Black and Caribbean Book Affair Celebrates Imagination

By Neil Armstrong

Photo credit: N. Affonso        Myriam J.A. Chancy, author of the novel, What Storm, What Thunder

When the pages of books featured at the 2021 Black and Caribbean Book Affair, October 14 to 17, are turned they will reveal works boldly discussing issues of colour, race, education, discrimination, identity, the COVID-19 pandemic, self empowerment and more at the virtual and hybrid event.

Hosted by A Different Booklist Cultural Centre: The People’s Residence (ADBCC) in Toronto, the annual festival will showcase the new books of 14 authors, 3 editors, lovers of literature, community advocates and a panel discussion to celebrate the 15^th anniversary of the Rita Cox Black and Caribbean Heritage Collection at the Toronto Public Library. All of the events will be live streamed on Facebook Live except a ticketed affair with award-winning author Myriam J.A. Chancy.

 

In 1973, Dr. Rita Cox pioneered the Black Heritage and West Indian Resource Collection at Parkdale Branch. It was subsequently established at three other branches: York Woods, 1984; Cedarbrae, 1989; Maria A. Shchuka, 2003.

 

The veteran librarian retired from the Toronto Public Library in 1995, having served as head of Parkdale for 21 years. In 1998, the important resource was renamed the Black and Caribbean Heritage Collection, and two years later renamed in honour of its founder. The Rita Cox Endowment Fund is established within the Toronto Public Library Foundation to support and enhance the growth of the Collection.

 

The Collection features more than 16,000 print and audiovisual materials for adults, children and teens about the Black and Caribbean experience with special emphasis on Canadian material. It is now available at the Parkdale, Maria A. Shchuka, Malvern and Downsview branches.

Photo credit: Neil Armstrong    Olive Senior signs a book for Cherita Girvan Campbell, president of Arts and Culture Jamaica Inc.

 

The Black and Caribbean Book Affair will kick off on the evening of October 14 with a toast to all the Black and Caribbean authors who won prizes this year.

 

In the first wave of the pandemic, Olive Senior, the renowned author of 18 books of fiction, non-fiction, poetry and children’s literature and other published work, wrote poems that she shared on social media. They were subsequently published as Pandemic Poems: First Wave.

 

Senior was named Jamaica’s Poet Laureate for 2021 to 2024 on March 17, 2021. Her many awards include Canada’s Writers Trust Matt Cohen Award for Lifetime Achievement, the OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the Commonwealth Writers Prize, an honorary doctorate from the University of the West Indies and the Gold Medal of the Institute of Jamaica. Her work has been taught internationally and is widely translated.  

 

Senior will discuss her new collection of poems at 7:00 p.m. that evening with Paula de Ronde, founder of Arts and Culture Jamaica Inc.

 

The panel discussion about the Rita Cox Black and Caribbean Heritage Collection will happen from 12:00-1:00 p.m. on October 15 with co-moderator and Caribbean culture enthusiast Denise Herrera Jackson. 

 

Educator, arranger and author, Dr. Salah Wilson, will showcase Steelpan Playing With Theory, a steelpan textbook, and The Steelpan Teacher’s Manual on October 15, 3:00-4:00 p.m. in conversation with educator and musician, Ivor Picou.

 

Like Senior, Canute Lawrence, a language and literature teacher for more than three decades who has taught in Jamaica, USA and Canada, has written a collection of poems, Pathology of a Pandemic. Author Gayle Gonsalves will interview Lawrence from 4:30-5:00 p.m.

 

Carl James, the Jean Augustine Chair in Education, Community and Diaspora in the Faculty of Education at York University, is the author of several books, including the recent Colour Matters: Essays on the Experiences, Education, and Pursuits of Black Youth.

 

Photo contributed    Carl James, author of Colour Matters: Essays on the Experiences , Education, and Pursuits of Black Youth

“Based on research conducted in Black communities, along with over thirty years of teaching experience, Colour Matters presents a collection of essays that engages educators, youth workers, and policymakers to think about the ways in which race shapes the education, aspirations, and achievements of Black Canadians. Informed by the current socio-political Canadian landscape, Colour Matters covers topics relating to the lives of Black youth, with particular, though not exclusive, attention to young Black men in the Greater Toronto Area,” notes a synopsis of the book.

From 6:00-7:00 p.m., he will be in conversation with fellow educator, Nigel Barriffe, about the new book.

Myriam J. A. Chancy, Guggenheim Fellow & HBA Chair of the Humanities at Scripps College, has written What Storm, What Thunder, a novel on the 2010 Haiti earthquake, published by Harper Collins Canada and Tin House in the USA. 

 

Chancy is a Haitian-Canadian/American writer born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and subsequently raised there and in Canada.  After obtaining her BA in English/Philosophy from the University of Manitoba (1989) and her MA in English Literature from Dalhousie University (1990), she completed her Ph. D. in English at the University of Iowa (1994).  

 

The author was awarded the 2011 Guyana Prize in Literature Caribbean Award for Best Fiction 2010 for her third novel, The Loneliness of Angels (Peepal Tree Press 2010; also shortlisted in the fiction category for the 2011 OCM Bocas Prize in Caribbean Literature), garnered a shortlisting for Best First Book, Canada/Caribbean region category, of the Commonwealth Prize in 2004 for her first novel, Spirit of Haiti (London: Mango Publications, 2003), and published a second novel, The Scorpion’s Claw (Peepal Tree Press 2005) to critical praise. All three of her novels are taught at universities and colleges in the US, Canada and the Caribbean.  The Loneliness of Angels was translated into Spanish by LaSiren Press in Colombia in 2020, and into Danish with Rebel With A Cause Press in Denmark, in 2019.

