Pan African Women's Action Summit

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI) and our sister organization, Priority Action Network (PAN) will be co-hosting a workshop at the Pan African Women's Action Summit on August 11th, 2011 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

The Pan-African Women’s Action Summit (PAWAS) was created in 2005 to convene diverse black diaspora women to promote collaboration, networking, skill building, as well as personal health and wellness to strengthen the Pan-African Philanthropy Movement's capacity to impact the social and other issues that affect our communities.

Our workshop is entitled Beyond Us and Them: Sharing Our Stories, Healing Our Communities. Here's the workshop description:

It is a fact that the “black community” in this country is changing and is a lot more diverse than we assume. While the majority of the Black population is still African Americans – there are significant and increasing populations of Black immigrants that are adding challenging existing assumptions of the homogeneity in the “black.”

When then Senator Obama first announced his candidacy for the highest Presidency, much of the discussion among Black communities was the challenge in defining his identity. Clearly he is black and yet he is not of slave-ancestry; he was not “black enough” for some and too black for others. His identity as a man whose father is African, married to an African American made visible the profound need for race dialogue among diverse black communities. It also made visible both the commonalities and differences in the black community.

Statistics show that an estimated 5% of the Black population is made up of immigrants from Africa and another 12% of immigrants from the Caribbean. Yet, racial discourse is framed always within the black/white dichotomy and very little exists to have transnational conversations which bring race, culture, identity and history into our communities.

We at Priority Africa Network and the Black Alliance for Just Immigration have held several community dialogues that brought together diverse groups from Africa, the Americas and the Caribbean in the San Francisco/Bay Area. Lessons learned from these over the past five years have given insight into ways to bring much needed exchanges on the critical need to know one another’s history, to go beyond the assumptions of damaging stereotypes held on all sides.

This workshop will present one model on how to hold open and healing exchanges about the divisions that exist in the African diaspora community. As the number of Black immigrants increases in the coming decade, and there is increased visibility of the diversity of Black communities, the opportunity to learn and use these transformative ideas is critical. It will also highlight the role and power of diverse black women, and their allies, in building community across ethnic and racial lines.

On Jose Vargas and Real Immigration Stories

Post by Renee Simms, BAJI Phoenix

Jose Vargas’s moving New York Times’ essay about how he came to the United States as a boy and how he has lived with the secret of his undocumented legal status is exactly the type of immigration story Americans should be telling. It’s a real story, about the personal decisions people make in order to have a better life. It’s not calculated political rhetoric like what we heard from Senator John McCain about immigrants starting wildfires in Arizona. It wasn’t a story intended to trigger fear or nationalism. Instead, Vargas’s essay was a story that we can all relate to since each of us, with the exception of indigenous Native Americans, is an immigrant to this country.

Each American has a story of how his or her family, for political and economic reasons, ended up away from an original homeland. We also have stories about our families’ migration within the United States. If I understand my family’s story of migration, I should be able to understand and sympathize with yours.

As a black woman, part of my migration history is the tale of my father who was born during the Great Depression in the Jim Crow south. He had seven brothers and sisters. His father left my grandmother to raise these eight children by herself. Because poverty, legislated racism and lynchings were accepted facts of life in the early 20^th century, my father left Atlanta, Georgia by train the very first chance that he got. Like millions of other blacks from 1915 to 1970, he moved to the urban north.

When my father arrived in Detroit in the 1950s, the city had a strong, post-war economy. By the 1980s when I was a teenager, Detroit was part of the declining industrial rustbelt and a community ravaged by the crack cocaine epidemic. The city that had attracted my father, would provide limited opportunities for me, and so in 1996, I moved west to Los Angeles, California.

I lived in L.A. during the second term of the Clinton presidency and the tech stock bubble. Many people were flush with cash during these years (or had access to easy loans) and a modest home in southern California could sell for $350,000 and upward. Because I was not flush with cash and couldn’t afford a home in California, I eventually migrated to the Southwest and then to the Pacific Northwest. My movement across the U.S. has been influenced by economic opportunities as well as cultural considerations like the racial attitudes within a community. I want to live in a place that is affordable, safe, that is tolerant of divergent viewpoints, that is ethnically diverse, and a place where I feel respected.

Immigration and migration have always been about our human search for a better life. That’s what Vargas’s essay makes clear and what this Times’ article about young blacks moving back to the south also makes clear. People will move to a place that promises a good life.

It’s in this spirit that the Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI) enters the immigration debate. BAJI seeks to raise awareness about the global economic systems and politics that force people to migrate in the first place. We know that immigration is not a small, national story about wildfires or workers who want to take American jobs. Immigration is a big, human rights story about economic opportunity, and the risks that people will take to attain that opportunity. The risks include separation from one’s family, crossing armed borders, or living in fear like Jose Vargas that someday you’ll be caught.

DWN: New Data Spotlights Influence of Private Prison Industry on Immigration Detention

Originally posted by Detention Watch Network

As the largest for-profit prison company in the country, Corrections Corporation of America (CCA), prepares for its annual shareholders meeting, new data released today by the Detention Watch Network (DWN) sheds light on the growing influence of the private prison industry on the immigration detention system.

