TRGGR Radio – Moral Mondays and the Supreme Court – 6.28.2013

Beginning in late May in North Carolina, activists have gathered in several cities to protest the cuts in education, increased taxes on the middle class, cuts in employment benefits, the repealing of the Racial Justice Act of 2009, and many other injustices reflective of increasing right-wing political power. Joining us from Durham are activists and educators Holly Jordan and Bryan Proffitt, two educators and members of People’s Durham organizers directly involved in what is known as the Moral Mondays protests in Raleigh and Durham. A strength of this growing movement is the broad scope in its goals and strategies, which collectivizes the struggles of many disconnected groups. The protests unite around educational justice, affordable housing, and accessible jobs within and beyond electoral governance. In a state that is flooded with right-wing money, both on the ground organizing – such as civil disobedience, protests and strikes – and as well as Black left political representation.

The challenge from this point forward is the sustainability of people-power and political bases in order to achieve the lasting, progressive demands. Connecting each Monday protest to the next, the NAACP documents the movement, participating in media to make each Monday swell greater than the last. However, at some point the legislative session will end, and with it the movement might falter. Yet the needs of our communities of color and working class people are more needed than ever. This speaks to the need for alternative forms of education that keeps our demands at the forefront of our every day struggles. As Bryan Proffitt states, this is the realization of how education is not a neutral force, that making connection between school subjects and current political structures needs to be seamless.

Our second interview features commentator and scholar Dr. Annalise Fonza, and Dr. Whitney Battle-Baptiste who joined us to comment on recent Supreme Court rulings, the Zimmerman trial, and related issues. CHECK IT OUT!

part 1: featuring Holly Jordan and Bryan Proffitt; and Annalise Fonza

Part 2:

photo credit: dr. whitney battle-baptiste

TRGGR Radio featuring Lois Ahrens, S.N.O.L., & Dr. Jared Ball – 6/7/2013

On this packed two-hour edition of TRGGR Radio, Chris sits down for an expository interview with Lois Ahrens, the director of the Real Cost of Prisons in Massachusetts. We discuss the current human rights abuses facing inmates in Massachusetts prisons, including the invasive strip searching of female assigned prisoners. In the second hour we speak with organizer Malcolm Chu and Springfield community youth Penny Noel and Kalimah Dunwell who share the importance and ongoing projects of the housing justice organization Springfield No One Leaves / Nadie Se Mude (S.N.O.L.). We hear personal testimonies of Penny and Kalimah who are fighting against the increasing home foreclosures in Springfield, witnessing the resilience of inter-generational activism in the face of discriminatory displacement. Keep on the lookout for several upcoming actions, including a community takeover of a foreclosed home, a community-organized garden in a vacant lot, and a fundraiser CD release party.

Finally, we are joined by TRGGR-South fam, Dr. Jared Ball of Vox Union who provided a highlight of his earlier conversation with author Jeff Chang about Hip Hop and radical politics. Enjoy the sounds of resistance!

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TRGGR feat. JASIRI X – 5.24.2013

On this episode we speak with Pittsburgh-based critically acclaimed activist and eMCee, Jasiri X on the role of community-based alternative media, the inspirations and directions in his music, and the development of his critical media justice organization, 1Hood. On the second half of the show we welcome TRGGR family, Rosa Clemente, for a multi-pronged discussion including recent news of Chicago school closings, homophobia in Lauryn Hill’s new song “Neurotic Society”, and the recent commencement addresses by President and Mrs. Obama and why they seem to only speak in condescending terms when addressing African American audiences. Enjoy!

Part 1: Featuring Jasiri X

Part 2: round table discussion of current events

TRGGR Radio Feat Jose Gonzalez – 2.22.2013

The banning of the MAS program in TUSD is arguably the latest phase of war on Mexican and Chicano heritage and humanity in Arizona and beyond; an effort to maintain white settler colonialism and domination. No doubt, the assault on Mexican American Studies in Tucson is one of the latest markers in the long history of what scholar Reiland Rabaka calls “Epistemic Apartheid,” which is currently marked by an institutional disregard for students’ abilities to think for themselves, and to think critically about the history of this country, the world, and their place in it. Joining TRGGR Radio hosts Chris Tinson and Carlos Rec McBride for insights into the current situation in Tucson and its meaning for the world is one of the teachers featured in the documentary Precious Knowledge, maestro Jose Gonzalez. 

