Two years after the passing of historian Manning Marable and the release of his Pulitzer Prize-winning Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention, one of his researchers Zaheer Ali joined Tavis Smiley and Cornel West to reflect on Marable's life and legacy, and on his biography of Malcolm X.
Listen to the segment here:
Download a podcast of the entire show here.
As part of the Manning Marable Memorial Conference, I participated in a session with Megan Marcelin and Mark Phillipson entitled "Digital Humanities Beyond the Classroom: The Education of Manning Marable" that examined the series of pioneering digital humanities projects Dr. Marable undertook with Columbia's Center for New Media Teaching and Learning (CCNMTL).
One of the projects on which I worked closely with Dr. Marable is an online, annotated, multimedia version of The Autobiography of Malcolm X. At our conference session, I screened this CCNMTL-produced video clip highlighting some features of that project:
Thanks to all those who tweeted, here's a storified recap of the entire session (may take a few seconds to load):
As part of the Manning Marable Memorial Conference, fellow Malcolm X Project researchers May Alhassen, Garrett Felber, & Liz Mazucci joined me in a roundtable conversation moderated by Hishaam Aidi, about Manning Marable's Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention. We reflected on our work with Dr. Marable, his book, and its critics.
A partial audio recording of the session is forthcoming, but in the meantime, thanks to all those who tweeted here's a storified recap (may take a few seconds to load):
On November 15, 2011, I was honored to read, on behalf of Dr. Manning Marable, from his Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention at the National Book Award Finalists Reading held at the New School in New York City.
Watch the reading here:
Malcolm X, Manning Marable, National Book Awards As part of the Harlem Book Fair, this panel discussion, held at the New York Public Library's Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, explores the landmark publication of the late Columbia University Black Studies scholar Manning Marable’s biography, Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention.
Moderated by Yohuru Williams (Black Politics/White Power: Civil Rights, Black Power, and the Black Panthers in New Haven), participants included (right to left) Herb Boyd (Civil Rights: Yesterday and Today), Peniel Joseph (Dark Days, Bright Nights: From Black Power to Barack Obama), Zaheer Ali (Former Project Manager, Malcolm X Project at Columbia University), and activist and poet Sonia Sanchez.
The program aired live on Saturday, July 23, on C-SPAN2, and can be viewed online here.
On Wednesday, May 25, 2011, C-SPAN's Peter Slen interviewed me at the BookExpo America held in New York City, where we discussed my work with Dr. Manning Marable for Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention and the Malcolm X Project.
The interview first aired on Sunday, May 29, on C-SPAN2, and can be viewed online here or here.
C-SPAN, Malcolm X, Manning Marable in Television "Dr. Marable created an open and welcoming space for a diverse group of students—Nationalists, Marxists, Muslims, Christians, Jews, atheists, progressives, whites, blacks, browns, gay, straight—and fostered academic exchange among us that was vibrant, rigorous, and respectful of our differences.... I am honored to be one of his intellectual offspring."
On Thursday, May 26, 2011, Columbia University hosted a public celebration of the life and legacy of Dr. Manning Marable.
My complete remarks follow:
Columbia University, Manning Marable in Web Events are being held today across the country to mark what would have been Malcolm X's 86th birthday. Earlier this year a major new biography of Malcolm X was published titled, Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention.
The book's author, Columbia University Professor Dr. Manning Marable, died at the age of 60 just days before its publication. Two decades in the making, the nearly 600-page biography is described as a re-evaluation of Malcolm X's life, providing new insights into the circumstances of his assassination, as well as raising questions about Malcolm X's own autobiography. Democracy Now! interviews Zaheer Ali, one of the researchers who worked with Dr. Marable on the biography. "In a sense, this book is kind of iconoclasm in that way in that it takes Malcolm off the pedestal to examine him as a human being struggling through these political and religious currents he was in," says Zaheer. Ali also served as associate director and senior researcher of Columbia University's Malcolm X Project, a program that focuses on the life and legacy of the civil rights activist.
Read the transcript and view the entire show here.
Democracy Now!, Malcolm X, Manning Marable in Television In a Q&A with the Austin American Statesman, I discussed the reception to Dr. Manning Marable's Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention, as well as the book's contributions to field of African American Studies and the public discourse on Islam in America.
Read the interview here.
Hosted by Philp Dodd for BBC Radio 3's "Night Waves," I joined Richard Brent Turner (author of Islam in the African-American Experience) and Mark Ledwidge (author of Race and US Foreign Policy: The African-American Foreign Affairs Network) in a conversation about the implications of Dr. Manning Marable's Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention. We discussed Malcolm X's relationship to Islam, his legacy in a so-called "post-racial" America, and the enduring legacy of Islam in the African-American community.
Listen to the program here (or click here to download):
African Americans, BBC, Islam, Malcolm X, Manning Marable, Richard Turner in Radio