magazine of the philadelphia folklore project

Volume 25:1-2 summer 2012 ISSN 1075-0029

• Kathryn Morgan • Remembering ancestors • Beauty is as beauty does • We cannot keep silent • Community supported art • Art empowers • Midweek hairdo Works in progress is the magazine of the Philadelphia Folklore Project, a 25-year-old public interest folklife agency. We work with people and communities in the Philadelphia area to build critical inside folk cultural knowledge, sustain the complex folk and traditional arts of our region, and challenge practices that diminish these local grassroots arts and humanities. To learn more, please visit us: www.folkloreproject.org 3 From the editor or call 215.726.1106. philadelphia folklore project staff 4 Kathryn Morgan (1919-2010) Editor/PFP Director: Debora Kodish by Debora Kodish and Marilyn White Program Associates: Selina Morales + Thomas Owens Program Specialist: Toni Shapiro-Phim Designer: IFE designs + Associates Printing: Garrison Printers 6 The ancestors are alive as [Printed on recycled paper] long as they remembered by Linda Goss philadelphia folklore project board Yvette Smalls: Beauty is as Beauty Does 8  Rechelle McJett Beatty Carole Boughter Interviewed by Caroliese Frink-Reed Barbara Grant Fariha Khan Ife Nii-Owoo Mawusi Simmons Ellen Somekawa William Westerman 12 Cultural Exchange Dorothy Wilkie

we gratefully acknowledge support from: 16   Announcing a New Community • The National Endowment for the Arts Supported Art Program • Pennsylvania Council on the Arts • The Philadelphia Cultural Fund • The William Penn Foundation Cover: Boycott leaders Duong Nghe 18  We Cannot Keep Silent • The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage, Ly and Wei Chen lead their fellow by Helen Gym, Ellen Somekawa through the Cultural Management Initiative SPHS students in a chant “We have the • The Pew Charitable Trusts power to make change!” at the one-year and Joan May Cordova • The Philadelphia Foundation commemoration of the December 3 violence. • The Douty Foundation Photo: Harvey Finkle • The Allen Hilles Fund 22 Midweek Hairdo • The Henrietta Tower Wurts Foundation by Katrina Hazzard-Donald • Stockton Rush Bartol Foundation • Union Benevolent Association • and wonderful individual Philadelphia Folklore Project members 24   Isaac Maefield: Art Empowers Interviewed by Debora Kodish We invite your support: thank you to all 30 PFP turns 25 Visit our website: www.folkloreproject.org Be our Friend on Facebook

2 WIP 2012 Summer from the editor

For 25 years PFP has been part of a address violence. It was at a PFP At our 25th birthday celebration, collective effort to cultivate what is gathering that Katrina Hazzard-Donald Board co-chair Ellen Somekawa spoke best in our communities. We have first shared the story about how she eloquently about our work. She talked acted from the belief that folk arts— learned about the metal plate in her about being Asian in the U.S. and tiring people’s hard-won knowledge, Daddy’s head—and about a problem of the question. “Where are you wisdom, and practices—can carry that community members took into from?” which all too often feels like a 3 From the editor forward radical hope for a better and their own hands. code for “You aren’t really from here.” more just world. In a world torn by violence, other “You are other.” She spoke of a Call this folk belief: the conviction folk arts offer alternatives. Losang different way to understand who we 4 Kathryn Morgan (1919-2010) that together people can do more than Samten lived in Tibet before Chinese are: “PFP is about creating a by Debora Kodish and Marilyn White we can do alone. Exhibitions in our crackdowns forced him and his family Philadelphia where ‘Where are you gallery, developed by participants in to flee. Losang creates a mandala at from?’ means ‘Who are your people?’ our Folk Arts and Social Change PFP every year: a practice of peace and ‘What is your grounding?’ ‘Who is a 6 The ancestors are alive as residency program and described in loving-kindness, breath of life and source of wisdom?’ ‘What is it that long as they remembered these pages, provide examples of what hope, shaped from generations of nourishes your strength and pride and by Linda Goss collective action can accomplish. We contemplation. He paints a mandala of love of justice?’ Many of us have been Cannot Keep Silent evokes (and colored sand, its intricate patterns torn from our homelands or had our representing spiritual truths. The languages and cultures ripped from Yvette Smalls: Beauty is as Beauty Does advances) the struggle of immigrant 8  beauty is inevitably temporary: us—whether in our generation or Interviewed by Caroliese Frink-Reed students in a Philadelphia high school. The voices of these young people and impermanent but still profound. We generations past. But PFP works so their supporters call on us to demand may be surprised to find that we can that more and more of us can say, 12 Cultural Exchange and practice accountability and an carry it inside us. This exiled art makes ‘Here and now, I am from a expansive vision of community. momentary sacred space in unimagined community that I am helping to build. I Developed by Asian Americans United distant places (like our hearts). am from a place where we have the 16   Announcing a New Community (AAU), the exhibition will be open Patience, Losang teaches. Don’t turn power to define our own sense of Supported Art Program through December 2012. Cultural away. Stay and see how we are ourselves, where we grow in Exchange, the exhibition on display last changed. However little we know compassion and strength through about Tibet or bloody history or struggling for justice for all 18  We Cannot Keep Silent winter, showed how revolutions begin violence or Buddhism or Dharma, we communities.’ That is the kind of by Helen Gym, Ellen Somekawa in everyday actions, and in the take in some part of this—and perhaps Philadelphia I want to help build.” and Joan May Cordova relationships and community we build together, over years. feel a way forward. With your help, PFP begins the next People featured in PFP programs At our 25th Birthday Bash, we 25 years. May we continue to find 22 Midweek Hairdo over the last year provide homegrown began a new tradition, an annual ways of using folk arts and social by Katrina Hazzard-Donald examples of both exemplary practice gathering to celebrate and advance this change to build the beloved and the transformative power of folk work in folk arts and social change in communities of our dreams. 24   Isaac Maefield: Art Empowers arts. Call them vanguard workers, which we all have a part and a stake. ­ — Debora Kodish revolutionaries, and clairvoyants. Dr. We inaugurated Folk Arts and Social Interviewed by Debora Kodish Kathryn Morgan showed how family Change awards, named after four stories are antidotes to racism and people who have taught us and 30 PFP turns 25 other toxins. Yvette Smalls showed us changed us, and who embody aspects how to see beauty in ourselves and of our vision and values. (Kathryn how living into beauty could be Morgan is one of those we honored in transformative. They changed our lives. this way.) We plan to use this annual Linda Goss, who has been “waking up event to reflect on what and who we the people” with stories for more than value, and why, and where we go from 50 years, reminds us both of the need here—together. And we hope to use to keep their memories present and of it to strengthen our capacity to work our responsibility to build on their against the forces that divide and teachings. diminish community power. We Teachings come from many thank you if you were part of this directions. Disturbing histories stay remarkable event this year (and we with us, calling us to consider how we invite you to come next year.)

2012 Summer WIP 3 Kathryn Morgan (1919-2010) | by Debora Kodish & Marilyn White >in*memory<

Kathryn Morgan, 1970s. Photo courtesy Friends Historical Library/Swarthmore College

4 WIP 2012 Summer athryn Morgan’s ground- and Ph.D (1970) from the University named in her honor by Swarthmore’s breaking book, Children of of Pennsylvania. In the 1970s she held Black Alumni Association, recognizing Strangers (1980), was the first visiting teaching positions at Bryn her contributions to the lives of work of African American Mawr College, Haverford College, African Americans at the College. In family folklore by a folklorist. the University of Delaware, and the 2000, a scholarship was established WhatK a voice, and what stories. If she University of California at Berkeley. in her name to support Swarthmore hadn’t known about Caddie Gordon, Other professional affiliations students interested in Black Studies. Kathryn Morgan her great-great-grandmother, whose included the National Council In 2009, the Kathryn Morgan legacy is recounted in the volume, of Black Studies, the Association Poetry Festival was established at (1919-2010) she would have had to invent her, of African and African American Swarthmore. Students read selection Morgan said. Read the book. From Folklorists, the National Afrocentric from Envisions, a book of her poetry, the first sentence, this is anti-racist Institute, and the Philadelphia Folklore illustrated by artist and Swarthmore work. Work that builds strength Project, upon whose board she sat colleague Syd Carpenter (2003). and power in the face of fear and in the early 1990s. She taught and Morgan was named to the Circle of all that is ugly. In her writing, and spoke widely on African American Elders by the National Association in her life, Morgan showed how to folklore, history, and culture. of Black Storyteller at their 25th be courageous and righteous, true The first African American woman anniversary gathering (2007) in a to enduring values, accountable to earn the Ph.D. in folklore at the ceremony orchestrated by Linda to the beloved communities who University of Pennsylvania, the first Goss, one of the NABS founders. make us who we hope to be. African American professor (and first Morgan wrote, “Caddy comes to Morgan took folklore seriously. folklorist in the History Department) my rescue even now when some She simply refused to countenance in 1970 at Swarthmore College, obstacle seems insurmountable.” May the idea that there was any second- the first African American on the we know and remember Morgan. May class status to the training she had Executive Board of the American she continue to come to our rescue. received from her own family and Folklore Society in 1991, Morgan Bibliography community, or to the inherited stories unerringly spoke truth to power. As Envisions. 2003. Illustrations by Syd Carpenter that proved sturdy antidotes to racism the first in many places unaccustomed [Poetry] and other toxins. She refused to to the presence of a strong black Weep Not For Me: Old Souls Speak [Unfinished accept that African American folklore woman who knew who she was, work in progress] could be defined by white scholars Morgan faced and surmounted The Ex-Slave Narrative as a Source for Folk History. 1970. Ph.D. University of Pennsylvania, with suspect intentions, focused only challenges with grace and humor. [Unpublished work in progress] on “street” genres, or defined by lack “I learned at 10 years old to Children of Strangers: The Stories of a Black Family. or pathology. She rejected the notion disturb the peace of racism, and I 1980. Philadelphia: Temple University Press that history could be defined without will continue doing so for as long as I “More excerpts from The Midnight Sun,” 1977. The Journal of Ethnic Studies 5:1 (Spring) 77-89 reference to the oral traditions that live,” she said in 2000, in an interview “Excerpts from The Midnight Sun,” 1976. The people shaped and shared themselves. with a former Swarthmore student, Journal of Ethnic Studies 4:2 (Summer) 49- 59 Kathryn Morgan grounded Laura Markowitz. Markowitz shares “On Black Image and Blackness,” 1973. Black herself in a history of Black self- Morgan’s account of how, in 1976, she World (December) 23-29, 84-85 determination, valuing community was denied tenure at Swarthmore. “Caddy Buffers: Legends of a Middle-Class Negro Family in Philadelphia,” 1966. In Alan practices that build power, dignity, Her history colleagues didn’t consider Dundes, ed., Mother Wit from the Laughing Barrel: and cultural health. Her Afrocentrism folklore a valid form of investigation. Readings in the Interpretation of Afro-American Folklore. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. embraced “children of strangers”: Black students immediately reacted, pp. 595-610. Reprinted from Keystone Folklore people who defined their status and “protesting the fact that the college Quarterly 1966 pp. 67-88 humanity by actions, by choosing to was getting rid of their one African identify with (and be accountable American woman teacher who taught Resources to) communities of choice. She courses on their lives, their history” Chopp, Rebecca. Kathryn Morgan. 2010: acted out of love and expansively: in (Markowitz 2000: 22). White student http://www.swarthmore.edu/x31577.xml Cook, Bonnie. 2010. Kathryn Lawson Morgan, scholarship, poetry and creative work, and faculty allies supported the 91, folklorist and historian. Philadelphia Inquirer in holding forth. And she refused protest. Morgan agreed to join a class (December 1, 2010). http://articles.philly.com/2010-12-01/ to be silent in the face of racism, action discrimination suit underway news/25293069_1_family-folklore-family-history- injustice or stupidity. In her writing against Swarthmore. The day before black-family (and her life and being), she insisted she was to testify, Morgan was Lott, Jeffrey. 2009. The World is a Story: Kathryn Morgan Speaks. Swarthmore College Bulletin, July. on the power of folklore in exposing awarded tenure; she testified anyway. tp://media.rthmore.edu/in/?p=281 lies. The family stories she studied The world eventually caught up to Markowitz, Laura. 2000. Disturbing the Peace of and encouraged others to study her. Morgan retired in 1995, the Sara Racism: An Oral History of the Oral Historian exemplify a way to be in the world. Lawrence Lightfoot Emerita Professor Kathryn Morgan. Swarthmore College Bulletin, 2000, pp. 16-23 Born and raised in Philadelphia, in History and Folklore, beloved by The Storytellers. 1979. http://www.youtube. Morgan earned an MA from Howard colleagues and students. In 1991, she comFHx9NCINhjk University (1952) and an MA (1968) was the first recipient of an award

