Believe it or not, I’ve been known to be a jackass. Ask anyone who had the misfortune of knowing me in college. Or a couple years ago. I really hope President Obama isn’t asked about it anytime soon: Anyway, lots of things have happened since our last Monday roundup. Here’s a few of them, a Read More
Our monthly reading and discussion group, featuring All You Can Eat: How Hungry Is America has started, and I just know you all have been busy reading. The author, Joel Berg, recently answered some questions about the book in an interview with yours truly for PostBourgie. We’ll use this post as a jumping off point Read More
This month’s pick, All You Can Eat: How Hungry Is America is a recommendation from shani-o who writes: “In the book, Berg touches on the role racism has played in starvation of both whites and blacks in the 60s, notes the varying policies presidential administrations have enacted to fight hunger, and gives an excellent primer on Read More
It has been speculated that Uncle Tom’s Cabin aggravated the cultural conversation about slavery and planted the seeds for the Civil War. Whatever analysis is taken from the novel, Harriet Beecher Stowe’s serialized stories became relevant during a very particular time and place. So, what set the cultural tone for an unknown West African man to Read More
Ricky Rice is a former dope fiend and a surviving member of a suicide cult. And when he gets a mysterious letter to uphold a promise he made long ago, Ricky becomes a member of a secret society of paranormal investigators called the Unlikely Scholars. When the society is threatened, Ricky is teamed up with Read More
It’s the story of pre-colonial Nigeria, groundbreaking because it was originally written in English by a black African writer. The title was taken from a William Butler Yeats poem. It features the story of Okonkwo, a young man struggling to maintain the old customs with the ones brought by white Christian missionaries. Gods and Soldiers, briefly reviewed Read More
Because of technical difficulties and an unusually busy work day, this almost became Your Tuesday Random-Ass Roundup. Sorry I’m late again. Your PostBourgie-approved weekend reading material: First things first, Stacia, one of our co-bloggers, is writing a novel and posting a chapter a day at her personal blog. What is this space for, if not Read More
I’ve been chomping at the bit to get to our discussion of Paul Tough’s Whatever It Takes, this month’s reading/discussion group pick. The book follows the efforts of Geoffrey Canada and his audacious Harlem Children’s Zone program, a formidable array of proactive social programs that Canada hopes will lift every child in Harlem into college Read More
After a walk by the Apollo theatre or a visit to the local music or book store, it’s clear that Michael Jackson is going to make people a ton of money posthumously. And as the media stories speculate on how he died, and people start barking for who owns what of his estate, the rights to Read More
Whatever It Takes is the story of Geoffrey Canada, the president and mastermind of the Harlem Children’s Zone (HCZ) an audacious social experiment that hopes to reduce poverty and raise education achievement in a 97-block area in Harlem. (Coincidentally, the program was mentioned today in a post here.) Paul Tough, the book’s author, reported on one Read More
