Category: Culture

Culture

7 Must-Visit Museums in the U.S. Honoring Black History, Culture and Resilience

By Recommend Staff | recommend.com

We’ve handpicked a selection of museums across the U.S. that you’ll want to recommend to clients interested in exploring Black history.

National Museum of African American History and Culture, D.C.
In D.C., the National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC), part of the Smithsonian Institution, features exhibits on slavery, the Civil Rights Movement, arts, music, sports and more. Highlights include Harriet Tubman’s hymnal; Nat Turner’s bible; a plantation cabin from South Carolina; guard tower from Angola prison; Chuck Berry’s red Cadillac convertible; and works by prolific artists such as Charles Alston, Elizabeth Catlett, Romare Bearden, and Henry O. Tanner.

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Culture, Identity

Black diversity: Panelists discuss the African diaspora experience

By Jennifer Micale | BingUNews

Immigrants and their children negotiate between two worlds: the culture, language and traditions of their homeland and those of their adopted country. Or as Kelechi Ibe-Lamberts’ mother put it: “When you come into this house, you’re Nigerian. When you leave this house, you’re American.”

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Culture

Nigerian cultural group hosts cultural festival in Canada

By Jimoh Babatunde | Vanguard

The organizers of the annual Global Black & African Festival of Arts & Culture (GBAFACC) say all arrangements have been concluded to have a successful celebration. The co-founder and operations director, Edo Global Royal Art and Culture Canada, Jackson Osamede Igbinosun, made this known while revealing that the Global Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture billed for December 11-12, in Toronto, Canada, would hold virtually this year due to COVID-19 restrictions on physical gatherings.

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Culture

How to Experience and Appreciate the Vibrant East African Culture in the Twin Cities

By Becki Iverson | Qalanjo

‌STEAM RISES FROM A CUP OF CARDAMOM AND CLOVE TEA. Fragrant fish curry bubbles. Meat kebabs sizzle next to a half-dozen flaky, golden sambusas. This doesn’t sound like a typical meal you’d get in the Midwest, a region best known for hot dishes and casserole. But, in fact, this kind of cuisine is common in East African restaurants in Minneapolis, the new vanguard of global dining in the Twin Cities and the most visible element of a thriving immigrant community. 

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Culture

Odunde, largest African American street festival, goes virtual for 45th anniversary

BY SINEAD CUMMINGS | PhillyVoice

The largest African American street festival in the country annually takes place in Philadelphia. Typically held on the second Sunday in June, Odunde draws large crowds supporting and celebrating African culture.

The festival’s concept originates from the Yoruba people of Nigeria, West Africa. Odunde is a Yoruba word that means “Happy New Year.”

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Culture, Education

Carleton University’s Institute for African Studies Celebrates 10 Years of Impact

By Tyrone Burke | Carleton Newsroom

In 2009, Carleton became home to the first stand-alone, degree-granting Institute of African Studies in Canada. It brought together scholars who were studying Africa in a diverse set of disciplines to pursue a coherent, Africa-focused research program.

 Continue reading “Carleton University’s Institute for African Studies Celebrates 10 Years of Impact” →
Culture

African Student Union celebrates heritage, mental health awareness at University of Georgia

By Mikaela Cohen

To embrace African heritage and ignite a mental health discussion, the University of Georgia’s African Student Union showcased a series of traditional African dances weaved through a story of a modern African family facing mental health issues during the “African Night”

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Culture

‘Taste of Africa’ slated for Rusk library
  • By Jo Anne Embleton

RUSK – Arts, crafts and delicious cuisines from the African and African-American culture are the focal point of “A Taste of Africa Arts and Culture” exhibit, slated from 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at the Rusk Public Library, 207 E 6th St.

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Culture

African culture celebrated at Heritage Fest Miami

The Black History Month event was held S at the Arsht Center.

Sheron Williams, sales director of Concerned African Women Inc., shed some historic light on African head-wrapping to show Black women have been “fly” for centuries.

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Culture

Diaspora Showcase brings African culture to Tucson

By Rogelio Mares

The history of African Americans in Tucson is rich, full of names, dates and titles.

During segregation if you were black you could only learn that history at the Dunbar Academy.

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Culture

African Festival of the Arts Celebrates 30th Anniversary This Labor Day Weekend

By Angel Idowu

“Africa is here and it’s a good thing,” says Patrick Saingbey-Woodtor, founder of Chicago’s African Festival of the Arts, which celebrates its 30th anniversary this weekend in Washington Park.