2012 Summer WIP 5 < point*of*view >

Linda Goss Photo: Ife Nii-Owoo, 2008

6 WIP 2012 Summer | by Linda Goss We have to know what Kathryn’s work stood for

ou know, people talk in what went on during the time of the when Kathryn Morgan came up to terms of legacies, and enslavement?” And I said there were me, and she started to praise me. what do we do from here. some, “I don’t know. I don’t remember It was like she lifted me up off the And you know, there’s an all of them.” And she was saying, “Well, ground. It wasn’t until years later African proverb that says try to remember. That’s what’s really that she told me her story of how, the ancestors are always alive as long important. Your own family stories when she went to the University of as they are remembered, and I know are very important.” And she put me Pennsylvania, she was given a very Ythat to be true. I think that we have on that path of really remembering to keep Kathryn’s name out there. some of those family stories because It doesn’t mean we have to just say I had more or less taken them for ...the ancestors her name, but we have to know her granted. Because when I began as a work and what her work stood for. so-called professional storyteller, I are always alive as When I reread her work, I see so was basically telling animal stories. I much of myself in it. I see so much in was into the Anansi the spider stories. Children of Strangers. A lot of stories I was telling alot of stories out of long as they are in there led me to re-realize some Africa. Thanks to her, I really started of my family stories. We haven’t valuing some of those stories that remembered told a lot of stories that our families had been passed on down to me. hard time as well. So she could relate didn’t want us to tell—that we had But the first time I met Dr. to what I was saying, and she was to kind of pull out of our families. Kathryn L. Morgan was at Howard also proud of the fact that I was still And I think Kathryn’s book reminds University, at the first conference determined to do what I wanted to us that we have to tell those stories. of Black folklorists. So this was an do. What she did was kind of like I remember the first time we had a historic event. And at that Black a praise song—what you do back sit-down conversation and she asked folklorists’ conference, I shared my down South when you’re in the Black me what kind of stories I told. I told ideas. I let them know I wanted church, where you realize this young her how my grandfather told me a to start a festival. I let them know person has some talent, or has some lot of animal tales. And she was telling I wanted to seek out other black worth, and you want to lift them up. me then that she didn’t really have a storytellers. And I let them know And that’s what she did. She lifted lot of animal stories in her family, but that these ideas had not met with me up in front of all of those people. she valued them. And she asked me, a warm reception elsewhere. Well, And it was an amazing conference “Were there family stories? Stories when I finished, people said that they because there I had a chance to meet about the history of the migration or really enjoyed what I said, and that’s Beverly Robinson, Gerald Davis, Bill

[Continued on p. 28 >]

2012 Summer WIP 7 <

| An interview by Caroliese Frink-Reed

in*memory > Yvette Smalls is B aseauty Does Beauty

Yvette Smalls in her studio with Estan Wilson us-El Photo: James Wasserman, 2007

8 WIP 2012 Summer (March 9, 1959–April 16, 2012) I give praise to those hair braiders who toiled, created, was a vanguard artist and activist. Master braider, hair sculptor, invented and experimented with techniques to beautify the andYvette filmmaker, sheSmalls advanced a movement of African American physical presence and soothe the spiritual sense of the African women rejecting definitions of “bad” and “good” hair based on woman. I employ African techniques with American inventiveness. European standards and reclaiming African traditions of beauty. My hairstyles are always on the edge of avant-garde with an Her mother always told her, “Beauty is as beauty does,” and the acknowledgement of the roots of my culture. In my sanctuary saying inoculated Yvette against the negative self-image she saw we have a spiritual experience that’s difficult to explain; you afflicting others. She schooled herself in the intricate and varied come in looking one way and you leave another way.” hair braiding, wrapping, coiling, and weaving traditions used across A revolutionary and a clairvoyant, she created the African Diaspora, understanding all of them as important extraordinarily striking visions—making us the people we forms of creative expression. A persistent, dogged researcher, she imagined we might be, or become. Her gifts in this revisioning learned how to bead before the technique was widely known in went beyond the “do’s” she created. Her greatest gift was the region. She was always perfecting her craft, aiming to outdo. how she was with people. She made us all see ourselves Yvette approached each person’s hair as the ultimate wearable differently. And we lived into the beautiful selves she saw we art. Having embarked on her own journey of self-discovery, she were. That was her mission: “for people to feel good about could guide others on their quests. She said: “Spirit intuitively themselves.” Spreading the message of self-worth and self- moves within me to create/sculpt hairstyles. I am obsessed love, she showed that folk arts are surely antidotes to racism with promoting the cultural, historical, and technical knowledge and other toxins. PFP honored Yvette for her life work at of African hair. I weave tradition, creativity and love into my an event in March 2012. It was her last public appearance. tapestry of natural hairstyles—especially since generations of Black women have been taught to wage war on their coil. —Debora Kodish

Caroliese: How did you get started? She was my first model. I used to And empowered. That was definitely Yvette: I was born in 1959 and scratch her dandruff. That’s an old important, just being around people. grew up in West Philadelphia, around tradition that we do. And I practiced The wig phased out. The hot comb the corner from where I live now. the braiding on her. I used to plait and curl kind of phased out. Don’t get I was told that I braid hair like my her hair prior to the braiding because me wrong: my mother and aunts, they grandmother on my father’s side. my mom had a thick head of hair. were not putting down the hot comb She passed on when I was born. My From there I started doing my hair, and curl or the wig in certain places. mother couldn’t do hair. She could do when I finally was allowed. See, we were My mother would get her hair braided, lots of things, but not hair braiding. the type of family that on Saturday but she would put it underneath the My older sister used to do hair and she night you’d get your hair shampooed wig. My sisters and those around me was always sharp. When she would do my and straightened and curled, and you were wearing natural hairstyles. hair, I would feel so regal. There was one would get your hair pressed for God. I was experimenting: wearing the style she did—a little bang and these two Then we’d go to church and back to Afro, wearing designs. Zerline Mace braids, and I was like Queen Nefertiti. the plaits after the curls fell out. Then finally came up from down South. Oh yes, I had a passion for it. I would you kept that for a few days, and then She’s an adopted cousin. She could practice on my dolls. I could plait hair and you got it re-combed or whatever. braid your name in your hair. She I could do other things, like chain braids Caroliese: What were the popular was one of my influences. I was and railroad tracks, but the cornrowing hairstyles during your teenage years? wearing all kinds of elaborate—and or braiding was a whole separate entity. Yvette: The Afro was very popular. I do mean elaborate—hairstyles. When I asked my sister one time—I was Cornrows. Braids with beads. Anything Seventh and eighth grade I was just really into it—she was like, “I don’t have that was African. Anything that was one of the queens at all times, with time.” Then I was more determined. In braided. Puffs—Afro Puffs. You’d have braids in different designs, and then in the sixth grade, a woman named Karen a couple braids going back and the ninth grade I went to Overbrook High Spencer sat with me out on the steps big bush—all kinds of designs. School. There were all the cultural of 52nd and Thompson, across the street Caroliese: By that time, you did see hairstyles. Braids, everything—there from her home, and she showed me. She images in the media, in Ebony and Jet and was a mix. I lost my mother at 15 and used to do her sister’s hair and that’s how movies. How did that make you feel? I was finding myself. My hair thinned I finally got the stitch for actual braiding. Yvette: That was another influence: when my mom died. I was just sad. I That started my journey with the plaits. seeing all that hair and all that art—that remember covering my hair with hats, I used to do my mother’s hair. was like whoa! It made me feel great! and because there were more Muslims

[Continued on p. 10>]

