AfricaNow! October 30, 2024 Meditations On: Black Labor & ‘The White Architects of Black Education’

Topic and Guest: From our archives--Labor has changed. Its production. Its definition. Its control. But one thing that has not changed are the parameters within which labor has been defined, its value extracted and dehumanized – mechanized – automated – artificially intelligentized.

What does "Labor" mean in a settler imperial world fortified by racial capitalist sociopolitical and cultural structures that maintain a social order that places the African and African descendant worker, beyond the periphery of benefiting from their labor? What about decolonizing labor and labor movements?

What about a world without work----What are the ideological frameworks that ‘labor’ is using to attempt to construct the material realities of our current world? .... Today, Dr. Kamau Rashid joins us in conversation where we meditate on black labor and the white architects of black education.

Our thoughts are centered on William H. Watkins work, the White Architects of Black Education: Ideology and Power, 1865-1954. In the White Architects of Black Education, Watkins “explores the body of ideas that undergird social, economic, racial, and educational beliefs about Black education in the U.S.: therefore, it is an ideological study. His stated objective is to investigate the ideological construction of colonial Black education by examining the views, politics, and practices of the white architects that funded, created, and refined it. Supporting this approach, Watkins argues that “a body of ideas serves to rationalize and justify any political, or economic system, but ideology helps organize our world and explains it in relation to power and vested interest” [1-2].

Watkins work highlights that “the white architects of black education represented great power and wealth. Most often they stood for the interests of northern capital and white southern expediency. Therefore, “colonial education in the South must never be confused with the educational agenda of blacks in the south. In fact, these agenda conflicted” [2].
The central question guiding this discussion, simply asks: How far have we moved away from these foundational ideas and their ideological grounding?

Dr. Kamau Rashid is currently Professor and Founding Director of the Urban Education, Ed.D. program at Northeastern Illinois University. ...

Dr. Rashid work focuses on African American history and culture, particularly on the inter-generational dynamics of African/a social critique, ....

Lastly, likely most importantly, Dr. Rashid is active in a number of community organizations in the Chicago-area including the Kemetic Institute of Chicago, a research and educational organization focused on mapping, exploring and applying the ancient and contemporary contributions of ancient Nile Valley civilizations.

MUSIC ON THE SHOW: intro--“YOU’VE GOT HAVE FREEDOM” BY PHAROAH SANDERS; closing--“OUTUBRO” BY MILTON NASCIMENTO & ESPERANZA SPALDING commemorating their birthdays—Milton Nascimento (October 26, 1942—); Esperanza Spalding (October 18, 1984—).

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Originally broadcast on WPFW 89.3FM, Washington, DC. Tune into AfricaNow! live on WPFW 89.3 FM in the Washington, DC Metropolitan area or visit www.wpfwfm.org on Wednesdays from 1:00 to 2:00PM (U.S. Eastern).

AfricaNow! Oct. 30, 2024 Meditations On--Black Labor & ‘The White Architects of Black Education’

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AfricaNow! Oct. 30, 2024 Meditations On--Black Labor & ‘The White Architects of Black Education’

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