Women's Center
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February 27, 2009
- 51%
51%
2/27/09 @ 12-12:30 p.m. 91.3 FM Tri States Public Radio. 51% takes a serious & intelligent look at society's impact on women & their impact on society. Topic: Marijuana issue; free market system
FR: WAMC, Albany, NY
RE: 51 PERCENT program rundown
In America, women make up more than half the population. Worldwide, women are expected to outnumber men within the next 50 years. And every issue we face is one that affects us all. Whether it’s the environment, health, our children, politics or the arts, there’s a women’s perspective, and 51% is a radio program dedicated to that viewpoint.
Host Susan Barnett talks to experts in their field for a wide-ranging, entertaining discussion of issues that not only fall into the traditional ‘women’s issues’ category, but topics that concern us all as human beings and citizens of the global community.
Broadcast of 51% on WIUM 91.3 FM is underwritten by the Western Organization for Women (WOW).
Here is this week's information on 51% # 1024
(SHOW THEME)
BILLBOARD Susan Barnett (:40) (Music Out)
________________________________________________
We're taking a serious look today at some ideas that many might call outrageous. But this is an economy in free fall - and any answer is worth putting on the table. Chris Goldstein, the host of Active Voice Radio, says we should consider a cash crop that right now doesn't pay a single penny in taxes.
4:11 Goldstein PRX
Chris Goldstein is the host of Active Voice Radio, a weekly Social Justice program.
This isn't one guy's idea - there are states all over the country that are reconsidering the marijuana issue. I spoke with marijuana reform advocates and some NY legislators.
9:43 Medical marijuana - Barnett
(music)
Coming up, another revolutionary idea - moving away from the free market economy.
If you missed part of our show, you can listen to 51% anytime. Just download our podcast at wamc.org or call 1-800-323-9262 to order a CD - you'll need to know the program number. This week's show is #1024. (15:04)
If decriminalizing, or even legalizing, marijuana strikes you as revolutionary - how about considering abandoning our devotion to the free market system? Robin Broad watches the international economy and she says the departure of the Bush administration is creating an opening for countries that say it's time to admit the free market just doesn't work.
7:47 Free Market Robin Broad - Barnett
Robin Broad is professor of international development at the School for International Service at American University in Washington DC. She is the co-author of Development Redefined - How the Market Met Its Match. It is published by Paradigm Publishing.
(8:47)
That's it for this edition of 51%
Thanks for listening. If you have any comments about today's program or ideas for future shows, please email me at sbarnett@wamc.org.
For 51%, I'm Susan Barnett.
(:24 pads out to 25:00)
Tune to 51% weekly throughout the U. S. on public and community radio stations, some ABC Radio Network stations, Armed Forces Radio stations around the world and on the Internet.
Susan Barnett, producer and host of 51%, is an award winning veteran journalist whose career has included anchoring and producing television news, radio news, writing for magazines and authoring a weekly column for an online newspaper. She’s a published fiction writer and an aspiring hobo. She lives in Woodstock, NY.
51%- The Women’s Perspective. It’s not just for women.
- Black History Month daily posting: Susie King Taylor
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we've been honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site. Thanks to Women's Center student assistant Shereen Ramos for her assistance with compiling these profiles and preparing them for posting.
Susie King Taylor (1848–1912) nurse, educator, domestic, and autobiographer. Susie Reed was born a slave on the Isle of Wight, off the coast of Georgia, in 1848. As a child, she was educated surreptitiously by white schoolchildren and slave neighbors. Once literate, she endorsed counterfeit passes for other slaves, early demonstrating both a defiance against bondage and injustice and a commitment to African American education. During the Civil War, she attained freedom when an uncle took her with his family to St. Catherine Island, South Carolina, then under Union army administration. At age fourteen, she taught island children by day and conducted night classes for numerous adults. Later in 1862, she joined a troop of African American soldiers, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel C. T. Trowbridge, and served them as nurse, laundress, teacher, and cook.
After the war, she and her first husband, Sergeant Edward King, returned to Savannah, where King died, leaving her to rear their infant son alone. From 1865 to 1868, she operated a private school, then performed domestic work in both southern and northern states. At age thirty-one, she married Russell Taylor. During Reconstruction, she organized the Women's Relief Corps, gaining national recognition for African American war heroes-men and women alike. In 1902 she published her autobiography.
Reminiscences of My Life in Camp portrays Susie King Taylor as both altruistic and astute; in it, as a representative African American woman of the late nineteenth century, she analyzes race relations and gender roles of her day. By reconstructing her army life, she tacitly demonstrates women's equality with men: while performing such traditional women's duties as sewing, women in the army revealed themselves to be as perceptive, valiant, and hardy as men. More overtly, Taylor condemns the post-Reconstruction racism manifest in Jim Crow groups such as the ex-Confederate Daughters, and American-Cuban relations. Throughout her Reminiscences, Taylor emerges brave and benevolent.
Bibliography
• Anthony Barthelemy, ed., Reminiscences of My Life in Camp: With the 33d United States Colored Troops Late 1st S.C. Volunteers, 1988.
• Joanne Braxton, Black Women Writing Autobiography: A Tradition Within a Tradition, 1990
Joycelyn K. Moody
Source: http://www.answers.com/Susie%20King%20Taylor%20
- Black History Month daily posting: Rosa Parks
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Rosa Parks Biography (1913 - 2005)
African American civil rights activist whose refusal to relinquish her seat on a public bus to a white man precipitated the 1955–56 Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama, which is recognized as the spark that ignited the U.S. civil rights movement.
In 1943 Parks became a member of the Montgomery chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and she served as its secretary until 1956. On December 1, 1955, she was arrested for refusing to give her bus seat to a white man, a violation of the city's racial segregation ordinances. Under the aegis of the Montgomery Improvement Association and the leadership of the young pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Martin Luther King, Jr., a boycott of the municipal bus company was begun on December 5. (African Americans constituted some 70 percent of the ridership.) On November 13, 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a lower court's decision declaring Montgomery's segregated seating unconstitutional, and the court order was served on December 20; the boycott ended the following day. For her role in igniting the successful campaign, which brought King to national prominence, Parks became known as the “mother of the civil rights movement.”
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9433715&page=3
- Black History Month daily posting: Maya Angelou
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Maya Angelou Biography (1928 - )
Writer, dancer, African-American activist.
Born Marguerite Johnson on April 4, 1928 in St. Louis, Missouri. Angelou spent her difficult formative years moving back and forth between her mother's and grandmother's. At age eight, she was raped by her mother's boyfriend, who was subsequently killed by her uncles. The event caused the young girl to go mute for nearly six years, and her teens and early twenties were spent as a dancer, filled with isolation and experimentation.
At 16 she gave birth to a son, Guy, after which she toured Europe and Africa in the musical Porgy and Bess. On returning to New York City in the 1960s, she joined the Harlem Writers Guild and became involved in black activism. She then spent several years in Ghana as editor of African Review, where she began to take her life, her activism and her writing more seriously.
Maya Angelou's five-volume autobiography commenced with I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings in 1970. The memoirs chronicle different eras of her life and were met with critical and popular success. Later books include All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes (1986) and My Painted House, My Friendly Chicken and Me (1994). She has published several volumes of verse, including And Still I Rise (1987) and Complete Collected Poems of Maya Angelou (1995). Her volume of poetry, Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'Fore I Die (1971), was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.
In 1993, Angelou read On the Pulse of Morning at Bill Clinton's Presidential inauguration, a poem written at his request. It was only the second time a poet had been asked to read at an inauguration, the first being Robert Frost at the inauguration of John F. Kennedy. In 2006, Angelou agreed to host a weekly radio show on XM Satellite Radio's Oprah & Friends channel. She also teaches at Wake Forest University in North Carolina, where she has a lifetime position as the Reynolds professor of American studies.
