Tag Archives: one drop of love

This Week as an Artivist 4/2/16: Frida Kahlo, SLC Utah, 50 Push-Up Challenge

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Frida Kahlo is my muse (0:00-1:26) (2:31-3:00)
NY Times review of 1992 Frida Kahlo documentary: http://nyti.ms/1SJonfY
University of Utah College of Social Work, Rose Wagner Center for the Performing Arts in Salt Lake City, Utah (1:24-3:15)
Museum of Tolerance 3/31/16 (3:17-4:48)
Venmo App = racist? (4:48-5:54)
50 Push-up challenge (5:55-6:17) http://bit.ly/20234gp
What are YOUR goals? (6:20-7:09)

Twitter: @fanshen @onedropoflove
Instagram: @onedropoflove

TRANSCRIPT:
So, do you know who Frida Kahlo is? I saw a documentary of Frida Kahlo when I was teaching Spanish to students in the 90s. I was teaching in a high school and my Supervising Teacher recommended that I show my students a documentary about Frida Kahlo, and I had known about her a little bit, I had probably seen her art but I didn’t know a whole lot about her life and I watched this documentary – I mean talking about the original Artivist – I mean not THE original because there have been other Artivists in the world and before her, but in so many ways her work and who she was as a person represents so much of what I want to be. Her work is both deeply personal, but also it talks about the power that women have when we share all of who we are, even when that feels very personal and you start to realize that you have connections to other people by sharing it and I love her. And this summer I was in Mexico and I found this bag, and I was like, “Yes. This is my bag.” And she just inspires me so whenever I travel to do the show I take this bag with me.

So I took this bag with me to our show at the University of Utah, which we did on Tuesday. And we had an incredible time. So the show was the closing act of the 10th anniversary of the University of Utah’s College of Social Work Social Justice series. This is put on by this incredible woman teacher, Educator, powerful woman there named Irene Ota. She invited Chandra and me to see her class and she’s doing a class social justice advocacy for social workers, and they’re creating toolkits for social justice advocacy and all of their projects were incredible. One woman is doing a support group for Transracially Adopted kids in Salt Lake City. Another woman is creating a website for parents to know their rights, the educational rights for themselves and for their children. They were just so great and amazing and inspiring! It was wonderful.

And then the best part is that then Irene took us out to dinner – we had dinner with some of the students and faculty before the show – the night before the show. And we’re walking up to dinner and Chandra goes, “Oh! Fanshen! Look at the name of this restaurant we’re going to!” and the name of the restaurant is ‘Frida Bistro’ and I got this gorgeous t-shirt from Irene – thank you Irene! That is at Frida Bistro in Salt Lake City, Utah, which was just a wonderful restaurant, the food was great and we were sitting there blessed by Frida herself.

I got to speak with quite a few people after the show and they were really moved and had lots of follow up questions, and I’m so proud that we were able to do the show there. So if any of you are watching from the University of Utah – thank you for having us – it was really inspiring.

OK this morning I did the show at the Museum of Tolerance here in Los Angeles. And it was so nice to go from – you know that I had big audiences, 1500 students a week ago and then Utah a really big stage, and then here it seats about 115 people or so, but generally these are smaller groups so probably about 35 or 40 people and I’m really up close to them and it makes a difference – it’s a very different feeling of the staging, but it’s really nice because it’s intimate and I can literally look right into people’s faces and interact with them directly. So it’s always nice to be back at the Museum, and also one woman who came today has seen the show there before, and she said, “You know I saw some new things here today,” so that was great – so she’s noticing that I’m making changes.

Now also by the way we have two new slides. So I talked a little bit about pacing last week, and how I’m looking at places to pick up the pacing, but I also realized that there’s a slide that can help situate the audience a little bit more when my father and I are both traveling I’m paralleling our trips to Africa together, so I’ve included a slide of when my father went to the Sudan, Ethiopia and Eritrea. Now interestingly, I’m using Venmo – Venmo is an app that you can use to pay people quickly. I asked my graphic designer Heather Fipps (who’s amazing – thank you Heather!) – I asked her to create a new slide and when I paid her on Venmo you write a little note like a memo on a check and I wrote “ODOL (One Drop of Love) Slide Sudan Ethiopia.” Well they put a flag on the payment and I just got an email from Venmo telling me they had to investigate my payment and they needed to know exactly what this payment was for, since I had used the words ‘Sudan’ and ‘Ethiopia.’ Interesting. Racist? I don’t what to say. All I can think of is, “My God, if you are Sudanese or Ethiopian, what life must be like for you now. And I am sorry for people who prejudge you – not that I have to apologize for what they do, but I’m sorry for what you have to go through.