Drawn from a variety of sources, including the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Reading Room, and the Federal Lobbying Disclosure Act Database, the data reveals the companies most heavily invested in the business of immigration detention – CCA, The GEO Group Inc., and the Management and Training Corporation – and suggests increased lobbying activity over the last decade, both in terms of dollars spent and government entities targeted.

“For years, private prison firms have played a critical role in shaping public policy around immigration detention, pursuing the bottom line at the expense of basic civil rights and tax payer dollars,” said Emily Tucker, Director of Policy and Advocacy at DWN. “This data highlights deep corporate investment in the detention business, raising concerns about how the corporate profit-motive is fueling the expansion of the detention system as a whole.”

According to research by DWN, corporations have increasingly devoted resources over the last decade to lobbying for policies and programs that will increase their opportunities to do business with the government. Of the five corporations with ICE contracts for which official federal lobbying records are currently available, the total expenditure on lobbying for 1999-2009 was $20,432,000, with CCA ($18,002,000) and GEO ($2,065,000) as the top two spenders. Lobbying efforts targeted a wide range of government entities, indicating a comprehensive strategy for influencing policy and legislation.

Both CCA and GEO have come under increasing scrutiny in recent years, as a lack of transparency and accountability has led to multiple cases of abuse and mismanagement in their facilities, resulting in the termination of contracts in a few recent cases.

“ICE has called for sweeping changes in the immigration detention system,” said Tucker. “Yet they continue to partner with private prison firms that are part of the problem. We hope this research inspires further exploration into the relationship between prison corporations and the government at all levels. We need to reduce our dependence on detention and begin putting human rights over profits.”

For the full collection of data, visit: http://www.detentionwatchnetwork.org/privateprisons

The Detention Watch Network is a national coalition of organizations and individuals working to educate the public and policy makers about the U.S. immigration detention and deportation system and advocate for humane reform so that all who come to our shores receive fair and humane treatment. For more information visit www.detentionwatchnetwork.org

Black in Latin America-what did we learn?

Post by Jean Damu, BAJI Steering Committee Member

Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s groundbreaking documentary, Black in Latin America, concluded lat night with forays into Mexico and Peru.

In Mexico Gates visited the town of Yanga, considered by many scholars the first town in the Western Hemisphere founded and administered by free blacks. Also he briefly examined Mexico’s national ideology of “mestizaje,” that body of thought that claims Mexicans have “solar blood,” or that Mexicans are a mixed race people.

Mestizaje equates closely to Brazil’s Lusotropicalism, ideologies that while on one hand argue for racial democracy, on the other hand deny the existence of racism and serve to make blacks invisible.

What was fascinating in Gate’s journey through Mexico was his encounters with adults who had no idea they were black until traveling outside Mexico; in one woman’s case to Cuba. It was there she made the connections between her families culture and African culture.

In Mexico, Gates discovered, there are plenty of remnants of African culture but only in small pockets are actual cultural holdovers in the form of music and dance still existent.

To this degree Mestizaje has almost totally erased positive images and forms of black culture and thus Mexico is the only Latin nation that has developed a truly national culture. All others, including and especially Cuba and Brazil, have folk cultures, which is why “Africanisms” (for lack of a better term) remain so strong there.

Gates, of course, doesn’t go into any of this and its complexity is beyond this brief review-but Gates should have made stronger connections between Mestizaje inMexico and Gilberto Freyre’s Lusotropicalism in Brazil.

Finally Gates took us to Peru, a center of Black culture almost totally isolated from the rest of the hemisphere.

Gates informs us that during the era of colonization, the population of Lima, Peru’s capital, was nearly 40% black. Today large pockets of blacks are scattered throughout the mountainous nation, and usually blacks are employed in industries that historically were reserved for enslaved Africans.

Gates encountered black women who were picking cotton. “It’s very hard work, but we have to do it,” said one. How much do they make? Five dollars a week.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, we were introduced to Monica Corillos, head of Lima’s Lundu organization, an organization dedicated to combating racism in Peru. Of all the personalities Gates interviewed in his four part series apart from Brazil’s aging Abdas Nascimento, Corrillos, who appears to still be in her twenties or very early thirties, was the most vociferous voice against racism encountered by Gates in Latin America.

“I think Peru is the most racist country in Latin America,” she said.

But Peru is the only Latin country that has apologized for its racist treatment of Blacks. Doesn’t that mean something?

Corrillos countered, “It’s not enough to apologize.” Policies must be implemented to give blacks access to jobs, education and material means, she said.

The encounter with Corrillos raises fundamental questions, but questions unasked by Gates, regarding race and racial identity in Latin America.

Why, for instance, has there never been in Latin America an organization similar in size and scope to the NAACP?

And finally returning to the question of questions, why do blacks in Latin America, consider themselves Latins who happen to be black, while African Americans consider themselves blacks who happen to be Americans? This question goes to the heart of the matter of racial formation in the Western Hemisphere, a question I have attempted to address in the attached article.

Gates should be congratulated for this documentary series on race. It was a courageous and highly insightful contribution to a most important gobal conversation.

--

Jean Damu is the former western regional representative for N’COBRA, National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America, and a former member of the International Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, taught Black Studies at the University of New Mexico, has traveled and written extensively in Cuba and Africa and currently serves as a member of the Steering Committee of the Black Alliance for Just Immigration.