2012 Summer WIP 9 smalls / continued from p. 9

entering the school, it was easier Nefertiti. I’m talking ‘bout stacked. then. There was Frenchy in her home. to get away with scarves, too. Those braids and beads were sharp. There was Brenda Eady in her home. In 12th grade diva status came That was it. That was the journey. There was me in my home. There back. I felt good and everything I was hooked from then on. So was Kim Simpkins in her home. was going okay, and then I went to I went to braids and beads. There was Lubara. You could say their college. I picked Harcum because it When we first started out, trying names and people would know who was right up the street. It was a girl’s to do what they did, we didn’t have they are. And Goldie. Those were school, so I could focus. I enjoyed the method or the rhythm to make it the braiders who were visible. You the educational aspects of it, but the flow. We didn’t have a system where would hear, “Oh, whose work is that?” racism and the feelings I got were we would do beads as a set. We Or you would spot their work and different. That’s where my hair journey would do each individual bead. Can know it. In Philly, it wasn’t like New started. I wanted to navigate and be you imagine? We were intrigued with York or Washington. At that point, treated equally. I had to go and prove what we were doing, and we were braiders weren’t really celebrated. my facts. I always loved the library. I determined to get it done. We had the We didn’t have shops. The barbers loved books. I always did my research. image of the bead set, how it would hated us because that meant they It was a challenge. You have to go on the hair, but we had to come up couldn’t cut hair. The hot comb hair remember, at Harcum they didn’t with ways to make the work go faster. people hated us because they couldn’t have stuff that was conducive to my Through trial and error and long, long press and curl. The wig industry hair. I had to figure out what to do days and nights of doing hair, seriously, hated us. We weren’t really popular. with my hair away from home. Not we’ve made it much easier for the Caroliese: I first met you really knowing how to straighten and women that are coming up after us. through Linda Goss. I wanted that curl, I had to just braid it and wear There were a lot of shops in African thread wrap. There were it crimped. The first year I would Washington, D.C., and New York, not a lot of African braiding shops roll it and come home every couple but they weren’t here. It was an in the late 1980s and early 1990s. weeks and get someone to do it. opening for me: “Wow, everybody all Linda said, “Yvette would know,” But that didn’t last long, especially over the world is doing this and it’s and recommended you. I wanted to when you’re sweating and you want amazing!” That pushed me further be authentic. You recommended an to do other things. Then I reunited in my journey, and then I went to African woman, Sheri Dovi. Sheri with Pam Parker, in 1978 or 1979. Temple and had Sonia Sanchez as a did this style, and I went to the That’s when I was introduced teacher. Well, you know, that was it! storytelling festival in Baltimore, to braids and beads. Pam went to With her big pretty Afro, and her and a picture of my hair was in the Washington and got her hair done affirming us as to who we were, I was Baltimore Sun. That set the bar. From from Cornrows and Company. She off to the races. It was a done deal. that year on, I had to outdo, I had to came back and she really looked like Women were doing hair at home have a different hairstyle every year.

10 WIP 2012 Summer Yvette: Sheri was from Nigeria; Women would stop and say, “Who did Yvette: The brothers were Yvette Smalls in her studio. Photos: James Wasserman 2007 she’s moved back home. Oh, she your hair?” and I’d say, “Yvette Smalls.” good. Renaldo was very tender- was so precious, and she helped me Yvette: I didn’t really advertise. I do headed because, again, when you have perfect my technique with thread what I do. Word of mouth is important. thick hair people don’t know how wrapping. Hiddekel Burks, who is our Caroliese: When I go to to comb it and we didn’t have the founder and director of the National conferences, people will tell me proper tools. I’m very gentle with Braiders’ Guild, made sure that we they wait every year to see what hair because I understand you have learned, and I love her for that. When style I’ll be wearing. So you’ve to take it from the bottom and bring you left there, you knew how to do created an image for me. it up, as opposed to people trying to the Senegalese twist, African thread Yvette: You know which clients yank it down. So I understood that wrap, lace braids, tree braids. You are loyal to you, which clients are everyone needs special attention. name it, we had to do it, and it was coming every year or every few Renaldo was tainted from having had great. We had to have the African months, and you were one of them. his hair yanked and pulled and such. technique down to a “T.” Perfection, It was definitely a ritual—and a So once he came and saw how I did okay? And I’m glad, because it made lot of styles in Africa are rituals. hair, he was hooked for life. Renaldo us set our bar right there as well. And the storytelling community is was a carpenter back then. I was able Hiddekel based the Guild on very important. That was their big to barter and get things done in my historical, cultural, and artistic aspects gala where they come and they renovated house, so that worked of our hair and culture, and it was so “peacock,” I call it. So you had to out well with some of the guys. beautiful to see women from all over be sharp. You had to win the hair Caroliese: Hair has always been the world come together with those competition, hair and clothes, every political. I want to bring up natural sharp styles. Of course, I had to outdo year. I would start searching for hair care. When you taught at Temple, her and she had to outdo me, which is hairstyles by August or whatever. you taught natural hair care and why I decided that we needed to have When you would come to get your beauty. Your role as an activist is huge. a Locks Conference. We already had hair done, we would run a little late, Many of the braiders acknowledge the braids, but I thought we should do because with braiding there is no you as a pioneer, as someone in the something different. It was right after concept of time. You get lost in—I vanguard in Philadelphia. How do you the bombing of MOVE, too. I said, “Oh, call it “hand talk.” You get lost in the feel about your role as a teacher? we need to celebrate locks because rhythm of the music, the conversation, Yvette: I wanted to be a teacher. locks is the original hairstyle.” That the hair, the artistic aspect, and so I thought I would be a traditional affirmed locks, and locks now have on. You allow me to be creative teacher, with a chalkboard, but the grown into a big cultural explosion. and to take it to that next level. universe said, “No, not a traditional Caroliese: In our community Caroliese: Talk about some teacher, a natural hair care teacher.” word of mouth is very important. of your male clients. I was very intense because I wanted

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2012 Summer WIP 11 < Cultural Exchange: pfp*exhibition >

12 WIP 2012 Summer

African Cultural Art Forum (Rashie Abdul Samad & Sharif Abdur-Rahim), Frito Bastien, Isaac Maefield

Cultural Exchange, PFP’s his native Haiti and his Philadelphia ACAF shea butter, body oils, incense, first Folk Arts and Social Change home. In the PFP exhibition and in and incense accessories are now residency, celebrated the efforts of public programs, these four men available in stores throughout the four vanguard cultural workers; showed how purposeful lives, arts, region, and ACAF aims to reach two merchants Rashie Abdul Samad and and interests can build the worlds million customers. Since 1995, their Sharif Abdur-Rahim (from African we imagine and want to inhabit. products, along with a collection of Cultural Art Forum), and artists Frito Rashie Abdul Samad and African art gathered through travels Bastien and Isaac Maefield. These men Sharif Abdur-Rahim established and trade, have been displayed and have practiced alternative economics African Cultural Art Forum sold in their store—the former Aqua and politics for 40+ years: making, (ACAF) in 1969, opening their first Lounge jazz club at 221 S. 52nd Street. trading, and recirculating folk arts. store on S. 60th Street. Taking their Artworks from Haiti, Mali, Cameroon, The exhibition (now online at http:// products to the public, they became Nigeria, and the Ivory Coast, as well as www.folkloreproject.org/programs/ the first street-cart vendors in Center samples from ACAF’s product line, exhibits/culturalexchange/index.php) City to sell something other than were on display at PFP, tracing a is a reminder that revolutions begin pretzels and hotdogs. They began 42-year journey for self-determination. in everyday actions, and in the manufacturing incense in 1971, and Isaac Maefield describes the brothers’ relationships and community we have since developed, produced, achievement: “They were among build together, over years. Rashie and distributed their own line of the first to educate people about Abdul Samad says: “If anything is products “made in the community what was happening throughout going to change, it will come from for the economic development of the African Diaspora, in terms of exchange with each other.” the community.” In their early days, literature, hair culture, beauty, and Abdul Samad and his brother responding to a need for images more. We didn’t know about shea Sharif Abdur-Rahim founded the reflecting Black cultural identity, ACAF butter until the vendors brought African Cultural Art Forum in manufactured wall plaques, using it. This is part of the undervalued 1969, aiming to foster community self- prints produced by local artists like material culture of America. Through sustainability and cultural awareness. Calypso and Leon Wisdom. Bringing their energy, many were educated The exhibition included artifacts from culturally minded goods to the and exposed to African arts.” their sculpture collection, acquired people, they and their carts became “Philadelphia was very accepting through trade in Haiti and West a well-known presence at ODUNDE, of our concept,” Abdul Samad Africa, as well as items from their Unity Day, the Penn Relays and reflects. “We were welcomed. The incense line and beauty products. homecomings, and other community cultural community really made the Isaac Maefield has championed and gatherings. In the mid-1970s, when Cultural Arts Forum last. Without cultivated cultural traditions from his African arts were not widely available the Philadelphia African community, Isaac Maefield, Rashie Abdul we wouldn’t be able to exist. We Samad and Frito Bastien. North Philadelphia neighborhood for locally, Rashie Abdul Samad traveled Photo: Selina Morales decades. On display were carvings, to Haiti and later to West Africa to tried to clear up the clichés that canes, and checkerboards hand-made buy and barter: “We were running Blacks do not support each other. by him and others. Frito Bastien’s off of what Malcolm was saying—that We cannot say that. We’ve been in paintings chronicle everyday life in we had to become producers.” existence since 1969, and 99.9% of

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2012 Summer WIP 13 cultural exchange / continued from p. 13

A view of the exhibition. Photo: Toni Shapiro-Phim

our customers are Black people. colleagues were assassinated, he was going on,” he says. “I have a headache We work for the idea that if you forced into exile. Months after arriving all the time, remembering what are diligent in producing quality in Philadelphia, Bastien learned that people are going through. No work products, then you will get the his wife and children had survived for them. No houses. So many people support. When we first started to and were in living in Port-au-Prince. died. Sometimes I paint just to stop manufacture goods and we were Bastien’s luminous paintings share myself from remembering. Sometimes selling in Center City, we were the thematic content of an artistic I put the paint on the wall to help my up against a lot of opposition. tradition that has flourished in Haiti mind calm down.” Because of a work- The police would throw our stuff since the 1940s. He paints from his related injury in 2009, he has been in the gutter, put us in a cab, and imagination and his memory of the unable to paint on an easel “Art is my send us back to West Philly—but life and mountainous landscapes life,” he says, hoping to find a way to the people protected us. People of rural Haiti, illustrating the return to painting in order to share would gather around our stand. customs and rituals of his homeland. his experiences and send money And then we went to court to get Although much of his work evokes home to his family. Bastien’s work licensed to sell in Center City.” joyful memories, several contain an has been shown in PFP’s “Folk Arts of Social Change” and a Challenge Frito Bastien was born in 1954 underlying suggestion of violence, exhibition at Fleisher, at Moore in Jacmel, a coastal town on Haiti’s evil, and hardship. This is a strategy College of Art, the Art Alliance, City southern peninsula. He began working traditionally employed by Haitian Hall, and Vivant Gallery, as well as on canvas at 13, when he became artists who could not oppose the on walls throughout Philadelphia, the apprentice of well-known Haitian repressive regime openly for fear of thanks to his tenure at the Mural Arts painter Celestin Faustin. In 1969 persecution, but used artistic coding Program. He has received awards he and his family moved to Port- to express the community’s concerns. from the Pennsylvania Council on the au-Prince, where he continued his In Philadelphia for 19 years, Bastien Arts and a Pew Fellowship in the Arts. schooling and learned about craft- continues to use indirect means of making and carpentry, which became expression. The beauty of his paintings Isaac Maefield Jr. gained an his livelihood. In late 1991 Bastien’s contrasts with the reality with which unparalleled education in carving, political activities made him a target he lives every day. His family lost their storytelling, and community history of Haiti’s paramilitary forces, the home in the earthquake. “I don’t have by listening to and learning from Tontons Macoutes. When two of his anything to do but imagine what is people around him. Most of those

