Hola, mi gente. ¿Cómo están? Mi nombre es
Albamar. Me pueden decir Alba. El canal se llama
"seriela". Estamos aquí para hablar de libros, algunos de ellos en español
desde Puerto Rico.
Hello, my name is Albamar. You may call
me Alba. The channel name is "seriela". We're
here to talk about books and some of
them in Spanish from Puerto Rico.
Today is a Friday Reads and it's going
to be really fast because I haven't
slept. I feel compelled to share
my Friday Reads and what I'll be reading
in the foreseeable future to see whether
I can decolonize my mind. You
know that I said - this past week as a
matter of fact - that I had Stamped from
the Beginning on my TBR for the longest
time. It's about time to start
reading it. And as soon as I finish that
one comes this one. I know there are
a couple of buddy reads coming up for
June and different activities. Those will
be incorporated. But my first priority is
going to keep the lives that have been
lost due to police violence... I'm going to
keep those people in my mind as I read
the books that I've had on my TBR for
the longest time. You know that I've
already read Just Mercy. I've read Audrey
Lorde. I've read some of bell hooks: Ain't
I a Woman?  I did the Taylor Branch
trilogy on the Civil Rights [era]. Also read
the Wilkerson book,
The Warmth of Other Suns. They're right
under here propping something up.
I've started to do my work. I've
also read Angela Davis, Freedom is a
Constant Struggle. But there are
books that I have been wanting to read
and haven't and I think it's about time
that I did. For the longest time I have had
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in
the Age of Colorblindness. And I
have no excuse for this because I have
it in the physical copy and I also have
it on the Kindle. I have had The Souls of
Black Folk for the longest time by W.E.B.
Dubois. This is an oldie but a goodie:
Crisis in Black and White by Charles E.
Silberman. This is another possibility
for Maybe Midrash - Divided by Faith: Evangelical
Religion and the Problem of Race in
America. Recommended by a friend - Derrick
Bell's Faces at the Bottom of the Well:
The Permanence of Racism. And one that I
just hauled a couple of months ago when
it came out - The Overground Railroad: The
Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel
in America by Candacy Taylor. Of
course, I also have When They Call You a
Terrorist:
A Black Lives Matter Memoir by Patrice
Kahn-Cullors and Asha Bandele,
with foreword by Angela Davis. And I have a
couple of books still pending by bell
hooks: Remembered Rapture, which is about
her experience as a writer. Bone Black:
Memories of Girlhood by bell hooks and
Wounds of Passion. I'm gonna leave it
there. I don't think that there's any
more to be said. Everything that had to
be said has been said. Now it's time to
learn. It's time to expand our minds. What
really moved me to make this Friday
Reads was a video that I saw of a little
boy singing - I don't know if was with his
mom or with his grandmother - in the car.
And his innocence, and the love
manifested in that car, and through that
song, made me think about all the lives
that were started in love and in
innocence, with hope for the future - to
have it snuffed out the way George
Floyd's life was snuffed out. The way
Brianna Taylor's life was snuffed out.
Amadou Diallo, Sean Bell, Anthony Baez and
I can go on, and on, and on. I'm doing it
in their memory - this video, and the books
that I'm going to read- and in memory of
my grandmother, who was black,
and my uncles, her sons, who were black,
and all people of color who suffer at
the hands of institutionalized and
systemic racism in the United States.
That's all for today, people. Take care.
Keep on reading. Cuídense mucho, mi
gente. Les quiero mucho. Adiós.