AZ UPDATE: Governor Jan Brewer signs two misguided border bills

Originally posted by Border Action Network

On Thursday, April 28th, Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed SB1406 and SB1495 into law. SB1406 allows for the creation of a state-sponsored border fence, while SB1495 authorizes the Governor to establish an armed force known as the “Arizona State Guard” for any reason considered necessary.

“We are disappointed in Governor Brewer’s decision to set our state back even further,” said Jennifer Allen, executive director of Border Action Network, a human rights organization based in Arizona border and immigrant communities. “We are still reeling from the effects of SB1070 one year later, and instead of learning from that grave mistake, she continues to take Arizona down a path of costly self-destruction.”

SB1406 would construct a state-sponsored border fence using private donations and inmate labor. According to Allen, the law is prime for lawsuits from both the federal government and individuals because it not only encroaches on the federal government’s area of responsibility, but also because private citizens could sue over the use of their donations if they do not see the progress they want.

“Arizona is once again trying to take into their own hands what should be the responsibility of the federal government,” said Allen. “This self-chartered path will not only be ineffective, it will also be costly to the state and taxpayers since nothing in this law prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars.”

SB1495, in the wake of murder convictions against border vigilantes Shawna Forde and Jason Bush, is another ill-advised measure, Allen continued.

“Sending ill-trained and equipped individuals to our border will only result in further unnecessary violence,” said Allen. “And again, it puts our state at risk of losing thousands, if not millions, of dollars on liability and legal costs. After all the talk about the need to balance the budget, we have these two politically motivated, ill-advised measures that our state does not need and cannot afford.”

Border Action Network monitored these two bills during the entire legislative session, along with 28 others focused on immigration and border enforcement. A total of 12 made it to the Governor’s desk while 18 of them were defeated, including the infamous bills targeting birthright citizenship and Senator Russell Pearce’s “immigration omnibus” bill. In addition to a letter from dozens of CEOs opposing such legislation, people across the state took action against all 30 of these bills in various ways, including sending a total of over 90,000 emails to state legislators.

“We will continue to monitor this type of legislation to hold our legislators and elected officials accountable for the decisions they make,” said Allen. “Especially when those decisions are costly, dangerous, and detrimental to Arizona.”

USHRN on Boycott in Georgia over HB 87 - an Arizona SB 1070 Copycat

US Human Rights Network's Ajamu Baraka discusses Georgia's HB 87 -- a draconian copycat of Arizona's SB 1070. Ajamu Baraka shares with Kali Akuno about the ensuing boycott if this bill becomes law in the state of Georgia and also explains why African-Americans should actively fight HB 87.

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration will promote and support a boycott of Georgia if HB 87 becomes law.

Re-post rom USHRN BLOG - Human rights group boycotts Georgia over immigration measure

By Jeremy Redmon

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
1:13 p.m. Tuesday, May 3, 2011

A human rights organization has canceled plans to hold its biannual conference in Atlanta this year amid calls to boycott Georgia because of a tough immigration enforcement bill that the state Legislature approved last month.

The U.S. Human Rights Network, a nonprofit organization based in Atlanta, had not booked a location yet for its three-day event but was expecting more than 600 people from across the country to attend the meeting in December, said a spokeswoman for the organization.

The meeting will be relocated to another state because of Georgia’s House Bill 87, the spokeswoman said. A new location has not yet been selected. The network, meanwhile, did not have an estimate for the economic impact its conference would have had for the Atlanta area.

Critics of HB 87 are hoping the network’s decision will be the first of many boycotts to be announced as they seek to pressure Gov. Nathan Deal to veto the bill. A spokeswoman for Deal recently confirmed the Republican governor plans to sign HB 87 before the end of next week.

“HB 87 is another sad apartheid initiative spreading throughout the country to create fear and exploit people in compromised positions,” said Ajamu Baraka, the U.S. Human Rights Network’s executive director. “Reactionary forces in this country are attempting to turn the clock backward to the 18th century by creating these laws.”

Supporters of the legislation say illegal immigrants are burdening Georgia's schools, hospitals and jails. And they point to a recent Pew Hispanic Center estimate that says Georgia is home to more illegal immigrants than Arizona, with 425,000 living here.

Like a law Arizona enacted last year, Georgia’s measure would empower police to investigate the immigration status of certain suspects. And it would punish those who transport or harbor illegal immigrants or use fake identification to get jobs here.

The Human Rights Network, which says on its website that its purpose is to build a human rights movement in the United States, plans to continue its boycott of Georgia until HB 87 is scrapped. Among the network's founding members are the American Civil Liberties Union, Amnesty International USA and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

Last week, the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau went on record opposing HB 87 over concerns that it could hurt the region's $10 billion tourism industry. The bureau's executive committee unanimously passed a resolution saying the measure is "unwelcoming" and could "tarnish Atlanta's reputation as one of America's most welcoming cities."

Atlanta's convention and tourism boosters are hoping Georgia won't suffer like Arizona, which lost dozens of conventions after that state enacted similar legislation last year. A spokeswoman for the Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau said Tuesday that no Atlanta conventions have been canceled because of HB 87.

A spokesman for Deal issued a statement last week in response to the bureau’s resolution.

