Groundings

Dr. Jared Ball joins the show to discuss his new book, The Myth and Propaganda of Black Buying Power. We discuss the propaganda used to perpetuate the supposed trillion-dollar "buying power" myth, Black capitalism, and the Black misleadership class of rappers. Writer and organizer Erica Caines just as guest co-host for the conversation. The first audio you will hear is a scene from the Malcolm X movie, the second audio clip is Angela Davis discussing the relationship between capitalism and racism. 

Rapper and poet Noname has spent a bulk of her career rejecting celebrity, and is now taking a turn towards the left to embrace anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist, and radical politics. Dr. Charisse Burden-Stelly and Devyn Springer speak with her to find out what the trajectory towards political activation has been like, who inspires her, where she sees the state of hip-hop today, how she hopes to continue on her political path, voting, and much more. You will hear interlude audio of Nina Simone discussing the role of artists, and of a clip contrasting the political orientations of Tupac Shakur and Young Thug.  If you enjoy the episode make sure to rate it 5 stars, subscribe and share. Also, consider supporting patreon.com/HalfAtlanta.

Guest hosts Yasmina and Tarik  interview filmmaker Merawi Gerima, who discusses his new film Residue. The film puts the spotlight on gentrification in DC, and all the racist, violent baggage and displacement that accompanies it. They discuss the process of 'community filmmaking' that helped create the film, the role of capital in dictating creative directing choices, the importance of Black film and narrative-shaping, the Gerima  legacy of filmmaking and community building, the power of DC's go-go music, and much more.  

Writer, educator, and author of Policing Black Lives: State violence in Canada from slavery to the present, Robyn Maynard joins me to discuss policing, state violence, and prisons in Canada, as well as the connections between Indigenous and Black struggles against state violence. We also talk about the 'post-racial' mythmaking which is synonymous to Canada, despite its centuries-long history of enacting structural and systemic violence on colonized communities globally.  

Dr. Charisse Burden-Stelly discusses the history and institutionalization of Black Studies, the often overlapping relationship between anti-communism and anti-Blackness, and the 'elision' of political economy in capitalist academia. Moreover, she also talks about 'academic McCarthyism', academic celebrities, ideological battles, and the current state of Black Studies. [cover image: student activist Don McAllister beaten bloodied and arrested by pigs during San Francisco State College protests, 1968]

Writer and activist Benji Hart discusses the multitude of ways grassroots movements against police in Chicago are challenging the Black misleadership class. We discuss the struggle around the struggle against the construction of a $95 million cop academy in Chicago, the many movements and educational moments birthed from this struggle, and how individuals like Mayor Lori Lightfoot represent the 'Black misleadership class'.You will here audio from a 2017 Chicago City Council meeting which can be found here. In this audio clip you will also hear chants stating "NTA is here to stay" - you can find out more details about that chant and the struggle surrounding it here. You can also learn more about LVEJO's ight against environmental racism here. You can find more of Benji's work at Benjihart.com.If you enjoyed the episode, consider supporting the podcast on Patreon here. Money goes to transcription of episodes (releasing soon!), production assistance, equipment, and more to keep the show running. 

Community organizer and educator Dustin Gibson discusses the white supremacist, colonial, capitalist roots of ableism which structures capitalist society, why a disability justice framework must be abolitionist, and why "the state always has a carceral response to disabled Black people."Throughout the episode, you will hear the following audio clips:Leroy Moore discussing the erasure of Emmett Till's disability Members of Fairfax County, Virginia, at a public forum following the killing of Natasha McKennaJennifer Msumba describing the abuse faced at the Judge Rotenberg Center in Canton, Mass.Cover image: “Back of the Neck,” (1983) by Jean-Michel Basquiat    

Mumia Abu-Jamal, world-renowned political prisoner, former Black Panther, and award-winning journalist, gives me his opinion on the movement taking place in the streets right now against police violence, the outpouring of international solidarity we've witnessed, and more. Because he is incarcerated, our interview was cut very short, but he still manages to pack intense amounts of wisdom into only a few minutes.Then we hear from author, professor, and longtime activist Johanna Fernández, who has spent nearly two decades working on the campaign to free Mumia and all political prisoners. We discuss what it is about Mumia specifically that makes millions around the world demand his freedom, why this new generation of activists and everyone else has a moral duty to free political prisoners, and why the creation of political prisoners inevitably means the ruling class shooting themselves in the foot.Mumia is arguably the most recognized political prisoner in the world, having served three decades on death row for