OK this week I’m going to do a physical goal. A friend of mine posted on Facebook a 50 Push-up Challenge and so it takes you through – you start out with 5 push-ups then you move on to 10 and you get rest breaks and then you move on to 12, and then you keep moving on and you do 50 push-ups eventually! So that’s my goal.

How about you? What are your goals? Are you writing? Are you performing? Are you workshopping your work? Are you sharing your work with other people? Are you sharing your story? Someone said today, after the Museum show, “Y’know, your story is incredible,” and I said I didn’t know that until I started sharing it with people. YOUR story is incredible too. You just gotta get it out there – and find out about your parents’ stories, and their parents’ stories and it’s so important to hear someone else’s narrative, so that we are not stuck in what we believe they are just based on what we see on the outside. OK. Thank you for watching #ThisWeekasanArtivist. I hope you have a wonderful week, and I’ll talk to you next week. Bye bye!

This Week as an Artivist 3/26/16: 1500 Students, Zootopia, Suzan-Lori Parks

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TRANSCRIPT:

Artivists! What’s up you all? How you doing? OK. So much to tell you.

(0:05-2:04) First of all One Drop of Love – so many great things. First of all Chandra booked us in Tempe, Arizona at Marcos de Niza High School. We did two shows back-to-back with high school students. 1500 students. So about 750-800 each. Juniors and Seniors first, and then Freshman and Sophomores. It was just fantastic. I got a t-shirt! Oh my goodness my t-shirt collection is growing. And I got a coffee mug!

I’m leaving for Utah Monday morning because we are doing the show for the University of Utah School of Social Work and this is their Voices of Diversity Social Justice Series and it’s their 10th anniversary and One Drop of Love is the closing act for that. So I’m very excited. That’ll be this Tuesday night 6PM in Utah. And then the first week of April I’m doing the Museum of Tolerance and then Philly. Philadelphia. Abington Friends School and that’s going to be for their ‘Many Voices’ diversity series and that’s going to be for parents at the school. And then at the end of April, I am the Keynote for the Mixed Heritage Conference at UCLA! So my goodness SO much going on for One Drop and it’s all incredible and exciting. Chandra noticed that the show is running a little bit over. Usually it’s an hour and it’s been running about an hour and 7, an hour and 8 minutes. So I want to look at what’s happening. Is it pacing? Does it have to do with the number…of course when there are more people it takes longer because I’m going out and I’m interacting with the audience. That’s something that we’re looking at – whether the pacing needs to change, or whether it’s ok – because when we perform for a school we have to keep that in mind because students have to go to another class or at least they have to know how long it’s going to take ahead of time.

(2:04-3:29) OK I have some recommendations for you. First of all have you seen Zootopia? I want to know what you think of it. I mean, I…the first time I saw it I read a friend’s Facebook post who I really respect and admire, and she was like, “Zootopia is all about racial profiling.” And I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa – WHAT, WHAT? Really? For real?” So I went and saw it by myself and I cried because I loved it so much. I thought it did a really great job of bringing up questions around gender and race, class in ways that young people can understand and adults…they were very, very clear and accessible, but also using some challenging themes to get their point across and I just thought it was really well done. But then I texted with my brother and he was like, “Well I don’t know – were the predators only supposed to be the Black people?” and I don’t think so because, remember in the beginning there’s that fox who was the bully and he was…he had a southern accent that sounded White southern and again – here I go with my stereotypes – but anyway I’m really curious what you thought. Especially if you have children – how did you feel about this movie? Tish Arana – what did you think? I’m dying to know. Is Zoey Fanshen – would this be a good movie for her to go see? I’m really curious.

(3:29-3:48) Another recommendation is Mashable did an article: 9 Youtube channels that will make you smarter about social justice. So first of all you KNOW – first of all I was following – I was already subscribed to ¾ of them, but there were some that I didn’t know about, so I went ahead and subscribed, so I’m putting a link. Check those out.

(3:48-4:26) OK another thing: check out Suzan-Lori Parks. She’s a great playwright and she’s doing this series called ‘Watch me work’ which is that she goes into a space and works – writes a play – and you have the opportunity to watch her work and write a play and watch her process and interact with her and ask her questions…and it’s just…SO great to allow people to be there and watch and learn from what she’s doing. It’s so encouraging. So I’m putting a link to the videos of her doing ‘Watch me work.’

(4:26-5:54) Alright I want to shout out some folks that are watching the videos, so Carol Banker – what’s up girl!? Alex Regalado – she’s our Editor for One Drop of Love, I think I’ve told you about her before. She’s got this great video, there’s a link for that. Also she did it with her team from the website called TWIGG How-To, which you should also check out, and there’s a link to that. Go, go, GO Alex – I’m so proud of you! DO it and I’m voting everyday and getting other people to vote, so let’s get you to win this and just keep making more amazing content, like you are.

