Picture taken at the African Union Mission in Washington, DC during the AU ECOSOCC Global African Diaspora Stakeholder Conference on November 19, 2015.
Introducing
Sankofa -
Youth Education Exchange, Cultural and Leadership Immersion Project 2018 (SYEECLI)
Sankofa is a word in the Twi language of Ghana that translates as Go Back and get/fetch it.
SYEECLI will be launched in the Jubilee Year of African Liberation Day with the first trip to Africa at the African Union Summit.
Mission Statement
SYEECLI 2018 is a pilot partnership program, project-based and multidimensional program to foster educational, cultural and leadership exchange among Historical African Diaspora youths
and their host peers in Modern African Diaspora and AU Member States. The
lessons are demonstrated through personal examples and actions.
Their action for change does not have to be big, it has to be purposeful and demonstrative of Pan African shared values and ethics.
Inspiration
Youth Exchange programs are generally oriented to promote and perpetuate long lasting friendship between sovereign nations or jurisdictions. Nurturing understanding has strong potentials to direct international diplomacy and interests into the future as young leaders emerge.
Unlike the China-Africa Youth or Europe-Africa Youth program, there is no publicly supported and institutionalized program to promote understanding among youths of African descent. The pilot program fills this void.
Real Life Learning
Beyond the physical meetings, participants will engage in virtual discussions and a t
rans-disciplinary approach to learning that is authentic and relevant to the real world. In effect, learning is not confined by single subjects or history but supported and enriched by them.
Here is the musical presentation for the launching
The Final Call by Langston Hughes
Taking Initiative
Send for the Pied Piper to pipe our rats away (eradicate problems with solutions).
This poem is a cry for help from the champions of justice and freedom More than a list of names, it speaks with passion for society - the love for it and struggle within. The morale transcends time.
Those send called for canonize transformative moments or the desire for one. The extremely moving experience is a mirror image of society. Who is going to bring the change...?
SEND FOR THE PIED PIPER AND LET HIM PIPE THE RATS
AWAY.
SEND FOR ROBIN HOOD TO CLINCH THE ANTI-POVERTY
CAMPAIGN.
SEND FOR THE FAIRY QUEEN WITH A WAVE OF THE
WANDTO MAKE US ALL INTO PRINCES AND PRINCESSES.
SEND FOR KING ARTHUR TO BRING THE HOLY GRAIL.
SEND FOR OLD MAN MOSES TO LAY DOWN THE LAW.
SEND FOR JESUS TO PREACH THE SERMON ON THE
MOUNT.
SEND FOR DREYFUS TO CRY
"J'ACCUSE!"
SEND FOR DEAD BLIND LEMON TO SING THE
B FLAT BLUES
SEND FOR ROBESPIERRE TO SCREAM
"CA IRA! CA IRA! CA IRA!"
SEND (GOD FORBID -- HE'S NOT DEAD LONG ENOUGH!)
FOR LUMUMBA TO CRY "FREEDOM NOW!"
SEND FOR LAFAYETTE AND TELL HIM, "HELP! HELP ME!"
SEND FOR DENMARK VESEY CRYING, "FREE!"
FOR CINQUE SAYING, "RUN A NEW FLAG UP THE MAST."
FOR OLD JOHN BROWN WHO KNEW SLAVERY COULDN'T
LAST.
SEND FOR LENIN! (DON'T YOU DARE! -- HE CAN'T COME
HERE!)
SEND FOR TROTSKY! (WHAT? DON'T CONFUSE THE ISSUE
PLEASE!)
SEND FOR UNCLE TOM ON HIS MIGHTY KNEES.
SEND FOR LINCOLN, SEND FOR GRANT.
SEND FOR FREDERICK DOUGLASS, GARRISON, BEECHER,
LOWELL.
SEND FOR HARRIETT TUBMAN, OLD SOUJOURNER TRUTH.
SEND FOR MARCUS GARVEY (WHAT?) SUFI (WHO?)
FATHER DIVINE (WHERE?)
DuBOIS (WHEN?) MALCOLM (OH!) SEND FOR STOKELY.
(NO?)
THEN
SEND FOR ADAM POWELL ON A NON-SUBPOENA DAY.
SEND FOR THE PIED PIPER TO PIPE OUR RATS AWAY.
(And if nobody comes, send for me.)
With a dramatic flair and finale...
Just a bit of background from New York to Paris
It is more than a list of names.
Langston Hughes calls for the Pied Piper, Robin Hood, a fairy queen, King Arthur, Moses, Jesus, Dreyfus, the blues singer Blind Lemon, Robespierre, Lumumba, Lafayette, Denmark Vesey, Cinque, John Brown, Lenin, Trotsky, Uncle Tom, Lincoln, Grant, Frederick Douglass, Garrison, Beecher, Lowell, Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, Marcus Garvey, Sufi, Father Divine, DuBois, Malcolm, Stokely, and Adam Powell.
At the end, Hughes returns to the Pied Piper, and asks that he be sent to pipe the rats away (address solutions to peculiar problems) if nobody comes in a dramatic finale.
James Mercer
Langston Hughes (February 1, 1902 - May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright. He was one of the earliest innovators of the then-new literary art form called jazz poetry. Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance in New York City.
"When the Langston Hughes Reader was published in 1958, the publisher felt able to call Hughes "the unchallenged spokesman of the American Negro."
"That Hughes was unchallenged in the role of spokesman may itself have been open to challenge. After all, Martin Luther King Jr. had already, the year before, appeared on the cover of Time Magazine and delivered his first major address at the Lincoln Memorial--but Hughes's importance was and remains beyond question." Citation: Langston Hughes and His Poetry Transcript of a video presentation by David Kresh.
During this period, the
Négritude Movement was having impacts. It is a framework of critique and literary theory that promoted African consciousness developed mainly by African and Caribbean intellectuals living in France.
The initiators wereLéopold Sédar Senghor(the first President ofSenegal); Martinican poet Aimé Césaire;andLéon Damas of French Guiana. Négritude intellectuals negated and disavowed colonialism, and argued for the importance of the African Renaissance and Pan-African ethics among people of African descent worldwide.
As Senghor wrote, "Négritude transcends the deep divisions within and between Arabs, Africans, and the African Diaspora by recognizing a common racial thread." It rehabilitated Africa and blacks form European ideology that considered the blacks inferior to the whites with an assertion of a self-defined identity for people of African origin.
From a political standpoint, Negritude was an important aspect to the rejection of colonialism with impact on how the colonized and Historical African Diaspora viewed themselves and ignited literary movements that responded to global politics.
Improvise...Send for Casablanca Group - Kwame Nkrumah, King Hassan of Morocco, Ben Bella of Algeria, Modibo Keïta of Mali, Ahmed Sékou Touré of Guinea, Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt, King Idris of Libys for a United Africa as the AU now says to be decided in 2023!
Who are the champions for today's challenge?
By identifying the names, youths gain insight on a transformative solutions.
African Diaspora
Migration-Development Conference
With
Global Partnerships for Inclusive Economic Growth
Theme:
ADVANCE. BUILD. COLLABORATE
May 24-27, 2018: Washington/Maryland
Africa Liberation Day Period
The Historical African Diaspora partner for the SYEECIL 2018 is Jah Kente, Inc.
The program is coordinated by the African Citizen Action Committee
The Sankofa Salon is an outreach to sensitize communities on the fine details.
