S E1258: In Class with Carr, Ep. 258: Blackest History Month III: Playing the American 'Great Game'

As we approach the close of Black History Month 2025, our focus remains steadfast on drawing from the wisdom of our ancestors and examples from today, seeking guidance on how we can and will take meaningful action to address the challenges we face—locally, nationally, and globally.JOIN KNARRATIVE: https://www.knarrative.com it's the only way to get into #Knubia, where these classes areheld live with a live chat.To shop Go to:TheGlobalMajorityMore from us:Knarrative Twitter: https://twitter.com/knarrative_Knarrative Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/knarrative/In Class with Carr Twitter: https://twitter.com/inclasswithcarrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In an interview with ally and race specialist, Tim Wise, Karen Hunter discusses the "Black Athlete" and why there is a need to control them and why the "outliers" in the black community should not be treated as the norm. #WhyWeKneelSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

As we enter the second half of Blackest History Month 2025, we reflect on themes of power, influence, culture, and resistance, particularly within the context of Black thought, history, and contemporary developments in the US and global social structures. The contrast between figures like Kendrick Lamar (highlighted during the Super Bowl) and Donald Trump illustrates how power often intersects with whiteness, capitalism, and entertainment to shape public consciousness. This is especially evident in major advertising events like the Super Bowl, where creating a cultural moment and capturing attention become paramount. Meanwhile, the increasing channeling of public resources into promoting visions of white supremacy and hypercapitalism has intensified to the point of impunity, daring the rest of us to resist it.Martin Kilson’s observation about shifts in African American intellectual and creative circles from pursuing power to emphasizing and commoditizing culture provides a lens through which we can examine intersections of cultural meaning-making and struggle. What happens when contemporary power dynamics—particularly regarding white nationalism and the redirection of both public and private resources—reduce Black Power to mere cultural posturing? Absent the deliberate connection of Movement and Memory to strengthening Africana Governance formations, can cultural influence contribute meaningfully to organizing, resisting, and building for the long term? Or is “playing the great American game” a never-ending cycle of diminishing returns?JOIN KNARRATIVE: https://www.knarrative.com it's the only way to get into #Knubia, where these classes areheld live with a live chat.To shop Go to:TheGlobalMajorityMore from us:Knarrative Twitter: https://twitter.com/knarrative_Knarrative Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/knarrative/In Class with Carr Twitter: https://twitter.com/inclasswithcarrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

During the second week of Blackest History Month, we continue to seek insights from Carter G. Woodson to fuel the momentum of historical memory as a device for breaking through the noise, distraction, and disruption of contemporary events.Neely Fuller Jr. (1929-2025), an early proponent of what has been labeled “Anti-Racist” thinking, contended in 1971 that “If you do not understand White Supremacy (Racism)—what it is and how it works—everything else that you understand will only confuse you.” He, Woodson, and countless others’ lives and thoughts should help us develop our best thinking on Governance by forming a fortifying genealogy in the face of serially hostile Social Structure activity. This includes strategies like the so-called “Bannon Strategy” currently at work in the US federal government—a barrage of manufactured crises designed to seize control of political and economic levers of power.Through all of this, the need for focus and deliberate action in the face of systemic distraction must be emphasized. A question emerges: How do we break from a punishing cycle of serial reaction, understanding how to use the interplay between study and practice? Answers can be found in applying the “momentum of memory” to propel forward action.Carter Woodson’s approach of slow, deliberate study and organized community-grounded activity serves as a foundation for mass action and collective learning, urging us to build a compendium of knowledge to guide our future. The key is that study, when properly understood, will lead to anti-oppressive action, fostering empowerment.JOIN KNARRATIVE: https://www.knarrative.com it's the only way to get into #Knubia, where these classes areheld live with a live chat.To shop Go to:TheGlobalMajorityMore from us:Knarrative Twitter: https://twitter.com/knarrative_Knarrative Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/knarrative/In Class with Carr Twitter: https://twitter.com/inclasswithcarrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