14 WIP 2012 Summer Frito Bastien portrait. Photo: Selina Morales; Bastien’s paintings and portrait of Malcolm X traded by African Cultural Art Forum. Photos: Toni Shapiro-Phim

from whom he learned are also Pathfinders and of Keepers of the “self-taught,” in the sense that their Culture, Philadelphia’s Afrocentric educations have been self-directed: storytelling group. Many institutions some went to great lengths to seek have showcased his carving, out teachers. Maefield’s training as sculpture, and jewelry: the African an artist began in his own home. His American Museum of Philadelphia, parents, who migrated to Philadelphia Balch Institute, Erie Museum of Art, from Georgia in the 1940s, settled in Hershey Museum of American Life, North Philadelphia. They encouraged the Luckenbach Mill Gallery, and a their children’s artistry and creativity. PFP exhibition at City Hall, among Isaac Maefield Sr. spent hours in his others. He has received commissions basement workshop, and Maefield from the Smithsonian Institution and Jr. remembers helping by measuring WDAS Radio; the United Negro and holding things still. As a child, he College Fund commissioned a piece was bored by the kind of meticulous that was given to Nelson Mandela. Thanks: The exhibition was curated by the artists in collaboration with Selina Morales care that his father required, but the He has been artist in residence at the and Debora Kodish. Isaac Maefield installed lessons stayed with him. After his Paul Robeson House and elsewhere. the show. Thank you to Eric Joselyn, Mia-lia Kiernan, and Kate Farquhar for help. Funding father passed in 1979, he began to Maefield has worked as a teaching was provided by the National Endowment for carve—making things with his hands artist for decades, through the the Arts, Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, in his father’s memory. His mother, Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Philadelphia Cultural Fund, and PFP members. a hairdresser and writer, passed on and independently, and continues to her literary and storytelling skills. An develop arts education programs for encounter with Gwendolyn Brooks young people in his North Philadelphia at a poetry reading—an occasion on neighborhood and citywide. which the 17-year-old Maefield shared his own poems with the audience— led to a college scholarship. Maefield remains active as a poet and storyteller. He was a founder of

2012 Summer WIP 15 Announcing Philadelphia Folklore Project’s inaugural

Community Supported Art Program

Own nine pieces of folk art by local artists “shareholders only” preview party at PFP in September. and support locally-sourced folk arts, made in the In December (at another party with artists) shareholders community, reflecting significant local traditions. Be receive their bags, in time for holiday giving. (Nine gifts a part of the Philadelphia Folklore Project’s first-ever for friends and family!) Shareholders get great original Community Supported Art Program (CSA)! Typically, art, meet (and invest in) interesting artists, learn about a CSA (where the A stands for agriculture) is a chance the social issues and histories behind their work, and for consumers to invest in local farms—they pay create a sustainable base for folk arts in our city. upfront to receive a weekly “share” of vegetables. This new art program is modeled after a traditional CSA but Only fifty shares are available. ($350 too steep?) instead of garlic, chard, and tomatoes, “shareholders” Consider splitting the price with nine other people, receive original artwork made by local artists working then dividing up the basket. A sample collection is on in community-based and traditional arts. display in PFP’s gallery at 735 S. 50th Street. Shares can be purchased online at PFP’s store (http://www. How it works: Nine folk artists will be producing folkloreproject.org/store/index.php) or with a check original works. One work from each artist will be part for $378 (includes sales tax) sent to PFP’s office at of every shareholder’s unique bag of art. Shares went 735 S. 50th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19143. For more on sale on July 12, 2012 and cost $350. In addition to information, call us at 215.726.1106 or email receiving a bag filled with nine art works, shareholders [email protected]. receive an invitation to meet the artists at an exclusive

16 WIP 2012 Summer Participating artists and what you get:

Ra’sheeda Bey, “Worry Doll”. As a child, growing up in Philadelphia, Ra’sheeda remembers making dolls from old socks, stockings, and scraps of fabric left over from the quilts and clothing that she, her mother, 1 and grandmother made. Ra’sheeda says, “My dolls are made with pride, dignity and love from the grassroots up!” Alma Luz Castro, Oshie (Japanese paper-folding). Alma has been making dolls since she was a child. In addition to the oshie, paper folding mounted on mats, that is her CSA offering, she makes kami ningyo (Japanese paper dolls), 2 kimekomi ningyo (Japanese miniature dolls), kusudama (pomanders—balls with 600 folds), oyama (adult dolls), and boxes. Maisaloon Dias, Palestinian tatreez needlework bookmark. Maisaloon is a Palestinian American Announcing social worker raised in Philadelphia. She says of her work, “This is my life, this is who I am, this is my culture. It gives me a sense of belonging.” Maisaloon teaches tatreez and uses the art to start Philadelphia Folklore 3 discussions about the occupation of Palestine and peoples’ perceptions of Arab women in America. Project’s inaugural Stephanie Hryckowian, Painted Ukrainian pysanky (Easter egg). Since the 1970s, Stephanie has taught pysanky-making at Wheaton Village (Millville, NJ) and in public schools, libraries, camps, 4 and bazaars in the tri-state area. She paints eggs with a wax dye-resist method, using traditional patterns and those of her own design. Included in this CSA is her specialty: painted goose eggs. Christina Johnson, Quilted picture frame. Christina is a fiber artist focused on relaying traditional African American quilting techniques and cultural values. She says, “My art challenges traditional and stereotypical edicts, encouraging 5 individual empowerment with the hope of assisting women to use their voices and art for continued social change.” Eric Joselyn, Philadelphia Bingo. Politically active his whole life, Eric is known among an extended community of activists as an invaluable resource. He says, “Traditional community skills and popular 6 cultural traditions have taught me a lot about building a happy and democratic opposition to the greedy, hateful society foisted upon us.” Folk arts play an important role in his politics and style. For this CSA Eric is creating a Philadelphia Bingo game guaranteed to help you look at the city in a new way.

Marta Sanchez, Confetti-filled cascarones. Since 1992 Marta has organized local artists and children throughout the Philadelphia area to create and sell brightly colored confetti-filled 7 cascarones, donating the proceeds to the “Cascarones Por la Vida Art Fund” (which she founded) to assist youth affected by HIV/AIDS. CSA shareholders will receive a dozen painted cascarones (“eggshells” in Spanish)—some painted by Marta and others created by community members.

P ang Xiong Sirirathasuk Sikoun, Appliquéd Hmong baby-carrier. In Philadelphia, Pang Xiong is a motivating force behind traditional Hmong celebrations of New Year, weddings, births, 8 and the commemoration of the Hmong people’s departure from Laos. Baby-carriers (nya) are deeply significant garments. Various Hmong peoples have their own traditional patterns, executed in appliqué and reverse appliqué, and with handmade pompons and other decorations.

Matthew Smith, Handmade steel cowbell. Matt’s percussion instruments travel the globe. He has been making congas, bongos, timbales, cowbells, and other percussion instruments in his shop, Ritmo Studios, for over 20 years. 9 “The cowbells I make are done completely by hand. Each one is tuned to be a beautiful-sounding instrument.”

Philadelphia CSA programs are mod- Culture and the Creative Economy. eled on a Community Supported Art Two organizations were chosen to program in Minnesota, created by participate. In addition to PFP’s CSA, Springboard for the Arts and mnartists. the arts collectives GrizzlyGrizzly org. Funded in part by the John S. and and Tiger Strikes Asteroid are James L. Knight Foundation, this new offering a CSA. Get information initiative in our region is facilitated by about the works included in their the City of Philadelphia Office of Art, offering at www.csartphilly.com

2012 Summer WIP 17 he exhibition We Cannot addressing how to build safe and of documents, students, parents, and Keep Silent goes beyond welcoming school climates.” Before community members give detailed the headlines about a and during the crisis, SPHS and school testimony about racial violence and groundbreaking civil district officials evaded responsibility call on authorities to take action. rights case to document for growing racial hostility within the student body.” The school needed to The next sections of the exhibit a community’s fight against bias heal,” Gym reflected, “but in order show how students and experienced violenceT at a Philadelphia high adult organizers took on the to do so it could not deny what school. Participants share their had been happening or sugarcoat oppressive conditions at the school stories and analyze their multilingual, simplistic efforts to ’move on.’” and grew as a force for change. A intergenerational organizing series of photographs selected by experiences. Like the social justice We Cannot Keep Silent offers a the students and the curatorial team struggle it documents and advances, compelling mix of participant voices, documents a two-and-a-half year We Cannot Keep Silent calls us all to documents, images, and analysis. The campaign to expose and address We Cannot Keep Silent Keep Cannot We be accountable—to one another and exhibit opens with the journal of bias violence in local schools. immigrant student Wei Chen, who Portraits of individual students and to a vision of community where we carefully chronicled relentless anti- adult allies accompany excerpts grow in compassion and strength Asian, anti-immigrant harassment at from in-depth interviews to convey through struggling for justice for SPHS dating back to 2007, including how involvement in this campaign all. Developed by Asian Americans steps he and others took to address transformed their lives. A final United (AAU) through PFP’s Folk the increasing violence. An hour-by- section on traditions of organizing Art and Social Change Residency hour timeline charts what happened reminds us of how shared struggles Above: Boycott leaders program, the exhibition will be on on December 3, 2009, when over the against bias violence have expanded Duong Nghe Ly and Wei display through November 2012. course of the school day more than the possibilities for all of us. Chen lead their fellow SPHS students in a chant two dozen Asian immigrant youths “We have the power to When PFP first approached AAU were beaten by their peers. School In the essay that follows, exhibition make change!” at the about doing an exhibit on the struggle officials would later deny that violence curators share an overview of the one-year commemoration of issues behind We Cannot Keep Silent. the December 3 violence at South Philadelphia High School had occurred on school grounds. Photo: Harvey Finkle (SPHS), the curators recognized the Two-sided cards prompt viewers to importance of critical reflection on a contrast the authorities’ statements case many Philadelphians experienced with eyewitness evidence. The simple only through the media. Helen Gym, device highlights how previously AAU organizer and exhibit curator, unquestioned “truths” serve to noted the campaign’s “complicated minimize, mislead, deny, normalize, racial politics and the difficulty in and even scapegoat. In a collection