OK last thing – I freaked out this morning because…one of my first…like and early This Week as an Artivist video I talk about LaGuardia Cross, who is a famous Youtuber and does these great videos with his toddler. And he started off with this great statement about success and a specific goal that he had – that was how he started vlogging – this goal that he had and he was going to reach the goal and he was saying it out to the world – so that he could be held accountable and I talked about him in that video – in the #OscarsSoWhite video and he left me a comment today! So – oh my goodness – thank you so much for walking it, and thank you for your work – you are inspiring. Thank you for the comment.

Alright everybody, that’s another This Week as an Artivist. I hope YOU have a great week. Thank you for watching and tuning in. Thumbs up if you like it. Subscribe if you like the videos and also tell me what I should watching and tell me what you’re up to. I would love to help support everybody as well.

Alright everybody have a great week. Bye bye.

How I Learned about the One-Drop Rule: Rudy

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TRANSCRIPT:

FANSHEN: Recently I asked my friends, when was the first time they learned about the one-drop rule, and their answers were incredible, so we’re sharing them with you here, and we’d like to hear yours. So send us an email onedropoflove@gmail.com, tweet us, anything, and let us know: When was the first time YOU learned about the one-drop rule?

RUDY GUEVARRA, JR.: I took an undergraduate course at the University of San Diego – Intro to Ethnic studies and that’s where I learned about it. As somebody that was mixed race it really made me interested into how that functioned with identity and larger issues of race relations. And that course gave me that information and that one thing got me interested in understanding how race functions. I’m racialized Chicano and oftentimes when I’ve had conversations, I’ll say I’m Filipino, or I’ll say I’m Mexipino and they’re like, “But you’re Chicano,” and I’m like, “Yeah, but I’m this too.” And the fact that, I think that I have this ‘drop’ – but more so the phenotype that comes with that drop, I think that there’s a conversation that I have to push back on sometimes, from people. Sometimes, and in particular within the Latino community, in particular the Mexican or Chicano community, they don’t often think that…or there’s not so much…there is and there isn’t…this association with Blackness and these connections and intimate relationships with Blackness that I engage in and always felt this engagement with, that I get questioned on sometimes.

But, I’m going to love who I love – and I don’t care what anybody says.

CHANDRA CRUDUP: Don’t forget to subscribe to the channel to keep up with the latest One Drop news and other videos. Do you have ideas for more video content? Tell us what you’d like to see. We’ll see you next time to share more drops of love. Be sure to tell us by commenting here and on twitter @onedropoflove and facebook.com/ondedropoflove how YOU are spreading drops of love.

This Week as an Artivist 3/12/16: Chicago vs. Trump, Brown U, Mujeres de Maíz

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TRANSCRIPT:

0:00:00.000,0:00:05.220
Hey Artivists! How are you all doing? I had a great week. I hope you did too.

0:00:05.810,0:00:09.599
What’s going on with you? How was your
week? What did you do towards your

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Art? Did you see any plays? Oh my goodness, I didn’t go see a play this week. That’s a first! I

0:00:16.230,0:00:23.039
was traveling. Did you go anywhere? Did
you stay home? Did you write? Did you

0:00:23.039,0:00:26.460
protect your work? I’m gonna do an
episode about how to protect your work. I

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think that’s really important. But what’s
going on? How’s life going for you? Leave

0:00:31.480,0:00:36.480
a comment. Also if you like these videos,
please do give it a thumbs up,

0:00:37.110,0:00:42.320
subscribe to the channel. I really
appreciate it. Alright. Oh wow – this is a

0:00:42.320,0:00:47.710
great week. So last Sunday I participated
in the 19th anniversary of Mujeres de Maíz,

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which is a an organization that is really dedicated to

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bringing together women -diverse women and girls to do

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programming, arts, culture, protest,
movements together, politics and I was so

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honored to be there. I met a lot of
really cool people. Shout out to that

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organization. Of course there are links
below – check them out if you’re here in LA,

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support them. Go and be a part of what they do!

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OK I went to Brown University and
performed One Drop there. This was their

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Multiracial Heritage series. They gave me
this lovely lovely t-shirt, and I love this

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on the back: Black Heritage Series and it was so wonderful I’ll show you some photos

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of our trip. So when we arrived for Tech,
they were putting up black

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curtains because there was this exhibit
behind them. And I was like, “Oh let me see

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what it is,” and it was a Black Lives Matter
exhibit at the school. And I was like, “You

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must keep this up!” So I was thrilled
to be incorporated into this exhibit for

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Black Lives Matter and it was

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beautiful. And there were some photos,
a painting behind me and it was so

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interesting just as I was moving on the
stage in tech and in the show, it was like

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I felt the ancestors. I felt this sacred
space behind me, just kinda like

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encouraging me to keep going – and that
this is part of the struggle – and also

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hopefully part of a solution –

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doing One Drop and having these
conversations we’re having with audiences,

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so that was just really beautiful. I want to say thank you to the organizers. Nimisha: you

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were incredible. I know what it’s like to
have to organize something and you are

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also a full-time student and you just
did such a great job, so thank you so

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much for organizing the entire thing.
Also to Sam and Anselmo who I know were

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really integral to making things
happen. Also to Elmo, the professor

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who hosted our Folk Thought after the
show.