I spoke with scholar, writer, and professor Charisse Burden-Stelly about W.E.B. Du Bois. Charisse recently co-authored the new book W.E.B. Du Bois: A Life in American History with historian Gerald Horne, and has an extensive amount of insight, knowledge, and research on the life of Du Bois. Moreover, she's apt to think deeply on the intellectual, political, and ideological history within his life trajectory.We speak about Du Bois, the many ways his ideological positions shifted over the century (!) he lived, where Du Bois fell short and where he accelerates, how to position him between Pan-Africanism, communism, and Black Nationalism, his internationalist politic, and much more!Throughout the episode you will hear excerpts from his speech "Socialism and the American Negro" given in 1960. You can read the speech here. You can purchase Charisse's book here. 

Philadelphia based community organizer and writer Steven Powers helps run a community based, free, socialist gym, the People Power Gym, and is involved in a number of other community survival projects. In this episode we discuss how his organization was able to turn these survival programs into a Covid-19 mutual aid grocery program, delivering free groceries throughout their neighborhood. We also discuss how capitalism has exacerbated this pandemic into a crisis with blood on its hands, the need for community organizing, a cautious understanding of 'mutual aid', and Sock'em Boppers. Support their fundraiser here. You can read Safiyah Bukhari's The War Before here, and George Jackson's Soledad Brother here. Audio samples used:Assata Shakur, Eyes of the RainbowMumia Abu-Jamal, Safiyah Bukhari: Lioness for LiberationFred Hampton, On the Importance of EducationEricka Huggins, On Meditation

Professor Johanna Fernandez introduces listeners to the Young Lords, a revolutionary Puerto Rican organization that radically shifted international discourse on Puerto Rican politics.Fernandez recently publish The Young Lords: A Radical History, a groundbreaking and foundational new book which compiles 20 years of research to create the authoritative history of the Young Lords. In our conversation we discuss the roots of the Young Lords organization, how they transformed from a street gang to revolutionary socialist organization, the political and ideological motivations of the group, why they took a specific, relevant focus on health issues, and much more. The poem you hear recited throughout the episode is titled "Puerto Rican Obituary",  written and performed by the late Pedro Pietri, poet, activist, former Young Lord, and one of the founding members of the Nuyorican Movement. If you enjoyed this episode, consider purchasing Johanna's book and support her work, and you can also support the host on Patreon

I speak with community organizer, researcher, and writer Taiza Troutman to discuss urban development, trap music, Tyler Perry, activism, homelessness, neoliberalism, displacement and, above all else, gentrification in Atlanta. Audio used throughout the episode was provided graciously by Eva Dickerson, activist, educator, and all around comrade. Watch the full video in which this audio is from here.  Some of the books mentioned in the episode:Rashad Shabazz, Spatializing Blackness: Architectures of Confinement and Black Masculinity in ChicagoLester K. Spence, Knocking the Hustle: Against the Neoliberal Turn in Black PoliticsSaidiya Hartman, Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Social Upheaval

We explore the philosophy and theoretical work behind the actions of Amílcar Cabral, African revolutionary from Guinea-Bissau who helped lead a succesful anti-colonial movement against the Portugese in Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde.Reasearcher, writer, and organizer Zeyad El Nabolsy discusses Cabral's approach to culture and cultural liberation, dispels some eurocentric and racist myth surrounding Cabral's legacy, and looks at Cabral's relationship to Marxism.You can find Zeyad's essays we reference here, as well as the essay by Blaut here which he mentions towards the end.Intro/outro audio: Angela Davis on Amilcar Cabral, 1973You can support me at Patreon.com/HalfAtlanta, and follow me on Twitter @halfatlanta.

If you don't know the story of #KeithDavisJr., make sure you listen to this episode of the #GroundingsPodcast. Keith is being framed for murder by the Baltimore police and the state of Baltimore. Police shot at Keith over 44 times, hitting him in the face and neck. Keith has been in jail for a crime he didn't commit since 2015. Keith has been through FOUR trials because Marilyn Mosby, the state attorney, is determined to see him behind bars. Keith was the first high-profile police in shooting in Baltimore since Freddie Gray, and because Marilyn Mosby gave the allusion (at the time) of accountability for Freddie Gray's murder, she's now being as hard on Keith as possible to win back the trust of police, police unions, and prosecutors. Virtually all evidence — surveillance footage, ballistics reports, firearms reports, firearms registries, witness testimonies — show that Keith is innocent. Keith's wife, Kelly, was on the phone with him when police began to fire over 44 rounds at him. She has fought relentlessly

In this episode, activist and writer Bilphena Yahwon get into the nitty gritty details of the school-to-prison pipeline, racial disparities in school disciplinary actions, how these disparities send Black children to prison, and the ways she uses restorative justice processes to combat it.

