RBG Afrikan- Centered Cultural Development and Education

RBG Street Scholars Think Tank's Purpose:
This Educational Program and Research Project is Dedicated to Further Building the Hip Hop--Black Liberation Movement Connection by Integrating Conscious Digital Edutainment with A Scholarly Self Directed Learning Environment.

Welcome to one of the baddest EduTainment Resources on the Web. A one-stop-shop for education,consciousness raising, entertainment and liberation. And the nicest thing about it is that you can become a contributor. Just start out by reading this overview and learning how things work. You can play a video right within this start page and even browse to it's music. Or turn on an audio playlist to facilitate your browsing. Tons of other options, too numerous to mention here are also right at you finger tips. Ride it however you like, it's all good. Once you get going, check out a Multi-Media Article that interests you and make a comment. I, RBG Street Scholar-Your Zine author, editor and guru will respond. The aforementioned approach is a kol gateway to doing bigger and better things in and with the Communiversity.

WHAT IS RBG STREET SCHOLARS THINK TANK AT ZIMBIO ALL ABOUT?

It's about creating and maintaining the best "Afri-Conscious Cyber EduTainment Portal / Communiversity on the Web".

It's about saving time doing study, learning / teaching together and having madd fun doing it.
The merticulously researched choice of links can be thought of as our votes in the popularity contest that is the "Best of the Best in Black Internet" . The intention is to provide a diverse and concise starting point for you to begin your quest for whatever information you are looking for from a progressive/radical/revolutionary Black perspective . As most of these sites have vast links sections of their own, so do the sites they link to, and so on, and so forth—starting from these links, you can delve further into whatever area interests you.

You got a myspace, youtube, odeo, website etc.
Add your Stuff Folx--and let's learn from each other, build together and teach the world

Our Zines are intended to help us develop and maintain a resource for scholarly research, build together and learn about any subject / topic related to what we're already about: Namely, the "Africentric Idea of Education" let's take the learner from G.E.D. to Ph.D in the contemporary liberal arts and sciences;

Including:
> computers & information technology,
> history and cultural development,
> religion and spirituality,
> sociology,
> political science,
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> education,
> health promotion and disease prevention
> economics and
> psychology
A one stop shop using all forms of media to interactively showcase our ideas of relavent education, unification, collectivity and self definition.

They say " Black Folx Can't Unite, I say they're a lie" Let's show the world our truth and culture; all under the umbrella of Black Nationalism> PanAfrikanism> Scientific Socialism> Revolutionary Change>Afrikan Internationalism.

Browse existing content in any of our four Zines and you will discover that they are all concentricly integrated, thus providing you with a most rich and wholesome interactive learning experience.

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Rate each others work as to keep us on point.

I'VE STARTED US OUT WITH SOME SOLID CONTENT. NOW WE MUST CONTINUE BY BUILDING TOGETHER. A GOOD WAY TO START IS BY FIRST SIGNING UP AND THEN BROWSING EACH FIELD IN THE TABLE OF CONTENTS PANE TO THE LEFT AS TO GET QUICKLY ORIENTED. A LINK BELOW TO "RBG STREET SCHOLARS THINK TANK RULES OF ENGAGEMENT" WILL TAKE YOU DEEPER STILL.

THE FOLLOWING IS A GUIDING SYNOSIS TAKEN FROM THE COMMUNIVERSITY PROPER:
With strick attention to developing our student’s basic education skills in the context of the highest standards of academic excellence, suitable for one to confidently sit for high stake exams(ie. SAT/ACT and MCATs, LSATs), we simutaneously advance the psycho-emotional healing and spiritual upliftment of our people by providing KNOWLEDGE, WISDOM AND OVERSTANDING of the historo-cultural, socio-political and psycho-educational experiences of Africans in America in away that RADICALLY REAPPRAISES EDUCATION from the pained and angry perspective of the oppressed black community.

