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Originally posted by ktsnake
What are the cultural asili and the utamawazo if you wouldn't mind explaining? Those are terms I've never heard.
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Consisder yourself lucky. They're terms that were brought into the African American/Africana studies lexicon by Dr. Marimba (Richards) Ani, in her book
Yurugu. In a nutshell, the
asili represents culturally structured thought. Ani would say that the idea of European cultural supremacy is an example of the Caucasian/European
asili. The
utamawazo is the act/state of putting the asili into action. It's how a culture -- European, African, or otherwise -- structures its collective thought patterns and influences the culture so that all within it adhere to it.
If you're not a student of philosophy, they're kind of dense concepts. Even if you are a student of philosophy, it's some chewy stuff.
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When whites and other races reply to Cosby's remarks as "Not my fight, not my concern", I think it's a problem. Not just the plight of one race, but poverty in general is everyone's problem. When we see poverty so concentrated on one segment of the population, we really need to look at ways we can fix that.
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ktsnake, are you sure you're not a closet Liberal?
Seriously - this is probably one of the better responses I've seen to this whole issue about "their" issues versus "our" issues. If you're human, it's your concern. If you're a citizen of the world (or even a Citizen of the United States), you should be concerned that there are more African American men in prison than in University -- no matter what your skin color/race. I should be just as concerned about the poor whites in Appalachia as I am about the poor blacks in public housing projects.
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To my ears, it's a welcome substitute for the messages of victimization and entitlement that have become far too common.
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Mine too. I'm not blind enough to say that we can ignore the effects of history and economic/social discrimination, but dammit -- we're (meaning Black Americans) are decendants of people who chose to survive.
We're stronger than we realize - and that's what I get out of messages like Cosby's and others. We need to start looking in the mirror and asking ourselves what we can do to better our individual -- and thus, our collective --realities. Like MJ said, start with the man in the mirror and ask him to make that change.