 

Chancy will share thoughts about her book with storyteller and author, Itah Sadu, 7:30-8:30 p.m. This is a ticketed event ($25, which includes a copy of the book) and the Zoom link will be sent to those who purchase tickets. 

 

On Saturday, October 16, programing will start at 10:00 a.m. for an hour with Tania Hernandez ‘Miss Tania Lou,’ author of One Pot: True Stories from Jamaica & Canada (Stories, Recipes, Poems).She will be in conversation with Gayle Gonsalves.

 

Ivelyn Harris is a Jamaican Maroon descendant and has been a traditional herbalist for over 40 years practising from her cottage in the foothills of the Blue and John Crow Mountains.

 

In Healing Herbs of Jamaica, Harris draws on her years of knowledge and experience as a herbalist to share how herbs can enhance health. She will talk about her new book from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

 

Children and their parents will be entertained between 1:00 p.m. and 2:00 p.m. by authors Ayana Francis and Kodi Dill.

 

Francis’ new book is ABC Where are We? The West Indies and she will be interviewed by Nigel Barriffe from 1:00-1:30 p.m.

 

Follow along with Caiden and Idris as they explore the Caribbean countries and territories through their ABCs! They’ll take you on imaginary adventures - from building pink sandcastles in the Bahamas, hiking Jamaica’s Dunn’s River Falls, to falling in love with the rhythm of Trinidad and Tobago’s steel pan, notes a description of the book.

 

Kodi Dill, educator, spoken word artist and author of Welcome to the Cypher will share the story of his book with author Yolanda Marshall.

 

“Starting with beatboxes and fingersnaps, an exuberant narrator introduces kids in his community to the powerful possibilities of rap, from turning “a simple phrase/into imagery that soars” to proclaiming, “this is a voice that represents me!” As Khodi Dill’s rhymes heat up, the diverse crew of kids—illustrated in Awuradwoa Afful’s bold, energetic style—gain self-confidence and a sense of freedom in this wonderful picture book debut that is perfect for reading aloud,” says publisher Annick Press about the book that will be out in October.  

 

From 2:30 to 3:00 p.m., storyteller Gayle Gonsalves will showcase her new book My Stories Have No Endings with author Yolanda Marshall.

 

 Situated in Antigua, the novel centres around the life of Kai and the voices she hears when she dips her head into the wind that whisper stories from a forgotten past. Gonsalves enriches her narrative by evoking colours, textures and shapes with words. 

 

 

Co-editors Nicole Salmon, Camila Pereira and Nneka Allen will talk with Itah Sadu about Collecting Courage, an anthology of 14 Black fundraisers, from 3:15 to 4:15 p.m.

 

“Collecting Courage is a powerful and moving collection of personal experiences written by Black fundraisers that chip away at the idea of an inherent goodness of the charitable sector,” says a synopsis of the book.

 

It notes that, “these personal testimonies document racism, survival and the preeminence of 14 accomplished Black North American fundraisers, 5 from the United States and 9 from Canada.”    

 

 

Rabin Ramah, author of I Only Make Love in Montreal, a collection of stories, will be in conversation with Gayle Gonsalves from 4:30-5:00 p.m.

 

“This stunning debut collection of stories draws heavily on the author’s memories of growing up in Trinidad and explores themes of family, faith, race, child abuse, sexuality, and otherness. 
​
“In one story, a young boy experiences his first signs of love for a man as sinful, terrifying, and evil, resulting in the end of his innocence. In another, a lonely schoolboy is whipped and shamed for soiling his pants, his only companion a cow he calls Mama. 
​
“Heartbreaking yet hopeful, funny yet wise, these stories are infused with the warmth and vibrancy of the Caribbean sun and the insight of a young man who was trying to find love amidst the violence of his childhood,” notes a description of the book.

Photo contributed  Author, poet and historian Afua Cooper

 

To close out Saturday’s programming, historian, poet, and author Afua Cooper, who has contributed to the new anthology Afrikan Wisdom: New Voices Talk Black Liberation, Buddhism, and Beyond (North Atlantic Books) and her daughter, Habiba Cooper Diallo, who has written #BlackInSchool (University of Regina Press) will participate in a book signing and sidewalk party at ADBCC from 5:15-6:15 p.m.

 

“Afrikan Wisdom represents an intersectional, cross-pollinated exploration of Black life–past, present, and future. Award-winning author and editor Valerie Mason-John (Vimalasara)’s collection of 34 essays–written by an eclectic and inspirational group of Black thought leaders and teachers–reflects on the unique and multilayered experience of being Black in the world today.”

Photo contributed      Habiba Cooper Diallo, author of #BlackInSchool

 

#BlackInSchool is Habiba Cooper Diallo's high school journal, in which she documents, processes, and resists the systemic racism, microaggressions, stereotypes, and outright racism she experienced in Canada's education system.

 

On the closing day of the Book Affair, October 17, Aina-Nia Ayo’dele will launch her new book, Self: An Inner Journey to Re-Membering Your Power, at The Diner’s Corner, 678 Yonge Street in Toronto. This is a ticketed event with limited seating and those interested should RSVP at aina-nia.com. The event will be live streamed on Facebook Live.