18 WIP 2012 Summer > pfp*exhibition <

Left: Trang Dang, co-founder of the Asian Student Association of Philadelphia, 2012 graduate of SPHS | by Helen Gym, Ellen Somekawa, & Joan May Cordova Photo: Harvey Finkle

e have been here before, on top of him. Around eleven o’clock on school grounds and dismissed too many times. We there was a rush of students into a the events of the day as a “blip.”1 have been in places hallway where English Language Learner As shocking as these assaults were, where racial bias, ineq- (ELL) classes were held. While school they were far from isolated. For more uity, and injustice come police held the crowd back, teachers than a year prior to December 3rd, together in a furious storm of hate. hurried students into classrooms and Asian Americans United, the Asian WeW have watched our children suf- locked their doors. At lunchtime, Asian American Legal Defense and Education fer the consequences, and, too often, immigrant students expressed fear of Fund, Victim/Witness Services of we have watched them pick up tools going to the cafeteria, but the school South Philadelphia, and a number of of hate against other communities. principal ordered them downstairs. community advocates had raised alarms But that is not the only story. Many were subsequently attacked there. about pervasive anti-Asian violence Our communities also share a Dozens of students surrounded small at SPHS. In October 2008, after five tradition of justice and activism. When groups of Asian youths, beating them Asian immigrant students were severely our children have been attacked, with fists and trashcans while security beaten in the subway by dozens of their communities have risen up to protect cameras showed other students egging classmates, most of the school’s Asian them, to envelop them with love the attackers on. Around one in the students stayed out of school for two and pride, to empower them with afternoon, a group of students dragged days. Chinese youths reached out to knowledge and the kinds of solutions an Asian girl down a stairwell by her adults in the community for support. that bridge racial divides. We have hair. After school, 10 Asian students Over the ensuing months, AAU and taught them to demand justice asked to remain inside the building. allies documented dozens of incidents— instead of resorting to retaliation. Instead, they were ordered to leave the from multi-student assaults to random On December 3, 2009, more than school grounds. The school principal, beatings, threats and intimidation, racial two dozen Asian immigrant students who had offered to walk them home, slurs, and near-constant harassment were beaten in a day of targeted quickly dropped from sight. A crowd and ridicule for students who were violence at South Philadelphia High of more than 100 chased, cornered, Asian and recent immigrants. School. The assaults began before nine and then surrounded the students as The harassment didn’t come just o’clock in the morning, when teachers 20 to 40 of their peers beat them. from classmates. Students reported that reported groups of students roaming At the end of the day, 13 students staff members made racist comments: the halls looking for Asian students. A sought emergency room treatment “Hey Chinese.” “Speak English.” “Are dozen students rushed into a classroom and many more had been assaulted you Bruce Lee?” Staff members turned and assaulted an Asian youth. Witnesses and terrorized. Yet school officials their faces away when classmates said they beat him and threw a desk denied that anything had happened threw food at Asian students in the [Continued on next page>]

2012 Summer WIP 19 we cannot keep silent / continued from p. 19

cafeteria or shoved them out of the school. So it’s just inevitable that been silenced and ignored could lines. A staff member mimicked Asian on December 3rd, 2009 there was a speak out and assert their power. students’ accents in front of others. series of attacks inside the school. So eeting in Chinatown, Security personnel often refused to 30 Asian students—Asian immigrant speaking their home investigate harassment complaints students—were beat up, and then 13 languages, students and unless students reported the problem of them had to go to the hospital to organizers collaborated in English. When community members seek treatment. Even after that, the and built their campaign tried to address the violence at school refused to take responsibility against harassment and violence. At the school, the principal accused for failing to protect the students Mthe same time, the coalition served them of having an “Asian agenda.” and for being indifferent when the students’ immediate needs, providing As one student said: “As soon as students were trying to ask for help.” them with counseling, legal assis- we open our mouths, we’re treated Shocked by the indifference, tance, and skilled interpretation. like we’re animals.” In contrast to defensiveness, and hostility of school It was the nature of the violence public documents and press accounts, leaders, Asian immigrant students on December 3rd that provoked the We Cannot Keep Silent is grounded boycotted their school for eight boycott and the ensuing campaign. Bias in first-person testimonies from days and went on to work with violence uses fear to constrict and people who lived through this crisis. community leaders and advocacy confine a whole group of people. It can ei Chen, SPHS stu- groups over the next two years to limit where people of a certain color dent, boycott leader, demand accountability and highlight can live or go to school, where people and founder of the the issue of bias violence. The boycott of a certain faith can observe their school’s Chinese announcement stated: “It is our religion, who is allowed to hold hands Student Association, opinion that South Philadelphia High with whom, what language people feel testified before the School Reform School is still not a safe place for us. safe speaking outside their homes. By CommissionW on December 8, 2009: Because we are Asian immigrants, refusing to admit that bias violence “I want to ask the School Reform we are targeted. . . . Because of was taking place at SPHS, school Commission something. . . . Have that we will not return to South leaders tried to evade responsibility you ever cared about us? Our Asian Philadelphia High School this week. for educational failure—for the fact students are being affected by school Instead, we are going to meet in that our children are growing up violence and it’s getting worse and our community to figure out some filled with such rage and intolerance worse. Looking at the students who real solutions of our own.”2 that they could attack peers based were attacked, I feel very sad because The student boycott forged on their race and nationality. the school could have done some- a strategic partnership between The campaign was not about thing to prevent it from happening.” young immigrants and veteran adult blaming young people. It placed SPHS student Duong Nhe Ly community organizers. The strength, responsibility squarely on the reflected: “South Philadelphia High breadth, and endurance of this shoulders of a school district that had School has been a persistently intergenerational coalition grew out of done little to address the alarming dangerous school in the city and the partners’ multilingual capacity and level of racial harassment at SPHS— there has been a long history of racial decades of experience in community despite the concerted advocacy of violence and bias violence going on lawyering, victim advocacy, youth students and organizers for more inside the school. But the school development, and organizing for than a year prior to the events of district—the school officials—hadn’t justice. Organizers created a caring, December 3rd. Students and their done much to resolve the issues inside safe space where students who had allies sought transformational change

20 WIP 2012 Summer Left: After a full day of work on the boycott, a core leadership group of students and organizers meet for one of many strategy sessions which would go late into the evening. December 2009. Photo: Kathy Shimizu March to the School Reform Commission (SRC), December 14, 2009. Photo: Harvey Finkle A student delivers one of the key messages of the campaign to the SRC, December 9, 2009. Photo: Harvey Finkle Multilingual interpretation was an essential component of a campaign that worked with immigrant youth. Organizers managed a minimum of three languages throughout the campaign. Photo: Kathy Shimizu

by building a loving, multiethnic/ that was so intergenerational and forms of racial oppression. AAU has multilingual community in which interdisciplinary. All of us came at pursued this mission for 26 years, participants could learn, grow, and this from different places and with organizing communities to challenge rethink and refute the options most completely different skill sets, but wrongs ranging from predatory often presented to them: silence we were able to bring such a level land development to educational or individualized retaliation. of commitment, deep listening, inequity while fighting for housing, The campaign that followed and mutual respect and incredibly hard immigration, and welfare rights. continues today achieved significant work. I felt like we asked ourselves Building on all these activist victories. A new principal was what does it mean to move forward traditions, the civil rights campaign appointed. The U.S. Department of through all of this, and together we at SPHS connected to larger Justice charged the district with racial came up with a profound answer.”3 struggles and demanded justice discrimination and violating the civil It’s worth remembering that in and institutional change. Like other and constitutional rights of Asian 1967, too, Philadelphia high schools movements, it built spaces of youths. A groundbreaking settlement were a flashpoint of interracial ethnic pride and voice. It sought with the Department of Justice and tensions as a result of the city’s connections with other communities the Pennsylvania Human Relations changing demographics. In particular, addressing violence in schools. It let Commission established that schools schools in South Philadelphia students know that a community have a responsibility to maintain a experienced significant racial violence of adults was there to share hard- climate free of harassment and bias as they underwent racial transition. won knowledge and history. It gave and would be held accountable for participants a sense of how struggle failing to do so. Coalition members escribing the rise of Black is advanced across generations. formed a multiracial, multilingual activism and Black Power And it calls all of us to collaborative at the school to raise in Philadelphia in his book consciousness that our struggles student voices around identifying Up South, historian Matthew for justice continue. and addressing safety issues there. Countryman writes that The South Philadelphia agreement many African American students at Notes these schools were harassed with became the model in spring D 1 James T. Giles, “Report to the School District 2012 for a Justice Department racial slurs. Trash was thrown at of Philadelphia of an Independent Investigation into Possible Racial/Ethnic Conflicts at South settlement involving the harassment them as they walked to school. Their Philadelphia High School on December 2–3, of LGBT students in Minnesota’s buses were pelted with stones. 2009: Report and Recommendations.” Released February 23, 2010. largest school district. In response, a community was  Perhaps the most lasting legacy is galvanized, staging rallies and marches 2 Student boycott announcement, December 6, 2009.  the rise of a new generation of vocal and demanding Black students’ right to 3 Alison Sprague, founder, Victim/Witness Services of South Philadelphia. Interview, April 2012. activists—from immigrant youths affirm and express their own culture. to adult community leaders—who The Asian American movement have continued and broadened of the 1960s and 1970s was deeply this campaign, making connections inspired by the practices and with larger issues and working traditions of the Black freedom within multiracial coalitions to struggle. Asian Americans United carry this struggle forward. Alison had its beginnings in “Yellow Seeds,” Sprague reflected: “I don’t think a radical organization that called I’ve ever been part of a coalition for a movement to combat all