“Illegal immigration costs Georgia taxpayers hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars, each year at the city, county and state levels,” said Brian Robinson, Deal’s spokesman. “Georgia will treat everyone in our state with respect, and we want to encourage immigrants who settle in Georgia to go through the proper legal channels. Frankly, Georgia is leading the way by requiring that employers follow existing federal law. Look for other states -- who face the same challenges and costs -- to follow Georgia's lead."
Find this article at:

http://www.ajc.com/news/georgia-politics-elections/human-rights-group-boycotts-933522.html

Watch Full Episode: Brazil: A Racial Paradise?

In Brazil, Professor Gates delves behind the façade of Carnival to discover how this ‘rainbow nation’ is waking up to its legacy as the world’s largest slave economy.

Watch the full episode. See more Black in Latin America.

Turning the Tide! This May - no more Arizonas!

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration is happy to be part of the planning committee for the National Turning the Tide Summit in Alrington, Virginia. Critical times require collective action. On May 26 — 28th, the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON), together with members of the Inter-Alliance Dialogue (IAD) network and other national partners, invite you to participate in a three-day Summit to Turn the Tide from the criminalization of migrant communities to a world of dignity and respect.

Check out the new video flier about the summit to learn more about the national gathering.

Visit http://altopolimigra.com to sign up for action alerts & updates on the national campaign to turn the tide from hate to human dignity. No more Arizonas!

Watch Full Episode of PBS's: Haiti & the Dominican Republic: An Island Divided

Originally posted by PBS

Full Episode: Haiti & the Dominican Republic: An Island Divided

In the Dominican Republic, Professor Gates explores how race has been socially constructed in a society whose people reflect centuries of inter-marriage, and how the country’s troubled history with Haiti informs notions about racial classification. In Haiti, Professor Gates tells the story of the birth of the first-ever black republic, and finds out how the slaves’s hard fight for liberation over Napoleon Bonaparte’s French Empire became a double-edged sword.

Watch the full episode. See more Black in Latin America.

BAJI turns 5 years old!

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration invites you to our 5th Anniversary Dinner and Awards Ceremony. Come celebrate 5 years of work in the community and help us recognize those who have helped to ignite a movement.

Founder Awards - Rev. Phillip Lawson and Rev. Kelvin Sauls
Ally Award - Priority Africa Network
Community Activist Award - Catherine Tactaquin, National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights
Community Activist Award - Pierre LaBosierre, Co-founder, Haiti Action Committee
Young Leaders Award - R.I.S.E. Immigration Research Team, Berkeley High School

Saturday, June 4, 2011
5:30 pm: Reception & Silent Auction
7:00 pm: Dinner and Program

Islamic Cultural Center of Northern California
1433 Madison Street, Oakland 94612

Tickets are $60. Please purchase at: http://bit.ly/BAJI5year
Facebook Event Page.

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI) is an organization founded in Oakland, California in 2006 to engage African Americans and other communities in a dialogue that leads to actions that challenge U.S. immigration policy and the underlying issues of race, racism and economic inequity that frame it.

BAJI is an education and advocacy group comprised of African Americans and black immigrants from Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean. BAJI’s goals are: 1) to develop a core group of African Americans who are prepared to actively support immigrant rights; and 2) to facilitate the building of relationships and alliances between African American and immigrant communities around a range of social issues to further the mutual cause of economic and social justice for all.

BAJI works to expose the ways in which racism and economic globalization have negatively impacted African American and immigrant communities alike, giving them common cause to fight together for economic and social justice for all peoples. BAJI’s strategy is to provide education and information to African American communities about the commonality of interests between African Americans and immigrants of color and to give technical assistance and training to leaders and organizers in communities of color.

In the past 5 years we've done various things including:

+ Led numerous “Conversations on Immigration” in local African American churches;

+ held public forums on Black Diaspora issues such as ‘Imprisonment of African Immigrants in Europe’;

+ Worked with various Inter-Faith initiatives around immigration and immigrant rights issues;

+ Active in Local May Day Immigrant Rights Demonstrations since 2006;

+Worked in local immigrant rights coalitions with Latino & Asian organizations;

+A major organization in the Oakland City I.D. card campaign ;

+ Collaborated with local groups working against car impoundments; for multi-language translation of Public documents; and most recently against the DHS-“Secure Communities” program;

+ Sponsored “Africa Diaspora Dialogues” between Africans and African Americans along with the Priority Africa Network; attempting to build unity along political and cultural lines;

+Collaborated with the Oakland Museum of California as part of the planning and publicity for the Museum’s “Africans in Mexico” Exhibition;

+Sponsored Tele-Conferences with prominent academics and activists on topical Black Diaspora issues;

On a the national and international level we've done the following:

+ Led campaigns to secure Temporary Protective Status for both Haitians and Liberians in the U.S.;

+ Active participant in both the U.S and World Social Forum processes 2007 -2011;

+ Founding members of the Pan African Network in Defense of Migrant Rights - participated in founding meetings in Bamako, Mali, Mexico City, Mexico and Dakar, Senegal;

+ Set up the Black Immigration Network (B.I.N.) as an advocacy network for Black Immigrants in the U.S.;

+ Led a delegation of Black Pastors to Phoenix, Arizona for the May 29^th Rally in 2010;

+ Participated in various national and state conferences on Immigration and related topics;

+ Along with the Coalicion de Derechos Humanos and the National Network for Immigrant & Refugee Rights, BAJI led the first all-Black delegation for a Tour of the Mexico/Arizona border in 2007;

+ Published 2 editions of the BAJI Reader;

+ Published the Report - Crossing Boundaries, Connecting Communities: Alliance Building for Immigrant Rights and Racial Justice. detailed case studies of 16 organizations from across the country that are forging effective cross racial alliances between immigrant and native-born communities in order to build power and win just policies and practices in their communities.

