Our Time PressThe Local Paper with the Global View

The African Burial Ground
More than a decade ago in New York City, archeologists excavated one of the most significant finds in American history: the largest known intact colonial African cemetery in America, the African Burial Ground. Stretching more than five city blocks, from Broadway beyond Lafayette Street to the east and from Chambers beyond Duane Street to the north, the cemetery was discovered in 1991 during the construction of a federal office building at 290 Broadway.
The remains of approximately 20,000 enslaved Africans were buried in the Lower Manhattan cemetery, which opened in the late 1600s and closed in 1795, and at that time represented the outskirts of the city proper. The remains of more than 400 men, women, and children were discovered carefully shrouded, buried mostly in hexagonal coffins, with coins and other artifacts. Half of those discovered were under the age of twelve, and some 1.5 million artifacts clothing, food, and other materials-were found at the burial ground and construction site. The discovery was a staggering one for anthropologists, historians, and the community. More than evidence of the often concealed or overlooked contributions of African Americans to New York City history, the remains are a poignant reminder of the inviolability of the family, community, and cultural ties among enslaved Africans living under the most oppressive of circumstances.
The burial ground, virtually disregarded before 1991, was for nearly 200 years concealed below city buildings, parking lots, and streets. Today it reflects a rich African history and culture in this city, a history that dates back more than 350 years. This fall, after some ten years of study, the ancestral remains from the burial ground will be returned to a permanent resting-place adjacent to 290 Broadway.
The 6-city commemorative ceremony, organized by the Schomburg Center and the U.S. General Services Administration, will  include Washington DC, Baltimore, Wilmington, Philadelphia, Newark and end in Lower Manhattan. The event will take place over five days, in five states and the District of Columbia, ending with an arrival ceremony, vigil, tribute, and reinterment ceremony at the African Burial Ground.
(Schomberg Center for Research in Black Culture)

by  Stanley Kinard

African Spirituality to Mend
a Failed School System
September 8, 2003, will start the first full year of the newly organized school system marked by unprecedented systemic change. There is no longer a central Board of Education, District offices have been eliminated and 110 Livingston Street has been sold.  Community School Boards are more or less defunct.
There is greater confusion as this school year begins than at any time in recent memory. The majority of black educators are angry, yet afraid to speak out against the new system, as our children are being subjected to a dictated curriculum that we have had no part in; designing additional classes are overcrowded and there remains a shortage of teachers.  Parents are confused, left to scratch their heads about where to go with issues regarding transfers and other pertinent questions regarding the education of their children.
Bloomberg is in charge and we no longer have control over our schools.  To be fair and objective, for the past 30 years when we did have some semblance of control of local schools, our community failed miserably to adequately educate Black children. Principals, politicians, parents, paraprofessionals, preachers and teachers must all share in the blame for this failure. Further blame can also be attributed to both the African Nationalists and civil rights leadership who failed to make education a priority. Historically, we have always faced White racist opposition to the education of Black kids. At one point, it was illegal for African children to read or write, then separate inferior schools were legal until Brown v. Topeka Board of Education changed the law in 1954. However, in 2003, we still have separate and unequal schools where our children continue to be miseducated.
Assigning blame for this problem does little, however, to change the current situation. The Bloomberg-Klein agenda for control of schools is in full effect as predicted.  It is not an agenda for African liberation; it is not inclusive or supportive of African-centered learning. While there are some positive attributes, Mayor Bloomberg is not the Messiah who will lead us to the Promised Land. As a matter of fact, if you look around we are losing land, resources and our schools under this administration. Our children are in crisis and awaiting our coming to their rescue. We cannot continue to lose them to drugs, disease, sex, violence, miseducation, MTV and BET.
At this time, my spirit has directed me to embrace a spiritual solution to this crisis, as all else has failed. Spiritual leaders, those with sight and vision, must now take their proper place in leading a crusade to educate African children. It is now time to rely on the one thing that has sustained us as a people throughout our history – Our Spirituality. God was with Harriet Tubman (called Black Moses) during the Underground Railroad. Nat Turner had a vision from God which led to his organizing a slave insurrection, Martin Luther King, Jr. had a dream and was God-filled, and Malcolm stood before us as a spiritually transformed man. We have certainly come this far by Faith, leaning on the Lord. The next major movement for the education of our children must be spiritually based. We will be victorious, when we affirm that GOD not Bloomberg or Bush is still on the throne. Approaching education from that perspective, Bloomberg can’t possibly be in charge.  We must educate our own children. Remember: God is Good All of the Time and All of the Time God is Good. Maferefun Olodumare.