© 2007 A&E Television Networks. All rights reserved
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9185388
- Black History Month daily posting: Mae C. Jemison
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Mae C. Jemison Biography (1956 - )
Astronaut, physician.
Born October 17, 1956, in Decatur, Alabama, the youngest child of Charlie Jemison, a roofer and carpenter, and Dorothy (Green) Jemison,an elementary school teacher. Her sister, Ada Jemison Bullock, became a child psychiatrist, and her brother, Charles Jemison, is a real estate broker. The family moved to Chicago, Illinois, when Jemison was three to take advantage of better educational opportunities there, and it is that city that she calls her hometown. Throughout her early school years, her parents were supportive and encouraging of her talents and abilities, and Jemison spent considerable time in her school library reading about all aspects of science, especially astronomy. During her time at Morgan Park High School, she became convinced she wanted to pursue a career in biomedical engineering, and when she graduated in 1973 as a consistent honor student, she entered Stanford University on a National Achievement Scholarship.
At Stanford, Jemison pursued a dual major and in 1977 received a B.S. in chemical engineering and a B.A. in African and African-American Studies. As she had been in high school, Jemison was very involved in extracurricular activities including dance and theater productions, and served as head of the Black Student Union. Upon graduation, she entered Cornell University Medical College to work toward a medical degree. During her years there, she found time to expand her horizons by visiting and studying in Cuba and Kenya and working at a Cambodian refugee camp in Thailand. When she obtained her M.D. in 1981, she interned at Los Angeles County/ University of Southern California Medical Center and later worked as a general practitioner. For the next two and a half years, she was the area Peace Corps medical officer for Sierra
Leone and Liberia where she also taught and did medical research.
Following her return to the United States in 1985, she made a career change and decided to follow a dream she had nurtured for a long time. In October of that year she applied for admission to NASA's astronaut training program. The Challenger disaster of January 1986 delayed the selection process, but when she reapplied a year later, Jemison was one of the 15 candidates chosen from a field of about 2,000.
Joins Eight-Day Endeavor Mission
When Jemison was chosen on June 4, 1987, she became the first African American woman ever admitted into the astronaut training program. After more than a year of training, she became an astronaut with the title of sciencemission specialist, a job which would make her responsible for conducting crewrelated scientific experiments on the space shuttle. On September 12, 1992, Jemison finally flew into space with six other astronauts aboard the Endeavour on mission STS47. During her eight days in space, she conducted experiments on weightlessness and motion sickness on the crew and herself. Altogether, she spent slightly over 190 hours in space before returning to Earth on September 20.
Following her historic flight, Jemison noted that society should recognize how much both women and members of other minority groups can contribute if given the opportunity.
In recognition of her accomplishments, Jemison received several honorary doctorates, the 1988 Essence Science and Technology Award, the Ebony Black Achievement Award in 1992, and a Montgomery Fellowship from Dartmouth College in 1993, and was named Gamma Sigma Gamma Woman of the Year in 1990. Also in 1992, an alternative public school in Detroit, Michigan - the Mae C. Jemison Academy - was named after her. Jemison is a member of the American Medical Association, the American Chemical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and served on the Board of Directors of the World Sickle Cell Foundation from 1990 to 1992. She is also an advisory committee member of the American Express Geography Competition and an honorary board member of the Center for the Prevention of Childhood Malnutrition.
After leaving the astronaut corps in March 1993, she accepted a teaching fellowship at Dartmouth and also established the Jemison Group, a company that seeks to research, develop, and market advanced technologies.
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9542378&page=2
- Black History Month daily posting: Harriet Tubman
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Harriet Tubman Biography (1820 - 1913)
Abolitionist. Born Araminta Ross around 1820 in Bucktown, Maryland.
Reared in slavery, she married a free black, John Tubman, in 1844. He opposed her plans to flee north, so she escaped alone via the Underground Railroad in 1849, and over the next decade she led nearly 300 Maryland slaves to safety, including several siblings and her elderly parents.
Known as “the Moses of her people,” Harriet Tubman was devoutly religious and a believer in decisive action. She helped John Brown organize his 1859 raid on Harper's Ferry, Virginia, but was prevented by illness from accompanying him. During the Civil War she repeatedly went behind enemy lines to spy for the Union, and recruit slaves to fight in the army.
In her later years, living in Auburn, New York, she helped support relatives and other former slaves, and raised money for freedmen's schools and a home for elderly blacks.
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9511430
- Black History Month daily posting: Frances E.W. Harper
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Frances E.W. Harper Biography (1825 - 1911)
(born September 24, 1825, Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.—died February 22, 1911, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) American author, orator, and social reformer who was notable for her poetry, speeches, and essays on abolitionism, temperance, and woman suffrage.
Frances Watkins was the daughter of free black parents. She grew up in the home of an uncle whose school for black children she attended. At age 13 she went to work as a domestic in a Baltimore, Maryland, household but continued her education on her own. About 1845 she published a collection of verses and prose writings under the title Forest Leaves. During 1850–52 she taught sewing at Union Seminary, a work-study school operated by the African Methodist Episcopal Church near Columbus, Ohio. Later she taught in Little York, Pennsylvania. The rising heat of the abolitionist controversy and the consequent increasing stringency of slave laws in Southern and border states at length drew her into the public arena.
In August 1854 in New Bedford, Massachusetts, Watkins delivered a public address on “Education and the Elevation of the Colored Race.” Her success there led to a two-year lecture tour in Maine for the state Anti-Slavery Society, and from 1856 to 1860 she spoke throughout the East and Midwest. In addition to her antislavery lecturing, she read frequently from her second book, Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects (1854), which was quite successful and was several times enlarged and reissued. It addressed the subjects of motherhood, separation, and death and contained the antislavery poem “Bury Me in a Free Land.” Generally written in conventional rhymed quatrains, her poetry was noted for its simple rhythm and biblical imagery. Its narrative voice reflected the storytelling style of the oral tradition. She also contributed to various periodicals; her story “The Two Offers” in the Anglo-African Magazine in September–October 1859 was said to be the first published by an African American author.
In 1860 Frances Watkins married Fenton Harper. When he died in 1864, she returned to the lecture platform. After the Civil War, Harper made several lecture tours of the South with addresses on education, temperance, and other topics, and in 1872 she published Sketches of Southern Life, a series of poems told in black vernacular. From 1883 to 1890 she was in charge of activities among blacks for the national Woman's Christian Temperance Union. She became a director of the American Association of Education of Colored Youth in 1894, and in 1896 she helped organize the National Association of Colored Women, of which she was elected a vice president in 1897.
Her novel Iola Leroy; or, Shadows Uplifted was published in 1892. She also wrote three novels serialized in The Christian Recorder, a religious periodical: Minnie's Sacrifice, Sowing and Reaping, and Trial and Triumph, all of which were published in book form in 1994. Harper's works were collected in Complete Poems of Frances E.W. Harper (1988) and A Brighter Coming Day: A Frances Ellen Watkins Harper Reader (1990).
Copyright © 1994-2008 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=40710
- 51%
51% 2/20/09 @ 12-12:30 p.m. 91.3 FM Tri States Public Radio. 51% takes a serious & intelligent look at society's impact on women & their impact on society. Topic: Noise; Halladay Museum; Artspace
FR: WAMC, Albany, NY
RE: 51 PERCENT program rundown
In America, women make up more than half the population. Worldwide, women are expected to outnumber men within the next 50 years. And every issue we face is one that affects us all. Whether it’s the environment, health, our children, politics or the arts, there’s a women’s perspective, and 51% is a radio program dedicated to that viewpoint.
