Dutch television host criticised for impersonating a black woman

Is it blackface or not, that is the question. Dutch television host Wendy van Dijk transformed herself into a stereotype black Antillean woman to fool Dutch Celebs. She called her Lucretia Martine, the weather woman from Curaçao. It was a transformation like Eddy Murphy did in the Nutty Professor. But there is one big difference, Wendy van Dijk is a white woman.

The television show is a big hit in Holland, already 2 million viewers watched the first show. But not everyone is happy with Van Dijk's creation. Surinam Actress and Singer Lucretia van der Vloot and and Author Clarck called it ridiculous.



Within the Surinamese and Antillean community there is criticism that Van Dijk stereotyped Antillean women: thick lips, fat ass, lazy, and always talking about sex.

But the criticism of Van der Vloot and Accord is not about the fact that she impersonated a black woman, but that she played an Antillean woman, but talked as Surinam woman. Which is the same as playing an American woman, but talking like a Jamaican. Writer Accord feels that Van Dijk should have known better, because she went to a black urban school in Amsterdam Bijlmer.

Wendy van Dijk’s act also sparked criticism on the media in general. At this moment Van Dijk’s Antillean woman is the only 'black' woman on Dutch television. Black people aren't underrepresented they have become totally absent on Dutch television.

Van Dijk says she doesn't understand the criticism: "I am only trying to play a funny, independent and well spoken woman."

The marketing agency of the Dutch Antillean island Curacao is happy with Van Dijk’s Curaçao woman act. They have offered her a contract to promote the Island.

Van Dijk also played a Japanese woman called Ushi, Lucreatia Martina, the weather woman from Curaçao, is her latest creation.

Update: see the interesting discussion on Shadowandact about blackface and and the Dutch Antillean character here

KINGSMEAD EYES: black children documented their world (UK)

Spotted on Africa is a country
Kingsmead Eyes is the result of a unique collaboration between photographer Gideon Mendel and 28 pupils from Kingsmead School in 
Hackney. The children documented their world over six months, photographing their friends, families, community and school to create an accomplished and vibrant body of work. At the same time, Mendel, working in parallel to the children made portraits of every child in the school as well as also documenting the life of the area.

This video installation is part of the Kingsmead Eyes exhibition on display at the V&A Museum of Childhood from 7 November 2009 till 7 February 2010.

The Kingsmead Estate, home to many of the pupils, is recognised as among the highest 4% for deprivation in the UK. The estate has suffered from a negative reputation in the past but conditions have improved in recent years and regeneration initiatives have encouraged a stronger sense of community. The school has played a major role in this turnaround, striving to achieve the highest standards with academic achievement above the national average – all the more impressive considering that 85% of pupils speak English as a second language. The success and creativity of the school has long been a source of local pride. For this project the ten year-old pupils were trained in the use of digital cameras in a series of workshops led by photographer, Crispin Hughes.

Kingsmead Eyes

A very interesting view in the lives of young black European children.

Singer Izaline Calister won the Dutch Edison Award 2009

Dutch Antillean singer Izaline Calister won the Dutch Edison Award 2009 in the category Jazz/world music. The Edison Awards are Grammy Awards of The Netherlands. She received the Edison for her album Speransa. The award ceremony will be held on November 19th.

Calister’s first videoclip just has been released. The song is called ‘Mi Pais’ (My Country) and tells about her love for her sometimes hampered island. It is a track of her latest cd-release, ’Speransa’. The clip is shot on the Dutch Caribbean island of Curaçao.

Izaline Calister's official website

Marie NDiaye is the first black woman to win France’s top literary prize (Prix Goncourt)

Today French-Senegalese writer Marie NDiaye (42) won France's top literary prize, the Prix Goncourt, for her novel Trois femmes puissantes [Three Strong Women], a novel on family, betrayal and the hellish ordeal of illegal migration from Africa. She is the black woman to win the prize.