(Excerpt from the Inaugural issue of Our Time Press, February 1996)
Our Time Press:  The images in your book, THE MIDDLE PASSAGE, stays with me and comes back into my consciousness at different times during the day, especially at night.  The feelings remind me of the mourning when a close relative dies.  What price did you have to pay to put those images on  paper?
Tom Feelings:  The first price was the time.  That’s one of the reasons it took me 20 years, because what I was trying to do was get more than one level so that the pictures would keep coming back to you.  What I believe is that this story is in the back of all of our heads, especially black people because we’ve heard something about it.  Maybe touched on it from reading or people talking, but as a story.  What I wanted to do was bring it forward.  It’s what a friend of mine called race memory.  I had to first do the drawings.  The line drawings took me two and a half years.  It was the painting of the thing in tone, adding depth and volume to them, that’s what took the long period of time.
OTP:   The period you’ve re-created is hundreds of years past, and yet as I go around the neighborhood –  the liquor stores, the armory.  Is this the pain you spoke about, and is that why you had to come back to New York?
TF:   Yes.  If you look at painful things now, you have to realize that it is directly connected to what happened in the past, and then what happened over and over again.  What I was trying to do is recreate the distance, even though it happened hundreds of years ago.
OTP:  Usually when you have pain you have to cure it in some way, how do you cure this from the past?  Can we cure this pain?
TF:  If you understand what happened in the past, then realize some of the things happened over and over again, then it means taking some action, doing something in the present that would help you avoid the same things in the future.  For example, people talk about why affirmative action. In the back of that what they really think is, “Why affirmative action for inferior people?”  The inferiority is connected to being a slave in this society.  (When you consider) the weight of slavery, it’s not the victims who should be ashamed, but the oppressor who should be ashamed.
OTP:   What can we do, since we have to do some kind of action, to alleviate the pain, correct the sorrow?
TF:   Well, first of all we have to look at it straight in the face.  And when we look at it straight in the face, and also realize what has helped us to survive.   Instead of just being victims to history, we begin to learn about the strength that helped us to survive.  The culture…this is one reason I went to Africa, to find out where this joy came from. I knew where the pain came from but where the joy comes from is its source.  And when I did find out, I began to realize that it is in our culture.   We have the celebratory rites.  That is, everything is celebrated, even death, as a new beginning.  And this ability to balance pain and joy, that they don’t just sit side by side, but they interact and build on each other, is a large part of the thing that helped us to survive.

Computer Housekeeping
Personal computers and workstations have made a difference in our lifestyles.  Someone who couldn’t draw a heart with a crayon now produces fabulous calendars, seasonal cards and cartoons.  A bookkeeper can crunch out the cash receipt and cash disbursal journals in seconds.  Income statements, balance sheets and cash flow statements are cinches.  Have a stock market ticker tape glide through the bottom of your screen while you write your blog.  You want to go to New Guinea? Easter Island?  Micronesia?  Log into a newsgroup to learn about great travel expeditions into the rainforest, find out about the cheapest airfare and even take a three-dimensional tour of the island.  No need to mention the thousands of music titles that your I-pod or MP3 having waiting for you to groove to.  Yes, computers make life global and expedient, but what does it take to keep your personal computer work optimally?  It’s not too sexy.
Like it or not, if you own Microsoft Windows or another operating system, you must make the time to download the patches and other Windows updates.  The computer will notify you that it’s time to check in for updates when you log onto the Web.  You have to be willing to allow the site to check for “critical updates”.  Most of them are security measures and code to make the operating system more stable.  Sure it may take more than an hour, if you have a dial-up connection.  Don’t you want a computer that seamlessly prints, saves and simultaneously runs many applications without hanging?  Make that time to log in, select the download and then walk away and do something else.
Then there’s guarding against viruses and worms.  You ever wonder what kind of person gets satisfaction in crashing thousands of PCs?  Imagine some young man (sorry: that’s the demographics), up late at night, staring at his PC monitor and tapping out his “bomb”.  Need I go into detail about the ravages of SoBig (Did you wonder why you received so many “nondeliverable” messages last week for email you didn’t send)?  The best step for the average computer user is to purchase and install a virus detection software.  Again, you must respond affirmatively to the request to download the virus definition and virus library.  It takes a few moments and is an important investment in time.  My personal plea: stop passing on forwards.  Forwards that require numerous “Opens” have gone through too many computers and routers.  The chance is too great that you infect your computer and those you wish to share that “inspiring message” (yes, men just love those x-rated shots and women wish to raise the esteem of their sister-friends).
Is the laptop or desktop running slower? Freezing or hanging upon shutdown?  System maintenance may resolve it.  Delete the temporary files in Windows and the temporary files from the temporary Web folder.  Scandisk the hard drive.  The last three jobs are defragmenting, optimizing and backing up the hard drive.  What does all that mean?  Straightening up the hard drive: putting parts of files closer together, moving files and folder in different parts of the memory based on your past usage.  Backing up is a full save of the hard drive and any other drive that you select.  There is much utility software that will do this for you in an orderly and expedient fashion rather than you remembering the different tasks.  Though Windows supplies the system with a maintenance application, it is a shadow to the other utilities sitting on store shelves.
Error messages are other things to take heed to.  The problem being the language is so idiosyncratic: “Notification Wnd for RNAdministration,” “Winword caused an invalid page fault in module.,”  “STM3 is either working or waiting for a response from .”  What does this mean?  Who wants to learn?  On a certain level, the average computer needs to learn to avoid being a captive to the computer consultant.  Some error messages relate to a system application and others refer to software.  Frequently, uninstalling and then, reinstalling software will resolve the situation.  It will require rebooting the system with each uninstall/reinstall.  Other cases may require going to the Web site of the software maker and accessing the “Knowledge Base.”  Knowing how to use the knowledge base is another adventure.
You don’t have to shout at this columnist about how horrid all this sounds.  This columnist grudgingly does it when it has to be done.  I learn much in the process.  You will too.  Now take care of you PC the way you care for your car.