Host Susan Barnett talks to experts in their field for a wide-ranging, entertaining discussion of issues that not only fall into the traditional ‘women’s issues’ category, but topics that concern us all as human beings and citizens of the global community.
Broadcast of 51% on WIUM 91.3 FM is underwritten by the Western Organization for Women (WOW).
Here is this week's information on 51% # 1023
(SHOW THEME)
BILLBOARD – Susan Barnett (:43) (Music Out) ________________________________________________
Close your eyes. Listen. You're not just hearing my voice - you're hearing everything around you. And there's a lot of noise out there. Doctor Arline Bronzaft is an environmental psychologist. She lives in one of the noisiest places in the world - New York City. And she's done studies on what the noise there does to children, to their learning, and to everyone's health. What she's found out may surprise you.
9:03 Bronzaft
Industry, too, has been trying to build quieter jets, appliances, even insulation for homes - though what effect the economy will have on that effort is hard to say. Doctor Arline Bronzaft is chair of the Council on the Environment of New York City.
(music)
Coming up, another kind of noise - the kind that calls attention to an issue.
If you missed part of our show, you can listen to 51% anytime. Just download our podcast at wamc.org or call 1-800-323-9262 to order a CD - you'll need to know the program number. This week's show is #1023.
And if you're interested in getting a FREE CD of our National Science Foundation “The Sounds of Progress,” go to www.womeninscience.org. (10:52)
Next up on 51%, noise of different sort. Making noise and taking action can often be the best ways to call attention to a problem - especially a problem on the other side of the world. 51%'s Charlie Deitz has a report on two Massachusett women who were honored this year on Martin Luther King Day for their work with children a long way from the snowy Berkshires.
7:25 Deitz Peacemakers
And finally, it's Artspace. This week we speak to a woman whose actions have been far louder than her words - whose efforts have created a national museum. Wilhelmina Cole Halladay is the founder of the National Museum of Women in the Arts...and she's just authored a book that tells how it happened.
4:41 Halladay Museum - Barnett
The book is “A Museum of Their Own” by Wilhelmina Cole Halladay. It is published by Abbeville Press. To find out more about the museum online, go to nmwa.org.
(12:43)
That's it for this edition of 51%
Thanks for listening. If you have any comments about today's program or ideas for future shows, please email me at sbarnett@wamc.org.
For 51%, I'm Susan Barnett.
Tune to 51% weekly throughout the U. S. on public and community radio stations, some ABC Radio Network stations, Armed Forces Radio stations around the world and on the Internet.
Susan Barnett, producer and host of 51%, is an award winning veteran journalist whose career has included anchoring and producing television news, radio news, writing for magazines and authoring a weekly column for an online newspaper. She’s a published fiction writer and an aspiring hobo. She lives in Woodstock, NY.
51%- The Women’s Perspective. It’s not just for women.
- Black History Month daily posting: Gwendolyn Brooks
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Gwendolyn (Elizabeth) Brooks Biography (1917 - 2000)
Poet. Born June 7, 1917 in Topeka, Kansas.
Brooks graduated from Chicago's Wilson Junior College (1936) and was publicity director for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (1930s). Her poetry is rooted in Chicago's poor and mostly African American South Side. After her first book of poetry was published in 1945, she received a Guggenheim Fellowship. Her verse narrative, Annie Allen (1949), won the first Pulitzer Prize awarded to an African-American woman (1950).
Brooks succeeded Carl Sandburg as poet laureate of Illinois (1968). After John F. Kennedy invited her to a Library of Congress poetry festival in 1962, she began teaching at colleges throughout the U.S., including Columbia College Chicago, Elmhurst College, Columbia University, Clay College of New York, and the University of Wisconsin.
In 1985, she was the Library of Congress's Consultant in Poetry and in 1994 she was chosen as the National Endowment for the Humanities' Jefferson Lecturer, one of the highest honors for American literature. Later volumes include Riot (1970), To Disembark (1981), and Blacks (1991).
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9227599
Additional information from WIU’s Gwendolyn Brooks Cultural Center Web site:
Gwendolyn Brooks was born in Topeka, Kansas in 1917 and lived in Chicago since she was an infant. Brooks graduated from Englewood High School and received her Associates Degree from Wilson Junior College. She taught in the University of Wisconsin (Madison), City College of New York, Columbia College of Chicago, Northeastern Illinois University, Elmhurst College, and Chicago State University. In the late 1930's, Brooks met poet and writer Henry Blakely and they were married in 1939. They were married 57 years until his death in 1996. The couple had a son, Henry Blakely III and daughter, Nora Brooks Blakely.
On Sunday, December 3, 2000, internationally recognized poet Gwendolyn Brooks passed away at her home in Chicago, Illinois surrounded by family and friends. She was 83. Brooks was the first Black person to receive the distinguished Pulitzer Prize. This award was given in 1950 for Brooks' volume of poetry, Annie Allen. In 1968, Brooks was named Poet Laureate of Illinois, succeeding the late Carl Sandburg.
Ms. Brooks was the first recipient of Western Illinois University's Honorary Doctorate in June of 1971. In the previous year (1970), the Gwendolyn Brooks Cultural Center was dedicated to honor her for her commitment, encouragement, humanitarian service and her personal inspiration to African American students at Western Illinois University.
Brooks visited WIU numerous times since the dedication, the most recent September 29, 1999 to celebrate the Gwendolyn Brooks Cultural Center's 30th anniversary. The same day, Ms. Brooks was given a key to the City by the Mayor of Macomb.
Chicago State University is the official repository for Gwendolyn Brooks works.
For more information
To obtain Gwendolyn Brooks information contact:
Brooks Permissions
PO Box 19355
Chicago IL 60619
Nora Brooks Blakely, President
Nichole L. Shields, Client Services Administrator
Cynthia Walls, Manager Administrative Services
Phone: 708/333-3330
Fax: 773/994-7432
E-mail: gbpermissions@aol.com
Source: www.gbcc.wiu.edu
- Black History Month daily posting: Ella Fitzgerald
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Ella Fitzgerald Biography (1918 - 1996)
Singer. Born Ella Jane Fitzgerald on April 25, 1917 in Newport News, Virginia. After a troubled childhood, including the death of her mother in 1932, Fitzgerald turned to singing and debuted at the Apollo Theater in 1934 at age 17. She was discovered in an amateur contest in Harlem and joined Chick Webb's band and recorded several hits, notably "A-tisket A-tasket" (1938).
After Webb died in 1939, his band was renamed Ella Fitzgerald and her Famous Orchestra. Two years later, she began her solo career and by the mid-1950s, she had become the first African-American to perform at the Mocambo. Her lucid intonation and broad range made her a top jazz singer. Her series of recordings for Verve (1955Ð9) in multi-volume "songbooks" are among the treasures of American popular song.
With the exception of Jazz at Santa Monica Civic '72, her latter recordings marked a decline in her voice due to complications from diabetes. The disease left her blind, and she had both legs amputated in 1994. She made her last recording in 1989 and her last public performance in 1991.
Fitzgerald was briefly married to Benny Kornegay, a convicted drug dealer and hustler, in 1941. She was married to bass player Ray Brown from 1947 to 1952; they adopted a child born to Fitzgerald's half-sister whom they christened Ray Brown, Jr. Fitzgerald.
© 2006 A&E Television Networks. All rights reserved.
