Wanda's Picks

Farmageddon director, Kristin Canty joins us to talk about Americans' right to access fresh, healthy foods of their choice is under attack presently, especially those small family farms who make such choices available. Farmageddon highlights the urgency of food freedom, encouraging farmers and consumers to take action to preserve our quickly vanishing right to produce these foods safely free from unreasonably burdensome regulations.The recent cantelop recall is testiment to the danger of commercial farm practices, dangers not inherent to the smaller agri-businesses. We see how these regulations and practices which favor, overwhelmingly the corporate structure of agri-production is tied to political support from these multibillion dollar industires which look less at healthy choices for the consumer, not to mention the animals and the land or soil, and more to profit--a shortsighted and limited way of thinking. If one is dead or sick, how useful is a huge bank account? Visit farmaggeddonmovie.com Mill Valley Film Festival 34 opens Oct. 6-16, 2011 and features many African films, among them, FESPCO winner 2011, Pegasus, dir. Mohamed Mouftakir. Fouad Challa, director, joins us from Morocco. The film screens at MVFF Oct. 7 & 9. Visit mvff.org We close with Rafael Jesus Gonzalez and Laura Inserra who speak about the second annual Art in Nature: The Nature of Art, A Free Multidisciplinary Arts Festival, October 2, 2011, 11 AM to 5 PM at the Stream Trail of Redwood Regional Park, in Oakland. Visit artinnaturefestival.org There will be shuttles leaving from Merritt College. Get tickets in advance at the program website.

Alpha Oumar “Bongo” Sidibe is a traditional drummer from Conakry, Guinea in West Africa and lead vocalist and founder for Wontanara band. He is Musical Director of Duniya Dance and Drum Company. Bongo studied with Master Drummer Mamady Keita at his school, Tam Tam Mandigue, Guinea, and participated in his workshops in Conakry and Balandougou, Mamady’s village. Since arriving in the U.S., Bongo has performed with Rhythm Village, Joan Baez, Bolokada Conde, Mickey Hart, the Grateful Dead, and Black Nature from the Sierra Leone Refugee Allstars. Joti Singh is a choreographer, performer, and instructor of Bhangra and Bollywood dances from India and dance from Guinea, West Africa. She is the Artistic Director and founder of Duniya Dance and Drum Company: www.duniyadance.com Intisar Sharif, RN speaks about the Prevention Well Project in Somalia, Saturday, Sept. 24, 2011, 6-9 PM at Eden Palm Apartments Hall, 53 Monterey Road, San Jose, CA 94511 Steven Anthony Jones, Artistic Director, Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, has worked professionally on stage, television and film for 37 years. Most recently, he was a core company actor at American Conservatory Theatre (A.C.T.), where he acted, directed and taught. Mr Jones received his early theatre training at Karamu House in his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio. He is a graduate of Yankton College in South Dakota. Don Reed, a San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle Nominee and NAACP Double Nominee for Best Actor & Best Playwright, is the writer, director and playwright of one of the longest running solo shows in Bay Area History – his highly regarded EAST 14th, which closed at The Marsh after a two-and-a-half year run earlier this year. THE KIPLING HOTEL picks up where the earlier show left off. Reed is currently the opening act/warm-up comedian for The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and has just closed a deal with a new FOX television comedy.

Former teacher Jonathan Dearmen is profiled in Vanessa Roth's new film: American Teacher. Dearman is a lifelong San Francisco resident who has worked in real estate and education for the past twenty years. As a lifelong learner and educator, Jonathan has worked on education non-profits and school boards while running his family-owned real estate business since leaving the teaching profession in 2002. Jonathan is now looking to combine two of his passions, education and music, in a community project for young people in his neighborhood. Denizen Kane is a poet and musician born and raised in Tree City. He is one of the founders of I Was Born With Two Tongues (1998-2003), an Asian American spoken word quartet and Typical Cats, a Chicago-based hip hop collective.  His recorded works include LPs with Two Tongues (Broken Speak, AIR Records 1999) and Typical Cats (Typical Cats, G4 2000; Civil Service G4 2004) and solo albums (Tree City Legends Vol. 1, G4 2002; Vol. 2, G4 2005; Brother Min’s Journey to the West, TTB 2009).  His poetry has been featured in the Asian Pacific American Journal, the Columbia Review, Echoes upon Echoes: New Korean American Writings, and Screaming Monkeys, and on three seasons of Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry Jam.  Ethel Long-Scott, Executive Director, Women's Economic Agenda Project. For more than 40 years, in jobs as varied as grassroots community organizer, social issues advocate, political campaign strategist and non-profit CEO, I have pushed, poked, prodded and worked cooperatively with the political, economic and civic establishments on a mission to increase social and economic justice.