Haiti is an island in perpetual revolution, and over the past few months massive island-wide mobilizations have been taking place as Haitians protest to oust their corrupt, neo-colonial, U.S.-installed government. I speak with lawyer, activist, and director of the Institute for Justice & Democracy in Haiti Brian Concannon, who gives a general overview of why Haitians are protesting, and how the corrupt and violent Moïse government has remained in power with support from Western empires like the US. Then we discuss the connection between the protests in Haiti and the imperialist aggression on Venezuela, and we compare the stark differences in Western media attention to both situations. The struggle in Haiti is ongoing, and independent media outlets like the Haiti Info Project are critical to understanding what's happening on the ground there. Please follow and support their work! If you like the podcast, make sure you subscribe, share it, and tweet at @halfatlanta to let Devyn know! You can also support

This is part two of a special report on Venezuela, in collaboration with Venezuelanalysis.com. First I speak with Christina Schiavoni, scholar and activist who deals with issues of food, food sovereignty, and agriculture. Her work in Venezuela has been very important to dispelling misinformation about food, food shortages, and agricultural production in Venezuela, as well as the great strides towards food sovereignty that the Bolivarian Revolution has made. We specifically reference an essay of hers titled "The Politics of Food in Venezuela" that masterfully combats myths and intentional misinformation surrounding the subject. Then Jeanette Charles of Venezuelanalysis.com interviews Dr. Akinyele Umoja, head of Georgia State University's Black Studies department and co-founder of the Malcom X Grassroots Movement. Akinyele is a friend of the Walter Rodney Foundation and has an incredible ability to tie relevant historical information in Black history with the social, political, and cultural movements

In collaboration with Venezuelanalysis.com, this is part one of a two-part special on current events in Venezuela, as well as the historical developments which have led to the country being the target of an international imperialist campaign, conducted by the U.S., to remove the popularly elected President Maduro and install a Western puppet via a coup. We remove the imperialist propaganda dominating the news and interview four different people whose analyses are key to understanding Venezuela, the Bolivarian Revolution, U.S. imperialism, grassroots activism, sanctions, race, gender and agriculture in the country, and so much more. For part one, you will hear an interview with Jeanette Charles from Venezuelanalysis.com, who gives a general overview of what is occurring in Venezuela: Western governments, lead by the U.S., supporting a coup attempt by an unelected representative of an elite opposition party. Then we speak with human rights lawyer and author Dan Kovalik, who was an official observer of Venezuela

Writer, academic, and activist Max Ajl discusses his critique of the Green New Deal, which particularly looks at the ways in which the Green New Deals intentionally leaves out the Global South and functions to preserve a "green" version of industrial capitalism. Then he explains what ecological catastrophe like global warming could mean for the Global South if left in our current state of global capitalism, and we explore revolutionary, agricultural alternatives to the Green New Deal that have emerged from the Third World. In short, full decolonization marks the future of hope in combating global ecological catastrophe. Finally, we end on a conversation about food and agricultural sovereignty before Samir Amin's 'delinking' theory, which Ajl wrote about here, and says can be a powerful model for moving forward.

Documentary filmmaker, activist, and writer Rebecca Pierce discusses her work documenting the resistance of those most oppressed by the Israel apartheid state. We discuss the ways her work highlights the oppression and resistance of African migrants in Israel, how Palestinians exercise solidarity with those migrants, and how many groups that are oppressed by Israel form linkages of solidarity and action. We also discuss the recent mass shootings at a synagogue in Pittsburgh and a Kroger in Kentucky, specifically how these two incidents are connected by similar white supremacist violence and how Rebecca, as someone who is both Jewish and Black, was impacted by these events. Then we briefly cover the legacy of Black-Palestinian solidarity. You can find Rebecca's documentary work here, follow her on Facebook here, and on twitter @Aptly_engineerd.