 

The ancient wisdom teacher, leadership coach and spiritual liberation activist is on a mission “to influence individual and institutional change by inspiring everyone to Re-Member their Power.”

 

The first in her 5-part tablet series, the author says, “Self comes from my own journey to remembering my power and the wisdom I have shared with students and audiences across the globe.”

 

* I will be in conversation with Olive Senior, Ivelyn Harris, and will also be a co-moderator of the panel discussion celebrating the 15th anniversary of the Rita Cox Black and Caribbean Heritage Collection.

Unblind Tibbin Feels Good About His Chances in Federal Election

By Neil Armstrong

Photo contributed         Unblind Tibbin, candidate for the Green Party of Canada in Humber River - Black Creek, Ontario

With just a few days to go before Election Day, Unblind Tibbin, the Green Party of Canada’s candidate for Humber River – Black Creek, says he has been getting “lots of good support and endorsements” so he thinks things will turn out nicely for him and his campaign team on September 20.

In the 2011 federal election, he was the Greens candidate in York West (now Humber River – Black Creek) where the incumbent Liberal Judy Sgro has been the Member of Parliament since 1999.

 

The other candidates are Rinku Shah of the Conservative Party, Matias de Dovitiis of the NDP, and Raatib Anderson of the People’s Party of Canada.

 

“I think we’ve had 20 years of nothing. Judy has been there doing nothing, she has been misrepresenting the community and like Justin talking a good talk and doing nothing, says Tibbin who is the executive director of the Sierra Leone Union of Canada, and a youth services officer in the Ontario public service where he works with the most challenging youth in Toronto.

 

Tibbin says he wants to empower, especially the youth in the community, to know that they can do things and be engaged in issues that the Green Party is championing such as free tuition, a liveable wage, food security and sustainability, and electoral reform.

 

The equal rights, social justice, sustainable lifestyles and accessibility advocate is bilingual and cares deeply about environmental sustainability, youth and bilingualism. 

He has volunteered in several capacities with many organizations, such as the United Nations Association in Canada where he was the chair of the youth committee.

He is also concerned about childcare, senior care and a liveable wage for seniors, and plans to be engaged in conversations to “move the clock forward.”

Drawing on lessons learned from his campaign ten years ago, Tibbin says he has become more efficient and has a team of specialists with more autonomy to develop some of their ideas. 

 

While canvassing, Tibbin says he has heard from constituents that they are “sick and tired of what is going on and that the pandemic is affecting them negatively,” in terms of being able to afford their day-to-day expenses.

 

They have also complained about the poor state of housing and very little being done to resolve their problems. 

 

“I have lots of those complaints being levied against the landlords and against the system that is currently in place,” says Tibbin, also listing availability of jobs and students being indebted and concerned about how they will pay back the loans they are using to sustain themselves.

 

As a graduate of York University, he is also in touch with students there because the university has 6,000 voters and some of them may not cast their vote for various reasons.

 

For 15 years, the spoken word artist was the host of a radio show, “De Port Au Prince A Bamako,” at CHRY Radio at York University.

 

Tibbin grew up in Switzerland and in north Toronto and has a Masters degree in economics from York University. He went on to work as a French teacher for children, and as a Kwanzaa instructor in the joint Black Coalition for AIDS Prevention (Black CAP) and Toronto Community Housing Corporation’s Mate Maisie program. He is also a published writer, spoken word artist, and martial arts teacher.

He later worked as a program manager at Friends in Trouble where he provided anti-oppression training to Toronto Public Library staff. Tibbin has also worked for the Positive Alternative to Youth Gangs project in the Jane and Finch area where he was in charge of creating holistic self-betterment programs for at-risk youth, including workshops on urban farming, food security and ecological sustainability.

“We need to understand there’s an environmental crisis and we need to go into a carbon neutral society by 2030,” says the former manager of community engagement for the Learning Disabilities Association of Peel Region. 

 

He supports removing subsidies to fossil fuels and investing that money into renewable energy through channels such as incentives to buy electric cars. Tibbin notes that there are companies retrofitting their buildings so that they are more environmentally sound.

 

Lunch programs, accessibility to food, and food security are major concerns in Humber River – Black Creek, especially for young people.

 

“They’re not eating quality food and there are some repercussions from that, they’re suffering lots of ailments which could be proactively negotiated,” says Tibbin who was employed by CUSO International as a youth development worker and spent 18 months in Cameroon and Nigeria teaching and helping to create programs for disadvantaged youth.

 

With his experience working in many different organizations, Tibbin says this will enable him to represent the community well and to get a feel for its pulse when addressing any issues in parliament.

 

He and his team have been targeting community events and places where people gather, and also canvassing virtually.

 

As a Back candidate, Tibbin is encouraging members of the Black communities who might be hesitant to seek political leadership to just do it. 

 

“There is nothing to stop us from going anywhere we want to in this society and doing anything we want. If indeed we have the calling to represent the people and with ethical, sound, political objectives then we are best placed to do that.”

 

Regarding the recent internal leadership challenges faced by Green Party leader, Annamie Paul, he said based on the rule of law she is still the person who is governing the party and still the first Black person who is leading a major political party.

 

“As she’s been demonstrating with her arguments in the debates and with her presence, she’s a person of great value. She’s of course working to establish and make these values more permanent in the Green Party.”