Sisters Omitola and Yaniba join us to talk about Wo'se Community Church & Bay Area Black Psychologists present a free Community Health Fair, Sept. 23, 2011, 6:30 PM to 7:30 PM and Saturday, Set. 24, 2011, 11 AM to 5 PM, (707) 637-2029. Marcus Lorenzo Penn, MD, speaks about stress reduction, the autumnal equinox, and a upcoming series of Yoga Meditations beginning Monday, Sept. 26, specific to Maafa Commemoration and Remembrance Month. He also gives listeners a way to reflect and respond to Troy Davis's pending execution.  GENEVIEVE JESSEEis an actor and playwright based in the San Francisco Bay Area. An Oakland native, she showed an early affinity for performance, which was fostered in a household full of words, music, and support. She attended Dillard University of New Orleans, LA where she received her B.A. degree in Theatre Arts. She went on to complete an M.F.A. in Playwriting from Boston University. Her theatre talents are varied, and in addition to her work as an actor and playwright she is a skilled improvisor, having received training from the Second City in Chicago. Her work has been presented at the Source Festival in Washington D.C., Intersections Play Festival of Baltimore, MD, Boston Playwright's Theater, and The Bay Area Playwright's Festival. Most recently, her one-woman show Girl in, but not of, the ‘Hood received a Best of 2011 San Francisco Fringe Festival award, and encore performance, in addition to a “Sold Out” award. Co-director/co-founder Elizabeth Gjelten came to playwriting via solo theater, performing her own work at venues around the Bay Area. Before the Strange Angels production, her play Hunter’s Point was in the 2010 Bay Area Playwrights Festival. Elizabeth has an MFA in Creative Writing from SFSU and is a longtime student of poetics with Diane di Prima. Her chapbook, say i am you, was published by Modest Proposal.

Fighting for Our Freedom Tour stops in Oakland, Sept. 27-October 1, 2011 and features: Dorothy Pinkney and her husband Rev. Pinkney, who is President of the Benton Harbor NAACP and has been singled out for political attack because of his years of outspoken criticism of the takeover of his local City government by the Whirlpool Corporation.

Carole Flowers speaks on the Second Annual "Stepping Toward the Cure 5K Fun Run & Walk (Northern California) at LakesidePark (near Bandstand) in Oakland, Sunday, Sep 18, 2011. Registration begins at 8 AM. Barbara Hunter joins us to talk about the Barbara Hunter Jazz Quartet performing tonight at the 57th Street Gallery in Oakland. Jacqueline Hairston speaks about Carnegie Hall Preview Concert at Afro Solo Sept. 24, 2011. We feature music arranged by Jacqueline Hairston and original music and that of others featuring Barbara Hunter: "My Secret Love/St. Thomas," "For Sarah" (B. Hunter), Searching for the Truth (M. Wright). We open with an excerpt from "Eternity" (Liz Wright from Salt).

Rebroadcast of archived show featuring Chinaka Hodge speaking about The Living Word Festival and Martina Correa who speaks about her brother Troy Anthony Davis, on death row. The warrant sets the execution between Sept. 21 and Sept. 28, 2011. The state Department of Corrections will set the actual date. Davis has been on death row for 19 years. In this interview, the execution date was set for October. It was overturned. Troy's birthday is October 9, 2011. Let's hope he sees that day. He has been at this point so many times, it is time for him to be released. However, Davis's appeals are exhausted. He is expected to once again ask the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles to grant him clemency. The board has previously denied that request.: http://troyanthonydavis.org/   Money orders can be sent to Troy Anthony Davis #657378 GDCP c/o Georgia Department of Corrections: Inmate Accounts, P O Box 405699, Atlanta, Georgia 30384-5699. Do Not Send Cash, It will be Returned and Sometimes is Lost! Please keep copy of money order for your records & write and let him know you mailed a money order: Troy A. Davis #657378 GDCP, G-2-48 PO Box 3877, Jackson, Georgia. 30233. We close with a recording from Freedom Archives: Attica State Prison 30th Year Anniversary. It is the 40th Anniversary now (Sept. 9-13, 1971) and there is a commemorative program at East Side Arts in Oakland, Friday, Sept. 16, 2011.  Visit http://revcom.us/a/245/40th-anniversary-attica-prison-rebellion-en.html