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Thank you for doing that with us. I
feel like the students are so lucky to

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have you. To Kathy and Alonzo for your
incredible tech work. They learned the show

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right away.

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Also Alexandrina Agloro – thank you because I know
you’re the reason that the show happened

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at Brown at all; that you connected with
them after you saw it and let them know

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to add me to their list of folks to
bring. So I appreciate that you did that.

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Oh and then who came to the show? Jessi Rizzi (who I knew as Jessi Rizzi

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growing up), she’s now Jessi Driskell,
fifth-grade y’all! Fourth or fifth it might have been

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fourth grade I’ve known he. Including our
fourth grade or fourth and fifth grade

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teacher Barbara Fox, and my high school
teacher Donald who did our Q&A with Junot Diaz in

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Cambridge were ALL there. It was just so
beautiful to have you – what a magical

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evening. Shout out to Black, Latino and
Muslim students at the University of

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Chicago, Illinois for shutting Trump DOWN. I’m
so impressed I’m sooo and, and I’d say

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this all the time and it’s still true:
I’m so hopeful

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about the future because young folks are
not playing anymore. Hopefully we’ve

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learned from past mistakes, particularly
about getting complacent. I keep

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thinking, “What happened?” like, the civil
rights movement there was so much

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unification and activity and pushing
back and then at some point it just

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feels like maybe we all got complacent,
or scared – very likely – when you’re

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reminded that your powerless, but, but
these young folks are not having that! They’re like,

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“Okay maybe we don’t have the financial resources you have.

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We don’t have the political
resources you have, but we have twitter!” –

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by the way I keep telling everybody I’ve
been telling you – I mean it’s getting late at

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this point, but like, you need to be on
social media. This is how folks are

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organizing. This is how we are finding
like-minded people and letting one

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another know we’re here and we are
supporting you. So I’m so proud of what

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you all did. Congratulations. I’m
gonna put a link to a fund for those

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protesters who have been arrested. That
information is there.

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OK I don’t know if you remember that a
few weeks ago I told you that submitted

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to the United Solo Festival. It’s a solo
theater festival that takes place on 42nd

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Street in New York for three months
total – and we got IN! HA!!! WE GOT IN! So One Drop

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will be playing on 42nd Street Theater in New York City in October. This really is one

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of those cases where we’re going to be
producing the show, so I’ve gotta find

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out about the Tech there, make sure
they’ve got space for a projector and a

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screen and I gotta figure out marketing
so I’m going to put together a budget this

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coming weekend, then really already
start doing social media pushes about

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it because if you sell out your show (and
we just have about 55 seats so I’m confident

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we can get folks in there) if you sell
out your show, they will extend your

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performances. So I’m SO excited,

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so glad and will keep you posted on that. Wow about you? What’s up? What’s going on?

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How was your week? What are your goals
for this week? Are you writing? Are you

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producing? Are you directing? What are you up to? Give us links to come and support

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your work! Alright you all have a
wonderful, wonderful week. Mwwaa!

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Go. Hit it. DO it. Get going

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Artivists. Get some good stuff done and
I’ll talk to you next week. Bye!

This Week as an Artivist 3/5/16: Haircut, Nina Simone, Native Voices

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TRANSCRIPT:

0:00:00.000,0:00:06.029
Happy Women’s History Month! Yay! DO it
women. Let’s DO it! All right.

0:00:06.029,0:00:13.870
Oh my goodness did you see this? Check it
out. Yeah I got a hair cut. Yeah. My friend Erin Athey

0:00:13.870,0:00:20.789
does my hair and she’s so great at it
and she loves CURLS, which is more and

0:00:20.789,0:00:24.580
more common, but it’s been a
really hard time finding somebody who

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actually enjoys doing my hair and she does
and I love her, so links to her, of course

0:00:29.460,0:00:35.090
below (http://erinatheyhair.com/). So first of all I saw a play – you know I like to go see my shows the

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first one was “Colony Collapse” at the
Boston Court Theatre. The other play

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I saw is “They Don’t Talk Back” and this
is part of Native Voices at the Autry

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it’s just…I just sit and watch and think –
it is so sad to me that I only get to

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see something like this once or twice a
year. This was beautiful and unique and

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they incorporated movement, incorporated
masks. So if you’re in Los Angeles I

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think it’s a short run, it’s just
playing through the end of March but

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then it’s going to the La Jolla Playhouse and it’s
also going to be in Anchorage, Alaska