 

Tibbin says the Green Party itself needs to evolve and he thinks Paul is the perfect leader to enable it to grow.

 

On September 12, several organizations collaborated to host the Black Community Federal Election Candidates Meet & Greet virtually.

 

It was an intimate opportunity for community members to engage directly with a number of party leaders and Black candidates from the GTA running in the upcoming election. 

 

“An opportunity to learn more about the various party platform highlights and their personal commitments and motivation for seeking office, working with, and serving the community.  Moreover, it will create an opportunity for community members to learn how they can support their candidate(s) of choice,” noted the promotional material.

 

The organizers were First Fridays, the Jamaican Canadian Association (JCA), the Ontario Alliance of Black School Educators (ONABSE), Canada's National Black History Month Expo, CAFCAN, Canadian Black Chamber of Commerce (CBCC), and the African-Canadian Entrepreneurs for Success (ACES). 

Two days earlier, on September 10, Operation Black Vote Canada in partnership with the Black Business and Professional Association (BBPA), Coalition of Black Trade Unionists (CBTU), and Generation Chosen held a virtual Black Leaders Forum.

 

It featured Matthew Green, NDP candidate for Hamilton; Greg Fergus, Liberal candidate for Hull-Aylmer; and Adrian Currie, Green Party candidate for Davenport.

 

 

Pan Africanist Marcus Garvey Continues to Inspire 134 Years After His Birth

By Neil Armstrong

 

One hundred and thirty-four years after his birth and one hundred and seven years after the international organization he founded, Marcus Mosiah Garvey is still positively influencing the lives of many people worldwide.

 

Garvey, who was born in St. Ann’s Bay, Jamaica on August 17, 1887, founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) in 1914 in Kingston, Jamaica. Three years later, he did the same in Harlem, New York.

 

His life and work are documented in books, plays, documentaries and films. A new docufilm, African Redemption: The Life and Legacy of Marcus Garvey, by Jamaica-born, American filmmaker Roy T. Anderson will be screened at upcoming film festivals. A Facebook post on August 15, 2021, noted that “an exclusive invitation-only preview screening of our film in front of a live audience” would be held on August 16 in New York City, a day before Garvey’s birthday. Anderson, director and producer of Black Star Line Films, is also the creator of the 2015 documentary film, Queen Nanny: Legendary Maroon Chieftainess. It was co-created with history professor, Harcourt T. Fuller and “unearths and examine the mysterious figure that is Nanny of the Maroons; Jamaica's sole female National Hero, and one of the most celebrated, but least recognized heroines in the resistance history of the New World.”

A few months ago, Anderson allowed me to preview the film and told me that he was really proud of the Marcus Garvey film and had put his “blood, sweat and tears into it.” Garvey’s UNIA had chapters in many countries throughout the world and its work and influence, as well as its advocates, touched the lives of several Black leaders in Canada. The late Bromley Armstrong has included Garvey in his memoir, B. Denham Jolly tells the story of the Garveyite whose rooming house he lived in when he travelled to Toronto in his early years while on holiday breaks from the Ontario Agricultural College in Guelph, and Natasha Henry, president of the Ontario Black History Society documents Garvey’s visits to Canada and his support of Emancipation Day events. Cheryl Thompson, an assistant professor in the School of Creative Industries, Ryerson University wrote “Garvey’s place in Toronto history” in Spacing magazine on August 17, 2018. Carla Marano has also written the article “We All Used to Meet at the Hall”: Assessing the Significance of the Universal Negro Improvement Association in Toronto, 1900-1950” in the Journal of the Canadian Historical Association, Volume 25, Issue 1, 2014.

In Dying to Better Themselves: West Indians and the Building of the Panama Canal, published by The University of the West Indies Press in 2014, Olive Senior notes that while the UNIA was founded in Jamaica in 1914, it “had not really taken off until he established it in the United States in 1917.”

“By the mid-1920s, the UNIA had approximately eleven hundred branches in over forty countries and millions of followers, and Garvey’s message of black self-reliance and racial pride crossed cultural and linguistic barriers.”

Senior states that Garvey’s “strongest support came from expatriate West Indians in places like Panama and Costa Rica, and, later, in Cuba (where there were fifty-two branches), as well as throughout the West Indies.” She notes that from 1918 onwards, Garvey’s ideas “were channelled through his newspaper, the New York-based Negro World.” 

“The fact that it was declared banned literature by many of the colonial governments did not prevent its widespread circulation in the islands, carried there by black seamen. Garvey himself had begun his journey to political consciousness as an emigrant in Costa Rica between 1910 and 1912, working as a timekeeper for the Unite Fruit Company, and he would later return to Central America to empower the workers in these places with his ideas of racial pride,” writes Senior.

So, at age 27, Garvey started the UNIA with his wife, Amy Ashwood Garvey, and twenty-six years later in 1940 at age 52, he died in London, England. He was buried there until his remains would later be re-interred in Jamaica in 1964 at the National Heroes Park. He also became Jamaica’s first national hero in 1969. Much of Garvey’s work in the UNIA was done alongside his wives, Amy Ashwood Garvey and Amy Jacques Garvey, who were also very involved in the leadership of the organization.

Armstrong, who passed away on August 17, 2018, notes in his 2000 memoir, Bromley, Tireless Champion for Just Causes, written with Sheldon Taylor that when he met community leader Donald Moore in 1950, he enjoyed their discussions.