Marie NDiaye was born in France, she is the daughter of a French mother and a Senegalese father. NDiaye was raised by her French mother in Pithiviers, a provincial town south of Paris. After her father returned to Senegal, she did not travel to Africa until she was in her 20s. She now lives in Berlin with her three children

Marie NDiaye is the sister of historian Pap NDiaye.

Marie NDiaye: “I grew up in a world that was 100 percent French. My African roots don’t mean much, except that people know of them because of the color of my skin and my name,” she said recently.

“I don’t represent anything or anyone,” she said. “I have met many French people raised in Africa who are more African than I am.”

While she rages at the discrimination still faced by French blacks, NDiaye says she has been sheltered by her writer career.

“I have always had a quite special, marginal life, the life of a writer lucky enough not to have to ask anyone for anything,” she said.(AP)

It’s great achievement for a black woman in France, and it’s also a sign that France is changing. But there’s one thing about Marie N Diaye that leaves me puzzled. She says her African roots don’t mean much to her, but she does write about Dakar and the black migration experience. Apparently roots does matter.

Entretien Marie Ndiaye
Geüpload door fluctuat. - Bekijk de laatste nieuwscontent.

Trois femmes puissantes [Three Strong Women] is the book beneath the French media’s spotlight this rentrée. Three, tenuously linked narratives. At their heart, three women who say no.

Forty year-old Norah arrives at the home of her father in Africa. An egocentric tyrant, he has now become silent and bulimic, and spends his nights perched in a tree in the courtyard. Why did he ask her to come? The answer, Norah discovers, is worse than she could have ever imagined.

Fanta, who used to teach French in Dakar, had to follow her partner, Rudy, to France. Here, Rudy proves incapable of providing her with the rich and joyful life she deserves. He remains under the morbid influence of his mother, who dedicates her life to convincing her entourage of the existence of angels.

Destabilised, Rudy wanders through an angry reality, while Fanta, by his side, is a rock. Khady Demba is a young African widow. Penniless, she tries to find her distant cousin, Fanta, in France. The long journey of emigration she pursues will be punctuated with unspeakable suffering. (source: French book news)

Read: Black woman wins Prix Concourt for the first time

Singer Leona Lewis talks of experiencing racism in London store

Photo and copyright: Ken Mckay - Leona Lewis with her parents at the X Factor UK (2006)
Spotted on Madnews
Singer Leona Lewis talks about experiencing racism in a trendy London store. An experience that left her devastated and angry.

Via The Daily Mail

‘I went into a shop while my dad waited outside because he was on the phone,’ she says. ‘I picked out a few photo frames, put them on the side to buy them and asked the lady who worked there about some other stuff in the shop.

‘She was incredibly stand-offish with me and I couldn’t understand why. I went up to the till and, at that point, my dad came in and started looking around. He picked something up and said, “What about this?”

‘I asked how much it was, but the woman told us to get out of the shop. I just couldn’t believe what I was hearing and said, “Excuse me?” She said, “Get out of my store right now.”

‘I looked at her and asked, “Are you joking?” She said, “No, I want both of you to remove yourselves from my store.” I asked her what she meant, and why, and she said, “I don’t like the look of him.”

Pointing at my dad, she said, “I want him to go right now.” Stunned, I asked her, “What do you mean, you don’t like the look of him?” She said, “You know exactly what I mean. He’s been standing outside my shop and I want him to go. I know why you’re coming in here.”

‘She was implying that we were trying to steal stuff. She came up to my face, this close.’ Leona holds her hand a few inches from her face. ‘She was so loud, shouting, “Get out right now or I’m going to call the police.”

‘It was so shocking and disgusting. I couldn’t believe someone was shouting at me in front of so many people. I can’t stand confrontation anyway, but she was so rude. I completely lost it. I was crying and bawling. My dad said, “Come on, let’s go.” I said, “No. I’m not going. I’m going to call the police. This is racism.”