As we enter US Black History Month 2025, we face the most severe crisis in white global nationalisms since World War II. In the United States, white nationalists are making good on their promise to try to destabilize the federal government and redefine the country. As Carter G. Woodson originally envisioned, this time must serve as a moment for reflection—an opportunity to consider what we should have learned about African world experiences throughout the year, to inspire action, and to propel us forward.JOIN KNARRATIVE: https://www.knarrative.com it's the only way to get into #Knubia, where these classes areheld live with a live chat.To shop Go to:TheGlobalMajorityMore from us:Knarrative Twitter: https://twitter.com/knarrative_Knarrative Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/knarrative/In Class with Carr Twitter: https://twitter.com/inclasswithcarrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Since the November 2024 U.S. Presidential election, it has become increasingly common for Africans in the U.S. and others to invoke the phrase “Fool Around and Find Out.” And the U.S. — along with the rest of the world — is certainly finding out. As serious observers and commentators have noted for years, Donald Trump represents a resurgence of global political intolerance, white nationalism, and nativism. Neither he nor his prominent supporters have made any effort to disguise it. The first “Hell Week” of Trump’s second presidential term has made his agenda clear, marked by a flurry of executive actions heavily influenced by the Heritage Foundation’s “Project 2025.”JOIN KNARRATIVE: https://www.knarrative.com it's the only way to get into #Knubia, where these classes areheld live with a live chat.To shop Go to:TheGlobalMajorityMore from us:Knarrative Twitter: https://twitter.com/knarrative_Knarrative Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/knarrative/In Class with Carr Twitter: https://twitter.com/inclasswithcarrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week’s In Class session will explore the symbolic clash between two diametrically opposed worldviews—represented by Trump and King—and examine how challenging oppressive structures can lay the groundwork for dismantling them.JOIN KNARRATIVE: https://www.knarrative.com it's the only way to get into #Knubia, where these classes areheld live with a live chat.To shop Go to:TheGlobalMajorityMore from us:Knarrative Twitter: https://twitter.com/knarrative_Knarrative Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/knarrative/In Class with Carr Twitter: https://twitter.com/inclasswithcarrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The United States is in the midst of a propaganda and disinformation war, fueled by plutocrats and tech moguls like Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg, who have harnessed technology for profit. Meanwhile, the American empire remains unchecked, its worst nationalist and jingoistic impulses amplified by political opportunism at the highest levels. The times demand serious, accessible intellectual work, but instead, our search for grounded perspectives is surrendered to the lazy pull of social media, leaving us unable to distinguish between deeply researched work, like James Loewen’s Lies My Teacher Told Me, and polemics like Lies My Liberal Teacher Told Me. As a result, debates over issues from the origins of Hip Hop to the legacy of Jimmy Carter reflect how vulnerable our society is to cultural mythmaking disguised as truth.This obsession with simplistic narratives plays out globally, with education becoming a battleground in places like the US and Syria. Curriculum debates reveal a struggle over shaping minds and controlling knowledge—whether education serves enlightenment or power. The entire system feels as futile as ice skating uphill, an exhausting and impossible task. What does education really achieve in this context? Does it enlighten us, or complicate our understanding of a world growing more disconnected? Martin Luther King Jr.’s vision of a World House seems increasingly distant, replaced by virtual realities manipulated by forces spreading influence at any cost.Meanwhile, the existential threat of global warming is no longer abstract. Weather events, like the fires ravaging Los Angeles, serve as harsh reminders of the consequences of environmental neglect. As smoke clouds our skies, we are left to ask: How do we fight the overwhelming tide of manipulation, racism, monopoly capitalism, nationalism, and climate destruction? How do we cultivate a genuine care for our shared humanity? Without this, education, climate action, and even our most cherished ideals unravel.The real test is whether we can rise above the noise—the propaganda, ego, and division—and see each other as part of a shared human struggle. Only then can we confront the true challenges of our time—education, climate change, unchecked power—and maybe, just maybe, create a future where we are more than the sum of our divisions.JOIN KNARRATIVE: https://www.knarrative.com it's the only way to get into #Knubia, where these classes areheld live with a live chat.To shop Go to:TheGlobalMajorityMore from us:Knarrative Twitter: https://twitter.com/knarrative_Knarrative Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/knarrative/In Class with Carr Twitter: https://twitter.com/inclasswithcarrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The passing of James Earl Carter Jr. [1924-2024] marks the close of not only a century-long life but the end of an entire political, cultural, and social era. Carter, the 39th President of the United States, was an “outlier” in the US Social Structure—an embodiment of the deeply rooted laboring class from the neo-Confederate South. His worldview and political philosophy were shaped by a unique fusion of white and Africana Southern Governance formations, creating a distinct approach to power and Cultural Meaning-Making. This blend, forged in the crucible of his upbringing, informed a political career that began in the Georgia legislature, ascended through the statehouse, reached the pinnacle of the US presidency, and then extended into more than four decades of global peacemaking at both the most intimate and the highest levels of engagement, visibility and diplomacy.In many respects, Carter’s life reflects the most aspirational elements of a white nationalist American politics, one that also embraced a deep commitment to universal human rights and dignity. His election marked both the zenith and the limits of the federal electoral expression of a generation’s struggle for human rights, achieved through the democratic electoral process. His electoral defeat, however, marked a watershed moment in the rhythm of "whitelash" that has shaped the electoral politics of every federal American election cycle since the 1850s and has triumphed in the decades since his defeat—a relentless white Cold Civil War between progress and reaction, our common humanity and its open enemies.JOIN KNARRATIVE: https://www.knarrative.com it's the only way to get into #Knubia, where these classes areheld live with a live chat.To shop Go to:TheGlobalMajorityMore from us:Knarrative Twitter: https://twitter.com/knarrative_Knarrative Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/knarrative/In Class with Carr Twitter: https://twitter.com/inclasswithcarrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