“Though nearing sixty when I met him, he still professed a commitment to the radical politics of Marcus Garvey and the UNIA. In fact, the Toronto branch of that organization was founded in 1919 in his tailor shop when it was located on Spadina Avenue,” he writes in book published by Vitabu Publications in 2000.

Armstrong notes that Toronto’s only Black lawyer, B.J. Spencer Pitt, became the president of the UNIA in the late 1920s and that its survival “was the product of a small number of men and women who laboured intensely to keep it solvent.” The UNIA members bought the building at 355 College Street and it became “a community centre where Black adults and children went to socialize, attend debates, danced, and played music.”

When B. Denham Jolly arrived in Toronto from his studies in Guelph, Ontario, he sought out “a rooming house on Manning Avenue, near Queen Street, run by a Jamaican woman named Violet Williams (later Blackman, when she married a Barbadian railway engineer.)”

Speaking of Violet, who immigrated to Canada in 1920 as a nanny, he notes that she became a community leader in 1924 when Marcus Garvey visited Toronto to set up a branch of his Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA).

“Violet joined the movement and eventually worked her way up to female president. The Toronto chapter grew in importance in the 1930s when the U.S. banned Garvey from entry, and he held his annual UNIA conventions in Toronto in 1936, 1937, and 1938. During the 1937 conference, he conducted a summer school in African philosophy in Toronto, and visited Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. His influence in Canada was enormous,” writes Jolly in his memoir, In the Black: My Life published in 2017 by ECW Press.

Jolly notes that Garvey’s “torch was still burning bright when I arrived in Toronto in spring of 1956, sixteen years after his death; UNIA and Garvey’s philosophy were still thriving in the city, an very much so at Violet’s house on Manning Avenue.” In his search for a summer job, she sent him to meet Harry Gairey, a fellow Jamaican, who was a railway porter, one of Toronto’s leading Black activists, and a leader in the Garvey movement.

The chair that Marcus Garvey sat in at the UNIA Hall in Toronto, Canada, now housed at the Jamaican Canadian Association

Meanwhile, historian Natasha L. Henry in her book, Emancipation Day: Celebrating Freedom in Canada, published by Dundurn Press in 2010 and reprinted recently, notes that Garvey toured Canada, visiting several branches of the UNIA, “including branches in Sydney, Nova Scotia; Toronto; and Montreal. He also fuelled the establishment of new branches.”

Henry notes that the UNIA also participated in Emancipation Day celebrations in Canada, and Marcus Garvey himself was a supporter of Emancipation Day commemorations.

“The aim of the formation of the UNIA was to provide a space in which Blacks could work cohesively to improve their social, political, and economic conditions; to address matters of concern to them locally and globally; and to foster racial pride,” writes Henry. She notes that Bob Marley’s lyrics in Redemption Song originated from a speech delivered by Garvey in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in 1937, in which he says: “We are going to emancipate ourselves from mental slavery because whilst others might free the body, none but ourselves can free the mind….”

In her doctoral thesis, “For the Freedom of the Black People”: Case Studies on the Universal Negro Improvement Association in Canada, 1900-1950, Carla Marano includes the voices of Garveyites such as Marjorie Lewsey, Gwen Johnston and Violet Blackman.

Referencing many sources, including No Burden to Carry: Narratives of Black Working Women in Ontario 1920s to 1950s, edited by Dionne Brand and published by Women’s Press, Toronto, 1991, and interviews done by others, Marano ensures that the voices of several Garveyites are telling the story of the UNIA in this city.

A tile from 355 College Street, once home of the UNIA Hall, on display at A Different Booklist Cultural Centre. It is imprinted with the UNIA abbreviation.

Tony Martin, the late Trinidad and Tobago-born scholar of Africana Studies and professor and chairman of Black Studies at Wellesley College, Massachusetts, has several and written several books about Garvey. He wrote a new preface for Amy Jacques Garvey’s The Philosophy & Opinions of Marcus Garvey or, Africans for the Africans. In Message to the People: The Course of African Philosophy, by Marcus Garvey, edited by Martin and published in 1986 by The Majority Press, the professor notes that Garvey’s “years of all-encompassing triumph coincided with his sojourn in the United States, from 1916-1927.”

“The immediate purpose of The Course of African Philosophy was to train a cadre of UNIA leaders who would carry on the great work of the organization after Garvey’s death. Garvey designed the twenty-two lessons in London and took them to Canada, where, from August 24^th to 31^st 1937 he conducted a regional conference for North American members of the Universal Negro Improvement Association,” writes Martin. For most of September 1937, Garvey trained a select group of UNIA organizers from North America.

The final resting place of Marcus Mosiah Garvey at the National Heroes Park in Kingston, Jamaica

Today, there are many Black community leaders in Canada who follow the philosophy of Garvey and the UNIA in their organizing. There are also authors who continue to reference him in their work. One such is Ian Williams, the Giller Prize-winning author of Reproduction, who in his new book, Disorientation: Being Black in the World, notes the disagreement between Garvey and W. E.B. Du Bois over Pan-Africanism. Published by Random House Canada, the new book will be out on September 21, 2021.

 

Education Ministry Responds to Concerns of Black Communities About Peel District School Board

By Neil Armstrong 

Ontario’s ministry of education is assuring members of the African, Black and Caribbean communities in Peel Region that it is working with the Peel District School Board (PDSB) to dismantle systemic racism and improve governance.