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9296210
- Black History Month daily posting: Toni Morrison
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Toni Morrison Biography (1931 - )
Writer and editor. Born Chloe Anthony Wofford on February 18, 1931, in Lorain, Ohio. Considered one of the best contemporary novelists, she graduated from Howard University in 1953 and continued her education at Cornell University where she received a master of fine arts degree in 1955. After graduating from Cornell, she taught English at Texas Southern University and at Howard University.
Morrison left academia in 1965, taking a job as a senior editor for Random House in New York City. Her first novel, The Bluest Eye, was published in 1970 and told the story of a young African-American girl who believes her incredibly difficult life would be better if only she had blue eyes. She continued to explore the African-American experience in its many forms and time periods in such works as Sula (1973), Song of Solomon (1977), and Beloved (1987), which won the 1988 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Morrison developed a strong following among both readers and critics whom fell for her lyrical style, sharp observations, and vibrant storytelling.
Morrison became a professor at Princeton University in 1989 and continued to produce great works. In recognition of her contributions to her field, she received the 1993 Nobel Prize in Literature, making her the first African American to be selected for the award. The next year, her novel Jazz was published, and she established a special workshop for writers and performers known as the Princeton Atelier. Along with her novels Paradise (1998) and Love (2003), Morrison wrote several children's books, including The Big Box (1999), The Book of Mean People (2002), and The Ant or the Grasshopper? (2003), with her son Slade.
In 2006, she announced she was retiring from her post at Princeton.
That year, the New York Times Book Review named Beloved the best novel of the past 25 years.
Married to Harold Morrison from 1958 to 1964, Morrison has two sons—Harold and Slade. She lives in Princeton, New Jersey, and Upstate New York.
© 2006 A&E Television Networks. All rights reserved.
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9415590
- Black History Month Daily Posting: Bessie Coleman
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Bessie Coleman Biography (1893 - 1926)
(born Jan. 26, 1893, Atlanta, Texas, U.S. - died April 30, 1926, Jacksonville, Fla.)
American aviator and a star of early aviation exhibitions and air shows.
One of 13 children, Coleman grew up in Waxahatchie, Texas, where her mathematical aptitude freed her from working in the cotton fields. She attended college in Langston, Oklahoma, briefly, then moved to Chicago, where she worked as a manicurist and restaurant manager and became interested in the then-new profession of aviation.
Discrimination thwarted Coleman's attempts to enter aviation schools in the United States. Undaunted, she learned French and at age 27 was accepted at the Caudron Brothers School of Aviation in Le Crotoy, France. Black philanthropists Robert Abbott, founder of the Chicago Defender, and Jesse Binga, a banker, assisted with her tuition.
On June 15, 1921, she became the first American woman to obtain an international pilot's license from the Fédération Aéronitique Internationale. In further training in France, she specialized in stunt flying and parachuting; her exploits were captured on newsreel films.
She returned to the United States, where racial and gender biases precluded her becoming a commercial pilot. Stunt flying, or barnstorming, was her only career option.
Coleman staged the first public flight by an African American woman in America on Labor Day, September 3, 1922. She became a popular flier at aerial shows, though she refused to perform before segregated audiences in the South. Speaking at schools and churches, she encouraged blacks' interest in aviation; she also raised money to found a school to train black aviators. Before she could found her school, however, during a rehearsal for an aerial show, the plane carrying Coleman spun out of control, catapulting her 2,000 feet to her death.
Copyright © 1994-2008 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=36928
- Black History Month daily posting: Bessie Blount
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Bessie Blount bio:
Bessie Blount was a physical therapist who worked with soldiers injured in W.W.II. Bessie Blount's war service inspired her to patent a device, in 1951, that allowed amputees to feed themselves.
The electrical device allowed a tube to deliver one mouthful of food at a time to a patient in a wheelchair or in a bed whenever he or she bit down on the tube. She later invented a portable receptacle support that was a simpler and smaller version of the same, designed to be worn around a patient's neck.
Bessie Blount was born in Hickory, Virginia in 1914. She moved from Virginia to New Jersey where she studied to be a physical therapist at the Panzar College of Physical Education and at Union Junior College and then furthered her training as a physical therapist in Chicago.
In 1951, Bessie Blount started teaching Physical Therapy at the Bronx Hospital in New York. She was unable to successfully market her valuable inventions and found no support from United States Veteran's Administration, so she gave the patent rights to the French government in 1952.
The French government put the device to good use helping to make life better for many war vets.
"A black woman can invent something for the benefit of humankind." - Bessie Blount
Source:
http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blblount.htm
written by Mary Bellis
- 51%
51% 2/13/09 @ 12-12:30 p.m. 91.3 FM Tri States Public Radio. 51% takes a serious & intelligent look at society's impact on women & their impact on society. Topic: Dating
FR: WAMC, Albany, NY
RE: 51 PERCENT program rundown
In America, women make up more than half the population. Worldwide, women are expected to outnumber men within the next 50 years. And every issue we face is one that affects us all. Whether it’s the environment, health, our children, politics or the arts, there’s a women’s perspective, and 51% is a radio program dedicated to that viewpoint.
Host Susan Barnett talks to experts in their field for a wide-ranging, entertaining discussion of issues that not only fall into the traditional ‘women’s issues’ category, but topics that concern us all as human beings and citizens of the global community.
Broadcast of 51% on WIUM 91.3 FM is underwritten by the Western Organization for Women (WOW).
Here is this week's information on 51% # 1022
(SHOW THEME)
BILLBOARD - Susan Barnett (:41) (Music Out) ________________________________________________
Everybody's thinking about love when mid-February rolls around. And for far too many people, it's just another reason to get stressed out. It's not just that awkward coffee date, or the do we or don't we question about that kiss goodnight. Now there's internet dating...so you can be rejected on 25 important personality traits by multiple people.
:15 chemistry.com ad
But if you just admit that dating is horrible, and stop pretending it's fun, maybe you'll be okay. You might even find someone you're really happy to be with. At least that's the philosophy behind the book “Dating Makes You Want To Die: But You Have To Do It Anyway” by Dan Holloway and Dorothy Robinson. They have some unique ideas about how to navigate the dating gauntlet...but even they can't agree on exactly the right way to do it.
7:33 Dating Makes You Want To Die Barnett
The book is “Dating Makes You Want To Die: But You Have To Do It Anyway” by Dan Holloway and Dorothy Robinson. It is published by Collins Living.
(music)
Coming up, what do kids think about dating? Wait til you hear the next generation's predictions for relationships.
If you missed part of our show, you can listen to 51% anytime. Just download our podcast at wamc.org or call 1-800-323-9262 to order a CD, you'll need to know the program number. This week's show is #1022.
And don't forget - FREE CDs are still available of our National Science Foundation “Sounds of Progress” series. Just go to womeninscience.org (9:54)
-------------------
If baby boomers and young people have it tough - imagine what it's like for the kids just starting to date. Bad enough that they're starting to date younger and younger, now they have texting, Myspace, Facebook and the ever-present cell phone. There's just no way they're going to be able to avoid the dating drama. Zoe Hye is a high school student, and in this report she checks in with the younger kids to see what they predict the future of dating will be.
Teen Dating 4:53 PRX
Next, Kimberly Kay has some common sense advice for anyone who's in a relationship and wants to stay that way. Listen closely - this is not your mother's idea of good advice.
3:55 Kay Relationship Guru
Kimberly Kay works on her relationship in the Catskills of New York.
And finally, Adrian Boies takes us back to high school to ask, “What IS love?”
4:15 What is Love PRX
(13:44)
That's it for this edition of 51%
Thanks for listening. If you have any comments about today's program or ideas for future shows, please email me at sbarnett@wamc.org.