For more on the Ethnic Studies struggle in Tucson, go to:
Save Ethnic Studies
Three Sonorans
Teacher Activist Groups

TRGGR Radio: The AOKI Controversy

air date: August 24, 2012

This is a show you do not want to miss! Listen as we discuss the recent controversy around the life and activism of the late Japanese American prominent member of the Black Panther Party, Richard Aoki.

In the first hour we are joined by Jeffrey O.G. Ogbar, professor and author of Black Power: Radical Politics and African American Identity, and current University Vice Provost for Diversity at the University of Connecticut. In the second hour the activist, author, and baritone saxophonist par excellence Fred Ho joined us to give his personal account of Richard Aoki, and explicitly refutes the claim that Aoki worked with the FBI. The legendary Fred Ho has numerous jazz recordings, including the Black Panther Suite, The Way of the Saxophone, Warrior Sisters, and Turn Pain Into Power. He has also published widely including, Sounding Off: Music as Subversion/Resistance/Revolution (1995), Legacy to Liberation: Politics and Culture of Revolutionary Asian Pacific America (2000), Wicked Theory, Naked Practice (edited by Diane Fujino, 2009), and Diary of a Radical Cancer Warrior: Fighting Cancer and Capitalism at the Cellular Level (2011).

Earlier in the day, Chris sat down with author and professor, Scott Kurashige of the University of Michigan to discuss the Aoki case. Checkout his reading of the controversy in his essay “Each Generation Must Discover Its Own History: Some Thoughts on the Richard Aoki Debate” published at NewBlackMan (inExile). We are providing our interview for you for the first time here. Professor Kurashige has been a campus and community activist since the late 1980s, was based in Los Angeles in the 1990s, and has been primarily based in Detroit since 2000. He is the author of The Shifting Grounds of Race: Black and Japanese Americans in the Making of Multiethnic Los Angeles and co-author with Grace Lee Boggs of The Next American Revolution: Sustainable Activism for the Twenty-First Century. He is also director of the Asian/Pacific Islander American Studies Program and a professor of American Culture and History at the University of Michigan. We close out the live portion of the show with Isabel Espinal, one of three co-chairs of the Latino Caucus of the Green Party USA, and Communication Director of the Green/Rainbow Party of Massachusetts. During the show we played the trailer from AOKI: A documentary film, by Mike Cheng and Ben Wang. Props to them as well.

Part 1 feat. Jeff Ogbar

Part 2 feat. Fred Ho and Isabel Espinal

Bonus Material: Chris Tinson & Scott Kurashige

TRGGR RADIO 4.20.2012 Edition

On this packed episode we are joined by Dr. Nat Turner, assistant professor of education at UMass, Amherst and Tyson Rose, who along with Turner, is currently offering the undergraduate course Hip-Hop Nation Language and Literacy Practices. We talk about the approaches taken in the class and some of the strategies and challenges of Hip-Hop in the Academy. In the second half of the show we speak with Jaymes Winell, a local student organizer with the group Preserving Our Civil Rights, a group organizing against Secure Communities (S-Comm), a collaboration between Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE) and local police departments. Later, we hear from Dr. George Gathigi, visiting assistant professor of Interdisciplinary Arts at Hampshire College. Professor Gathigi’s work explores the history and evolution of Hip-Hop and Popular Culture in East Africa, specifically focusing on Kenya and Tanzania. Finally, we send a special note of congratulations to one of our interns, Sam De Pilar, who recently won a design award for his Sneakers4Success project from the School of Management. Steady move makin’. Enjoy!!

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TRGGR Radio – The Indigenous Edition 11.25.2011

We dare you to listen.

Part 1

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Part 2

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