community – Black Future Feminist

Black Joy, Celebration, Holiday Celebration!!

Habari Gani?!! It’s Kwanzaa Time!!-Day 1: Umoja

Posted on December 26, 2023December 26, 2023 by drblackfuturefeminist

Ahhhh one of my favorite times of the year!!

Habari Gani!! We have come to that time of year again, a time to celebrate an annual tradition of family, community, and culture!! So you ask what time it is…It’s Kwanzaa Time !!

Kwanzaa is an African American and pan-African holiday that celebrates family, community, and culture. Created in 1966 by Dr. Maulana Karenga, a professor of Africana/Black Studies it’s a 7-day cultural festival beginning on December 26th and ends January 1st. Kwanzaa comes from the phrase matunda ya kwanza, which means “first fruits” in Swahili, an Eastern African language spoken in countries including Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Mozambique and Zimbabwe. Karenga wanted a way to bring African Americans together to remember Black culture.

While Kwanzaa is primarily an African American holiday, it has also come to be celebrated outside the United States, especially in the Caribbean and other countries where there are large numbers of African descendants. It should also be noted that Kwanzaa is not a political or religious holiday, and is not considered to be a substitute for Christmas.

During this holiday celebration, families and communities “organize activities around the Nguzo Saba” (The Seven Principles):

Umoja (Unity)
Kujichagulia (Self-Determination)
Ujima (Collective Work & Responsibility)
Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics)
Nia (Purpose)
Kuumba (Creativity)
Imani (Faith)

Photo by RDNE Stock project on Pexels.com

In addition to the seven principles there are a total of nine symbols (in Swahili and English) that make up Kwanzaa:

Mazao (The Crops): These are symbolic of African harvest celebrations and of the rewards of productive and collective labor.
Mkeka (The Mat): This is symbolic of our tradition and history and therefore, the foundation on which we build.
Kinara (The Candle Holder): This is symbolic of our roots, our parent people — continental Africans.
Muhindi (The Corn): This is symbolic of our children and our future which they embody.
Kikombe cha Umoja (The Unity Cup): This is symbolic of the foundational principle and practice of unity which makes all else possible.
Mishumaa Saba (The Seven Candles): These are symbolic of the Nguzo Saba, the Seven Principles, the matrix and minimum set of values which African people are urged to live by in order to rescue and reconstruct their lives in their own image and according to their own needs.
Zawadi (The Gifts): These are symbolic of the labor and love of parents and the commitments made and kept by the children.
Bendera (The Flag): The colors of the Kwanzaa flag are colors of the Organization Us, black, red and green – black for the people, red for their struggle, and green for the future that comes from their struggle. The Bendera is based on the national flag given to us by the Hon. Marcus Garvey, with slight adjustments in order and interpretation of the colors made in the 1960s along with many African countries.
Nguzo Saba Poster: The Nguzo Saba poster or some form of the written Nguzo Saba should always be a part of the Kwanzaa set. For it is these Seven Principles which give Kwanzaa its core and seven days of cultural focus.

Each symbol “represents values and concepts reflective of African culture and contributive to community building and reinforcement.”

During this Kwanzaa celebration, I look forward to sharing a little knowledge on each principle and what you can do to take part in this welcoming tradition!! Make sure you stay tuned!!

Today’s principle is UMOJA which means UNITY!! What are you doing today to strive and maintain unity in our families, communities, nations, and the world!! #UMOJA #Celebration #Affirmation

How you can embody UMOJA today is by being kind to your sisters and brothers in order to help keep your family and community strong and happy?!

For more information check out the following links:

To get you in the Kwanzaa spirit check out this playlist below:

A Professor's Thoughts..., Holiday Celebration!!

Habari Gani?! Nia-Kwanzaa Day 5

Posted on December 30, 2022December 31, 2023 by drblackfuturefeminist

Habari Gani?!! What’s today’s good news?

Today, we celebrate one of my favorite principles of Kwanzaa….Nia (Purpose). Through Nia, the principal seeks “to make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.”

Examine your ability to put your own skills and talent to use through service to your family and community at large. When we take time to reflect on our expectations from life, we can take the opportunity to discuss one’s desires and hopes with family and friends. On today, try to determine your purpose and how it will result in positive achievements for family and community.