“As the world braced for intensifying international conflicts between countries, corporations and cultural movements, the final week of 2024 also saw a notable intensification of class conflict within the ranks of the nativist MAGA movement, as tensions grew between its controlling elites and its increasingly vocal white nationalist base. Often referred to as a “MAGA Civil War,” this internal rift was fueled by provocative statements from figures like “President” Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, both immigrants who made pro-immigrant comments in conflict with millions of MAGA nativists. This turmoil exposes the fragility of what is too often perceived as a unified coalition of ideological and cultural allies. In reality, this fragile alliance, however toxic and harmful, is held together by fear, hatred, and anxiety rather than deeply shared values of cooperation and shared responsibility.In contrast, the Kwanzaa season—a time for Pan African solidarity and Black cultural reflection—presents an alternative vision of unity at family, community, national and international levels. During this period, tensions between Social Structure and Governance were laid bare in symbolic convergences such as the live-streamed “Beyoncé Bowl” on Christmas Day. This moment of Cultural Meaning-Making highlighted Africana Ways of Knowing, with Knowles-Carter continuing her commitment to feeding Africana Movement and Memory. While MAGA followers grapple with the fracturing and divisive consequences of their illusory politics of white nativism, Kwanzaa offers powerful reminders that Africana Ways of Knowing emphasize collective work and responsibility. Can we overwhelm impulses to search for differences among ourselves with a rededication to the principle of Ujima, understanding that working together for the common good is essential to survival and progress?” —Dr. CarJOIN KNARRATIVE: https://www.knarrative.com it's the only way to get into #Knubia, where these classes areheld live with a live chat.To shop Go to:TheGlobalMajorityMore from us:Knarrative Twitter: https://twitter.com/knarrative_Knarrative Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/knarrative/In Class with Carr Twitter: https://twitter.com/inclasswithcarrSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.