Teleconference IV: The Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to the U.S.

Black Alliance for Just Immigration & Priority Africa Network present

Black Intersections on Migration – Teleconference IV

Thursday, April 28th 12 PST : The Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to the U.S.

Janvieve Williams Comrie will discuss the historical, social and cultural dimensions of successive migration of Afro-Latinos/as and Afro-Caribbeans to the U.S. She will also shed light on the experience of these immigrants as they navigate the racial landscape of the U.S. society.

Janvieve Williams Comrie is the founder of the Latin American and Caribbean Community Center, she is dedicated to improving the conditions and opportunities for socially excluded and marginalized groups. Janvieve has worked throughout the Americas with communities on the ground and organizations to address the division and isolation faced by many of African descent and indigenous people, including low wageworkers, undocumented families and immigrants from Latin America and the Caribbean in the United States, by building a political and critical consciousness while using a human rights framework.

TO JOIN THE CALL:

1. Dial into the conferencing service

Toll-Free US/Canada: 1-866-931-7845

International Dial-in: 1-310-374-4949

2. Enter your conference code: 904167

Background to teleconference series: The United Nations has declared 2011 as the “International Year for Peoples of African Descent”. Ten years ago, landmark recommendations were made at the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban South Africa. In a four-part series of teleconferences that looks at the span of Black presence in the U.S. over the centuries, we will examine the unique migration experiences of the African Diaspora within the context of U.S. history and the current debate over immigration. The series brings provocative frameworks and analyses into the discussion about race and immigration that are seldom considered.

Teleconference III Recording Available: New African Immigrants-Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

On Thursday March 31st we held our 3rd national teleconference. On this call we listened to a presentation by Dr. Jackie Copeland-Carson moderated by Priority Africa Network Director, Nunu Kidane and then had a discussion with call participants. The conversation is entitled New Immigrants - grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity. If you missed this engaging teleconference please listen to it here -



Dr. Copeland-Carson discussed following topics.
- Figures of increase of African immigrants in the U.S
- Why is this significant, particularly for African American communities
- Understanding the importance of race and immigration as relates to African immigrants
- What are some of the important points to consider for organizers and social justice activists to increase outreach into African immigrant communities
- The need to develop a global Pan African consciousness


Please note that our next teleconference is Thursday April 28, 2011 at 12pm PST.

Teleconference: New African Immigrants-Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

The Black Alliance for Just Immigration & Priority Africa Network present

Black Intersections on Migration – Series III of IV Teleconferences

Thursday, March 31: New African Immigrants-Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

Speaker: Jackie Copeland Carson, PhD, President Copeland-Carson and Associates and author of "Creating Africa in America: Translocal Identity in an Emerging World City".

Moderator: Nunu Kidane, Director Priority Africa Network


Dr. Copeland-Carson will speak on the following topics and more:

- Figures of increase of African immigrants in the U.S

- Why is this significant, particularly for African American communities

- Understanding the importance of race and immigration as relates to African immigrants

- What are some of the important points to consider for organizers and social justice activists to increase outreach into African immigrant communities

- The need to develop a global Pan African consciousness

Toll-free Dial-in (US/Canada): 1-866-931-7845

International Dial-in: 1-310-374-4949

Conference Code: 484457

Please RSVP by calling (510) 663-2254 or sending an email to teleconference@blackalliance.org

Speaker Bio

Trained as an anthropologist and urban planner, Dr. Copeland-Carson has worked for over 25 years as an executive, grant-maker, evaluator, or researcher for philanthropies, including the Pew, Lilly, Noyes and Northwest Area foundations among others. In addition to serving as vice president of The Philadelphia Foundation, she was the founding managing director and vice president for private philanthropy at US Bank’s Private Client Group. Currently she is founding principal of Copeland Carson & Associates, an international consulting practice providing program design, evaluation and related services to diverse philanthropies in the U.S. and abroad. A frequently sought after speaker and published author on a wide range of nonprofit sector issues, Dr. Copeland-Carson has also taught philanthropy to graduate students for the University of Minnesota and St. Mary’s University. Over her career, she has worked with several hundred foundations. Current clients include Bertelsmann Foundation, Grantmakers Concerned about Immigrants and Refugees, and the Ford Foundation among others.

Dr. Copeland-Carson holds two masters degrees, one in urban planning and the other in cultural anthropology, with a Ph.D. in anthropology all from the University of Pennsylvania. She has done fieldwork in Nigeria as well as numerous U.S. cities and rural communities. Her undergraduate degrees are from Georgetown University in literature and African studies. She also studied African history, culture, languages and religion at Obafemi Awolowo University in Nigeria.

An expert in community development, cross-cultural issues, immigration and emerging markets, Dr. Copeland-Carson’s most recent books and articles examine issues in diversity, evaluation, community revitalization, alternative finance, and transnationalism. She serves on the board of the African Women’s Development Fund and is founder and chair of the Pan-African Women’s Philanthropy Network.