Conference Notices
September 23, 2003:  BlackTech Magazine sponsors “Changing the Game: Strategies to Balance the Landscape of Black Business.”  8:00 AM to 6:00 PM at Baruch College, Vertical Conference Center, 14th Fl., 55 Lexington Avenue.  This symposium is one of a series designed to share technology trends, strategies, and experiences.  Whether a seasoned business or an emerging firm, there are techniques and resources that we still need to uncover.  $99 is the early bird special through September 12; $129 between September 13 and September 22; and $179 for late registration.  Visit www.blacktechmagazine.com to register.
October 30 – November 1, 2003:  PhotoPlus Expo at Jacob Javits Convention Center.  For photographers, photojournalist, documentarians, and shutterbugs; come to the largest trade show and review the latest digital media and software.  To register, visit www.photoplusexpo.com or telephone 866 693 1007 and 301 694 5243 between 9:00 AM and 5:00 PM EST.
Have a tech story, know of hoax or great cyber lounge? Contact me at akos_a@juno.com

EXPERIENCE
8/17/87-present: Sole practitioner handling primarily criminal, immigration, and real estate matters.
9/81-8/14/87: Assistant District Attorney in the Kings County District Attorney’s Office.
Kings County Assistant District Attorney Municipal Building, 210 Joralemon Street, Brooklyn, New York 11201
Responsible for the preparation and prosecution of criminal cases in Brooklyn
September 1981 to May 1983: I was assigned to the Sex Crimes Bureau as a misdemeanor Assistant District Attorney.
May 1982 to May 1983:  I was assigned to the Criminal Court Bureau, which handled all misdemeanor cases except those involving a sex offense.
May 1983 to October 1983:  I was assigned to the Investigation Bureau.  My duties in this bureau were to go to police precincts on serious felony crimes, interview witnesses and defendants, and
assist the police officers.
October 1983 to February 1985:  I was assigned to the Supreme Court Bureau as a Felony Assistant District Attorney.
In February 1985 to June 1985:  I was assigned to the Early Case  Assessment Bureau.  I was assigned to this bureau as a supervisor and my responsibilities were to interview witnesses and police officers and decide what should be represented to the Grand Jury and what should be handled as misdemeanors.  My other duties were to supervise the support staff and the Criminal Court Assistant district attorneys.
June 1985 to 1987:  I was assigned to the Supreme Court Bureau.

EDUCATION: Northwestern School of Law of Lewis and Clark College Portland, Oregon, Juris Doctor, May 1981
Syracuse University, Syracuse New York
Bachelor of Arts, 1974

PERSONAL Married, two children,
COMMUNITY SERVICE Soccer Coach in a youth league, Visited schools as ADA and private attorney.  Represented teachers, students and parents in disputes with the Board of Education.  A member of the North Crown Heights Nostrand Avenue Merchants Association, Inc.  This is an organization that is striving to improve the neighborhood and to create more jobs in the neighborhood Provides legal services to churches in the neighborhood Religious education at St. Marks Sunday School.