For 51%, I'm Susan Barnett.
(:24 pads out to 25:00)
Tune to 51% weekly throughout the U. S. on public and community radio stations, some ABC Radio Network stations, Armed Forces Radio stations around the world and on the Internet.
Susan Barnett, producer and host of 51%, is an award winning veteran journalist whose career has included anchoring and producing television news, radio news, writing for magazines and authoring a weekly column for an online newspaper. She’s a published fiction writer and an aspiring hobo. She lives in Woodstock, NY.
51%- The Women’s Perspective. It’s not just for women.
- Black History Month daily posting: Sojourner Truth
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Sojourner Truth Biography (1797 - 1883)
Abolitionist and women's rights activist. Born Isabella Van Wagener c. 1797 in Ulster County, New York. Born to slaves of a wealthy Dutch-American estate owner (she grew up speaking Dutch), she herself served as a slave in the Dumont family (1810–27) and had at least five children (two daughters were sold away from her). She fled her owners' household in 1827, found refuge in the home of the Van Wageners, and took their name.
Van Wagener successfully sued to get her son back from slavery in Alabama, and c.1829 she settled in New York City with him and a daughter. A religious mystic by this time, for the next few years she was heavily involved with some questionable religious evangelicals, and, after a scandal in which she was an innocent bystander, she withdrew to raise her children and to work as a domestic.
In 1843, she announced that ‘voices’ had commanded her to assume the name ‘Sojourner Truth’ and to set out as a preacher. She ended up in Northampton, Massachusetts, with a utopian community and stayed there until c.1850, when she settled in Battle Creek, MI. By that time she had also added lectures on abolition and women's rights to her public appearances. (Extremely tall, she was accused of being a man, and is said to have bared her breast at a women's rights convention to prove she was a woman.)
Truth was received by President Lincoln at the White House in 1864. After the war she advocated a ‘Negro State’ and promoted the emigration of African-Americans to the West. She continued to travel throughout much of the Northeast, lecturing on a variety of inspirational and social reform topics, retiring to Battle Creek, Michigan, in her later years.
Source:
www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9511284
- Black History Month daily posting: Oprah Winfrey
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Oprah Winfrey Biography (1954-)
Oprah Gail Winfrey was born January 29, 1954, in Kosciusko, Mississippi. After a troubled adolescence in a small farming community, where she was sexually abused by a number of male relatives and friends of her mother, Vernita, she moved to Nashville to live with her father, Vernon, a barber and businessman. She entered Tennessee State University in 1971 and began working in radio and television broadcasting in Nashville.
In 1976, Winfrey moved to Baltimore, where she hosted the TV chat show, People Are Talking. The show became a hit and Winfrey stayed with it for eight years, after which she was recruited by a Chicago TV station to host her own morning show, A.M. Chicago. Her major competitor in the time slot was Phil Donahue. Within several months, Winfrey's open, warm-hearted personal style had won her 100,000 more viewers than Donahue and had taken her show from last place to first in the ratings. Her success led to nationwide fame and a role in Steven Spielberg's 1985 film, The Color Purple, for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
Winfrey launched the Oprah Winfrey Show in 1986 as a nationally syndicated program. With its placement on 120 channels and an audience of 10 million people, the show grossed $125 million by the end of its first year, of which Winfrey received $30 million. She soon gained ownership of the program from ABC, drawing it under the control of her new production company, Harpo Productions ('Oprah' spelled backwards) and making more and more money from syndication.
In 1994, with talk shows becoming increasingly trashy and exploitative, Winfrey pledged to keep her show free of tabloid topics. Although ratings initially fell, she earned the respect of her viewers and was soon rewarded with an upsurge in popularity. Her projects with Harpo have included the highly rated 1989 TV miniseries, The Women of Brewster Place, which she also starred in. Winfrey also signed a multi-picture contract with Disney. The initial project, 1998's Beloved, based on Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Toni Morrison and starring Winfrey and Danny Glover, got mixed reviews and generally failed to live up to expectations.
Winfrey, who became almost as well-known for her weight loss efforts as for her talk show, lost an estimated 90 pounds (dropping to her ideal weight of around 150 pounds) and competed in the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, DC, in 1995. In the wake of her highly publicized success, Winfrey's personal chef, Rosie Daley, and trainer, Bob Greene, both published best-selling books.
The media giant contributed immensely to the publishing world by launching her "Oprah's Book Club," as part of her talk show. The program propelled many unknown authors to the top of the bestseller lists and gave pleasure reading a new kind of popular prominence.
With the debut in 1999 of Oxygen Media, a company she co-founded that is dedicated to producing cable and Internet programming for women, Winfrey ensured her place in the forefront of the media industry and as one of the most powerful and wealthy people in show business. In 2002, she concluded a deal with the network to air a prime-time complement to her syndicated talk show. Her highly successful monthly, O: The Oprah Magazine debuted in 2000, and in 2004, she signed a new contract to continue The Oprah Winfrey Show through the 2010-11 season. The show is seen on 212 U.S. stations and in more than 100 countries worldwide.
According to Forbes magazine, Oprah was the richest African American of the 20th century and the world's only Black billionaire for three years running. Life magazine hailed her as the most influential woman of her generation. In 2005, Business Week named her the greatest Black philanthropist in American history. Oprah's Angel Network has raised more than $51,000,000 for charitable programs, including girls' education in South Africa and relief to the victims of Hurricane Katrina.
Winfrey is a dedicated activist for children's rights; in 1994, President Clinton signed a bill into law that Winfrey had proposed to Congress, creating a nationwide database of convicted child abusers. She founded the Family for Better Lives foundation and also contributes to her alma mater, Tennessee State University. In September, 2002, Oprah was named the first recipient of The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences' Bob Hope Humanitarian Award.
© 2009 A&E Television Networks. All rights reserved
Source:
www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9534419&page=3
- Black History Month daily posting: Mary Edmonia Lewis
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we're honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site.
Mary Edmonia Lewis Biography (1845 – 1909)
(born July 4, 1845, Greenbush, New York, U.S.—died after 1909) American sculptor whose Neoclassical works exploring religious and classical themes won contemporary praise and received renewed interest in the late 20th century.
Lewis was the daughter of an African American man and a woman of African and Ojibwa (Chippewa) descent. By age four she was an orphan. She then lived with her maternal aunts among the Ojibwa, who called her Wildfire. With the help of an older brother, she obtained admission to the preparatory department of Oberlin College in 1859, and from 1860 to 1862 she attended the college proper.
Lewis thrived at Oberlin, excelling particularly at drawing, but she left in 1863 after having been accused both of theft and of poisoning two of her classmates. A mob beat her severely before her trial for accusations of poisoning; she was later acquitted, with the help of lawyer John Mercer Langston. Again with her brother's support, she made her way to Boston, where abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison introduced her to a local sculptor from whom she received a few lessons in modeling.
Lewis's first work seen publicly was a medallion, advertised for sale early in 1864, that featured the head of militant abolitionist John Brown. Later in the year her bust of Colonel Robert Gould Shaw (a Boston hero who had been killed leading his black troops in the attack on Fort Wagner, part of the assault on Charleston, South Carolina) was widely praised. Sales of copies of the bust allowed her to sail in 1865 to Rome, where Charlotte Cushman, Harriet Hosmer, and other members of the American art community took her under their wing. Lewis mastered working in marble and refused to hire Italian stone carvers to transfer her plaster models to marble, in order to quell any question that the work was her own.