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which is where the writer is from. So
check it out, Native Voices that the

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Autry. Alright tonight I’m going to my
school. Cal State LA. I don’t think I’ve

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talked to you about where I got my MFA,
so I got my MFA at California State
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University Los Angeles. It is the
cheapest MFA in the entire country, so

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that makes it unique in and of itself;
the other great thing is that Cal State

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LA is very, very diverse and an inclusive
environment socioeconomically, racially

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and culturally, age-wise it’s a
wonderful campus and tonight they’re

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doing their MFA alumni awards and
so I’m going to that and I’m always down

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for supporting my school, so I’m excited
to go to that. I just…I’m…so many

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people have talked about this already,
and I just want to kind of like, leave

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it here for posterity, and also to see if
I change my mind

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on this later on because I think it’s a
good healthy thing to grow and

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evolve – but it makes me really sad that
Zoe Saldana was cast as Nina Simone.

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Now I know how this business works. I
know it so well and I know that this is

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not entirely of Zoe Saldana’s doing,
and that there was lots of pressure to

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do the role and also that she felt like
she could do that role. And I never

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want to take away from another actor –
because I know what it feels like to

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have somebody not believe in you to be
able to deliver on a performance – but

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unfortunately they made the really bad
decision to  put black face on her. I mean I’m

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like, look – if you’re confident that you
can play this role? Don’t put blackface,

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don’t put on prosthetics, like, let
Nina Simone’s essence come out of you.

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But more importantly, Nina Simone fought
against racism and colorism and shadeism

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and that was an important part of who she was as a
person and her activism, so to cast

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somebody who is representative of the
system that the lighter you are, the

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closer you are to white, the more
attractive you are, the more acceptable

0:03:26.139,0:03:30.849
you are, the more you can sell tickets – it
just is wrong. Obviously I don’t know

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Nina Simone personally, but her family
has spoken out against it and it’s just

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a really unfortunate situation, and it
just felt like an insensitive response.

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I think for me, one of the most
heartbreaking things about racism is a

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lack of sensitivity, and Nina Simone
herself couldn’t have wouldn’t have been

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cast or paid the amount of money
that Zoe Saldana got paid, like not even

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today. It was just really unfortunate and
I support Zoe Saldana in other roles, and

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the work she does, she’s a great actor –
but this was a bad choice and a painful

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one

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and insensitive. Let’s all be more
sensitive to each other. I published a

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Q&A session with my very good friend
Tanya McRae this week on “Presidential
Mixedness” check that out, it’s under the
One Drop of Love playlist here on the

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channel. I backed a Kickstarter project.
Check it out in the links. So this young

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woman Nijla Mu’min – I hope I’m saying
her last name correctly – Nijla Mu’min – and

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homegirl works, like she’s making her own
opportunities and she’s already raised

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lots of funds for the movie, but YOU can
help out too. We talk about the

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problems, here is a solution. When a
filmmaker is sharing their own story,

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most importantly she’s telling her truth,
telling her story – and not letting

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somebody else tell it for her. So please
back her project called Jinn and there

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are links to that below, or if you don’t
have the funds, then please share it and

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encourage your friends and family to
support it.

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OK this was week two of my new job Head of
Equity and Inclusion of Pearl Street

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Productions, and this was a good week.
So I had a good phone call with Matt an

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Ben and got approval on the things that
I laid out, that I want to get done in this

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first year. And I’ll talk about that a
little bit more because one of the

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things that I want to do is make our
commitment to equity and inclusion

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transparent to everybody, so one of the
things I’m working on is giving us an

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online presence that is specifically
about this commitment we’re making and

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so we’ll have a place where people can go – it
is not about being congratulated or

0:05:55.030,0:05:58.770
rewarded for the work, but, I
want there to be a place where people

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can go and look at our numbers and look
at our data and say,

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“You’re not doing very well in this area,”
or “Hey this is great!” I had a couple of

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good phone calls with friends to
initiate some other things that I want to

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get done and also I made a list of
festivals and conferences that I want to

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attend, so of course I’ll vlog a
little bit from those conferences and

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events. And I’m so excited about the job. I feel really good about it and I feel like I’m

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gonna get some good things done.

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Alright you all, this was another This
Week as an Artist – thanks for watching.

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Share it if you like it, subscribe to the
channel or give a thumbs up if you like

0:06:36.030,0:06:36.440
it,

0:06:36.440,0:06:45.290
add comments if you want to, and you…YOU…
you keep doing your good work.

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Tell us if you need support, tell us what
you’re up to. Yeah. Kick BUTT. GO Women’s

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History Month! If you’re a woman,
celebrate yourself, Sister! If you’re a

0:06:55.390,0:07:00.600
man, celebrate a woman BIG time. Let her
know how important she is. Let her know

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that you support her, and don’t just say
it DO it. All right you all, have a

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wonderful, wonderful week and I’ll talk
to you next week. Bye!