The festival was initially created to bring attention to Saingbey-Woodtor’s Window to Africa shop and Hyde Park’s Harper Court. It has since grown into an annual weekend celebration that draws crowds from across the country with live music, fine art, food and more.

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Communities, Culture

Separate festivals honor African, African American heritage, culture

Separate festivals honor African, African American heritage, culture

By Eric Lagatta


Columbus has long been home to African Americans who have contributed to the city’s rich tapestry. For decades, the neighborhood now known as the King-Lincoln District has buzzed with African American business owners, musicians and artists. And throughout the city, African immigrants are bringing their own cultures to Ohio’s capital.

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Culture

Laolu Senbanjo: Broklyn based- Nigerian visual artist paints Serena Williams for the cover of Essence Magazine

Laolu Senbanjo is a brooklyn-based Nigerian body artist who has done so many works that speak for themselves. He painted fBeyoncé for her album, Lemonade. His latest work is with the American tennis super star, Serena Williams, on the cover of the September issue of Essence.

In the magazine’s cover, the tennis player rocks the daring body art of the Nigerian visual artist in a way that gives her a daring look.

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Culture

‘It’s very important to share our culture’: Folklorama’s 1st-ever Egyptian pavilion takes flight

A sold-out show and a colourful, high-energy vibe set the tone Sunday at Folklorama’s first-ever Egyptian pavilion — an effort organizers say was years in the making.

More than 400 people packed into the University of Manitoba’s University Centre Multi-Purpose Room to take in performances of Egyptian dances, snack on traditional foods and a view a photography display from select parts of the north African country.

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Culture, Education

Indiana University starts course to teach Rwandan national language, Kinyarwanda

If you are living in the United States and wish to learn Kinyarwanda – Rwanda’s vernacular, your destination has been unveiled.

Indiana University (IU) in the United States will start offering a course in Kinyarwanda, making it the 8th African language the university is teaching under its African Studies Program.

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Culture

Smithsonian exhibit shows how Senegalese women used jewelry to project power.

BY PENNY DICKERSON

The measure of a woman’s worth has historically been associated with her appearance. An arguable Western society bias, the latter conceptually crosses the African Diaspora to the coast of Dakar – the cosmopolitan capital of Senegal where aesthetics both define and convey more than an affinity for fashion but transcend wealth, aristocracy, prestige and preference. 

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Culture

Kehinde Wiley’s Black Rock Senegal Residency Announced 16 Artists Selected for Inaugural Year

by VICTORIA L. VALENTINE

BLACK ROCK SENEGAL announced the first group of artists selected for the residency program established by Kehinde Wiley. Located in Dakar, Black Rock is hosting an international slate of 16 artists working in a variety of disciplines, including painting, sculpture, photography, film, and one writer, from August 2019 and April 2020. The news was released today by Stephen Friedman, Wiley’s London gallery.

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Culture

National Folklore Ensemble represents Egypt in North Carolina

By Mustafa Marie 

The National Folklore Ensemble of Egypt is participating in the Carolina Festival in the United States of America. 

During its participation in the grand art festival, the band performed a series of dances reflecting an authentic part of Egyptian traditions and heritage. The event will end on July 30th.

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Culture

DanceAfrica: Pittsburgh returns to Kelly Strayhorn Theater for three days of African cultural immersion

By Amanda Waltz

Audiences will be immersed in three days of history and traditions of African art when DanceAfrica: Pittsburgh returns to Kelly Strayhorn Theater from Fri., July 26-Sun., July 28.

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Culture

Ko-Thi African Dancers Honor the Past, Prepare for the Future

By John Schneider

In 1969, just into her 20s, Ferne Yangyeitie Caulker won the opportunity to study with the National Dance Company of Ghana, West Africa. A native of Sierra Leone already living and studying modern dance in Milwaukee (“It’s a long story,” she says), she’d set her sights on dancing with the famed Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre in New York City. She’d even received an encouraging letter from Ailey. Then, in Ghana, she visited Elmina Castle, the most famous of the fortresses along the Ghana coast used by Americans and Europeans as holding pens for captured Africans.

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Culture, Festivals

Delou Africa, Inc. Will Host African Diaspora Dance & Drum Festival of Florida in August

Delou Africa, Inc. will celebrate its 10 year anniversary by hosting the African Diaspora Dance & Drum Festival of Florida on August 2-4, 2019 at Little Haiti Cultural Complex (212 NE 59th Terrace, Miami, FL 33137).