‘I was so angry. My dad had to drag me out of the shop. Afterwards, I sat in the car for ten minutes and was so upset. My dad was trying to calm me down but I was furious. What happened was awful – absolutely awful.

‘I’d never experienced anything like that, and I would never wish anyone else to. Being judged by the colour of your skin is horrible. My dad is really laid-back. He said, “Don’t worry about it. I’ve experienced stuff like that many times, especially when I was younger, so don’t be upset for me. I’m fine.”

‘Do you know what he did? He got my CD, went back in the shop and said, “You’ve just offended a really nice young lady. I just want to leave you this, so you can look and see who it is. This is my daughter. I’m not trying to cause trouble, but I wanted you to see that.”‘

I understand her father’s reaction, he wanted to show that his daughter is a famous singer. But this is racism, period. It's good Lewis talked about it, but they should really make a case of this and name the store.

Bonnie Greer versus the extreme right-wing BNP (UK)

BBC One's Question Time on October 22 was one of the most controversial television events this month. Live on television, the leader of the extreme right-wing British National Party(BNP) on the panel of the BBC's Question Time. Also on the panel was black British American playwright Bonnie Greer.

The BNP's website referred to Greer as a "black history fabricator" for her work on the radio documentary In Search of the Black Madonna, which was, it said, an "Afrocentrist daydream".

Back to BBC's Question Time. To be honest it wasn't a strong performance of Greer. She said." I don't know much about politics, my background is culture." And it showed. But also a line as," Nick and I, both have an undergraduate degree in history". Nick and I? That's not the way you talk about someone who is an honoured guest of the KKK.

We know that Greer hates the BNP, but she is culture, so let her stick to that. Don't ask her to debate with a notorious racist.

read: BNP leader Nick Griffin savaged by Question Time panellist Bonnie Greer

In the video she discusses the claim of the BNP that Winston Churchill could have been a member of the BNP. Churchill had made some anti-immigration remarks.

German reporter criticised for posing as black man in film

German reporter Günter Wallraff spent over a year travelling through Germany disguised as fictional Somalian man Kwami Ogonno for the film Schwarz auf Weiss ( Black on White ). His goal was to experience racisme at first hand, so he put on a blackface for the occasion.

And he succeeded. In East-Germany – of course - he was attacked by drunken youth. Read the full story here.

But Afro-German Noah Sow, author of Deutschland Black & White, criticised Walraff: “A painted white person is not a black person and cannot have the same experiences even if he thinks he can,” said Noah Sow, author of Everyday Racism in Germany . “Wallraff is earning money and respect on the backs of oppressed minorities.”

If you're not acquainted with Germany this film may seem as an eye opener, but racism in Germany doesn't need to be uncovered. Long before the 2006 FIFA World cup football tournament even the FIFA warned people of colour to stay away from the “rural areas” in East German Berlin.

And Günter? I think he wanted to be on the news again, but this time with a racism show with hidden cameras. If he really wanted to expose racism he could have used the black guy in the film. But I think the sole purpose of this black man was just to legitimate his blackface.

See shots of the film in the interview (German)

Last Moroccan leaves the Netherlands

What if all the Moroccans in the Netherlands were to pack up and leave? This is the question posed by an internet video.

In the video A man cycles in his dressing gown to collect his own newspaper from a pile in the street – the Moroccan delivery man has left the country. Streets are strewn with litter, buildings fall into disrepair. Stranded commuters queue for taxis, with no one left to drive them. “Last Moroccan leaves today,” reads the newspaper headline, as a plane overhead flies south. “Last Moroccan leaves the Netherlands”

Moroccans tend to feature in the Dutch media as young criminals, causing nuisance in the street, hurling abuse at gays and women, and carrying out muggings and robberies. Or indeed as Muslims struggling to integrate, in a debate driven by anti-Islam MP Geert Wilders, leader of the far-right Freedom Party. Mr Wilders has said he would not hesitate to deport Muslims who commit crimes or fail to integrate into Dutch society – and his party is riding high in the polls.

