inches from me. And the joy of being able to reach over and have you rest quietly on my chest, when daddy needed a break from his ambition. I miss the simplicity of those days.

You were such a tiny thing. When you began to walk—just short of ten-months—folk often remarked that you were too small to be so dexterous. Of course many of those folk had witness ed the dexterity with which you used kitchen utensils as early as 8-months old. We rarely remark on how little you are these days—you are a fully grown five-year old, whose passion for food, is perhaps only matched by your father’s. It’s that hearty appetite, hearty sense of humor and hearty desire for life that we share. And of course the music thing. I don’t know if I was proud or angry that night you grabbed a handful of CDs from my cherished collection (hastening my move to the MP3 world) and listened to them on your portable radio to find the ones that mattered to you. 35-years earlier, that was me going through your Papa AC’s album collection. Dru Hill. Corrine Bailey Rae. James Brown. Bill Withers. Chrisette Michele. Arrested Development. Mary J Blige. Those are your current faves, though they never overpower your own rhythms. How many of your teachers have told us that you flow to your own music—as if we didn’t wage battle with your strong will everyday of your life. Like your unwillingness to go to sleep until it’s sleep that you want—so you sit in your room and imagine and build and create and pretend and dance and sing and tell stories to yourself, and I can’t get mad, since it’s your eternally restless daddy who can never get his own ass to bed before 1am.

There’s that defiant streak in you and your sister, marked by the defense of your rights to know the logic behind the things that your parents/teachers/friends/coaches ask of you. Like when one of your teachers asked you not to remove your shoes during nap time (who sleeps with their shoes on?); Sensing the lack of logic behind the request, you defiantly took off your shoes one at a time, while staring your teacher down. Your mother and I would like to think that we have endowed you and your sister with the ability to make your own decisions and to develop your own convictions and yeah when we’re running late on the mornings that I teach or the two of you are testing our last nerves at the end of a long day, that shit is maddening. But I often think about how well your spirits will serve you as grown women in a world that would rather you sit quietly and take directions.

The thing I so love about you now, is the way that you simply fill a room. The little boys, some twice your age, who feel the need to gravitate towards you—and take your direction. The little girls who, literally sit at your feet. The teachers who need to remark about your low-key intellect. Perhaps because I too only get a glimpse of you , I often find myself mesmerized by your spirit. My favorite moments with you these days are those times when your reach up—like you are that crawling infant again—asking for me to lift you up. At first I would complain—you are in fact a fully-grown five-year-old and daddy’s is 42-year back—until I came to realize your intent. Yes, you are a big girl, but even a big girl needs to feel small in her daddy’s arms. Hopefully this big girl knows her daddy loves her, whether near or far.