Writing: Some final, final edits on the Kairos pieces that are due this week. Publishing in web text form has certainly opened up new options. For example, the editors felt the issue would benefit from a kind of conclusion, so my buddy Todd Craig and I decided to record one, give it a light edit, and submit the audio in place of a written one.

Teaching: This past week I taught Darkroom: A Memoir in Black and White by Lila Quintero Weaver. The graphic novel explores the author’s experience growing up as a white passing Latina in the 1960s racially segregated Alabama. In class, we are reading through the filter of anti-racist pedagogy, especially Thandeka’s ideas about learning to be white through white inter-communal abuse. Here are the discussion prompts we used in class:

What are the key instances in which Lila is disciplined, abused, or socialized into “becoming” white? Who or what is acting upon her (person, law, social arrangement)? What effect does this have on her?

What are the key instances in which Lila is participating in a process of “becoming” white? 

Listening: The new Madlib album Sound Ancestors, which starts slow but ends strong.

Bonus listening: A bunch of records made, pressed, or bought in Detroit — which I laid down into an hour+ mix and posted on my Soundcloud. Spiritual jazz, modern Detroit techno, funky house – all bases covered on this one while playing from the hip.