Background to teleconference series:

The United Nations has declared 2011 as the “International Year for Peoples of African Descent”. Ten years ago, landmark recommendations were made at the World Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance in Durban South Africa. In a four-part series of teleconferences that looks at the span of Black presence in the U.S. over the centuries, we will examine the unique migration experiences of the African Diaspora within the context of U.S. history and the current debate over immigration. The series brings provocative frameworks and analyses into the discussion about race and immigration that are seldom considered.

Examining Black History & Forging our Future —The Challenges of Migration and Globalization

Post by Phil Hutchings, BAJI Senior Organizer

Practically every African American has been touched in some way by the great Black Migrations out of the Southern states between 1914 and 1960. Most everyone has a parent, grandparent, uncle, aunt or some family relative who was a participant in that historic migration. In the case of the author, my mother's family came from small towns near Memphis, Tennessee, while my father and his father migrated from Macon, Georgia. Both parts of my future family ended up in Cleveland, Ohio, where I was born.

But the migration continues. People have not stopped moving from place to place. Today the United Nations tells us that across the globe there are 230 million people not living in their country of birth, with 2/3 of them being from the continent of Africa. More people are migrating from one country to another, or within the same country than ever before in human history.

Some of these migrations are caused by wars, climate changes or chances for family reunification. But most of the migration in today’s world is caused by the forces of economic globalization and foreign aid policies based upon the privatization of resources for the wealthy, which has made making a living next to impossible in many countries of Latin America, Africa and Asia.

But migration is not only a geographical phenomenon, but also a psychological one as well. The late scholar Florette Migri in her book titled "Black Migration: The Movement North, from Myth to Man" reminds us that one of the byproducts of migrating was the inner transformation of people, i.e., changing notions of who they were and what they were capable of accomplishing.

Today in 2011, many years after the great migrations and now over 50 years since the glory days of the Civil Rights Movement, we see a situation where most African American communities in major cities and many small towns are worse off in many respects than they were in the past. Statistics on unemployment and underemployment, bad housing, poor schools, health problems, incarceration, and the widening racial wealth gap all paint a dismal picture of where we are today as a people.

And perhaps because of the above-mentioned statistics, African American migrations continue into the present time. Many Black people have made a "reverse migration” back to fast growing cities of the New South. Even in cities of the North and the West Coast, there is a pattern of black migration out of the old “inner-city neighborhoods" to mostly black suburbs outside the traditional city boundaries.

At the same time many newcomers from global migrations caused by economic globalization are increasingly moving into what were once majority Black communities. Historic black communities are increasingly dealing with people from all parts of the world, particularly from Mexico and other Latin American nations, along with peoples from Southeast Asia, the Caribbean and the Pacific.

Are there still "black communities" today? Where does "black space" exist now in the complex of U.S. metropolitan communities? Are these "newcomers" in our areas "competitors", "neighbors", or potential "allies"?

How to respond to these new challenges of the 21st century? This is the type of work the Black Alliance for Just Immigration deals with in its regular community and political work. There are no easy answers but we know that with the system as it is, that there will be no real progressive changes for anyone or any group unless we find ways to understand one another’s’ histories and issues and to blend our struggles together in a united front for social and economic justice and real community security.

Being that February was Black History, we look to creating our Black Future in the present. We stand on the shoulders of those migrants who came before us. Those ancestors of the post First and Second World War migrations who left all they had in the South to travel into unimagined experiences where the reception they often received was one of hostility and danger.

In their struggles, they were able to transform themselves and eventually the entire country as well. Their mass movement from the South to the North transformed the so-called “Negro Problem” from a Southern regional issue to a national issue. The fight against racism became more complex as we moved from rural areas to major metropolitan areas and into industrial sectors. Those who came before us met their challenges then and in this era of globalization, we can and must do the same.

Phil Hutchings is a veteran of the Southern Freedom Movement of the 1960's with the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee. Currently he is the Senior Organizer with the Black Alliance for Just Immigration based in Oakland, California.

Teleconference II Recording Available - The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration

On Thursday February 24th we held our 2nd national teleconference. On this call we listened to a pre-recorded interview with Isabel Wilkerson and held a live discussion. Unfortunately, Isabel was unable to join us due to a scheduling conflict, however we had a very engaging teleconference. In case you missed it you can listen to it here -


Pulitzer Prize-winning author Isabel Wilkerson who wrote the epic book, "The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration". We will then have a discussion about the impact of The Great Migration on the African American community and on the United States as a whole. We will also talk about parallels with immigration to the United States, a comparison that Ms. Wilkerson alludes to in her interview.

In her review of the book, Janet Maslin of the New York Times wrote, "Ms. Wilkerson works on a grand, panoramic scale but also on a very intimate one, since this work of living history boils down to the tenderly told stories of three rural Southerners who immigrated to big cities from their hometowns."



Be sure to join us again on March 31st and April 28th.

Teleconference III – Thursday, March 31: New African Immigrants—Grappling with Concepts of Race and Identity

Speaker: Jackie Copeland Carson, PhD, President Copeland-Carson and Associates and author of “Creating Africa in America: Translocal Identity in an Emerging World City”.

Teleconference IV – Thursday, April 28: The Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Latino Migrations to the U.S.