One Drop of Love Q&A: Presidential “Mixedness”

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TANYA: I have a question in terms of the understanding of what being “biracial” is. And now that it is “presidential” (laughs) and people in this country see a person in power who is of mixed race, what have you seen in terms of the different concept of what being biracial is now compared to when you were growing up, and people not really knowing what “mixed” meant?

FANSHEN: I have to say I’ve kind of come full circle. So you saw some of my identity search and conclusions growing up, and then for a while I was very involved in the mixed community, and proud of being mixed, and I started to see that there was this issue of privilege in that community too, that wasn’t being recognized, and it’s problematic.

One of the things we would do a lot is complain about being asked “What are you?” well, the truth is, that’s a privilege. Because when someone asks you that, they want to be relieved by finding out that you’ve got some white in you, right? And they want to determine where they’re going to put you on a hierarchy. And so I’m more careful about what being mixed means.

Some people that I work with, we have a non-profit called Mixed Roots Stories, and we want to encourage the personal narratives, but within a critical framework. So: understanding history, understanding privilege, understanding that this is all part of an evolutionary process and that if we’re not about doing some good, dismantling of some racism, then that’s not cool. And President Obama publicly stated that on the Census he chose African American. That’s how the world treats him. That’s how he’s seen, and he’s proud of it. So – the biracial folks, and mixed folks, I’m like, ‘yeah, yeah, cool, but just don’t let that determine that you have decided now that you are exclusive of, or better than.

One Drop of Love is a multimedia one-woman show exploring the intersections of race, class, gender, justice and LOVE.
Please SUBSCRIBE to support our work and to get updates on our channel
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Direction by Carol Banker
Q&A Host Patti Lewis
Camera by Katie Walker http://bit.ly/1FSOtea
Music by Carol Doom
Editing and logo graphics by Alex Regalado http://bit.ly/1Lh73wE in association with SarafinaProductions http://bit.ly/1OkzzQD
The One Drop of Love logo was designed by Zerflin http://zerflin.com/

One Drop of Love Testimonial: Ashley – one story DOES make a difference

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CHANDRA: One of the best parts about the post-show conversations is when people feel compelled to share their own stories. In this clip, Ashley shares what it’s like for her as a Black female traveling through the Dominican Republic.

ASHLEY: One of the things that really resonated with me was the dynamic with race in other cultures. As a Black individual I’ve had the experience to go live in the Dominican Republic and there’s this racial dynamic between Haitians and Dominicans and oftentimes I was cussed out in four languages, by Haitians – they were telling me I’m denying my Haitian roots. The Dominican family I lived with, they had problems with my braids because those were identified as Haitian. Especially as a Black American you go on these journeys to really figure out who you are because you DO have so many people trying to tell you who you are – or what it means to be Black, or what it means to be this and, you think – well I had the perception that if I go overseas, I’ll be able to connect more, and I’ll be able to just be me, and it won’t have to be about race or how dark I am or how I sound and, just hearing that my experience wasn’t the only experience like that. That it really didn’t matter, like I didn’t find that oneness, that wholeness that I was expecting to find. I found more divisions. And hearing that in the story, it was sad.

Because I’m actually a Youth Pastor at an all-White church (laughs). At an all-White church. I never share that story. I always kind of tread on light water because I always have this feeling that…I know that my being here is a great thing, but it ruffles some feathers as well. And it’s like you never know when you’re put in these environments how you’re supposed to be. What’s uncomfortable? What’s not comfortable enough? What’s too, what’s saying too much? How bold can I be? Our congregation is older, white individuals, it’s a highly conservative church and things that are just uncomfortable? We don’t really do.

PATTI: And that’s the show. Like, if it’s uncomfortable…

ASHLEY: You just gotta deal with it yourself. You’re uncomfortable within yourself because you can’t find any comfort talking about it. But, with this show I appreciate it because you realize how many people have similar stories. Even if it’s just a little part of her story resonates with someone else, you realize that, OK. I’m not uncomfortable by myself. People ARE talking about this. And…one story DOES make a difference. The stories are never the same but the themes are always recurring. It’s human nature.

This Week as an Artivist 2/20/16: #BlackPanthers #Tagalog #EastWestPlayers

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ARTIVISTS!!! That’s YOU! What’s up you all? How was your week? How are your goals going? What did you accomplish? I’m for real – I really mean it when I ask you this, like, leave a comment, make a video, tell us what’s going on – really – what did you get done this week towards your Artivism?

