Link Love for 12.1.08

NPR's News and Views blog reports that researchers discovered a lost slave ship. The Spanish ship, Trouvadore, is "the only known wreck of a ship engaged in the illegal slave trade." And several residents of the Turks and Caicos islands, where the wreck occured, are descendants of the 192 slaves who survived. Read more about this fascinating story here and here. When I think of this story I think of "No One Knows the Mysteries at the Bottom of the Ocean," by Katherine McKittrick and Clyde Woods, which is also the introduction to Black Geographies and the Politics of Place, their edited volume. What do we learn when we do know? Or what do we think we know when know? What can a submerged, centuries old slave ship tell us about slavery in the Atlantic world? And what can't it tell us about the experience of Africans caught in its knot?

The Undercover Black Man introduces us to Navajo woman Radmilla Cody. The daughter of a Navajo woman and an African American man, she was slso Miss Navajo 1997. Also an activist against domestic violence. Go be a fan here.

While looking back through some fun videos (I still get a kick out of Mos Def's "If I Were President") I came across Majora Carter. I am probably late in the game, but Majora is a Macarthur "genius" and is doing green activism in the South Bronx, where my people come from. I collect inspiration and I am adding her to the collection. Listen to her IIWP:



Yonmei at Feminist SF-The Blog! has insightful things to say about why she writes science-fiction and fantasy and why the genre is especially conducive to subverting and resisting gender roles but at the same time finds itself caught in the bind of privilege, power and oppression. At least that is what I take away from it. And I love it. Take what you will from it here.

Ever wonder about that oh so famous Obama logo? An interview with the designers is here.

Blackwell Compass is having an online, social sciences and humanities conference. This is the first of the virtual conference experiments that I think I will attend. It helps that it is free. Check out the call for papers here.

Happy Birthday to Identity Crisis!!!

Have you played in The Common Room yet? If you thought I was uncensored before, check me around these ladies. It is potty mouth central. (Now don't go telling on me!)

That is all for now.

If you can, say your prayers to your deity(s) for those killed in Mumbai--and the terrorists involved who are lost themselves--for those living with or living with someone living with AIDS, and for all those who did not have somewhere to go, food to eat, or someone to share their Thanksgiving holiday with.