#Dr.MaulanaKarenga

James Baldwin in Critical Conversation With Kamala and Us: Striving To Achieve Our Country and Change the World”

Dr. Maulana KarengaJuly 31, 2024

On this the centennial anniversary and celebration of the coming into being of Nana James Baldwin (August 2, 1924), beloved writer and teacher of the beautiful, transformative and lie-resistant truth, we find ourselves still struggling and working our way through the awesome responsibilities of what he called the possibility of our being able “to achieve our country and change the history of the world.”

Opinion

Us, Continuing Labors of Love and Righteous Struggle:cMarking Periods of Fierce Passage and Fundamental Turning

Dr. Maulana KarengaSeptember 7, 2023

This year and month marks the 58th anniversary of the founding of our organization Us, September 7, 1965, 58 years and 232 seasons of righteous and relentless struggle in the best of summers and the worst of winters, the flourishing of springs and the witherings of autumns.

Uncategorized

Black Art, Black People and Black Liberation: Reaffirming the Critical Role of Black Artists

Dr. Maulana KarengaJune 22, 2023

We come from a culture where drums talk; songs and singing lift us into the heavens and sustains us on earth; sculpture, painting and carving come alive; and dance is a creative link and life-line to the Divine.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

White Public Safety as Sacrifice of Black Lives: Publicly Judging and Killing Jordan Neely

Dr. Maulana KarengaMay 11, 2023

The brutal public judging and killing of Mr. Jordan Neely, a poor, homeless, mentally-ill Black man in New York City, offers again life-and-death evidence of the need to expand the discussion and solution concerning gun violence to include the American culture of violence itself.

Uncategorized

The Mind and Heart of Harriet Tubman: A Hearing Heart and An Amazing Mind – Part 1

Dr. Maulana KarengaMarch 9, 2023

This is in homage to Nana Harriet Tubman: African woman, Black and beautiful woman; fierce and fearless freedom fighter; womanist warrior for all the people, up all night with her weapon on her knee, waiting for the day to dawn; the relentless and transformative fire that finds and makes a way for itself wherever it goes; thunder-while-sitting-and-thinking-freedom; broad-shoulders ancestor, tall and unmovable like a mountain; honored leader, tireless liberator, and inexhaustible light, opening and making clear the way to freedom and an uplifted life for our people and an expanded and inclusive realm of freedom in this country and the world.

Dr. Maulana Karenga

Black Women’s History: Celebrating Miracles, Wonders and Struggle

Dr. Maulana KarengaMarch 2, 2023

This is the month for celebrating the miracles and wonders we call Black women, that other half of our community which makes us, as a people, whole, these equal and most worthy partners in life, love and struggle to bring good in the world.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

Centering King in the Context of Community: Considering the People Who Produced Him

Dr. Maulana KarengaJanuary 19, 2023

Every holiday of every hero or heroine we celebrate is, at the same time and in equal measure and meaning, a celebration of our people, indeed a celebration of ourselves. Indeed, whether we believe they are chosen and raised up among us by heaven or history or both, they find their foundation and footing, their mission and meaning in the lived experience, the cultural values and practices and the historical and ongoing struggles of our people.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

Nevertheless, Still Bloom Blackly in the Whirlwind: New Year Resolutions, Reaffirmation and Continuing Resistance

Dr. Maulana KarengaJanuary 5, 2023

In the tradition of our ancestors, again and at the beginning of this new year of our people 6263 AFE, we pause and pay rightful homage to the beautiful, strong and unbreakable bridges, past and present, that carried us over.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

Symbols and Insights of Kwanzaa: Deep Meanings and Expansive Message

Dr. Maulana KarengaDecember 15, 2022

Kwanzaa was conceived as a special time and space for celebrating, discussing and meditating on the rich and varied ways of being and becoming African in the world.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

Rethinking Thanksgiving: Beyond Big Turkeys and Small Talk

Dr. Maulana KarengaNovember 24, 2022

The histories and holidays of the oppressed, colonized and enslaved are, of necessity, different from the history and holidays of the oppressor, the colonizer and the enslaver. Likewise, their interpretations of those histories and holidays also differ, for they are lived and learned from different standpoints.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

Confronting the Shifting Color of Racism: Resisting the Tyranny of Another Majority

Dr. Maulana KarengaOctober 20, 2022

The recent revelation of the racist rant, irrational reasoning and inequitable reordering of the political map of Los Angeles by a group of Latina/o city council and labor leaders offers useful insights and lessons in racial, racialized and racist sentiments, thought and practice in American politics, regardless of the local and Latino context in which it occurred.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

The Urgency and Rightfulness of Reparations: Cash Money, Its Immediate and Larger Meaning

October 6, 2022

It is no accident of history, or inscrutable reason to be discovered, nor the result of an organized effort that Black people in overwhelming numbers understand and engage reparations first and foremost as the just and urgent receipt of direct cash money payments for damages done and justice due.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

The Righteously Royal Women of Us: No Hereditary King or Queen Among Them

Dr. Maulana KarengaSeptember 22, 2022

On this the 57th year and 228th season of our coming into being as an organization, it is morally imperative and historically necessary to pay rightful homage to the righteously royal women of Us who have made Us and all we have dared and done possible.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

The Seven-Fold Path of Blackness: Color, Culture and Self-Conscious Practice

Maulana Karenga,September 15, 2022

Since the Sixties, we of Us have understood, engaged and embraced Blackness as a very serious and sacred way of being and becoming in the world, an African way, a unique and equally valid and valuable way of being human with all its rich and varied possibilities and worthy of the highest respect.

Dr. Maulana Karenga Opinion

Tambiko for Three Simba/Saidi of Us: Lions of August and All-Seasons Soldiers

Dr. Maulana KarengaAugust 25, 2022

This is tambiko, sacred words and water offered in remembrance and rightful honor of three Simba/Saidi of Us, three Lions of August and all-seasons soldiers: Nana Sebati Wasifu Tangulifu, Nana Omowale Tambuzi and Nana Robert Tambuzi.