Lewis quickly achieved success as a sculptor. Inspired by the Emancipation Proclamation, she carved The Freed Woman and Her Child (1866) and Forever Free (1867). She subsequently turned to Native American themes and created The Marriage of Hiawatha (c. 1868) and The Old Arrow Maker and His Daughter (1872), both based on the narrative poem The Song of Hiawatha (1855) by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, of whom she carved a bust (c. 1869). Her other notable works included busts of Garrison (c. 1866), Abraham Lincoln (1873), John Brown (1864–65), and Hygeia (c. 1876), a grave statue that was commissioned by Harriot K. Hunt.
Lewis also depicted biblical figures, such as Hagar (1875). Her career reached its peak in 1876 when her sculpture The Death of Cleopatra was exhibited at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition. In 1883 she received her last major commission, a version of the Adoration of the Magi, from a church in Baltimore, Maryland. This piece, like the bulk of her work, cannot be located and perhaps did not survive. It was variously reported that Lewis had been last seen in Rome in 1909 or 1911, but the circumstances of her death are uncertain.
Copyright © 1994-2008 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Source:
www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9381053
- Black History Month daily posting: bell hooks
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we'll be honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board & Web site.
bell hooks Biography (1952 - )
(born Gloria Jean Watkins on September 25, 1952, Hopkinsville, Kentucky, U.S.) American scholar whose work examines the varied perceptions of black women and black women writers and the development of feminist identities.
Watkins grew up in a segregated community of the American South. At age 19 she began writing what would become her first full-length book, Ain't I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism, which was published in 1981. She studied English literature at Stanford University (B.A., 1973), the University of Wisconsin (M.A., 1976), and the University of California, Santa Cruz (Ph.D., 1983).
Hooks assumed her pseudonym, the name of her great-grandmother, to honour female legacies; she preferred to spell it in all lowercase letters to focus attention on her message rather than herself. She taught English and ethnic studies at the University of Southern California from the mid-1970s, African and Afro-American studies at Yale University during the '80s, women's studies at Oberlin College and English at the City College of New York during the 1990s and early 2000s. In 2004 she became a professor in residence at Berea College in Berea, Kentucky.
In the 1980s hooks established a support group for black women called the Sisters of the Yam, which she later used as the title of a book, published in 1993, celebrating black sisterhood. Her other writings included Feminist Theory from Margin to Center (1984), Talking Back: Thinking Feminist, Thinking Black (1989), Black Looks: Race and Representation (1992), Killing Rage: Ending Racism (1995), Reel to Real: Race, Sex, and Class at the Movies (1996), Remembered Rapture: The Writer at Work (1999), and Where We Stand: Class Matters (2000). She also wrote a number of autobiographical works, such as Bone Black: Memories of Girlhood (1996) and Wounds of Passion: A Writing Life (1997).
Copyright © 1994-2008 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Source:
www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=41040
- Black History Month daily posting: Daisy Bates
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we'll be honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board & Web site.
Daisy Bates Biography (1914-1999)
Civil rights activist, writer, publisher. Born Daisy Lee Gatson on November 11, 1914, in Huttig, Arkansas. Bates’s childhood was marked by tragedy. Her mother was sexually assaulted and murdered by three white men and her father left her. She was raised by friends of the family.
As a teenager, Bates met Lucious Christopher “L. C.” Bates, an insurance agent and an experienced journalist. The couple married in the early 1940s and moved to Little Rock, Arkansas. Together they operated the Arkansas State Press, a weekly African-American newspaper. The paper championed civil rights, and Bates joined in the civil rights movement. She became the president of Arkansas chapter of the National Association for Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1952.
As the head of the NAACP’s Arkansas branch, Bates played a crucial role in the fight against segregation. In 1954, the United States Supreme Court declared that school segregation was unconstitutional in the landmark case known as Brown v. Board of Education. Even after that ruling, African American students who tried to enroll in white schools were turned away in Arkansas. Bates and her husband chronicled this battle in their newspaper.
In 1957, she helped nine African American students to become the first to attend the all-white Central High School in Little Rock, who became known as the Little Rock Nine. The group first tried to go to the school on September 4. A group of angry whites jeered at them as they arrived. The governor, Orval Faubus, opposed school integration and sent members of the Arkansas National Guard to prevent the students from entering the school. Despite the enormous amount of animosity they faced from white residents of the city, the students were undeterred from their mission to attend the school.
Bates’ home became the headquarters for the battle to integrate Central High School and she served as a personal advocate and supporter to the students. President Dwight D. Eisenhower became involved in the conflict and ordered federal troops to go to Little Rock to uphold the law and protect the Little Rock Nine. With U.S. soldiers providing security, the Little Rock Nine left from Bates’ home for their first day of school on September 25, 1957. Bates remained close with the Little Rock Nine, offering her continuing support as they faced harassment and intimidation from people against desegregation.
Bates also received numerous threats, but this would not stop her from her work. The newspaper she and her husband worked on was closed in 1959 because of low adverting revenue. Three years later, her account of the school integration battle was published as The Long Shadow of Little Rock. For a few years, she moved to Washington, D.C., to work for the Democratic National Committee and on antipoverty projects for the Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration.
Bates returned to Little Rock in the mid-1960s and spent much of her time on community programs. After the death of her husband in 1980, she also resuscitated their newspaper for several years, from 1984 to 1988. Bates died on November 4, 1999, Little Rock, Arkansas.
For her career in social activism, Bates received numerous awards, including an honorary degree from the University of Arkansas. She is best remembered as a guiding force behind one of the biggest battles for school integration in the nation’s history.
© 2006 A&E Television Networks. All rights reserved
Source: www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=206524
- Black History Month daily posting: Daisy Bates
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we are honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board & Web site.
Daisy Bates Biography (1914-1999)
Civil rights activist, writer, publisher. Born Daisy Lee Gatson on November 11, 1914, in Huttig, Arkansas. Bates’s childhood was marked by tragedy. Her mother was sexually assaulted and murdered by three white men and her father left her. She was raised by friends of the family.
As a teenager, Bates met Lucious Christopher “L. C.” Bates, an insurance agent and an experienced journalist. The couple married in the early 1940s and moved to Little Rock, Arkansas. Together they operated the Arkansas State Press, a weekly African-American newspaper. The paper championed civil rights, and Bates joined in the civil rights movement. She became the president of Arkansas chapter of the National Association for Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1952.
As the head of the NAACP’s Arkansas branch, Bates played a crucial role in the fight against segregation. In 1954, the United States Supreme Court declared that school segregation was unconstitutional in the landmark case known as Brown v. Board of Education. Even after that ruling, African American students who tried to enroll in white schools were turned away in Arkansas. Bates and her husband chronicled this battle in their newspaper.
In 1957, she helped nine African American students to become the first to attend the all-white Central High School in Little Rock, who became known as the Little Rock Nine. The group first tried to go to the school on September 4. A group of angry whites jeered at them as they arrived. The governor, Orval Faubus, opposed school integration and sent members of the Arkansas National Guard to prevent the students from entering the school. Despite the enormous amount of animosity they faced from white residents of the city, the students were undeterred from their mission to attend the school.
Bates’ home became the headquarters for the battle to integrate Central High School and she served as a personal advocate and supporter to the students. President Dwight D. Eisenhower became involved in the conflict and ordered federal troops to go to Little Rock to uphold the law and protect the Little Rock Nine. With U.S. soldiers providing security, the Little Rock Nine left from Bates’ home for their first day of school on September 25, 1957. Bates remained close with the Little Rock Nine, offering her continuing support as they faced harassment and intimidation from people against desegregation.