8:00 AM:  Jewell Parker Rhodes is the award-winning author of Voodoo Dreams, MagicCity, Douglass’ Women, Season, Moon, Hurricane, and the children’s book, Ninth Ward. Her writing guides include: Free Within Ourselves: Fiction Lessons for Black Authors and The African American Guide to Writing and Publishing Nonfiction. Jewell is the Virginia G. Piper Chair in Creative Writing and Artistic Director of Piper Global Engagement at Arizona State University. 8:30 AM: Remembering Attica 40 Years Later with Yusufu L. Mosley has a BA in sociology & a MA in political science with an emphasis on social ethics. Currently, Yusufu works in the social justice field and is a member of several professional organizations related to the criminal justice field in the Chicagoland area. Yusufu is a trained and certified as a Circle Keeper in Restorative Justice (RJ) field. He is joined by Claude Marks, a former anti-imperialist political prisoner and is the Project Director of The Freedom Archives, a political, cultural oral history project, restoration center, and media production facility in San Francisco. Under his direction, The Freedom Archives has released several recent documentary CDs and videos combining restored historical audio and contemporary interviews. 9:00 AM: Rohina Malik is a Chicago-based playwright, actress and solo performance artist currenting performing her solo piece: "Unveiled," through Sept. 17. She was born and raised in London (UK) of South Asian heritage. Raelle Myrick-Hodges studied literature at Ealing College (London) and theatre arts at the University of Southern California. Raelle Myrick-Hodges is Artistic Director in Brava Theatre. Lenora Lee & Francis Wong join us to talk about Reflections on stage this weekend at CounterPULSE, a piece is inspired by stories of three generations of men as they realize their identity and community as Chinese Americans.

This is a black arts and culture site. We will be exploring the writing, visual and performing arts of African people in the Diaspora. It is my claim that the artists are the true revolutionaries, their work filled with raw unfettered passion. They are our true heroes. Ashay. Periodically, we will rebroadcast shows, what we call, "From the Archives."

STEVE JAMES, Director, Producer, Cinematographer, Editor, is best known as the award-winning director, producer, and co-editor of Kartemquin’s Hoop Dreams, which won every major critics award as well as a Peabody and Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award in 1995. Steve’s other award-winning films produced with Kartemquin include Stevie, winner of major festival awards at Sundance, Amsterdam, Yamagata and Philadelphia; the PBS series, The New Americans, which won the prestigious 2004 International Documentary Association Award for Best Limited Series THE INTERRUPTERS, which opens toda, Sept. 2, in San Francisco and Berkeley, is Steve’s sixth film in partnership with Kartemquin and his fifth film to play at the Sundance Film Festival.The film will be broadcast on PBS' Frontline in late 2011. Jetta Martin joins us to talk about "Mirrored: An Interactive Evening of Dance with Martin and Michael Velez at Dance Mission in San Francisco, Sept. 9-10. Come join us for an evening of dance, adventure and the element of choice. The audience and performers will create their own shared story each night through a combination of chance and luck. We will deconstruct coincidence vs. fate and consider the choices, if any, we really have. Visit www.jettamartin.com Alisa Froman,Executive Director, established PlazaCUBA in the year 2000 and continues to be the visionary creator of projects and events. Alisa is an accomplished Afro-Cuban folklore and salsa dancer and performs in the Bay Area with various groups. She has studied Cuban culture and religion for many years and remains a knowledgeable and loving member of an international community interested in investigating and preserving Cuban culture. Alisa has been traveling to Cuba  for 18 years and has accompanied hundreds of Americans to Cuba on music, dance and cultural adventures. The program ends with testimony from the Legislative Hearings on the SHU. Music: Keb'Mo & Wil Campas

Broadcast of the Public Comments point of the historic California Assembly Hearing on Solitary Confinement August 23, 2011.