WHY WE NEED TO DO THIS:
With the present day high rates of Black on Black homicide, suicide, and imprisonment and a rise in single-parent homes, rampant police brutality, unprecedented unemployment, and Blacks use of popular (ENEMY) culture (through music, video games and popular movies) to celebrate "anti-intellectualism, ignorance, irresponsible parenthood, drunkenness, dope dealing, weed smoking, cocaine, x-pills, loose sexual behavior and criminal lifestyles / thuggism"; we have chose to design a curriculum that, rather than getting caught up in the entertainment / BLACKPLOTATION aspects of hip hop/rap, will use hip hop/rap within a historo-cultural, socio-political and psycho-educational framework to address these various death walks forthrightly. Our new methodological style is intended to get our young people to begin to think critically about themselves, their world and their role as people of Afrikan descent.

WHERE WE ARE AND WHERE WE WANNA GO:
This work is a comprehensive (but only a core framework) sequenced survey of subjects and topics that have confronted Afrikans in America throughout our 246 years of chattel slavery, 100 years of aparthied and only “one generation of freedom” here in America. I like to describe the school as a “cultural development and leadership training communiversity”. From our research, we have determined that the idea of Sankofa, which means "We must go back and reclaim our past so we can move forward; so we understand why and how we came to be who we are today", really encompasses the whole Afrikan-centered ideal. Nonetheless, as this is a work in evolution and always under construction, we have chosen to focus our teaching/learning journey most directly on the past 45 years of our struggle for human and civil rights—

THE THEME “THE MORE THINGS CHANGE, THE MORE THINGS STAY THE SAME, WE NEED A REVOLUTION, THE SYSTEM AIN’T GONA CHANGE UNLESS WE MAKE IT CHANGE”.

The content and character of the curriculum is Afrikan-centered and the goal is academic excellence in persuit of black power. We tease out the social, political, economic and moral imparatives of black power in the 21st century by zooming in on two povital questions throughout our course of study:

“WHAT IS BLACK OPPRESSION IN AMERICA AND WHAT IS AFRIKAN LIBERATION.”

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"Can Reality Mimic Fiction ?" The Spook Who Sat by the Door

Written by RBGStreetScholar on

A book written by Sam Greenlee in 1969. It was made into a film in 1973. An explosive, award-winning novel in the black literary tradition, "The Spook Who Sat by the Door" is both a satire of the civil rights problems in the United States in the late 1960s and a serious attempt to focus on the issue of black militancy. Dan Freeman, the "spook who sat by the door," is enlisted in the CIA's elitist espionage program as its token black. Upon mastering agency tactics, however, he drops out to train young Chicago blacks as "Freedom Fighters." As a story of one man's reaction to ruling-class hypocrisy, the book is autobiographical and personal. As a tale of a man's reaction to oppression, it is universal.

It also reflects the CIA's odd tradition of giving training to persons and/or groups that later use what they have learned against them.

Plot Summary

"The Spook Who Sat by the Door" takes place in the early 1970’s in Chicago. Dan Freeman (Lawrence Cook) is a black nationalist who is enlisted in the CIA as the first black man to be a secret agent; he is hired as the Top Secret Reproduction Center Sections Chief. Freeman becomes the token black person for those within the CIA, enabling them to use the fact that they hired a black man as a sign of integration and progress. After training and learning about guerrilla warfare, weaponry, communications and subversion, Freeman quits his job and returns to work in the social services in Chicago. Upon his return though, Freeman immediately begins recruiting young black men living in the inner city of Chicago to become “Freedom Fighters” teaching them all of the guerrilla warfare tactics that he learned from the CIA. They become a guerrilla group with Freeman as the secret leader. The “Freedom Fighters” set out to ensure that black people truly live freely within the United States by partaking in both violent and non-violent actions throughout Chicago. The “Freedom Fighters” of Chicago begin spreading the word about their guerrilla warfare tactics across the United States; as Freeman says, “What we got now is a colony, what we want is a new nation.” As revolt and a war of liberation continues in the inner city of Chicago, the National Guard and the police desperately try to stop the “freedom fighters.” This film provides discussions around black militancy and the violent reactions that took place by white America in response to the progress of the Civil Rights Movement.