2012 Summer WIP 21 < by Katrina Hazzard-Donald point*of*view >

iss Cassie’s Beauty Saloon, Teddy, a local wine-head, and Teddy’s on the corner of Cedar youngest and handsomest brother, Avenue and 35th Street in Herman, who was just starting out Cleveland, Ohio, was like on the road toward alcoholism. The many Black-owned and- winos had got sober just for the Mpatronized beauty parlors in hundreds occasion. These men—two and a of African American communities. For half winos and a 65 year old—had the regulars, as well as the occasional formed an ad hoc community vigilante patrons, it was a hub of community group. On that warm Saturday information and activity. Here, the morning, during the housewives’ women convened their neighborhood mid-morning ritual of sweeping the circle to catch up on gossip, get job sidewalk and tossing soapy water information, and take a few moments onto it, while the street-corner to themselves—as well as preparing mechanics worked on their cars or their hair for the upcoming week. gathered around them with a few Getting one’s hair done on Saturday bottles of beer, at a time when the allowed it just enough time to “cure” action would be highly visible to before it was revealed either on that the community, the vigilantes caught important evening out or in church Hazzard, had a steel plate in his Albert and began to mete out justice. the next day. But of course, for the head. Junior Pearl, Reverend Pearl’s It seemed that Albert had been married woman and the sexually wine-head son, had revealed that molesting Miss Annie’s six-year-old active girlfriend, it meant no sex that fact as he heaped praises on Stoney, daughter. Albert and Annie lived Saturday night, especially if your man as Daddy was called. Stoney took together, or it appeared that way couldn’t afford to pay to have your a blow on the head that cracked a sometimes. No one was exactly sure, hair redone, maybe by Tuesday, so that two by four in half and shattered a because sometime he was there it would be presentable for the rest Thunderbird wine bottle. “You shoulda and sometime he wasn’t. He was of the week. Moisture was the enemy seed him, Miz Stonewall, you shoulda her “old man” and not her husband. of hot-combed and curled hair, so seed it, Katrina. He jus’ shook his Albert was “urple” in color, with any activity that worked up a sweat haid an kep’ own comin’.” Junior intermittent pink flesh speckled across was off limits. This included sex. himself had sustained a small cut his lips—“wine-burned lips,” acquired On Saturday, Cassie’s most heavily on his left hand, inflicted by Albert, from drinking so much cheap wine booked day, neighborhood men whose hair was in a “bad process.” that the color had actually faded onto entered the Beauty Saloon to peddle Albert had been openly attacked them. His dark skin, which at one their wares: perfumes, costume and severely beaten in public by time was a glorious, enviable ebony jewelry, boosted clothing and records. several men in the neighborhood, one with a deep purple cast, had become It was on Saturday, July 11, 1958, that of whom was Junior Pearl. The other uneven: blotchy, greasy, darker in some I learned that my Daddy, Stonewall men included my Daddy, Stonewall, places, dry looking in others. That’s

22 WIP 2012 Summer “urple”—used to describe Albert and demanded that something be done; others like him who ruined the gift of they cuddled up, stroked, teased, flowers in their pigment by drinking tempted, and promised their men too much cheap wine for too many the best sex that they ever had. But years. Albert was about five foot ten not before letting their men know inches tall and thin. He always wore that something had to be done “high-water pants” that looked like about Albert. “Supposed he tries they ended an inch or two above that with someone else’s child?” his ankles. He thought of himself as they asked. “You know Annie ain’t a “good dresser” and kept up with got no man,” I heard Susie Mae the latest fashions sold by the Jewish whisper into Stonewall’s ear. merchants who peddled certain types The following Saturday, Albert met of clothing in Negro communities. his fate right outside of Miss Cassie’s Miss Annie was a tall, milk- Beauty Saloon. In the bright sunshine chocolate brown woman with the community observed Junior Pearl, a greasy face and finely chiseled Rev. Pearl’s wine-head son, Teddy, features. Her well-defined mouth and Herman, and my 65-year-old Daddy, dialect of Alabama, now transferred nose had a natural “come hither” Stonewall, with the steel plate in his to Cleveland via the Great Migration, quality. She was one of the very few head, grab Albert and administer an the word “have” had a very different women in our neighborhood who old-fashioned neighborhood ass- meaning. Here it meant sex. In had a child but no husband. Thick, whuppin’. No one dared to interfere. other words, she feared that Albert luscious, nappy hair framed her Even the local police patrol, known was trying to have sex with her stunning dark face like a halo, yet to the neighborhood as “317” from daughter. He had not penetrated she hated her hair, and that’s how the number on the black and white the child fully yet. But he was using she found herself seated inside Miss car they drove, passed on by and his fingers to prepare her for that Cassie’s Beauty Saloon under the care pretended not to notice what was rapidly approaching inevitable day. of Dixie Peach, the hot comb, and the happening. Albert drew a knife trying curling iron. There she told the tale. iss Annie had not spoken to defend himself, cutting Junior on to anyone about this. Not As she spoke to the beautician, the left hand. He also resorted to a the police—what would the conversation could be overheard discarded wooden two by four, which they do? Not anyone. But by nearly everybody seated in the he used to clobber Daddy over the that day in Miss Cassie’s storefront beauty parlor. This was head. When the wood couldn’t deter Beauty Saloon the women overheard a time before the Negro “perm,” M Stoney, Albert grabbed a discarded her tears, and the mothers in and women could actually hear each Thunderbird bottle and laid it against particular fought to contain their other talking because their ears were my Daddy’s forehead just above his collective rage. Miss Annie had no not muffled by a blowing stream of left eye, the exact location of the steel male relatives close by who she hair; nor were their heads engulfed plate. I later heard Junior Pearl and could call upon to help her, and the by spaceman-like headgear. They had Daddy laughing about it. “The police neighborhood knew it. So they often a sense of community in the shop didn’t do nothing,” they said. I asked helped her out by giving her small because they could and did talk to why. Junior and Daddy explained that items, like extra fish when someone each other. They shared Hoodoo the policemen had families. “They in the neighborhood went fishing or got kids. They got girl children. They Katrina’s father, secrets on the use of urine and Stonewall Hazzard (1976), vegetables from the backyard gardens. and Mr. Hazzard and his wife, menstrual blood; and sometimes knew why we was trying to kill ‘im.” Albert, though he was not killed that Susie Isaac Hazzard (1983) they cried. Miss Annie’s heart had The mothers were so outraged Photos courtesy of the author become so full over this issue that that they carried the tale back to sunny Saturday morning in July 1958, she was ready to explode, and now the confines of their homes, their disappeared from the community and she did. Tears came rolling down basement or attic apartments, their was never seen or heard from again. her cheeks like waterfalls as she kitchenettes, and that Saturday The following Tuesday, Miss Cassie’s said the words, “I think he tryin’ to night they forgot all about their Beauty Saloon was overbooked. have my li’l girl.” In the rural black newly pressed hairdos. Instead they with midweek appointments.

2012 Summer WIP 23 > artist * profile <

Isaac Maefield with his sculpture “The Visionary” Photo: Debora Kodish

24 WIP 2012 Summer Interviewed by Debora Kodish

Isaac Maefield empowers art

y father was a sanitation Mitchell, who has passed away. Often wood from. I have never broken a worker. But to me, his woodcarvers express themselves in branch off a tree to carve. All my job was when he went other media too, so he made jewelry pieces are found pieces or the tree to the basement and and drummed. He was one of the is cut down. I don’t believe in killing made things. My mother original Pathfinders, a network of anything. I’ve been a vegetarian wasM a beautician by trade, but for artists, mostly woodcarvers. When for 29 years. I don’t believe in me, I was most proud of the hats I would see a carved walking stick, sustaining myself off the backs of she made. I remember the first I would say, “Who made that?” And other creatures. I like to respect time she called me to show me her often it would be someone working all life, even the life of a tree. first hat. I was a little kid, and she in their basement, and I would say, The everyday stories behind the wanted to know what I thought “Come on in.” My models were cobra stick are incredible. I don’t of it. I was so proud of her. I have the jazz musicians. They would get know how many fights I’ve broken rings that my father made. I have an together and share. So I was thinking, up with that stick. I know of at appreciation of people making things. “That’s what woodcarvers should least three muggings I’ve broken So that was my motivation for do.” We were together no more than up. One even involved the cops. inviting other people in from scratch six months before we had a show A guy was mugging an elderly guy to this exhibition. I also want to at the African American Museum, and I told him, “No, you stay right encourage them. Bobby Hart makes which was unheard of. We went here.” He was looking at it. Later these chairs. He makes intricate tables to schools to do workshops… the cops were wondering, “Who and chairs, and he does it for love, For me, it’s a mantra. I use art are you and what is that stick?” as a hobby. When he saw me making for social change. I use that as a Once I went into the bathroom these elaborate checkerboards, that bridge. When I started carving, people at Penn Station in New York, and made him want to make a better would gather to watch me carve, and there were these young guys board. The same thing with the I could ask, “Have you ever heard around this elderly white man. I walking sticks. Mark Brown is my about Malcolm?” In this way I could could see his face was red. I used next-door neighbor. Mark’s work start a dialogue. Art empowers. to wear the cane like a rifle, with influences me. Even though he’ll I made the cobra walking stick in the cobra face over my shoulder. I say he is my student, he influences 1980 or 1981. I was in South Philly, had a turban on, with Africa in the me. The walking stick by Mark at a place called Chicken George’s middle of the turban. I was in very has 22 symbols, including adinkras. at Broad and Christian. Someone good shape at the time. I was getting I’m proud of that stick because I had cut down a sumac tree there, acclimated to the rest room, and pointed him down various paths, but and the cobra came from that tree. I heard one of them say, “Who is Mark went on his own journey. The I remember all the sources I get my this guy? Let’s get out of here!” other stick was done by Thomas

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2012 Summer WIP 25 maefield / continued from p. 25

