In Conversation Michaela Angela Davis and Melissa Harris-Perry

Brooklyn Museum 

Michaela Angela Davis, writer, image activist, and creator of MAD Free, a multi-platform community conversation project, speaks with Melissa Harris-Perry, professor, MSNBC political commentator, and author of the new book Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America. The two will discuss the persistent and detrimental stereotypes that afflict black women in the political arena and contribute to policies allowing their unfair treatment. This event took place at the Brooklyn Museum Thursday, February 16, 2012.

MAD Free & HuffPost BlackVoices: Stand for Sybrina Fulton

Standing for Sybrina Fulton on Mother's Day

by Michaela angela Davis | HuffPost BlackVoices

Thirteen. That was how many times my mother stood and collapsed at my brother Eddie's funeral. He was so full of mischief, magic, and life, so very full of life. Eddie was seventeen years old, just like Trayvon Martin. Had it not been for her three surviving devastated, disoriented adolescent daughters, my mother would have died too. I know this to be true, as she told me years later. Death would have been preferable to the unimaginable pain that accompanies burying a child. My mother not only didn't die, she recovered and re-imagined a rich, fulfilling life for herself; but it took time and a mighty outpouring of love.

Sybrina Fulton has refreshed the memory of the debilitating pain of my mother, who could barely stand; seeing Sybrina standing at podiums and press conferences, surrounded by men and microphones, has been remarkable. With her eyes so soft, with tears just a blink away, her open heart was the only thing holding her up. So many times I've wanted to reach through the screen and hug Sybrina and say, I feel you, my sister. I'm sure many have. We know Sybrina Fulton. She's the classic American working mother. She is the mother who lost her child. Sybrina represents all mothers who have lost children to guns, through war, gangs, and homicide. The image of Sybrina Fulton recalls all mothers who have lost children, lost them in the system, lost them in prison, lost them in addiction. Mothers who lose children stand outside the natural order of life. It can be a violently lonely place if left alone.

I will not, we will not, leave Sybrina Fulton alone. That is the meaning and the mission behind the #4Sybrina Campaign. We want to send Sybrina a mighty outpouring of love to keep her standing.

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Michaela angela Davis is the creator of The MAD Free a conversation project, a writer, cultural critic, creative consultant, Helen Delaney’s daughter and Elenni Davis-Knights mother.

Black Music Month 2011: Urban Soul | "it was the fabric our lives" 1978-1982"

Tags: VH1 Rock Docs, Reality TV Shows, Reality TV Shows 6

Urban Soul: The Making of Modern R&B
A film by John Akomfrah

Part One: "It Was the Fabric of Our Lives, 1978-1982"