Speaker: Janvieve Williams Comrie, Executive Director, Latin American and Caribbean Community Center

All briefings are at Noon Pacific, 1PM Mountain, 2PM Central & 3PM Eastern

Toll-free Dial-in (US/Canada): 1-866-931-7845
International Dial-in: 1-310-374-4949
Conference Code: 707591

Please RSVP by calling (510) 663-2254 or sending an email to teleconference@blackalliance.org

HB 2191: The Arizona Syndrome Or another Arizona anti-immigrant law of white privilege

By Arnoldo Garcia

This blog post has been re-blogged. The original post appeared here.

The Arizona legislature, dominated by white supremacists and anti-immigrant haters, continues leading the way to undermine if not gut the 14th Amendment. And everyone's rights are in danger.

The Arizona House just approved a bill that would not allow undocumented persons their day in court.

The East Valley Tribune in Arizona reported:

A House panel on Wednesday approved legislation designed to benefit one man: Cochise rancher Roger Barnett.

The measure would spell out that anyone who is in this country [SIC] illegally cannot collect punitive damages even after winning a lawsuit.

Voters already approved a constitutional amendment doing precisely that in 2006. But that came nearly two years too late for Barnett who was sued following a 2004 incident when 16 [SIC] illegal immigrants said the rancher illegally imprisoned them.

HB 2191 makes that ballot measure retroactive to the beginning of 2004.

Guilty by immigration status.

Arizona is not alone in its zealot anti-migrant, anti-Mexican, anti-human notoriety. From Prop. 200, approved in 2004 and that prohibits state public services to persons who can't prove their status in the U.S., to SB-1070, the anti-immigrant racial profiling law approved last year, at least 20 states are pursuing similar initiatives. Now, across the U.S., a person's rights are being trumped by their immigration status, race, color, class and gender. This is the new double standard: "guilty by immigration status." (NNIRR's HURRICANE initiative, working with community groups, documents the human rights abuses being committed by ICE, police and other government officials and private citizens, issued the report "Guilty by Immigration Status.")

While HB 2191 represents another low blow to our rights, it's is not just another law. The fact that a measure of this nature -- protecting Roger Barnett a rancher with a hate reputation that's a staple of the anti-migrant violence on the border -- would get this far is testament to the depth of the human rights crisis in Arizona. How far can the Arizona hate legislators drive a stake into the heart of the U.S. Constitution? HB 2191 is more evidence of the the new normal defined by a deepening anti-immigrant hate and vigilante vitriol.

Tit for tat: Even so, Arizona is the offspring of a big plan, Operation Endgame, fueling the national anti-immigrant pandemic. ICE operations against workers; the extension of federal immigration-police collaboration to every nook and cranny of the U.S. and the anti-immigrant hate are not passing fancies. And Arizona's Prop 200 was the offspring of California's Prop. 187. SB-1070 is the culmination of federal immigration-police collaboration programs and the militarization of immigration control and border communities. The U.S. will enlist the police force in every county by 2012 to take part in immigration control. Every county that abuts the border and every county in Texas and Arizona and about two-thirds of all counties in California are already part of the Department of Homeland Security's "Secure Communities, which allows police to share the fingerprints of everyone arrested with the DHS database....

These are not just flawed policies and laws. We are witnessing an emerging immigration policing regime that is criminalizing immigrants beyond recognition and using the shameless excuse of going after "criminals" to destroy everyone's rights -- citizens and non-citizens, immigrants and non-immigrants, working people and communities of color.

The Rise of the U.S. Immigration Policing Regime


HB 2191 may be just a shamefaced attempt to change the rules for a white rancher who was convicted of imprisoning migrants at gunpoint. While the legislator behind HB 2191 is ratcheting white privilege up a notch, HB 2191 whittles away our basic rights.

The recent conviction of Shawna Forde for the cold-blooded murder of Raul Flores and Brisenia Flores, his nine-year old daughter, is a small measure of long-overdue justice. Stopping HB 2191 would be a tiny sign of sanity in the Arizona legislature. But don't hold your breath waiting for the Arizona Senate to stop HB 2191. The cold-hearted Arizona Senate got cold feet and yanked yet another one of its worst case scenario bills, which would have allowed hospitals to ask persons for their immigration papers before helping them; they didn't have the votes to pass it.

The revolution is civil rights?

What are we going to do? How do you stop them from legislating hate, from continuing to build a policing regime with its own criminal justice and prison system exclusively for persons with immigration status? It's easy to say: we need push back on all the criminalization, which drives the hate movement, and demand that the 14th Amendment be defended and expanded, say with policies and measures that ensure that:

• A person is innocent till proven guilty;
• A person has the right to her day in court;
• Racial, ethnic/national and religious profiling -- i.e. all forms of discrimination based on race, color, religious and political creed and belief, gender and class -- are illegal.

That would be revolutionary.

Come to think of it, this is the law of the land right now; but not in Arizona and dozens of others states and counties if we don't push back hard.

* Arnoldo Garcia works for the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights. For more information visit: www.nnirr.org

Videos about African Migration from the World Social Forum

Post by Opal Tometi, BAJI National Organizer

Our final days at the World Social Forum in Dakar, Senegal were a blur. With several meetings, workshops and other impromptu activities we just didn’t have time to capture it all on our blog. However, now that we’re back in the United States we are beginning to reflect on some of the highlights and have some videos we’d like to share with you.