“Our yearly festival is a springboard to community capacity building, to increase understanding within and between communities and to stimulate dialogue and increase awareness and sensitivity for culture within the African Diaspora,” says Njeri Plato, Executive Director, Delou Africa, Inc.

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Culture

Egyptian-born artist opens art gallery in America

By Ryan Kneller

For decades, Phillipsburg artist Mohamed Bayoumi Mansour followed in the footsteps of his older brother, Ali Bayoumi. Bayoumi, a professor of architecture and prominent Egyptian artist, inspired Mansour to nurture his creativity and pursue his own career in the arts.

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Culture

DanceAfrica celebrates Rwandan rebirth/renewal in New York

By Zita Allen

Abdel Salaam, artistic director of BAM’S DanceAfrica, has announced that when the 42-year-old festival, founded by the late Baba Chuck Davis, returns to the Brooklyn Academy of Music on Memorial Day weekend (May 24 – 27) it will highlight a dramatic international story of rebirth, reconciliation and transformation in the African nation of Rwanda.

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Culture

Wangechi Mutu-Keep Moving, Keep Making Art

Text by Ananda Pellerin

Hugely prolific multidisciplinary artist Wangechi Mutucame first to the UK as a teenager from Nairobi, before moving to the US where she studied art at Parsons and Cooper Union and completed an MFA in sculpture at Yale. Now working between New York and her home city – Mutu – known for her fantastical drawings, collages, sculptures, installations, performances and film work, regularly returns to themes related to the female body, communication, migration and the human experience.

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Culture

Kenyan-born Wangechi Mutu will make works for New York’s Metropolitan Museum

By Victoria Valentine

THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART in New York recently announced new artist commissions.

The Met plans a series of contemporary art installations at its Fifth Avenue flagship. For one of the projects, Wangechi Mutu is creating sculptures that will be installed in the niches in the museum’s Fifth Avenue facade.

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Culture

Moroccan American Network considers Moroccan cities for 2020 Morocco Day

The first Morocco Day, in Washington, D.C., celebrated the culture and heritage of the city of Zagora, the gate to the Moroccan Sahara desert.

The Moroccan American Network (MAN), an organization dedicated to create business opportunities for Moroccan small enterprises in the US, is preparing a list of Moroccan city candidates for the second annual Morocco Day, in which the culture and heritage of Moroccan cities are celebrated.

The network said in a previous statement that it will celebrate one Moroccan city from each of the 12 regions of the North African country every March 29 for the next 12 years in Washington, D.C.

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Culture

African Migrants Strive to Preserve Their Cultural Heritage

By Sharon Birch-Jeffrey*

To experience a taste of African culture deep inside the Big Apple, visitors – including many Senegalese – turn to Le Petit Senegal (Little Senegal), a West African neighborhood in West Harlem, New York.

African grocery shops, fabric stores, hair braiding parlors and regional restaurants sit shoulder to shoulder along the streets.

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Culture

Africa Salon festival in Yale University to celebrate arts and culture of the diaspora

By Adam Gaberapril

Africa Salon, Yale’s celebration of contemporary African arts and culture, returns to New Haven Friday-Saturday, April 12-13.

The fifth annual festival will bring poets, writers, filmmakers, comedians, and musical artists to Yale and New Haven to showcase the diversity of art and culture throughout the African diaspora.

According to the organizers, at a time when contemporary African art is drawing more eyes than ever, the salon invites audiences to rethink their conceptions of the continent and diaspora — to watch, listen, and respond — and to celebrate the creation and complexity of contemporary African narratives.  

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Culture

Celebrating Africa Culture at Eastern Kentucky University

By Samantha Tamplin

Traditional African dancers, drummers, poets and a panel of speakers performed at Eastern Kentucky University’s Africa Today event on March 22.

The event was hosted by the African Student Association (ASA) and was held in the O’Donnell auditorium in Whitlock.

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Culture

Africa Day at Univeristy of Virginia celebrates black pride and first-generation students
This year Africa Day focused on performances of empowerment
By Maya Das

When she arrived at the University, Uma Jalloh, current president of the University’s Organization of African Students, wanted to showcase her personal experience as a first-generation college student.

Her parents are immigrants from Guinea, but Jalloh was born in the U.S. After moving back to Guinea for a brief period of time, she returned to the United States and has lived in America since the age of six. She describes her experience of coming to America as a time of self-discovery and a chance to find her true identity, which blends both African and American culture.

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