On July 22, Advocacy Peel and other representatives of the communities held a press conference and rally outside the PDSB head office to express their disappointment in recent developments at the Board.  

They said Black parents and community members were hopeful when the education ministry placed the Board under supervision after Arleen Huggins’ investigation “determined that the collective Board and the Director’s Office is lacking both the ability and capacity, and perhaps even more importantly, the will, to address the findings in the report.”  

In a media release, they note that recent developments one year later have community members questioning whether the ministry itself is capable and willing to provide safe schools for all students, free of discrimination.

Among their concerns are “significant changes in leadership at the PDSB while they remain under supervision.”   

“Both the interim permanent director of education, Colleen Russel-Rawlins, and the associate director of equity, Poleen Grewal, are currently absent from the Board. Returning to the Board’s past practice, no community groups are being consulted as part of the selection process for a new director.” 

However, Caitlin Clark, a spokesperson for Education Minister Stephen Lecce, says the Supervisor, Bruce Rodrigues, will work in partnership with the Board to hire a new director of education for the PDSB.

 

"We believe that Ontario's schools must be places where all students learn in safe and inclusive classrooms, free from discrimination and hate. While there has been progress, we know there is more to do, which is why the board will remain under supervision until the minister is satisfied that his directives are fully addressed and fulfilled to dismantle systemic racism and improve governance.

 

“Mr. Rodrigues will continue to work with the Board's senior administration and with the Board of Trustees to ensure good governance of the Board, equity and to address issues related to disproportional access to learning opportunities for all Peel students. Mr. Rodrigues will - in partnership with the Board - also manage the recruitment and hiring of a qualified and appropriate new Director of Education for Peel District School Board."

 

Meanwhile, Advocacy Peel board member, Colin Winston-Browne, notes that “white supremacy never goes away on its own” and that, “without strong anti-racist leadership at the board, change will not happen.”

The groups say the government’s comments on the math curriculum is a reversal of the anti-racist direction the ministry took on the release of the ministry report a year ago.  

Echoing the sentiments of most Black, African and Caribbean residents, community organizer Idris Orughu is “disappointed that the ministry raised our hopes only to let us down.  It will be difficult to trust the minister of education unless he returns to the path he was on when he placed the board under supervision due to its systemic anti-Black racism.”

The report on the PDSB is conscious that its findings of anti-Black racism are not unique to the Peel Region.  “Indeed, the recommendations we offer may be instructional to other school boards across the province,” notes the Review of the Peel District School Board.

Advocacy Peel and the community representatives said the only way to regain the trust of the community is to stay the course until anti-Black racism is eradicated from the Peel District School Board. 

 “Now is not the time to try and turn us around.  We are not going anywhere and will fight with greater intensity if they continue to marginalize our children,” says Paula Hylton, another Advocacy Peel board member.

 

 

The ministry of education says it will continue to drive real, meaningful change for Black and racialized children in Ontario, including through the new destreamed Grade 9 math curriculum and the end of discretionary suspensions for students from kindergarten to grade 3, which disproportionately impacted racialized children. 

 

“We have mandated that all education staff, trustees, and senior school board staff have human rights, anti-racism and anti-discrimination training, and rescinded regulation 274, so that students see themselves reflected that [sic] their educators by ensuring hiring is done based on merit, qualification, and diversity in Ontario. We will continue to take action to counter racism and act to ensure all students feel safe, respected, and included within Ontario's schools.”

 

The education ministry notes that while the board has made progress over the past year towards meeting the minister's directions related to good governance in the interest of all students, it nonetheless remains under supervision until the binding directions are addressed to the minister's satisfaction.

 

While under supervision, the supervisor is vested with the authority of the board and, accordingly, is responsible for the recruitment and hiring of the director of education, including the composition of the hiring panel.

 

The ministry says the supervisor continues to provide regular updates on work underway at the board, in response to deliverables and timelines outlined in the minister's directions.

 

On June 19, 2020, Bruce Rodrigues was appointed as Supervisor of the Peel District School Board (PDSB) with a mandate to enable the Board to provide good governance in the interests of all students of the board, including ensuring implementation of the minister's binding directions issued on March 13, 2020.

 

The concerns in the PDSB that led to the Supervision of the Board were substantial. Since the start of Supervision, the PDSB has made significant progress in providing good governance and leadership to the board, including addressing issues of systemic racism, specifically anti-Black racism, and discrimination, says the ministry.

 

It says this work to address the systemic issues in the PDSB are ongoing as Rodrigues has taken a number of important steps to address these concerns, including:  hiring a governance expert to establish procedures and practices for effective and equitable board governance; establishing an Equity Office, including the hiring of a Superintendent of Equity and an Equity Outreach Office; supporting the development of an anti-racism policy; and developing human rights, equity and governance training for all trustees.

 

 

Jamaican Canadians Join in Celebrating Miss Lou in Anthology

By Neil Armstrong

Photo credit: Sophia Findlay        Lorna Goodison, poet, author, academic and former Poet Laureate of Jamaica, 2017-2020 

A soon-to-be-published anthology celebrating Jamaica’s cultural ambassador, the late Louise Bennett-Coverley, includes the contributions of several Jamaicans, some of whom live in Toronto or used to call Toronto home but have returned to their birthplace. It also includes the Canadian librarian of a university in Ontario that houses the Louise Bennett Coverley ‘Miss Lou’ fonds.

