So where is Cornell West? Where is Henry Louis Gates? Where was Leon Higginbotham (who has died, I know) and his daughter Evelyn who is now a professor at Harvard? Where is Lani Guinier?

Wasn't one of the main contributions of W. E. B. Dubois and Franz Fanon the attempt to internationalize the experience of African victims of European slavery and colonialism? Where has that internationalism of Black consciousness gone? Has it been replaced by Hip-Hop?

I don't care if I offend anyone here– if Professor Jonathan Gray is reading this, please explain what happened. The moment is too important to let things like this slide.

See link to members.aol.com
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The OJC and Israel Advocates can turn off the spigot on a tremendous amount of money that comes into the African American community while individual Jews often very devoted to Israel have government positions from which they can spike important public programs serving African Americans.

First off, thanks for taking the time to revisit this. I assumed you were referring to the diversity of thought in the Black community when you made your comment about the Black intellectual community, but upon rereading it I felt compelled to address your phrasing. No harm, no foul.

Now, regarding African American support of Palestine, and here I won't pretend to speak for anyone but myself: I support a two state resolution with limited rights of return and a return to some approximation of the 1967 border. When I was an idealistic undergrad three political events moved me to tears. One was watching Nelson Mandela walk out of prison. The second was the death of Ken Saro-Wiwa. The third was the assassination of Rabin by a f***ing settler. They were tears of joy, tears of frustration and tears of despair respectively. So. Now that I have gotten that out of the way…

I want to share something with you, something that you probably already know. Being a Black intellectual in the post-Jesse Jackson, post-Farrakhan, post-Leonard Jeffries academia means that you watch what you say about Jews, at least until you get tenure. I am only half kidding. So perhaps there was a bit of self-censuring when Sam showed his middle-agedness, but it wasn't that I didn't have anything to say it was that I didn't want to turn the topic into a mano-a-mano about our understandings and misgivings regarding Hip Hop and neo-con Zionism. Again, I'd love to have that conversation, and with Sam if possible, perhap under the aegis of something on cultural blind spots.

Oh and Madrid, there is a ton of hip hop that comments on the Palestinian situation. This work tends not to receive much airplay, but its out there. For example Mos Def and Talib Kweli performed a song on the Chappelle Show called What's Beef. The song was a critique of the attention paid to conflicts between rap artists relative to imperialistic injustice throughout the world. Mos Def's lyrics contain the following:

…Yeah, beef is not what Ja-Rule said to 50
Beef is Weldon Irv not bein here with me
When a soldier ends his life with his own gun
Beef is tryin' to figure out what to tell his son
Beef is oil prices and geopolitics
Beef is Iraq, the West Bank, and Gaza Strip
Some beef is big and some beef is small
But what y'all call beef is not beef at all…

Still, when political hip hop critiques imperialism it tends to do so in ways that reference the more direct concerns of the Black community. So, things like police brutality, the prison-industrial complex, the exploitation of black labor abroad (think Haitian sweatshops), conflict diamonds. It would be nice if american hip hop artists engaged the situation in Palestine as directly as Mos does above, but, you know it might be bad for record sales if ADF calls for a boycott of your record.

and Madrid, I forgot to mention that Cornell West does a tremendous amount of work on Palestine with Michael Lerner in support of Palestinians. And that work gets roundly ignored by organizations like the Center for Jewish History, for the reasons that Phil enumerates above

Mighty Mos oughta be a requirement on the curriculum:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=IxvQKZPb6Wo

…
There are places where TB is common as TV
Cause foreign-based companies go and get greedy
The type of cats who pollute the whole shore line
Have it purified, sell it for a dollar twenty-five
Now the world is drinkin it (New World Water)
Your moms, wife, and baby girl is drinkin it (New World Water)
Up north and down south is drinkin it (New World Water)
You should just have to go to your sink for it (New World Water)
The cash registers is goin "cha-chink!" for it (New World Water)

Fluorocarbons and monoxide
Got the fish lookin cockeyed
Used to be free now it cost you a fee
Cause it's all about gettin that cash (Money!)
Said it's all about gettin that cash (Money!)
Said it's all about gettin that cash (Money!)
Said it's all about gettin that cash (Money!)

with such a friend who needs an enemy.

with such a friend who needs an enemy.

with such a friend who needs an enemy.

rabin? israelis/jews are made so insane rabin couldnt even lie without getting killed.

Cause it's all about penguins that splash (Monkey!)
Said it's all about penguins that splash (Monkey!)