The first is a short video with Mamadou Goita, the Director of IRPAD (Institut de Recherche et de Promotion des Alternatives en Développement), based in Mali. In this clip he briefly discusses the connections of environmental justice and immigration. An issue we are sure to blog about more in the future.



Our 2nd video is with Mary Tal, a courageous migrant justice organizer in South Africa. In this video she tells her personal story of migration and talks about how she’s helping women and their families in South Africa through support groups, advocacy and by providing other social services. Mary’s story is powerful and compelling as she explains how she cast off the shame of being a refugee, empowered herself and found her voice.


Whole World Women Association - South Africa from opal ayo on Vimeo.

The World Social Forum Kicks Off with Historic March

Posted by Opal Tometi, BAJI National Organizer
February 6, 2011


The World Social Forum has officially begun! With a whirlwind of smaller events, meetings and orientations leading up to today’s (Sunday February 6, 2011) opening ceremony in Dakar, Senegal everyone seems to be energized for this week's historic gathering. 

Today, we marched through the streets of Dakar for about 3 hours, not including the time where people were able to listen to speeches. One of which was delivered by Bolivia’s celebrated President Evo Morales. There were people as far as the eye could see, and thousands of Senegalese participated throughout the day,  including those who served as volunteers helping to answer questions, and who worked as security to ensure that the day went smoothly.  It is estimated that well over 100,000 people participated in today’s march.

Along with our companer@s from Priority Africa Network, Grassroots Global Justice Alliance, and several other organizations we marched through the streets of Dakar chanting in solidarity and with much enthusiasm.

People waved banners and held signs representing movements from throughout the world and highlighting issues such as violence against women, police brutality, environmental justice and migrant rights, while other banners called into question the occupation of various lands, neocolonialism, economic exploitation, militarism and so much more. We saw and even befriended people from throughout the world - from Brazil to Palestine, Rwanda, Nigeria, Egypt and Japan! What seems most evident is that social movements around the globe are vibrant and people are working tirelessly toward social justice in every part of the world.

The march was just the beginning and we are hopeful that the sentiment of joy and justice, that permeated the air, will be one that carries us through the complex discussions, networking and strategizing that are sure to fill the week.

You can see some pictures from our day at the march on the our Flickr page.

Check out the program here to see the range of plenaries and workshops that will take place this week.

World Assembly of Migrants

Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Goree Island, Senegal 


Posted by Gerald Lenoir, Executive Director, Black Alliance for Just Immigration


Nunu Kidane of Priority Africa Network, Colin Rajah of the National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights and I traveled from Oakland, California to Dakar Senegal to attend the World Assembly of Migrants (WAM) on Goree Island and the World Social Forum (WSF) at the Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar.

A statue of freed slaves on
Goree Island donated by the
government of Guadeloupe.

Today, we took the 20-minute ferry ride to the infamous Goree Island where enslaved Africans were imprisoned, brutalized, led shackled through the "Door of No Return" and shipped en masse to the New World.  We were there to attend the opening session of the World Assembly of Migrants.  The Assembly was initiated by a migrant rights organization in France, Sans Papier (Without Papers) to provide the opportunity for migrants from all over the world to give input into the draft of the World Charter of Migrants.  The opening session, attended by over 100 migrants, started with a panel that included the Mayor of Goree Island, a representative from WAM and a member of the leadership of the WSF leadership group.

The Mayor reminded us that the event was taking place on the spot where the first brutal forced migration of Africans took place.  The WSF representative spoke about the importance of migrant rights as a central theme of the Social Forum scheduled to take place February 6-11.

Migrants from all over the world listen
to the opening panel presentations at
the World Assembly of Migrants.

The WAM speaker spoke to the need of the rights of migrant to be recognized.  The draft charter, he said, builds upon the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Indigenous People.  As an Austrian, he talked about the "wave of xenophobia sweeping across Europe."  He indicated that process of input into the charter will make sure that it's ratified by the people and that it is a people's document.  The aim is to get the charter ratified by United Nations.

The 2-page draft charter reads, in part:

"We Migrants declare to the world that:  MIGRATION WILL BE A FREE AND WORTHY CHOICE FOR ALL AND IN EVERY CORNER OF THE PLANET..." (emphasis in the original document)

"...We are entitled to the same rights, recognized under exactly the same conditions as everyone else.

Denying this basic principle is a serious blow to humanity, a negation of Humanity. Laws, regulations and practices that do not respect this principle will disappear over time, a ghostly memory of less humanitarian times in the past.

Unequal access to development and well-being within countries and between countries can and should be avoided and are in fact a crime against Humanity. We must prevail over such disparities."

(To read the entire draft of the World charter of Migrants, go to www.cmmigrants.org. 


Tomorrow, the day will be spent pouring over the draft document.  There will opportunities for the migrants assembled to give their input.  By the end of the day, the charter will be adopted by those assembled.  On Friday, migrants, along with their allies, will consider the future of the charter.  for many, the future for migrants is depending upon migrants themselves articulating their rights and, together with their allies, fighting for them.


My colleagues and I will continue to blog from the WAM and the WSF until February 11.  For photos of today and throughout the week, go to Priority Africa Network's D2D - World Social Forum web page at http://d2dworldsocialforumdakar2011.blogspot.com/