 

Ms Lou 100+ Voices Anthology, to be published by The UWI Press, is the brainchild of Professor Opal Palmer Adisa, University Director of the Institute for Gender and Development Studies at The University of the West Indies, Mona, and the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, Government of Jamaica. 

 

In early 2019, there was an open call from Professor Adisa for entries for an anthology featuring 100 voices in honour of Miss Lou’s 100^th birthday, #misslou100. Entries could fall in one of six categories: academic, reflection, poetry, children’s works, stories, and illustrations. 

 

The anthology was not ready in time for Miss Lou’s 100^th birthday celebrations on September 7, 2019 and was further delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. It is expected out later this year and will be published by the UWI Press.

 

There are over-330 pages in the book which has 110 articles written by 105 contributors. The publication is divided into four sections: One Big Family, Reaffirming Our Culture, Aunty Roachy Seh, and Engaging in a Quarrel with History.

 

Lorna Goodison Foreword: Simply Love

Poet, author, painter and academic Lorna Goodison has written the foreword “Simply Love.” She used to divide her time between Ann Arbor, Michigan; Toronto; and Halfmoon Bay, British Columbia. In 2017, she was appointed as Jamaica’s Poet Laureate, succeeding Mervyn Morris and this year Olive Senior became the nation’s new poet laureate. 

Photos contributed   Fabian Coverley and Pamela Appelt, co-executors of the Estate of Louise Bennett-Coverley

 

Section One: One Big Family 

 

Section One: One Big Family includes articles written by Fabian Coverley and Pamela Appelt, son and longtime friend of Miss Lou, respectively, and co-executors of the Estate of Louise Bennett-Coverley, and me.

 

In 1987, Appelt was appointed the first female Afro-Canadian to serve as a judge of the Court of Canadian Citizenship, a position she held for 11 years before retiring to  pursue other interests. During her tenure, she administered the ceremony where Miss Lou took the oath of citizenship. A member of the council of the Institute of Jamaica, Appelt was also the co-chair of the committee for the 50^th anniversary celebration of Jamaica’s Independence in Toronto in 2012.

 

Her piece is titled ‘Reflections and Memories,’ while Coverley’s article is ‘My Mother, My Friend.’ 

 

Coverley, who has 50 years of experience in the fire detection protection industry with services in Canada, Kuwait, USA, UK, Africa and Europe, was a broadcast engineer in Jamaica and Canada. 

 

He is married to Olive for 46 years and they are the proud parents of sons, Clayton, Craig, Jamie, and adore their granddaughter, Caylen. 

 

The CEO of Coverley Holdings Inc. and director/consultant of International Agencies Management Inc. (IAMI) has established the Louise Bennett Coverley Foundation, (LBCF) with the mission of “Maintaining the Memories and Legacy of Louise Bennett and Eric Coverley Alive.” 

 

 

In the piece that I have written, ‘You Can’t Bury Creativity,’ I reflect on the many interviews and conversations I had with Miss Lou.

Photo contributed      Kevin Ormsby, founder and artistic director of KasheDance

 

 

Section Two: Reaffirming Our Culture

 

Kevin Ormsby and Lisa Tomlinson collaborated to write ‘A Ring Ding Love Affair.’

 

Artistic director of KasheDance, Kevin A. Ormsby works as a dancer/choreographer and Arts strategies consultant. He is the program manager for Cultural Pluralism in the Arts Movement Ontario (CPAMO), professor of Dance Performance at Centennial College and an adjunct artist with Dance Exchange in Washington, D.C. 

 

The 2016 Ontario Arts Council Chalmers Fellowship recipient and Toronto Arts Council’s Cultural Leaders Lab Fellow appeared on Miss Lou’s popular children’s program, Ring Ding, on JBC Television.

 

With a career that spans over 30 years, Ormsby has performed with various companies and projects in Canada, the Caribbean and the U.S. He currently sits on the Board of Nia Centre for the Arts, Dance Collection Danse, and Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts.

Photo contributed   Dr. Lisa Tomlinson, author and lecturer in literary and cultural studies,  the Institute of Caribbean Studies and Reggae Studies Unit, The UWI

 

Lisa Tomlinson, an author of two books, Una Marson (2019) and The African-Jamaican Aesthetic: Cultural Retention and Transformation Across Borders (2017), has taught at universities and colleges throughout the Greater Toronto Area. 

 

She specializes in literary and cultural studies of the Caribbean and African diaspora. Tomlinson is currently a lecturer at the University of the West Indies, Mona campus in Kingston, Jamaica, where she teaches undergraduate courses in literature and film.

Photo contributed   Grace Carter-Henry Lyons, 

Grace Carter-Henry Lyons, the founder and musical director of the Heritage Singers, a group founded in 1977, wrote ‘Friend of the Heritage Singers in Canada’ regarding Miss Lou.

The group aims to promote the development of Caribbean folk music and theatre; use folk singing and dance as tools to bridge cultural gaps internationally; enhance, ethnic, historic and social traditions; and to share that heritage with the larger community.

Since its inception, the Heritage Singers has performed in Jamaica, the U.S., Netherlands, Taiwan, Germany, Mexico and Venezuela; produced recordings and videos; and been the subject of a CBC documentary. 

Photo credit: Neil Armstrong     Pamela ('Pam') Mordecai, author and academic

Section Three: Aunty Roachy Seh 

 

 

Poet, author and academic Pamela ('Pam') Mordecai wrote ‘Bawl Woman Bawl.’

