Africa in Silver Spring: Upcoming Movies and Entertainment Awards

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AFI, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, Half of a Yellow Sun, Liberia, Lumumba, Montgomery Community College, New African Films Festivaal, Politics & Prose, Raoul Peck, Silver Spring, TransAfrica Forum

On a walk to Silver Spring today I passed by the Montgomery Community College which had an announcement for the Liberian Entertainment Awards this Saturday scrolling outside its performing arts center for all passersby on Georgia Avenue to see.

A few minutes later I passed by the AFI Theatre where TransAfrica Forum’s 10th annual New African Films festival will screen in a few weeks.  Half of a Yellow Sun, the film adaptation of a book by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (who has me thoroughly mesmerized after I saw her at Politics & Prose in May) will be screening as part of it and AFI also has a film introspective by Raoul Peck coming soon.  Peck has made a film on Lumumba, and as I recall, he is a Haitian who grew up in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

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Injustice Anywhere is a Threat to Justice Everywhere: Howard University Examines the Free South Africa Movement in DC

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anti-Apartheid legislation, black Hindus, Free South Africa Movement, Howard Dobson, Howard University, Moorland-Springarn Research Center, Nelson Mandela, Ronald Dellums, Ronald Reagan, South Africa, Sylvia Hill, TransAfrica Forum, Washington Office on Africa

Yesterday I attended an event at Howard University on ‘Washington, DC and the Free South Africa Movement: A Retrospective.’  The event was moderated by Dr. Howard Dobson, Director of Howard’s Moorland-Springarn Research Center, which is celebrating its centennial this year.  Panelists included former Congressman and Mayor of Oakland, Ron Dellums, as well as TransAfrica Forum board member and Professor of the University of the District of Columbia, Sylvia Hill.  A black ordained Hindu minister, Gregory McCay also spoke on discrimination in India.

Celebrating Madiba’s 95th in DC: Mandela Matters

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Eleanor Holmes Norton South Africa, Faida Mitifu, Johnetta Cole, Mandela birthday, Mandela day in DC, Michael Eric Dyson South Africa, Princeton Lyman, Richard Lugar Africa, Ron Dellums, TransAfrica Forum

For those of my generation (I was barely in school when Mandela was released from prison) who may have historical yearnings to have experienced the US anti-Apartheid movement of the 1980s first-hand, attendance at yesterday’s 95th birthday celebration of Nelson Mandela may be the closest that one will ever come to rekindling that atmosphere.  However, I don’t think that one would have found the South African Ambassador scurrying around with a bunch of bananas in