Sam Greenlee's novel

Greenlee’s novel, released in 1969 was and continues to be a very important work reflecting upon the harsh realities of African Americans living in the United States in the face of racism, violence and oppression. Greenlee’s novel is, in a sense, a manual on how to be a successful revolutionary by beating the system at its own game (Peavy, 222). Greenlee demonstrates through his character Dan Freeman, how important cooperation is among oppressed peoples in the fight for equality and freedom (Joiner, 41). Greenlee, years after the release of his book and the film, reflects upon the various messages of his work: “One of the things I was saying with that book is that gangs could become the protector of the community rather than predators”(Joiner, 41). He goes on to say, “…the purpose of the film was to encourage blacks to create an action plan to ‘survive in the belly of the beast’ rather than always reacting as victims of a racist society”(Joiner, 41). By working intimately with Ivan Dixon, Greenlee’s powerful book was transferred to the big screen without losing its strong revolutionary messages. Yet, the film and the book were both received with great hesitation and resistance by certain sectors of society.

READ THE FULL BOOK ONLINE

Historical Context

"The Spook Who Sat by the Door" was published as a book in 1969 and released as a film in 1973. The political atmosphere at this time was particularly contentious as civil rights, women’s rights, and gay rights movements became visible in the public sphere. It is not surprising that the filmmakers felt compelled to make a movie that addressed the presence of blacks in politics as well as portrayed black unity and strength. Furthermore, prior to the movie’s release, Martin Luther King was assassinated, as were other significant civil rights figures in the sixties. Tim Reid, whose company helped to release Spook on DVD, said to the Los Angeles Times in 2004: "When you look back at the times...Martin Luther King was assassinated, Malcolm X, Bobby Kennedy. Black people were really angry and frustrated; we were tired of seeing our leaders killed. What do we do? Do we have a revolution? There is nothing that comes close to this movie in terms of black radicalism." (Beale, 2004) Reid notes how Spook served as a reactionary piece in the way that it addressed the feelings of black people during the late sixties and early seventies. Soon after its release "The Spook Who Sat By the Door" was removed from theaters as a result of its politically controversial message. Prior to its release on DVD in 2004, it was a relatively difficult film to get. In a feature for NPR, Karen Bates reported that the director of the film, Ivan Dixon, admitted that United Artists would not show the film in a way that would allow its political message to come through when clips were viewed prior to the film’s public release. “Dixon says when United Artists screened the finished product and saw a Panavision version of political Armageddon, they were stunned” (NPR article, 2004). Perhaps it is a testament to the powerful message of the film that it was deemed potentially too influential, as if the film would encourage black people to militantly rebel against white people.

Critical Reception

Film critics agree that "The Spook Who Sat By the Door" is a significant movie in that it presents a highly politically charged vision of black people. In a review for City Paper Philadelphia Sam Adams recognizes the importance of "Spook"’s questioning of politics and race in America, despite some other technical weaknesses. Adams writes: “the movie's sly polemicism has arguably aged better than the revolutionary rhetoric that inspired it.” In this way, although the film’s militant messages are not necessarily applicable today, its controversial questioning of politics and race is still significant. Adams also notes the conflict within "Spook" in its use of stereotypical imagery along with its revolutionary political message: “Hailed as a landmark and denounced as racist, 'The Spook Who Sat by the Door' is, at the very least, still worth arguing over” (Adams, 2004). Similarly, Tim Canby’s 1973 review of the film for The New York Times notes the film’s use of stereotypes in order to convey the message at the heart of it. “The rage it projects is real, even though the means by which that rage is projected are stereotypes. Black as well as white”(Canby, 1973). Canby also notes the difficulty he had with reviewing the film in that although it is not technically impressive or innovative, its political and racial significance is not to be underestimated or dismissed. “...'The Spook Who Sat by the Door' is a difficult work to judge coherently. It is such a mixture of passion, humor, hindsight, prophecy, prejudice and reaction that the fact that it's not a very well-made movie, and is seldom convincing as melodrama, is almost beside the point” (Canby, 1973).

Title

The word "Spook" in the title has a dual meaning: it has been used as a racial slur against Blacks, as well as a slang term for a spy.

Bibliography

Adams, Sam. “The Spook Who Sat By the Door.” Philadelphia City Paper.net. [1] July 1, 2004

Beale, Lewis. “ ‘Spook’ unearths a radical time capsule of a movie; Pulled from theaters but now on DVD, the 1973 film imagines a black political revolution in the blaxploitation era.” The Los Angeles Times, Feb. 28, 2004

Canby, Vincent. “Using the CIA: Ex-Agent Is Spook Who Sat By The Door.” The New York Times, Sept. 22, 1973

Joiner, Lottie L. “After 30 years, a Controversial Film Re-Emerges.” The Crisis November/December 2003: 41.