We did it! We booked a new show! So we don’t have all the details, we don’t have the date yet, but a good friend from Pasadena City College checked in on availability and it’s gonna happen. It’s gonna happen! So Pasadena City College – we did it! Go ‘head, Lilah. We also are talking to someone in Ottawa, Canada at Carleton University about bringing the show, and Cambridge – bringing it back to Cambridge for a special event. I’m not gonna tell you quite yet, but I promise I will as soon as details get a little bit closer. So YEAH! Bookings! Good stuff, good week, we got a lot done this week for One Drop, and that was fantastic.

Who saw the Black Panthers documentary on PBS this week? Great documentary – I thought it was a great documentary – now the director is Stanley Nelson, and a woman named Elaine Brown came out with a really strong critique of the film and I’m…ohhhh…how are you feeling about it? ‘Cause I’m torn because I feel like the documentary is really important. I feel like it tells us a lot of history that we didn’t know. It certainly helps us see the role of the government in suppressing radical movements and suppressing something that really was very positive and really, like, all they were doing for the most part – not everybody – but just like there are good and bad people in all groups, but for the most part around especially carrying the guns they were like, “Look, this is our legal right and we’re protecting ourselves.” NRA people should be happy about that. I don’t know – watch for yourself. I say it’s all important. I say context is important and one person’s truth is somebody else’s different perception of the truth, but it is important. It’s all good we’re talking about it – that’s beautiful.

OK a couple friends my friend Leilani, who has a theater troupe called TeAda Productions – I’m going to put information about it there. My friend Leilani and Carol Banker we went to go see Criers for Hire at East West Players here in LA. So they do the show in Tagalog, which is the main language of the Philippines. The show is in Tagalog and then they either translate within their dialogue or they also and they add subtitles, or super titles, to the wall with projections and BIG UPS to East West players for doing this show because we need to hear these stories – especially those of us who are not Filipino – although I also loved feeling in the audience the Filipino folks who understood the Tagalog before they translated into English. And it’s funny – the show is hilarious, so if you’re in LA, go check out the show, support East West Players; they do really important work.

OK so I told you that I was hired to be an Assistant Director at the Boston Court Theatre and I have had to turn that job down. I know that I told you last week I’m not teaching ESL anymore and now I’m telling you that I’m not doing the Assistant Director job and it is all because there’s this new potential job that I should be hearing about and having confirmation on any day now and as soon as I do I will let you know. But it is certainly in line with the goals that I have in life and so I’ll just leave it at that. But I will say this interestingly that within the negotiations of the contract, at some point a person within these negotiations told me that I was being paranoid for requesting clarity and this is so common for Women and for People of Color to be told that we’re being paranoid when we’re displaying behavior that by another person would be considered good business sense, would be considered protecting your interests, but when we do it we’re called paranoid so that’s not cool and we’re not gonna put up with it, so yeah I will still keep demanding clarity for my job.

Oh! I love this. My high school in Cambridge is doing an event for Black History Month where they’re having alumni make videos talking about how they are innovative in their work, so I was very honored I just made my video for them and once they show it, I’ll put it on this channel. But I just love that – what a beautiful idea to have folks come on and hopefully inspire the young people – and as I told them on the video actually young people inspire me – they’re the reason that I keep doing what I do.

OK that’s kind of it. It was a quick update this week.

What are YOU up to Artivists? What are your goals? What did you accomplish this week? What are you planning on accomplishing? How are YOU going to change the world with your art? Let me know. Make a video response, tweet @fanshen @onedropoflove

If you like the t-shirt Oh! We’ve got t-shirt on the web site – I’ll put a link. And also subscribe to the videos – please subscribe to the channel.

Alright you all have a wonderful, wonderful week. I hope to have some clarity and information for you next week. Bye bye. Keep up the great work.

Peace.

How I Learned about the One-Drop Rule: Laura

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FANSHEN: Recently I asked my friends – when was the first time that they heard about the one-drop rule. And their answers were really incredible, so we’re sharing them here and we’d like to hear yours – so send us an email, tweet us, anything and let us know, “When was the first time YOU learned about the one-drop rule?”

LAURA: My name is Laura Black, and the first time I heard about the one-drop rule was in the 7th grade. An English teacher had introduced me to Langston Hughes. I read Simple Takes a Wife written in 1953. And the quote was,

“It’s powerful,” he said. “What?” “That one drop of Negro blood. Because
just one drop of black blood, makes a man colored. One drop? You are a Negro.”

CHANDRA CRUDUP: Don’t forget to subscribe to the channel to keep up with the latest One Drop news and other videos. Do you have ideas for more video content? Tell us what YOU’D like to see. See you next time to share more drops of love. Be sure to tell us by commenting here and on Twitter and Facebook how YOU are spreading drops of love.

This Week as an Artivist: 2/13/16: #Formation #Shadeism Goodbye to ESL Teaching

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TRANSCRIPT:
Hey…What’s up, Artivists? How’s it going? What’s going on with your goals? Have you reached any of them? I didn’t get the goal of getting a new show booking last week, but that’s OK. But some amazing things happened this week – really wonderful, positive stuff, good stuff for storytelling, good stuff for Artivism, for the stories I want to tell so I’ll fill you in a little bit on those things.