 

A former language arts teacher with a PhD in English, she was for fourteen years editor of the Caribbean Journal of Education. The author of over thirty books including textbooks, children's books, six collections of poetry, a reference work on Jamaica (with her late husband, Martin), a collection of short fiction and a novel, her creative and critical writing appears in numerous journals, as well as in major anthologies of Caribbean and African-Canadian literature. 

 

Her writing for children and adults is represented in anthologies and textbooks on both sides of the Atlantic as well as in West Africa and Malaysia. She has a strong interest in promoting the writing of Caribbean women and has edited and co-edited ground-breaking anthologies of their writing.  

Photo credit: Sophia Findlay       Lillian Allen performing at Reggae Lane in Little Jamaica, Toronto

 

Lillian Allen, grassroots artist, cultural activist and university professor has written ‘Queenie Queenie and Colonial Empire.’

 

She is a professor of creative writing at Ontario College of Art and Design University (OCAD) and a two-time JUNO Award winner and trailblazer in the field of spoken word and dub poetry.

 

Allen artistically explores the aesthetics of old and new sounds in music to create her distinctive leading edge brand of Canadian reggae with new world sounds in her poetry recordings, with her powerful reggae dub poetry/spoken word recordings, including her latest single Woken & Unbroken (2018), album ANXIETY (2012), her ground-breaking first solo Juno award-winning album Revolutionary Tea Party, a Ms. Magazine Landmark Album, followed by another Juno winner, Conditions Critical. 

 

Her third album, Freedom & Dance and her recording for children and young people, Nothing But a Hero, were released to critical acclaim.

Photo contributed        Nadia L. Hohn, author and teacher

 

 

Nadia L. Hohn is a dynamic "story lady" who has presented to audiences in Canada, United States, United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Jamaica, and Trinidad.  

 

Her contribution in the Miss Lou anthology is entitled ‘Louise Go a Country.’

 

Hohn’s first two books, Music and Media in the Sankofa Series, were published by Rubicon Publishing in 2015.  Her award-winning first picture book, Malaika's Costume was published in 2016 and its sequel Malaika's Winter Carnival 2017 by Groundwood Books. Hohn is also the author of Harriet Tubman: Freedom Fighter, an early reader by Harper Collins published in December 2018.  

 

A Likkle Miss Lou: How Jamaican Poet Louise Bennett-Coverley Found Her Voice, Hohn’s nonfiction picture book was published in 2019 by Owlkids. 

 

She is an elementary school teacher in Toronto and has taught early years music in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. 

Photo contributed    Owen "Blakka" Ellis, actor, writer and teacher

 

Actor, writer and teacher, Owen ‘Blakka’ Ellis has written ‘Mi Name Jamaica.’

 

Ellis is an established artist who is also involved in education and training. He has conducted workshops and training seminars for development workers, cultural agents, Peace Corps volunteers, diplomats, teachers and performing artists locally and internationally. These projects include working in places such as England, Germany, Canada and Zimbabwe.

 

Photo credit: Klive Walker, author, music historian and cultural critic

 

Section Four: Engaging in a Quarrel with History 

 

Klive Walker’s contribution is titled ‘The Truth Must Reveal Itself.’

 

He is a UK-born Jamaican-Canadian author, music historian and cultural critic who is a specialist in reggae culture, its birth in Jamaica and its adventures in Canada, the United States and the UK. Walker also writes about jazz, rock and hip hop. 

His writing is not confined to music, he discusses photography and is an analyst of international cinema with a focus on Caribbean films from the region and the diaspora. 

Walker’s book Dubwise: Reasoning from the Reggae Underground was published by Insomniac Press in 2005. His essay “The Journey of Reggae in Canada” appears in  Global Reggae edited by Carolyn Cooper (UWI Press, 2012). His reggae timeline is showcased in Nadia Hohn’s children’s book, Music (Rubicon, 2015). The book, Ears, Eyes, Voice: Black Canadian Photojournalists 1970s-1990s, (BAND, 2019) features his essay “Essential Thermometer.” 

 

Ajamu Nangwaya’s article is ‘Miss Lou, Organic Intellectual of the Jamaican Masses 

In her Examination of Racial Politics.’

 

Nangwaya is a former lecturer in the Institute of Caribbean Studies, the University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica. He is co-editor (with Michael Truscello) of Why Don’t the People Rise Up? Organizing the Twenty-First Century Resistance and (with Kali Akuno) of Jackson Rising: The Struggle for Economic Democracy and Black Self-Determination in Jackson, Mississippi. 

 

Photo credit: Eddie Grant       Vivian Lewis, McMaster University Librarian and Olivia Grange, Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, Government of Jamaica

 

McMaster University Librarian, Vivian Lewis, has penned her article, ‘Celebrating Miss Lou’s Historical Record: A Canadian Perspective’

 

 

Lewis was reappointed for a five-year term as McMaster University Librarian in 2018.

 

Since her appointment in 2013, the Library has made significant contributions in support of the University’s broader research mission, taking a leadership role in key campus-wide projects.

  

Lewis is a recognized leader in her field. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) and the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC), both headquartered in Washington, D.C. She was a member of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Association of Research Libraries from 2014 to 2018. 

 

Lewis first came to McMaster in 1991 as a government information specialist. She assumed the role of Associate University Librarian in 2003.