Peavy, Charles D. “Four Black Revolutionary Novels, 1899-1970.” Journal of Black Studies 1 (Dec., 1970): 219-223.

“Profile: Importance of the Movie “The Spook Who Sat by the Door” on the release of a 30th anniversary DVD” All Things Considered, Washington D.C. March 2, 2004

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RBGStreetScholar said...

DVD release date: 27 January 2004

Freedom Dues. If we're gonna be outsiders, man, take advantage of being outside. If you wanna be a rich ho, then go to Hollywood. If you wanna say something true about black people, then do what we did. Raise the money from the black community and shoot what you want. — Sam Greenlee, "One on One" Yes, they do make good athletes. — General (Byron Morrow), The Spook Who Sat By the Door

"The bling blings are looking for a white audience," says Sam Greenlee in an interview included on Monarch's DVD of The Spook Who Sat By the Door. "My audience is not white." Comparing his own experience with today's hiphoppish excesses, Greenlee is understandably skeptical of commercial processes. Writer of the 1966 novel on which Ivan Dixon's 1973 film is based; Greenlee's frustrations with history between then and now are palpable.

The Spook Who Sat By the Door remains one of the few uncompromised representations of black armed resistance in the United States. Dewayne Wickham, USA Today columnist, provides context in the DVD's introduction to the film: "It was a story of aggressive reaction to white oppression." On its initial release, the film garnered mixed responses. Whereas, according Wickham, "There was violent reaction in some parts of white America," for many black viewers, it was a wakeup call. Theaters in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, and Oakland sold out for the three weeks the film was in release. Greenlee and Dixon contend that the FBI pressured the distributor to pull the film (in keeping with other tactics deployed the Bureau's COINTELPRO [Counter Intelligence Program]).

Since 1973, the film has only been available on bootleg videos, until Monarch released it to DVD in January. As Robert Townsend recalls for the DVD's introductory piece, "The Spook Who Sat By the Door changed my life. There was a sense of, what if we took destiny into our own hands. Now there are no communities. This film is about a sense of community."

Today's contexts -- so fragmented, so hurried and strained -- make the film seem at once dated and immediate, a duality supported by Herbie Hancock's brilliantly percussive soundtrack. Wickham says, "If you accept it as the message movie it was meant to be, as the protest film it was intended to be, I think a lot of people will enjoy it as a film and also come away with a heightened sense of awareness about themselves, about the struggles of our people, and about the need for us to come together to move our agenda forward."

This need is made clear in the film's first moments. The Spook Who Sat By the Door opens in the office of a white Senator (Joseph Mascolo) as he worries about -- what else? -- his reelection. Given to understand that the "Negroes are the trouble spot," he conjures a cynical appeal, namely, accusing the CIA of discriminatory hiring practices, in order to win over black voters. "I'm the best friend those people have in Washington," he asserts.

The hiring proceeds as a contest, with potential agents competing against one another for a vexed prize. Even as the white recruiter, Carstairs (Jack Aaron), tells them, "You men... represent the best of your race," they are subject to constant secret surveillance, distrusted and examined like lab animals. Imagining they're alone, the recruits make "integration" jokes: "Ain't it groovy to be a spy?" or "We the first spooks to be spooks in the CIA." Their training montage, accompanied by Hancock's synthetic whops and slides, comprises all sorts of standard secret agenty tests: bomb defusing, martial arts, scuba diving, academics, athletics, and demolitions.

Through this process, their initial unity soon dissolves, as they're pitted against one another for this seeming honor. They accuse one another of being too eager to please the white man: "What kind of Tom are you anyway?" one asks the leading contender, Dan Freeman (Lawrence Cook), so focused and quiet that the General (Byron Morrow) overseeing the process says, "Somehow I forgot Freeman even existed, he has a way of fading into the background." As the film has it, this quality is precisely what makes him dangerous: no one, black or white, suspects the mild-mannered Freeman of hostility, anger, or ingenuity.

Freeman understands what's at stake in their "training." "None of us were picked for our militancy," he observes. When he "wins" the competition and is duly assigned as the Agency's "new top secret reproduction center section chief," that is, the Xerox room, Freeman continues to observe and learn, his hostile environment repeatedly figured as the long white hallway he walks at CIA headquarters.

