Ah, Africa 
Learn the Music of Language to Float in Communal Space(0)
It’s perfectly possible to not know a word of a language, but to seem as if you know the language and culture well if you know the symbolic utterances and music of a language…it’s rhythms, rising and falling.
If you know when to make sounds of sympathy and appreciation.
If you know when to exclaim in amazement [...]
Post-Apartheid: A White Woman and a Black Woman Walk Down the Street…It is Unremarkable.
A woman in an on-line group I belong to shared this comment with me: “I was at an Romance Writers of America party in the early ’90’s and we were talking about apartheid and a best selling author said, ‘What’s apartheid?’ It spoiled my whole concept of her.”
I’d been noodling with how to [...]
Riehlife on African Holiday
Between August 4th to August 26th, Riehlife travels to Southern Africa—South Africa and Botswana.
I’ve decided not to take too many gadgets, so I’ll be leaving my laptop and cellphone at home. I’ll be in erratic computer contact, so I cannot say if I’ll be able to update Riehlife while I’m gone or not. Maybe [...]
Iconic Moments: Treasured Touchstones or Dross that Drowns?
Iconic Moments are defining life moments we harken back to. On the downside, they may be idealistic images that keep us from being grounded in the now. On the upside, they can serve as guideposts in our lives…to follow what was best and brightest…and create more Iconic Moments to draw from, as Treasured Touchstones.
How do [...]
More in this category:
- Riehlife Review: “Twenty Chickens for a Saddle,” by Robyn Scott
- Ladysmith Black Mambazo brings African Spirit to America:Portable Village in Song
- Portable Village…on the move!
- Back to Africa…Yes!
- River’s Mercy: African Wilderness
- Drumvoices Revue: A Confluence of Literary, Cultural & Vision Arts
- Botswana’s Bessie Head: A Meeting with Barbara Bamberger Scott
- Kenyan Glimpse: Toy Compound Speaks of Home
- Wole Soyinka, SIU Carbondale: “Have Culture; Will Dialogue”—a dialogue with civilizations
- Riehlife Poem of the Day: Obi Nwakanma’s “Credo” from “The Horseman and Other Poems”
- Soyinka in St. Louis Conversation at Black Rep
- Soyinka’s “The Lion & The Jewel” brings total art to Edison Theatre, Washington University, St. Louis
- Healing Africa: Sew Congo
- Kenya & Region: Alternatives to Violence shows great heart; great work
- Violence in Kenya in Early 2008—Nine Interpretations by David Zarembka, Coordinator African Great Lakes Initiative of the Friends Peace Teams
- Healing Africa: Women’s Trauma Healing and Care Center, Buhavu, Great Lakes Region, Eastern Congo
- Soyinka’s “The Lion and The Jewel” at Washington University’s Edison Theatre St. Louis for Five April Performances
- John Rozelle’s Sanga Series represented at St. Louis Art Museum and Salon 53
- Phillip Hampton’s experimentation with acrylic media demonstrates thin line between art and science (yet again!)
- Amazon’s Democratic Jungle: Case study, Wole Soyinka’s new memoir “You Must Set Forth At Dawn” with 5 Amazon comments, dissassembled
- Sorting upon the return home…Soyinka on my mind
- Wole Soyinka Symposia at SIU/Carbondale—Muse & Mimesis: Wole Soyinka, Africa, and the World
- Nobel Prize-winner Soyinka Comes to Southern Illinois and St. Louis
- “Iron Ladies of Liberia” airs on KETC in April…Sneak Preview of Independent Lens Film at Missouri History Museum
- Kenyan Quaker Letter Sent to the Leaders of the Nation
- “Water Ceremonies,” Part II, Africa—a poem by Janet Grace Riehl (Tales from Maun, Botswana; Okavango Delta in Northern Botswana; Kalahari Desert in Western Botswna)
- Tracks in the Snow by Janean Baird (my niece/my brother’s oldest daughter)
- Sankofa, Return (Reach Back) and Fetch It—Adinkra Symbols Define Path in a Woman’s Life
- (African Culture of Story Series) Damaria Senne: Stories from The Place of the Mist, Part 2
- (African Culture of Story Series) Damaria Senne on “Stories from the Place of the Mist”: Part One
- Brown Bookshelf Calls for African-American Children’s Literature nominations for “28 Days Later” project during Black History Month 2008
- Riehl on “African Culture of Story”—Guest blog post in two parts on Damaria Senne’s “Story Pot”
- Missouri History Museum evening “Journey of African-American Cultural Institutions: Where do we go from here?” generates thirst for continued Kgotla gatherings to pull together and package African-American Cultural Institutions to attract Heritage Tourism Dollars to St. Louis
- Martin Puryear Retrospective opens at MOMA
- Africa is a continent, not a country: water from heaven, a vision
- Connections: Finding Relatives In Unexpected Places, by Damaria Senne of Johannesburg, South Africa
- Riehl’s story “Driving Lessons” is Editor’s Choice this week at Traveler’s Tales
- Best Travel Writing–Solas Award for Riehl’s “Driving Lessons”
- “The Soul of a New Cuisine: A Discovery of the Foods and Flavors of Africa”
- “Bahto”: Setswana’s Poetic Window into Batswana Culture
- Middle Passages: African American Journeys to Africa, 1787-2005
- “I will take you halfway.”