OK. Beyonce’s #Formation video came out last week just before the Superbowl and that song in the Superbowl and there was a lot of conversation about LOTS of things in the video, but something that was really important to me was the conversations about #colorism and #shadeism, especially in Louisiana, there are people called Creoles and what I didn’t know is that Creole does not mean ‘light-skinned’ and that was the idea that I had, but a woman named Yaba Blay wrote an article about living in Louisiana and having some really painful moments around shadeism and colorism and I was really moved by her piece and so I posted about it, and then some other folks from the Mixed and Creole community came on a were like, “Wait a minute – her analysis is lacking the fact that there are lots of Creole people who are ‘dark-skinned’ and it has to do with the geographical area you’re in and so it was really a great conversation – so shout out to Carolyn Battle Cochran, Joahana Workman, to Senta Burke for sharing your very personal story on our thread and I thank you so much. I just want to keep talking about things and I know I’m going to get things wrong, especially when it’s something I have zero context on – so I just appreciate the conversation and let’s keep that going.

On Tuesday I went to #KPCC, which is our local #NPR station – one of our local NPR stations here in LA and had an interview with Leslie Berestein Rojas – she’s doing a story about #multiracial identity in Los Angeles and so that’s coming out on Monday. It was a wonderful opportunity to talk a little bit about One Drop and talk about my experiences being a Mixed person growing up and how I’ve evolved around that and how my focus more is on justice – so we had a great conversation and I’ll put a link once that comes out and I’ll talk about it more next week.

While I was at KPCC, I met Liz Garbus, so anyway I hugged her and said thank you for her documentary – What Happened, Miss Simone if you didn’t see it, I believe it’s still on Netflix. It’s really powerful – speaking of shadeism and colorism – it is very, very clear in this movie, so check out that documentary.

OK so, I have been an ESLTeacher for the majority of my life at this point – I started teaching ESL after I joined the…when I joined the Peace Corps right after college. I lived in West Africa and I taught ESL and I coordinated the English Department in the Cape Verdean Islands, West Africa and I’ve been teaching ESL pretty steadily ever since then everywhere. In New York City, in a high school in the South Bronx, I taught 5th grade for one year – a bilingual 5th grade class. I then taught in a few schools in Los Angeles including CalAmerica, where I met my husband Diego and…oh my gosh, maybe I’m going to cry. After that I taught at East LA College for a long time and then for the last 8 years or so I’ve been teaching at Glendale Community College, where the majority of the students are Armenian, we’ve recently had a lot of Syrian students come in and still there are also Latin American students mostly Guatemalan and Mexican and Salvadorian and Thursday was my last day teaching. And so I’m – whooo – I’m making a transition I can talk about the transition probably in next week’s video, but teaching ESL has been such a wonderful, wonderful, part of my life for the last 20 years and I will miss it so much. I’ll miss my students. I will certainly infuse my new job with everything. All the incredible tools that I learned and I’ll also maintain my relationships with the communities that motivated me to be grateful for everything that I have and to be grounded and to really understand what things are important in life – and that those are not material things – and they are not about money and power, they are about community, they are about family, they are about LOVE. And so I’m saying goodbye to ESL teaching, but not to my life as an Educator and to my life as a person who’s committed to justice and equity for everyone. So I want to say thank you – if you’re one of my students – I will miss you so much and you have made my life wonderful and THANK YOU for that. And you have my email address, so email me any time, and I’ll remind you how to use ‘Be’ verb correctly and ‘what is a noun’ and ‘what is a subject pronoun’ – I’ll remind you of all of that, so I am still your friend forever.

I am so proud, I have to say, of the students at CalState LA. So I went to CalState LA for my MFA and the students there have made a list of demands to the President of CalState LA. I’m going to put the link so that you can read. And they got it! They got the things that they were asking for – including divesting from private prisons, money to support their work – it’s so exciting. I’m so proud. And congratulations, keep up the amazing work you’re doing.

And shoutouts to everybody who’s been watching these videos! Thank you for watching them, thank you for your ‘likes’ on the videos. Please subscribe if you haven’t and also interact with me. I’m sorry I know this is a lot of just talking at you, but I don’t mean it to be, what I mean it to be is to hear from you your thoughts and questions. Let’s talk about Shadeism, ESL students if you’re watching you can ask me questions about grammar, and Artivists – what’s going on for you this week? What are your goals? What are you planning on getting done? What did you get done last week? Let me know. Let’s talk about it. What do you need support on? Have you got projects going that you need support on? Alright everybody have a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful week. I’ll have great, amazing news for you that I can share next week. And until then: Bye Bye!