An interesting video of a minority group under pressure. But for a community who has been in the Netherlands since the sixties, it is very one sided view. It seems that they will only be missed if the newspaper is not being delivered anymore.

Although their unemployment rate is the highest of all minority groups the Netherlands, there is a large group of young and ambitious Moroccans who are successfully entering the professional sector. This video is more a street view.

I wonder how a video entitled "Last black person leaves Europe" would look like.

Read “Last Moroccan leaves the Netherlands”

Marvin Sapp - Gospel Festival Paris 2009 (Oct. 31)

Le Festival Gospel de Paris – Sunday October 31st in Paris (50. av. dur President Wilson 92310 La Plaine St-Denis) with Marvin Sapp and Total Praise.

After Kirk Franklin and Bebe Winans, ‘Le Festival Gospel de Paris’ invites the gospel and R & B star Marvin Sapp. The reputation of Marvin Sapp has gained momentum in 2008 with his hit "Never Would Have Made It” from the album Thirsty. The song peaked at 1st on the Billboard Hot Gospel Songs and 14th in U.S. Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart. In 2008 Sapp received the BET AWARDS for Best Gospel Artist.

MARVIN SAPP AUX BET AWARDS from KAL N on Vimeo.

The Former member of legendary group Commissioned will perform for the first time in France at the Gospel Festival 2009. He will be joined by 180 singers and musicians of Total Praise. Total Praise has performed with Barbara Kendrics, Jessye Norman, Johnny Hallyday and many other famous artists.

The concert will be preceded by a plateau of young modern gospel talent such as Dré Bonny (ex Poetic Lover) and Leah Vincent (Lion King).

Interview Spike Lee: "I wasn't the one that put blackface on Judy Garland."

It has been 20 years since the release of Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing. So for the occasion Spike Lee was interviewed by Jason Solomons of the Guardian. In the interview Lee talks about Do The Right Thing, other films and Obama.

In the interview he also talks about a film which is very relevant today. It's the blackface film Bamboozled, a satirical film about a modern televised minstrel show featuring black actors donning blackface makeup and the violent fall-out from the show's success. The film - of course - is relevant because of the recent Vogue issue and the blackface Australian performance of the Jackson Five. In the interview Jason Solomons said that some people found this film a very angry film, Lee replied, "I wasn't the one who put blackface on Judy Garland."

On YouTube I found the video montage of the black face shots used in the film Bamboozled. You sometimes wonder how people can use black face and call it 'artistic'. (See all videos below.)



Do The Right Thing (1989)
Lee: Do The Right Thing takes place in hottest day of the summer. We wanted the people to be sweating while they watched this film.


Fight the power (theme song)
Lee: I knew I wanted an anthem, so I called Chuck D and he came back with this classic. It's really the theme at that time of young black America. In 1989 Fight the power was the only song you heard that summer.


The Toy (1982)
Interviewer: Back in 89 black filmmakers were struggling to be heard. Black actors were struggling to get out of ghetto parts.
Lee: A very important individual, people don't really acknowledge, is Michael Schultz. He was our only African American director in Hollywood at that time. He made a lot of hit films of Richard Prior. Prior was a big star in Hollywood.
Interviewer: They had to had to give him a white buddy, Gene Wilder.
Lee: “The worst was the film The Toy (1982), where he was bought by rich white man as a toy for his child.


Soul Plane (2000)
Interviewer: Do you think, that because of Do The Right Thing, that kind of film will ...
Lee: Hé hé, they still make some of this stuff. You ever heard of a film called Soul Plane?



Malcolm X (1992)
Lee on Malcom X: This is biggest run I've done so far. People said, don't mess it up.