hen I realized they were going to the wood.” That piece suggested laughed. I thought this guy was crazy! to rob him. The elderly man what it wanted to be, and I heard it. I put my hand on his shoulder and looked at me and said, “Thank I always had an affinity for the water. said, “Don’t worry, you can give this you.” It was my presence, but I’d salvage pieces of driftwood and to Denzel. I can make you one or I know it was also the stick. decorate them, and then I started two more.” Later, I found out who TThe thing about the stick is its carving them. Driftwood is forgiving, he was! But Demme commissioned thickness. Depending on the angle, one soft to negotiate. I think it might have a three-panel relief portrait from side is friendly and the other side is been discouraging if I had started off me, of Martin Luther King, Mandela, ferocious. That wasn’t by design, but I with a hard block of wood. Wood is and Malcolm X, and he gave it to could tell you all kinds of stories. One like a cat. You have to rub it a certain a dear friend of his, Jean-Bertrand time two rottweilers attacked me way or it’s not going to like what Aristide, who was then President of and I used the stick to fend them off. you are doing. You have to learn Haiti. Aristide idolized these men. That stick is one thing I’ll never sell. the ways of it, the challenges of it, Had I not done the Mandela piece Ironically, my mother was disgusted the various grains, the blemishes. in the first place, I wouldn’t have had by it. Growing up in Waynesboro, I had a neighbor, Philip Dukes, a any portraits to show anyone, and I Georgia, she killed so many snakes in truck driver. His company used to would have been at that flea market the cotton fields that she never wanted give me some of the wood I used. He just with some jewelry, and that door to see another. The cotton itself fought would give me wood over 20 years never would have been opened. So you because it had those needles old. Sometimes I would come home, that’s the empowering aspect of art. that would prick you, and then those and wood would be piled on my By the time I was 10, my father worms that would bite you. There porch. Mr. Dukes had a coal-burning and I had a secret—that I could beat were mosquitoes and sometimes a stove. He used this wood to heat him at checkers. As a kid in North possum or a raccoon coming through, his house—mahogany and all this Philadelphia, by the end of one day I so it was tough duty working in those precious wood. He saw me carving might have played marbles, deadblock, cotton fields and being paid a penny and said, “Let me give you some real halfball, football, baseball, swimming—all a pound! And what does cotton wood.” Mr. Dukes was my first teacher in one day. But I always made a point weigh? Of all the little varmints and when it came to identifying woods. of being home right before dinnertime challenges of picking cotton, the The United Negro College Fund and having the checkerboard set up, most feared was the snake. She didn’t invited me to do the Mandela piece. waiting for my father when he came even want to look at the cobra stick I had never done a portrait before. home from work. As it went along, because of her memories of snakes. And I was faced with the difficulty of he couldn’t understand this little boy The Visionary’s wood came from getting current pictures of Mandela, beating him. Playing other children the Recycling Center in Fairmount as the images around were mostly of wasn’t a competition for me. Other Park. I cut the wood out after walking him as a younger man, before he was places to play were street corners and the length of the tree. The Visionary’s imprisoned. When I saw I could do this, barbershops, but it was unthinkable for mouth is open: it is influenced by the covered with sawdust in the middle a kid to play with adults, grown men. need to speak out for freedom, justice, of my shop, I just fell on my knees and So I had no competition. I stopped and equality. All too often, people thanked God for showing me how. The playing checkers, and by the time I was don’t speak out. They deny themselves original piece is hanging somewhere 12, I got into chess. And chess became their own voice. We think of spoken in Mandela’s living room. This started my game. In 1976, I came in fourth word as someone in front of an me on a track of doing portraits. in the World Open at the Sheraton audience, but long before that, there I did a little carving of Malcolm in Philadelphia. I was a rated expert. was someone to say, “No, the emperor X, and I was at a flea market with I beat masters and grandmasters. I doesn’t have any clothes. No, this is it—which I never do, but someone beat a man, a doctor, at the Franklin wrong.” The Visionary speaks out. had talked me into going. And this man Mercantile Chess Club. It took me Sometimes, as a woodcarver, you bought the Malcolm X carving, and he two years to beat him. I used to wait might have a concept first, begin to asked me if I could do other portraits. on him like I waited on my father with work that, and have that emerge He was buying the Malcolm X piece the checkerboard. I’ll never forget from the wood. The flip side is that for someone else, he said, but he might the first and only time I beat him. He sometimes the wood itself suggests want to keep it for himself. His name looked at me and said, “I think you something. The Messenger is one in was Jonathan Demme, and at the time know enough to win.” And he laid which I saw the face in there. The that did not mean anything to me. his king down. That was a triumphant wood itself took the lead in what it There was a moment when I asked moment for me because this man would do. There’s an expression that him, “Who do you want to give this had once played Bobby Fischer. Even woodcarvers have called “listening to?” He said, “Denzel Washington.” I though he was elderly, he mentored

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26 WIP 2012 Summer me. He took me under his wing. but they were afraid of playing him, They say, if you can’t win the Fast forward to Bootsie’s of getting beat by him. He really game, win the trash talking. Laundromat, where I was reinitiated had to demoralize you. There’s an The checkerboards are part of into checkers. I had become a chess expression in checkers—the greatest the material culture of the game. player. I studied dozens of books. thing you can be is “hard.” If you And the beauty of it is, you can go They say chess is a jealous lover. To are a good checker player, they’ll into prisons around the world and be good, you have to study. So I read. say, “He’s hard.” That’s what made see boards of all kinds of materials, I went to all of the masters. I studied me hard. Moley, 94 years old. found objects. People have a personal their games. I read and practiced their I originated the checker gathering connection to their set. You didn’t go games. I looked down on checkers “Rise and Fly” on June 9, 2006, into a store and buy a board. People because I thought it was a children’s my mother’s birthday. When these play on boards that their fathers and game. Bootsie’s Laundromat was checker players came together, no uncles made. “Spanish Pool” is the where I did my clothes. These men one knew, and most still don’t, that name of the game we play, and you were playing checkers there, every I wanted to celebrate her birthday can’t go to a department store and day. In between washing and drying in my own way. Chess and checkers buy that kind of board. You’ll find the my clothes, I watched them and I was were the bridge that brought us kind of little plastic board kids play amused by the dialogue. It reminded all together. Through the culture of on, but you can’t go to a store and me of the experience of growing chess a lot of disagreements were find a hundred-man board. Mostly, up with my father. I was captivated solved. There is an honesty, a blatant people will buy two sets and make by the culture, the language that dialogue that goes on during checkers a board. There are some exquisite was used. One day I was watching that’s very therapeutic. The language boards and some that people made Bootsie and Thomas Rogers, who and the usage of it—it’s almost like and just left, with different color would become my second checker an unwritten rule of checkers as it combinations that they like. There’s teacher after my father. He was 92 is played at Bootsie’s. You can call a lot of creativity involved with the at the time, a retired welder. He someone a name. You can talk about game. That’s the beauty at Bootsie’s. had worked on the waterfront and their family tree. You can tell them at the Budd plant. He was a master how fantastic you are. How they welder. “Roger the Dodger” was know nothing about it. You can talk his nickname. That’s another thing I trash. You can say whatever you want. like about checkers. They are always It’s not taken personally, regardless of going to give you another name. how big or small someone is. Maybe y nickname is “Mister Ike.” someone was a bully, but towards And it’s so funny—these the end, there are no bullies there. guys are 90 years old. History, art, and culture change And I’m calling them people. The culture of checkers is “Manslaughter Junior,” very therapeutic. Very similar to “HongM Pong,” or whatever their name playing ball. I used to play ball. One of is. Some of these names go back to the therapeutic things about playing their childhood. But the names read ball is you can affirm your “I am.” like wrestlers’ names. Somehow they That trash talking translates into your gave me “Mr. Ike.” That’s my checker everyday life. You gotta believe in name. I was trying to play Roger and yourself even when it looks as if you I could not win a game to save my are up against all odds. Sometimes life. I thought, “How can this man be it looks like you are going to lose beating me at this children’s game?” a game; then you see a move and He was laughing, and I realized that it opens it all up. These skills are checkers was more than a notion. transferable to everyday life. You can There was a science. Then I would think that all is lost, but then there’s see the masters play—like the man a move you can make. Or there’s who really showed me the nuances a blessing that comes your way. of the game, John Davis, “Moley.” He There is the same bravado in was a terror. He talked about you checkers. You have to believe in in the worst way. People wanted to yourself—if for no other reason love Moley because he was so funny, than to back someone off of you.

2012 Summer WIP 27 goss / continued from p. 7

Wiggins, Bernice Johnson Reagon Didn’t matter how painful that truth kept that plaque near her side as long (well, I already knew Bernice–but was. They were willing to get that as she could, even when she was in the again, to see her in that situation), truth out and really, to encourage us senior citizen home. You would walk Richard A. Long, William J. Faulkner, as a people to get that truth out. And in there and there was that plaque, and James Early. And they didn’t look as a Black storytelling association, and she would say, “Oh, I just love the down on me. They welcomed me part of our mission was to bring out Black storytellers. Oh, I’m going to into the mix, saying “Go for it.” “Do the story, bring out the storyteller, every one of the gatherings.” That was what you need to do.” I really was bring out the oral historian, bring really like my thank you gift to her, you encouraged from that gathering and out those who were promoting the know. And she received it like a thank especially by Kathryn, because, like I culture and who had really sacrificed you gift from everybody in that room. said, she just went out of her way. themselves to get that culture out. It was like “Asante sana. Asante sana.” You know Kathryn talks about the So, to me they were perfect to really We were singing and chanting. And Caddy “buffer” stories in her book. be introduced to the storytelling after the circle of elders, we gather in Kathryn became a buffer for me. She family, and to be honored. a circle. We gather around the elders would be there at the times where When Kathryn was introduced and we chant and we just start dancing I really needed someone there to to the storytelling community at in a circle. And there’s the drums—and support me. And every time we would the National Association of Black the word is so spirited. It’s all just meet we would have these wonderful Storytellers in 2007, it was like she spirit, and things just happen. You don’t discussions. She was encouraging me represented the ancient mother even know what is gonna happen. to keep doing what I was doing, and to of all mothers. The queen mother. It’s just something that’s magical. write the stories down and put them The African mother. She owned this And that day was just so magical. in a book. Even though I had been a beautiful white gown, and with her I was just so happy for Kathryn. poet and I had been in anthologies bald head and that necklace around And now I think about the fact that during the Black Arts movement, her head—we were in awe. And she would be making transition three and I kind of thought of myself as even though I had seen her on a years later—you know I had no idea. a writer, I had never really thought regular basis, I was in awe too. We But she really enjoyed it. It was just a about getting a book together. But were all in awe of her presence. spectacle, but in the most positive way. she said it’s very important to make a When I introduced her, I told the record of these stories, and you must story of how we met, and how she get those stories in print one day. had encouraged me. I was crying. I brought it up at the board meeting Everybody in the audience was crying. for the National Association of Black And Kathryn just sat there smiling. Storytellers. I realized that when I She just sat there beaming. And when would put Kathryn Morgan’s name out she stood up, everybody just rose to there to other storytellers, they had their feet. And she lifted up her arms, never heard of her. They had never and she said “How I love you and how heard of her book. Alot of people I thank you for this great honor.” I really didn’t know that much about mean it was just unbelievable. They Sonia Sanchez, either. There are alot swarmed her—they surrounded her of Black storytellers out there, but to the point that you couldn’t even they don’t necessarily know of Black see her. You couldn’t see her face. I poets. So I said, “Oh, my goodness, had to break through the crowd. And you know something has to be done she was just laughing. Just grinning. about this.” There were some people And they were calling her “Mother.” that I felt we really needed to honor They were touching her. It was like and one of them was Kathryn Morgan, they had always known her. It was like and the other one was Sonia Sanchez. she was never a stranger to them. It They are so important to the was the strangest thing. It was just development of our people. To me, wonderful. It was just beautiful. they both were truth messengers. And we gave her a plaque and she