Bates also received numerous threats, but this would not stop her from her work. The newspaper she and her husband worked on was closed in 1959 because of low adverting revenue. Three years later, her account of the school integration battle was published as The Long Shadow of Little Rock. For a few years, she moved to Washington, D.C., to work for the Democratic National Committee and on antipoverty projects for the Lyndon B. Johnson’s administration.
Bates returned to Little Rock in the mid-1960s and spent much of her time on community programs. After the death of her husband in 1980, she also resuscitated their newspaper for several years, from 1984 to 1988. Bates died on November 4, 1999, Little Rock, Arkansas.
For her career in social activism, Bates received numerous awards, including an honorary degree from the University of Arkansas. She is best remembered as a guiding force behind one of the biggest battles for school integration in the nation’s history.
© 2006 A&E Television Networks. All rights reserved
Source: www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=206524
- 51%
51% 2/06/09 @ 12-12:30 p.m. 91.3 FM Tri States Public Radio. 51% takes a serious & intelligent look at society's impact on women & their impact on society. Topic: Foreclosure, 3 furies, Girl Wars
FR: WAMC, Albany, NY
RE: 51 PERCENT program rundown
In America, women make up more than half the population. Worldwide, women are expected to outnumber men within the next 50 years. And every issue we face is one that affects us all. Whether it’s the environment, health, our children, politics or the arts, there’s a women’s perspective, and 51% is a radio program dedicated to that viewpoint.
Host Susan Barnett talks to experts in their field for a wide-ranging, entertaining discussion of issues that not only fall into the traditional ‘women’s issues’ category, but topics that concern us all as human beings and citizens of the global community.
Broadcast of 51% on WIUM 91.3 FM is underwritten by the Western Organization for Women (WOW).
Here is this week's information on 51% # 1021
(SHOW THEME)
BILLBOARD - Susan Barnett (:32) (Music Out) _________________________________________________
The Obama administration took over facing problems from every direction - there are assaults on many fronts: environmental, political, military, economic and social. And there is no consensus on which problem takes priority - which ones can wait. For many in the US - there's nothing more important than the economy. That's because they're in trouble - and they're losing their homes at alarming rates. Aime Jackson knows firsthand...she was nearly evicted - and she hadn't missed a mortgage payment.
Foreclosure - Jackson
Want to know more? Need some help? You can track down Aime Jackson at AdvocateAime.com...she spells her name A-I-M-E. She handles all the requests herself - at least for now.
(music)
Coming up, insight into the connection between the three furies...poverty, addiction and mental illness.
If you missed part of our show, you can listen to 51% anytime. Just download our podcast at wamc.org or call 1-800-323-9262 to order a CD - you'll need to know the program number. This week's show is #1021.
And don't forget, FREE CDs of our exclusive National Science Foundation “Sounds of Progress” series are still available at www.womeninscience.org (11:10)
Which comes first - poverty, mental illness or addiction? Or do they have to go hand in hand. Producer Dawn Dryer spent six weeks in a North Carolina residential facility for substance abusers...and she filed this report for North Carolina public radio.
6:48 Three Furies PRX
And finally, let's focus on girls. “Girls can be cruel” mom used to say. Actually, girls can be bullies. And Carol Dellasega has a book called “Girl Wars” that talks about what can be done.
4:35 Dellasega - Bullying Barnett
Dellasega has tips for the girls being bullied, too. The book is “Girl Wars” by Carol Dellasega. It is published by Simon and Shuster.
(12:33)
That's it for this edition of 51%
Thanks for listening. If you have any comments about today's program or ideas for future shows, please email me at sbarnett@wamc.org.
For 51%, I'm Susan Barnett.
(:24 pads out to 25:00)
Tune to 51% weekly throughout the U. S. on public and community radio stations, some ABC Radio Network stations, Armed Forces Radio stations around the world and on the Internet.
Susan Barnett, producer and host of 51%, is an award winning veteran journalist whose career has included anchoring and producing television news, radio news, writing for magazines and authoring a weekly column for an online newspaper. She’s a published fiction writer and an aspiring hobo. She lives in Woodstock, NY.
51%- The Women’s Perspective. It’s not just for women.
- Black History Month daily posting: Hallie Quinn Brown
Hallie Quinn Brown Biography (1850 - 1949)
(born March 10, 1850, Pittsburgh, Pa., U.S.—died Sept. 16, 1949, Wilberforce, Ohio) American educator and elocutionist who pioneered in the movement for African American women's clubs in the United States.
Brown was the daughter of former slaves. From 1864 she grew up in Chatham, Ontario, Canada, and in 1870 she entered Wilberforce University in Ohio. After her graduation in 1873 she taught in plantation and public schools in Mississippi and South Carolina. In 1885–87 she was dean of Allen University in Columbia, South Carolina, and during that period, in 1886, she graduated from the Chautauqua Lecture School. After four years of teaching public school in Dayton, Ohio, she served as a principal of Tuskegee Institute (1892–93) in Alabama under Booker T. Washington.
In 1893 Brown was a principal promoter of the organization of the Colored Woman's League of Washington, D.C., which the next year joined other groups to form the National Association of Colored Women. In 1893 she was appointed professor of elocution at Wilberforce University, but her teaching duties were limited by her frequent and extensive lecture tours, notably in Europe in 1894–99. Her lectures on African American life in the United States and on temperance were especially popular in Great Britain, where she appeared twice before Queen Victoria. She was a speaker at the 1895 convention of the World's Woman's Christian Temperance Union in London and a representative of the United States at the International Congress of Women there in 1899.
Brown's formal connection with Wilberforce lasted until 1903, although in 1910 she was highly effective in raising funds for the school during another British visit. She served as president of the Ohio State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs in 1905–12 and of the National Association of Colored Women in 1920–24; during the latter period she helped begin a campaign to preserve the Washington, D.C., home of Frederick Douglass. In the 1920s she was also active in Republican politics. She addressed the party's national convention in 1924 and subsequently directed campaign work among African American women on behalf of President Calvin Coolidge.
Among Brown's published works were Bits and Odds: A Choice Selection of Recitations (1880), First Lessons in Public Speaking (1920), and Homespun Heroines and Other Women of Distinction (1926).
Copyright © 1994-2008 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Source:
www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9228275
- Black History Month daily posting: Eleanor Holmes Norton
Eleanor Holmes Norton Biography (1938 - )
Civil rights activist, politician. Born June 13, 1937 in Washington, D.C. A graduate of Antioch College, Yale University and Yale University Law School, Norton worked in private practice before becoming assistant director of the American Civil Liberties Union (1965–70) where she defended both Julian Bond's and George Wallace's freedom-of-speech rights.
As Chairman of the New York Human Rights Commission (1970–7), Norton championed women's rights and anti-block-busting legislation. She then went to Washington to chair the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission (1977–83), and in 1982 became a law professor at Georgetown University.
In 1990, Norton was elected as a Democratic non-voting delegate to the House from the District of Columbia. Currently under scrutiny, the DC Fair and Equal House Voting Rights Act (or DC Vote) would give one vote to the District of Columbia in the House of Representatives, but not the Senate. Norton is a regular panelist on the PBS women's news program To the Contrary.
© 2007 A&E Television Networks. All rights reserved.
Source:
www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9425250
- NGWSD honors Flo Hyman
Today (Feb. 4, 2009) is National Girls and Women in Sports Day (NGWSD)
NGWSD is celebrated in all 50 states with community-based events, award ceremonies, and activities honoring the achievements and encouraging participation of girls and women in sports.
NGWSD began in 1987 as a day to remember Olympic volleyball player Flo Hyman for her athletic achievements and her work to assure equality for women's sports. Hyman died of Marfan's Syndrome in 1986 while competing in a volleyball tournament in Japan. Since that time, NGWSD has evolved into a day to acknowledge the past and recognize current sports achievements, the positive influence of sports participation, and the continuing struggle for equality and access for women in sports.