Bamboozled (2000)
Interviewer: One of my favourites is Bamboozled (2000). One of the least seen, one of the most angry.
Lee: One of my favourite films too, very funny film.
Interviewer: Black film makers, black activist say it comes a big angry.
Lee: I don’t know it was angry. I wasn't the one who put blackface on Judy Garland, Mickey Roony and Bugs Buny.



(The film below is a video montage of the blackface shots used in the film Bamboozled)

You sometimes wonder how people can use black face and call it artistic.

Driving Miss Daisy (1989)
Interviewer: The film Do The Right Thing has shaped the politics of Obama.
Lee: Well I don't know if it has shaped his politics. People forget that the best film in 1989, according to the academy, was Driving miss Daisy. A film no one has seen, no one is watching that today.


La Hain (1995) - The Hait
Lee: The one film I have issue with is La Hain (1995). That film was a complete rip off of Do The Right Thing. The director Mathieu Kassovitz has never acknowledged it. He said he never saw it. When you see Do The Right Thing, it's an homage.


More Bamboozled

Quote of the film. In the film the white boss says to the black screen writer: “I grew up around black people my whole life, the truth is know N*gers more then you. And don't go getting offended by me using the word N***. I have a black wife and two Bi-racial kids so I feel I have the right.”

Spike Lee: “I never drank that post-racial Kool Aid”

An interview with Spike Lee and BBC Newsnight’s Jeremy Paxman on changing race relations in America since Lee made "Do The Right Thing". In the interview which aired a month ago, the two argue about the impact of Barack Obama’s election on modern day racism.

A very interesting interview, the idea that racism is something of the past seems to infuriate him.


Spotted on Soulculture

Queendom: Black female and Norwegian

On October 14th the Norwegian group Queendom had the television premiere of their comedy series for TV-action 2009. Queendom has written the script and plays all the supporting roles. Place of action is Sogndalstrand in Norway and Bagamoyo in Tanzania,the themes are women, Africa, development aid and multicultural Norway.

Queendom about Queendom: “Queendom is based in Oslo, Norway, and draws on the talent and experience of five performing artists with backgrounds from Ethiopia, Nigeria, Uganda, Trinidad and Gambia. The group was established in 1999 and is unique in that it represents the first time young, black women have set up their own performing arts group in Norway. The members of the group are professional actors, journalists, singers and songwriters.



Queendom aims to raise the profile of black women by creating both socially aware and entertaining performances. Our shows touch on themes relevant to our everyday lives in Norway, such as racism, identity and women’s issues. While most of our material is original we also present a selection of texts and music written by other black artists - both in Norwegian and English. Through humour, satire, poetry and song, we wish to raise the level of awareness and understanding between men and women of all ethnic backgrounds.”

Queendom performers:
Hannah Wozene Kvam, born 1972 - background Ethiopia
Asta Busingye Lydersen, born 1970 - background Uganda / Norway
Isabell Dahlsveen Sterling, born 1972 - background Trinidad / Norway
Monica Ifejilika, born 1977 - background Nigeria / Norway
Haddy Jatou N'jie, born 1979 - background Gambia, Norway

Read the review of Queendom on Jamati

Website Queendom
Queendom on Myspace

Haddy Jatou N´jie

Musical Tismee with Aurélie Konaté (France)

The musical Tismee, Sept 18th till Nov 11th 2009 in Theatre de la Reine Blanche in Paris

The musical Tismee is a musical about ordinary racism. It’s about words and telling jokes that are not often considered evil, but can hurt. It’s about bias, prejudice and the colour of one's skin. It’s about living in two cultures, at a time when more and more people carry two cultures and two lives in them: one where they are, the other where they come from. It’s about the difficult duality where the solitude of exile and feelings of rejection regularly overwhelms.

Sounds very dramatic, but with this line up no tears will be shed.

With Aurélie Konaté – Singer, dancer and comedian
Félix Sabal Lecco – Singer, musician and comedian
Khalil Maouene – Singer, musician and comedian

Official Myspace website Tismee

Official theme song Tismee "Je Pars Seule"