28 WIP 2012 Summer smalls / continued from p. 11

people to get it. It’s not just about might die and I didn’t finish this work, I cried, my sister cried, as children, the natural hair; it’s about natural I didn’t do this movie, I didn’t finish because the comb that my mother hair care, because you have to this film.” So there I go—another was using was not for our hair. know how to take care of your mission. I didn’t know about making Yvette: I was so fixed on hair. That was important to me: I’m movies, so I went to Miyoshi Smith, making sure that women felt good grateful that I had that opportunity and that was a deep process. about themselves, having them feel to teach and pass it on to my We’re very visual people and empowered. One image that stays in young people, to my students. we need to see and hear. I wanted my mind is of this little girl when we My nieces were my first students. people to see and hear what I was were in school. I see some girls like I just started teaching them how to trying to say. People wouldn’t listen this now. Little dark girls who have take care of their hair when they to me, because I had been talking hair that’s either short or broken were about six or seven. They would for years and trying to tell them or plastered to their head. And that sit there and watch us, and I saw things. I said, “I’ll get the information messes with their self-esteem. And how tradition was passed down. through another way.” That is my it’s still prevalent today. When their They would come and imitate us mission, for people to feel good about hair is done, they act differently. later. My baby braiders touched my themselves. Whoever, however—the Don’t the children act differently heart because that affirmed what creator made you, you’re perfect. in school? I remember growing up I kind of suspected—that when The film taught me a lot of things short, dark-skinned, left-handed; I children watch they really do learn. as well. I didn’t realize our history had a lot of things going against me. When I started teaching, I didn’t wasn’t documented in America even In my home, I didn’t feel that way. I have a set rule or way to do it, but though we built America. I had to go was loved and felt affirmed by my after I saw that I was going to be to people’s archival photo books, to parents and my aunts. My mother teaching, I made a curriculum. I want their family albums, because when told me, “Beauty is as beauty does.” them to know about the historical, we went to the Free Library and She was serious, because that’s how cultural, and artistic aspects of hair. I the Balch Institute to find pictures she was. That’s how we were raised. want them to get the techniques last. and images of us, it was really hard. But the outside world was cruel and A lot of them want the techniques to It left me feeling like we weren’t mean to darker children. So that is go make some money: no. You’re going important enough to be documented my mission—that nobody has to to learn your history and culture, in history. That was an empty feeling. feel bad about themselves, whether and then you get the techniques. The thing that I’ve understood they are light, dark, green, purple, Caroliese: What are some about the film is that it is political. blue. You’re okay however you are. things you’re most proud of? It wasn’t intended for politics, but That is a mission God has me on. Yvette: I’m proud of the film Hair it is. My intention was to bring Stories—that I have done something awareness to the subject. I want that people can go reference a people to just love themselves and hundred years from now and say, know that they’re perfect as they are. “Oh, okay, this is something she Caroliese: I love that you talk was saying,” whether they accept about hair not just from a scientific it or reject it. The work that I’ve standpoint but also in a cultural way. done in terms of natural hair and You taught me a lot about hair in natural hair care has helped people to America and its use and misuse. really take it and run with it, and be From the time that we were enslaved, serious about the art form—not just what the uses were for hair. We exploiting it for money. So I’m proud mistreated our hair; we did what we about the film, and knowing that I could. I always tell my children we left some very good students, and didn’t have time to pack our lotions they’ll pass it on and keep it going. and creams. My children are amazed The movie was finished as a result when I tell them it wasn’t until the of my father dying. Me saying, “Oh, I 60s that we had a comb for our hair.

2012 Summer WIP 29 Philadelphia Folklore Project’s 25th Birthday

< BASH!

The Folk Arts & Social Change Awards pfp*doings

> PFP turned 25 with a great party! Fabulous performances, delectable food and drink, and dancing were enjoyed by 225+ people. Mark your calendar for the first weekend of June next year. This will be an annual event. For now, thank you to everyone who made it a wonderful evening. This year, we inaugurated the Folk Arts & Social Change Awards to exemplify values and traditions central to PFP’s African American woman a resource for community Koung (1976-1996) work: commitment to to get a Ph.D. in folklore well-being. In the vanguard learned learning traditional social justice, engaged and from the University of of cultural movements, she Cambodian music from activist work, a sense of Pennsylvania, and the first pushed the Commonwealth her father, Koung Peang, hope and possibility, belief appointed to be on the of Pennsylvania to treat and performed in the in the power of work faculty of Swarthmore all children the same family mohori ensemble that pays attention to the College. A pioneering regardless of the marital from a very young age. lived experiences of local folklorist, she opened the status of their mother. In She took a lead role in the communities. By naming field of family folklore, collaborations with PFP first lakhon bassac (folk the awards after people paying attention to African (“Hucklebuck to Hip-Hop,” drama) performance to

Folk Arts & Social Change Honorees who forged PFP’s vision, American and women’s “Philly Dance Africa,” be produced here for the & PFP staff (from left) Toni Shapiro- we hope to draw attention experiences, and showing exhibitions, and more), and Cambodian community, in Phim, Louis Massiah, Lois Fernandez, Debbie Wei, Germaine Ingram, to the lives and legacies of how family stories were in community coalitions, a 1990 partnership with Debora Kodish,Selina Morales. those who have changed “antidotes to racism.” Lois has stood strong for PFP. She helped a new Photo: Tony Boris, 2012 us. In this inaugural year, Kathryn’s presence on self-determination and for generation of Cambodian we gave awards to people PFP’s board in the 1990s the importance of culture Americans to embrace who have been critical in built our commitment as a means of creating and extend folk and shaping PFP’s path. Here to “disturbing the peace community well-being. traditional arts, assuming are brief introductions to of racism.” Awardee: She was a PFP board responsibility for keeping the awards and awardees: Lois Fernandez is best member in the 1990s. folk arts a vital resource in Kathryn Morgan known as the co-founder new settings. Awardee: Channavy Lenora Award for Folk Arts of ODUNDE and for 37 Germaine Ingram’s Koung Award for & Social Justice. years the driving force creative work as a tap Folk Arts & Cultural Kathryn Morgan behind this beloved dancer and choreographer Heritage Practice. (1919–2010) was a native annual celebration, which has consistently showed Channavy Lenora Philadelphian, the first affirms African culture as how tap dance (and

30 WIP 2012 Summer Photos of artists at the Bash (clockwise from left): Elaine Watts and Katt Flagg play klezmer; Pang Xiong Sirirathasuk Sikoun; Jeannine Osayande enjoys Terrence Cameron’s steel pan music; Vera Nakonechny’s birthday cake; Kulu Mele African Dance and Drum Ensemble; Dancing to DJ OP; Sifu Shu Pui Cheung’s lion dance troupe. Photos: Tony Boris, 2012

African American folk for justice, no matter what and work documenting arts, from self-fashioning the odds are. Awardee: African American quilts in to ring shouts) are rich One of the founders of the South influenced her resources for exploring Asian Americans United approach. She founded challenging legacies. She (AAU) and an inspired the Pew Fellowships in initiated PFP’s project on educator, Debbie Wei the Arts and included folk local African American opened a view of cultural artists in a groundbreaking women tap dancers reclamation as an effective act of equity that has had (“Plenty of Good Women social justice strategy. A powerful local, regional, Dancers”), uncovering and long-time member of PFP’s and national impacts. documenting experiences board, Debbie worked Awardee: Louis that had been left out of with PFP to create anti- Massiah. Since 1974 Louis the record. Thanks to her, racist folk arts workshops Massiah has pioneered a generation of pioneering for teachers, student the use of media for artists received long- residencies, children’s creative expression and overdue recognition. As books, a documentary social change. PFP is one an artist, board member, video, and the Folk of countless beneficiaries and staff member, she has Arts-Cultural Treasures of Louis’ work. We have shaped PFP’s approach to Charter School—all efforts taken part in many Scribe using folk arts as a means grounded in attention to programs and learned from for opening doors. the experiences of Asian them all: “Precious Places,” “Storyville,” “Documentary Rosemary Cubas American and immigrant History Project for Award for Folk Arts & communities. For more Youth,” community radio Activism. Activist and than 20 years, PFP has been station WPEB, and more. community organizer guided and inspired by Louis’ politics and vision, Rosemary Cubas Debbie and AAU activists, both at Scribe and in his (1943–2005) was involved who have modeled how to creative work, have truly in countless campaigns for organize and analyze and opened doors, showing human rights—locally and speak truth to power. how inclusive and critical globally. PFP worked with Ella King Torrey work can change lives and Rosemary to develop the Award for Visionary reveal and reshape the documentary I Choose to Work in Community terms by which we reckon Stay Here, supporting the Culture. Ella King history and experience. struggle of people in her Torrey (1957–2003) was lower North Philadelphia a program officer at The neighborhood to fight the Pew Charitable Trusts in Who should receive city’s abuse of eminent 1987, when she helped these awards next year? domain and hang on to PFP get our first grant—a Nominate community Send the name of the nominee, their homes. Rosemary process of encouraging us members for consideration the award for which you are taught PFP (and many to imagine possibilities and by calling 215.726.1106 nominating them, and a brief others) how community articulate work that needed or emailing us account of why you think they is knit and rebuilt when to be done. She had great [email protected] should be honored. Thanks! people listen to one generosity of spirit. Ella’s another and act collectively graduate study of folklore

2012 Summer WIP 31 NON-profit org. u.s. postage paid philadelphia, pa permit no. 1449

magazine of the philadelphia folklore project

Philadelphia Folklore Project 735 S. 50th Street Philadelphia, PA 19143

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about the philadelphia folklore project membership form Folklore means something different to everyone—as it should, since it is one of the chief means we have to represent our own realities in the face of powerful institutions. Here at the Philadelphia Folklore Project, we are committed to paying attention to the experiences and traditions Name of “ordinary” people. We’re a 25-year-old independent public interest folklife agency that documents, supports and presents local folk arts and culture. We offer exhibitions, concerts, workshops and assistance to Address artists and communities. We conduct ongoing field research, organize around issues of concern, maintain an archive, and issue publications and resources. This work comes out of our mission: we affirm the City State Zip human right to meaningful cultural and artistic expression, and work to protect the rights of people to know and practice traditional and community-based arts. We work with people and communities to Phone build critical folk cultural knowledge, respect the complex folk and traditional arts of our region, and challenge processes and practices that diminish these local grassroots arts and humanities.We urge you to join—or to call us for more information. (215.726.1106) E-mail ____$25 Basic. Get magazines like this 1-2x/year, special mailings and 25% discount on publications. ____$35 Family. (2 or more at the same address). As above. Join online at: www.folkloreproject.org/store/index.php ____$60 Contributing. As above. ($35 tax-deductible) or mail in this form ____$150 Supporting. As above. ($110 tax deductible) Please make checks payable to: Philadelphia Folklore Project Mail to: PFP, 735 S. 50th St., Philadelphia, PA 19143 ____$10 No frills. Magazine & mailings only. No discounts.. ____ Sweat equity. I want to join (and get mailings). Instead of $$, I can give time or in-kind services. thanks to new and renewing members! Please join us today! Give $35 or more and get a PFP t-shirt T-shirt sizes S M L XL XXL (circle size)