In thinking about how you can reflect on Nia, consider these few practices:

Reflect on finding your purpose in life outside of your career
Add some books and movies that educate you about your ancestry and your history
Set short term and long term goals that will set you and your community on a path towards a more intentional and purpose-driven life.

What’s your purpose in life for today and in the future?

A Professor's Thoughts..., On the Desk...

Thank You Issa Rae!!

Posted on November 4, 2021November 2, 2021 by drblackfuturefeminist

The new season of Insecure has started and we are 2 episodes!! Let me tell you as someone who has been watching the show since DAY ONE, Issa rae and the show never ceases to amaze me!! So much so that I had to write down a few notes in the form of a ‘thank you’ note post expressing my appreciation!! I remember actually hearing about the show in 2016 while vacationing at Martha’s Vineyard and attending the annual MVAAFF. If nothing else I had planned to watched the series off the strength of Issa Rae’s previous web series “Awkward Black Girl” and the fact that it was a series about young Black professionals. With little to no expectations, like many others we just dived in. In the words of R&B singer Vivian Green, we were always riding an “emotional rollercoaster” 30 mins at a time when it came to this show.

It is not often that you find a show that tells so many stories and is so relatable that you have to step back and say “damn that’s really close to my life” or “I totally know that feeling!” Every season has created an on-going dialogue, surrounding everything from entrepreneurship to family planning (birth and death) to complex relationships/dating to self-preservation to job security to simply just believing in one’s self, all topics that will surely continue linger in the atmosphere even after the last and final episode. For me, Insecure is the Living Single of its time! As a professional, awkward, funny, driven Black woman seeing the various experiences of Black womanhood play out on-screen via the vision of a Black woman always gave me a sense of hope and promise.

And so I have to thank you for showing the many complex layers of relationships and friendship and that they are not perfect nor should we strive for them to be. To be honest in each of the four main Black female characters (Issa, Molly, Kelli, and Tiffany) I found a piece of myself in each character. That’s what makes being a Black woman so great!! Life truly is a learning process. You provided us another outlet that permits us to stumble, fail, get back up, find joy, be angry, and persevere!!

Black women friendships as personified in HBO’s Insecure

Thank you for normalizing therapy, particularly for Black women…The familiarity of each session was so very refreshing….this is so needed and necessary. The way therapy is showcased on this show is a great example of how it can be utilized in fiction but translate into reality.

Molly in a therapy session on ‘Insecure’ Season 2-Episode 2 “Hella Questions”

The fashion and hair…So versatile..Daring…Forward-thinking…Inspiring…I definitely picked up a few things and added them to my closet.

How about all the cameos….Syd, Sterling K. Brown, Lil Rel Howery, Kyla Pratt, Luke James, Kofi Siriboe, Jidenna, Hayley Kiyoko, Dawn Richard, Wendy Raquel Robinson, and many more…

I will always look at couches, Best Buy shirts, and Coachella very differently and I’m good with that!

New and improved vocabulary…words/concepts/phrases like ‘zaddy’, ‘ho-tation’, ‘Go for it, go for it, go! Ho for it, ho for it, ho!’, ‘work in progress’, ‘thug yoda’, and ‘we got y’all’ will always have a special place in the Black community.

Thank you for the location…location…location!!

Oh and I cannot forget the amazing soundtracks, my music game continues to level up thanks to this show!!

Official ‘Insecure’ Playlist from Spotify

Watching this show this show for me personally allowed me to have those moments of thinking about how to evaluate my life and actions. Lots of growth and self-reflection!! I definitely increased my intake of daily affirmations and learned to truly be honest with myself and others. About five years ago, Issa Rae made a statement to NPR that definitely resonated then and even more so now, “We don’t get to just have a show about regular Black people being basic.” Who would have thought basic, regular, and awkwardness were just the things we needed in life.

Once again my Sunday nights will never be the same after Insecure comes to a final close. Insecure will join such shows as Lovecraft Country, Power, and The Wire, as premium channels shows that were well worth the extra purchasing cost.

So when it is all said and done…Issa you switched up the tv landscape around how we CAN center Black people and culture in a variety of ways….And I thank you Issa Rae for making this contribution to the pop culture landscape!!