by kspence | Oct 5, 2012 | Imaging the City, Neoliberalism, The Future of the City
The Packard Plant and the Old Detroit Train Depot are the two most photographed “ruin porn” sites in Detroit. Below an artist talks of his Packard Plant art installation. [vimeo]https://vimeo.com/42199118[/vimeo]
by kspence | Oct 4, 2012 | Black Popular Culture, Hip-hop, Obama
This picture has been making the rounds since Beyonce and JayZ held a $40,000 campaign event for President Obama. It's an absolutely beautiful picture, one shared and commented on by thousands. The most powerful man on the planet, and the most powerful MC on the...
by kspence | Oct 3, 2012 | Black Leadership, Black People Mythology, Black Politics, Black Popular Culture, Knocking the Hustle |
On August 22, 2011, the Martin Luther King Memorial opened to the public. The first African American to be honored with a memorial on the Mall, and only the fourth non-President, King’s memorial took decades of planning and fundraising. It stands, or perhaps better...
by kspence | Oct 2, 2012 | Afrofuturism, Black Popular Culture, Neoliberalism
Last week I showed a documentary about the spread of electronic music. And have shown a couple of videos that were a part of the Imaging Detroit project. This week I meld the two. And I do it on this specific day because of one of the individuals interviewed in this...
by kspence | Oct 1, 2012 | Crime and Punishment, Neoliberalism, Urban Politics
Last week the New York Times ran an article on the front page about Defy Ventures–a venture capital project aimed at individuals formerly incarcerated: Defy Ventures provides carefully selected, ambitious men who have criminal histories with life-changing...
by kspence | Sep 28, 2012 | Imaging the City, Neoliberalism, The Future of the City
Of the videos from MODCAR’s Imaging Detroit project I’ve seen so far, this is one of the most frustrating. But at the same time it was just good enough to provide inspiration for an essay I’m working on for Nobody’s Coming....
by kspence | Sep 27, 2012 | Black Popular Culture, Pop Culture |
Denzel Washington is on the cover of October’s GQ magazine as part of a press junket for his 42nd (!!) movie. Great interview. But I want to focus on two quotes. The first deals with Whitney Houston: What did you feel when Whitney died? Whitney was my girl, and...
by kspence | Sep 26, 2012 | Class and Politics, Neoliberalism, Sports |
But of course that’s not the real story. Why are the original refs being replaced in the first place? The struggle between the owners and the referees is part and parcel of a much larger series of struggles between labor and capital. In this case, the two...
by kspence | Sep 25, 2012 | Neoliberalism |
On February 26, 2012, George Zimmerman (a self-appointed neighborhood watchman) shot and killed Trayvon Martin, a black teenager in a gated community in Sanford, Florida, while the teenager walked from the grocery store to his father’s girlfriend’s house. According to...
by kspence | Sep 24, 2012 | Black Popular Culture, Culture
Idris Elba of The Wire (and most recently Luther) is a DJ and has been emersed in the British club scene for decades. In the documentary Clubbing Changed the World he makes a number of powerful claims about the role electronic music played in popular culture and in...
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