NGWSD is jointly organized by the National Girls and Women in Sport Coalition. The Coalition combines the experience and resources of the five premiere girls- and women-serving organizations in the United States: Girl Scouts of the USA, Girls Incorporated, the National Association for Girls and Women in Sport, National Women's Law Center, and the Women's Sports Foundation. Collectively, these organizations have been in existence for over 427 years and have a membership reach of 5.5 million girls and women.
Source: http://member.aahperd.org/ngwsdcentral/template.cfm?template=day.html
Flo Hyman
Flo Hyman was the captain of the 1984 Olympic volleyball team. This team went on to win the first U.S. medal in volleyball. In the 1981 World Cup, Hyman was named best hitter. She has been on the All-World Cup Team and recognized as one of the best in the world. Flo Hyman is known for her "dignity, spirit, and commitment to excellence. She pushed for the passage of the Civil Rights Restoration Act, which protects against sex discrimination in high school and college athletic programs. Also, she was a leader in promoting opportunities for women athletes (NGWSD, 1998).
Sadly, the one thing Hyman is most remembered for is her tragic death from Marfan's Syndrome, an inherited disease. Hyman was playing in Japan in 1986. During a substitution, she left the game, sat on the bench, and slid to the floor. She was dead, apparently from a heart attack. After an autopsy was performed, they found that Marfan's Syndrome killed the 6'5" athlete (Demak, 1986).
Marfan's Syndrome is a connective tissue disorder that affects a person's bones, ligaments, eyes, heart, and lungs. The disease tends to gravitate toward tall, lanky people, like Hyman. Other characteristics of the disease are long arms and fingers, deformities of the breastbone, and near-sightedness. Hyman was nearsighted, but there was not another single sign of the disease. She passed her physicals with flying colors. No one had detected the small weak spot in her aorta. The artery burst. Her blood pressure had risen too high, and the weak spot could not withstand the increased force. The high pressured flow ripped the aorta apart. People with Marfan's Syndrome have less than half of normal life expectancy. Hyman was lucky to live so long playing such an aggressive sport (Demak, 1986).
The Flo Hyman Memorial Award was established in 1987. It is awarded to athletes who show Flo's "dignity, spirit, and commitment to excellence." It is awarded annually in Washington, D.C. by the Women's Sports Foundation. Some recipients include Mary Lou Retton, Jackie Joyner-Kersee, and Chris Evert (NGWSD, 1998)
Flo Hyman loved her sport more than anything. She once said, "You're only young once, and you can only do this once" (Demak, 1986)
References
Demak, R. (1986). Marfan Syndrome: A silent killer. Sports illustrated. [Online]. Available: http://www.marfan.org/vol04/flo.html.
(1997). FIVB's 100 year history of volleyball. Volleyball hall of fame. [Online]. Available: http://www.volleyhall.org/FIVB.htm.
(1998). NGWSD Flo Hyman history. AAHPERD. [Online]. Available: http://www.aahperd.org/nagws/history.htm.
Plowden, M.W. (1996). Olympic black women. Pelican Publishing Company.
Further Readings
(1995). Genetics and human health: A journey within. Brookfield, CT: Millbrook.
Hickok, R. (1998). The Flo Hyman Award. Hickok's sports history. [Online]. Available: http://www.ultranet.com/~rhickok/hymanawa.shtml
Source: http://www.wvu.edu/~physed/blacksports/hyman.htm
- Black History Month daily posting: Byllye Avery
February is Black History Month. Throughout the month we'll be honoring African American Women's Sacrifices & Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Electronic Bulletin Board & Web site.
Byllye Avery Biography (1937 - )
(born 1937, DeLand, Florida, U.S.) American health care activist whose efforts centred on bettering the welfare of low-income African American women through self-help groups and advocacy networks.
Avery studied psychology at Talledega (Alabama) College (B.A., 1959) and received an M.A. in special education from the University of Florida (1969). She devoted herself to the education of emotionally disturbed children, first as a teacher and then as a consultant to the state of Florida.
Her husband's sudden death at age 33 was the catalyst for Avery's commitment to improving the health of the African American community; she focused particularly on women who, like herself, had a high level of stress in their lives. Self-help groups for African American women facing poverty, crime, violence, and racism were the cornerstones of her activism.
In 1974 Avery cofounded the Gainesville (Florida) Women's Health Center and later became its president and executive director. Four years later she cofounded Birthplace, an alternative birthing centre, also in Gainesville.
The self-help groups she initiated served as models throughout the nation and worldwide, and they paved the way for her founding in 1983 of the National Black Women's Health Project (NBWHP; since 2003 the Black Women's Health Imperative). That year the NBWHP held its first national conference at Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia. As executive director (1982–90) of the NBWHP, Avery helped the grassroots advocacy organization grow to an international network of more than 2,000 participants in 22 states and 6 foreign countries, producing not only the first Center for Black Women's Wellness but also the first documentary film by African American women exploring their perspectives on sexuality and reproduction. For her proposals and work with the NBWHP, which enabled thousands of African American women to take charge of their health care, Avery was awarded a MacArthur fellowship in 1989. In the 1990s she wrote and lectured widely on how race, sex, and class affect women's empowerment in the women's health movement.
Copyright © 1994-2008 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=39626
- Black History Month daily posting: Angela Davis
February is Black History Month, and throughout the month the Women's Center will be honoring African American Women's Sacrifices and Celebrating their Accomplishments with bios on our Women's Center Electronic Bulletin Board and Web site: wc.wiu.edu (daily postings).
Angela Davis Biography (1944 - )
Writer, activist, educator. Born on January 26, 1944, in Birmingham, Alabama. Angela Davis is best known as a radical African American educator and activist for civil rights and other social issues. She knew about racial prejudice from her experiences with discrimination growing up in Alabama. As a teenager, Davis organized interracial study groups, which were broken up by the police. She also knew several of the young African American girls killed in the Birmingham church bombing of 1963.
Angela Davis later moved north and went to Brandeis University in Massachusetts where she studied philosophy with Herbert Marcuse. As a graduate student at the University of California, San Diego, in the late 1960s, she joined several groups, including the Black Panthers. But she spent most of her time working with the Che-Lumumba Club, which was an all-black branch of the Communist Party.
Hired to teach at the University of California, Los Angeles, Angela Davis ran into trouble with the school’s administration because of her association with communism. They fired her, but she fought them in court and got her job back. Davis still ended up leaving when her contract expired in 1970.
Outside of academia, Angela Davis had become a strong supporter of three prison inmates of Soledad Prison known as the Soledad brothers (they were not related). These three men—John W. Cluchette, Fleeta Drumgo, and George Lester Jackson—were accused of killing a prison guard after several African American inmates had been killed in a fight by another guard. Some thought these prisoners were being used as scapegoats because of the political work within the prison.
During Jackson’s trial in August 1970, an escape attempt was made and several people in the courtroom were killed. Angela Davis was brought up on several charges, including murder, for her alleged part in the event. There were two main pieces of evidence used at trial: the guns used were registered to her, and she was reportedly in love with Jackson. After spending roughly 18 months in jail, Davis was acquitted in June 1972.
After spending time traveling and lecturing, Angela Davis returned to teaching. Today, she is a professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she teaches courses on the history of consciousness. Davis is the author of several books, including Women, Race, and Class (1980) and Are Prisons Obsolete? (2003).
© 2007 A&E Television Networks. All rights reserved.
Source: http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9267589
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