Five years later, he quits the Agency ("You're a credit to your race," says the General) in order to work for a "do-gooder outfit in Chicago." Assigned to work with a street gang, the King Cobras, he retrains them as a revolutionary underground movement, to challenge The Man on his own terms. "You really wanna mess with whitey," he tells the Cobras, "I can show you how." His assembly resembles the BPP (Black Panther Party), complete with a Minister of Information, Pretty Willie (David Lemieu), assigned to "talk to the people in a language that they understand."

Unlike the white vigilante movie heroes so popular at the time of this film's release (Dirty Harry, Buford Pusser, Death Wish's Paul Kersey), Freeman's cause is not personal (or not completely personal, anyway). On leaving the CIA, he spends time in his Chicago neighborhood, observing childhood friends running numbers, pimping, and pushing drugs. Freeman sees a clear and present opponent: confronting one of these locals, Freeman demands that he see beyond his limited horizon. "White folks control your neighborhood through drugs," he grumbles, "And you dealing?"

To its credit, The Spook Who Sat By the Door complicates Freeman's desires for revenge and respect. He's more contemplative and less solitary than the standard blaxploitation hero, as comfortable riding a desk as he is working with his own recruits in scenes that recall and also refract the CIA training scenes (where Freeman and his fellow recruits wear Agency-issued jumpsuits, so they all "look alike," his crew wears assorted revolutionary costumes: berets and jean jackets, knit caps and bellbottoms. He instructs his soldiers, "We live off the land; we match technology with spontaneity and improvisation." He also teaches them to steal, not from "your black brothers and sisters," but from "the enemy." Their access to white establishments is easy: "Remember, a black man with a mop, tray or broom in his hand can go damn near anywhere in this country, and a smiling black man is invisible."

At the same time, Freeman strikes the requisite macho-sex pose. He maintains a relationship throughout the film with his light-skinned, Cook County casework supervisor girlfriend Joy (Janet League), even after they officially "break up" and she marries another, more conventional man. At the same time, Freeman charms a hooker (Paula Kelly) he meets while training in D.C., calling her his Dahomey Queen (and encouraging her to wear her hair "natural"). Joy takes a middle of the road approach to change: "Since the war on poverty," she says, "all the social workers are making money," that is, the best way to get ahead is to work within the corruption that can't be fixed anyway. Freeman's goals are more profound: he wants "the poor" to benefit from this so-called "war" as well.

Freeman and the Cobras form a tight, if occasionally uneasy unit, as they question his leadership, absorb his lessons, and take the revolution to the streets. During a seemingly playful moment, the crew discusses the racism that shapes their everyday lives, from childhood memories to career "options" to stereotypes: "You dig those plantation movies on television? No chains, no whips. Bunch a happy darkies just waitin' on Massa Charlie and his family and diggin' it." Amused and alarmed by the image, the guerillas declare their need for independence: "What we got now is a colony, what we wanna create is a new nation. In order to do that, we gotta pay a different kind of dues. Freedom dues."

Toward this end, Freeman sees in U.S. Vietnam War-era imperial policies a chance to intervene. "There is no way that the United States can police the world and keep us on our ass too," he argues, "unless we cooperate." The counterargument is embodied in his longtime best friend, Dawson (J.A. Preston), now a detective and a specialist in "inner city riot control." When a riot breaks out in Chicago, Dawson and Freeman are on point, courtesy of their state jobs, to quell it. They argue over strategy and possibility. Dawson believes in "law and order or we might as well be back in the jungle." But for Freeman, "The ghetto is a jungle, always has been. You understand, you cannot cage people like animals and not expect them to fight back someday. It has always been an army occupation here, with police badges and uniforms. You and me, cop and a social worker, we are keepers of this goddamn zoo."

In a film replete with potentially incendiary speeches, this one may be the most overtly furious, indicting assimilation, complicity, and just getting along, as much as any specific aggression or systematic oppression. For all its obviousness, stilted acting, and low budget deficiencies, The Spook Who Sat By the Door retains its sense of urgency and outrage.

— 29 March 2004

— Director: Ivan Dixon Cast: Lawrence Cook, Jack Aaron, Don Blakely, Paul Butler, Paula Kelly (United Artists, 1973) Rated: PG