At just a tender age, Unique becomes a victim of wicked offenses that leaves her physically and emotionally scarred. Unable to confide in her mother, she takes matters into her own hands by killing the poison that has been destroying her. The outcome lands her in a juvenile facility, where she meets two other girls suffering from their own troubled past. The trio finds serenity in one another and form a deadly triangle that not only gets them out of prison but life as well.
The street life seems to grow within four young men who have made up their minds that struggling is not an option. JC and his crew soon find out who's who among them and the women as well. A major storm plus chaos soon begin. Deceit, betrayal, loyalty, and murder come into play as the young men grow into one of New Jersey's most powerful crews. If this summary has piqued your interest, wait until you read this urban novel--it will have you wanting more.
Western culture has long regarded black female sexuality with a strange mix of fascination and condemnation, associating it with everything from desirability, hypersexuality, and liberation to vulgarity, recklessness, and disease. Yet even as their bodies and sexualities have been the subject of countless public discourses, black women’s voices have been largely marginalized in these discussions. In this groundbreaking collection, feminist scholars from across the academy come together to correct this omission—illuminating black female sexual desires marked by agency and empowerment, as well as pleasure and pain, to reveal the ways black women regulate their sexual lives. The twelve original essays in Black Female Sexualities reveal the diverse ways black women perceive, experience, and represent sexuality. The contributors highlight the range of tactics that black women use to express their sexual desires and identities. Yet they do not shy away from exploring the complex ways in which black women negotiate the more traumatic aspects of sexuality and grapple with the legacy of negative stereotypes. Black Female Sexualities takes not only an interdisciplinary approach—drawing from critical race theory, sociology, and performance studies—but also an intergenerational one, in conversation with the foremothers of black feminist studies. In addition, it explores a diverse archive of representations, covering everything from blues to hip-hop, from Crash to Precious, from Sister Souljah to Edwidge Danticat. Revealing that black female sexuality is anything but a black-and-white issue, this collection demonstrates how to appreciate a whole spectrum of subjectivities, experiences, and desires.
Rev. Dr. Michael Waters identifies as a member of the hip-hop generation living in an urban context. His purpose in writing is to inspire “hope in the promise of a new day, in the assurance of victory over defeat, and in the fulfillment of God’s promises within the created order.” Freestyle boldly confronts issues within the urban community such as addiction, education, incarceration, family issues, and absentee fathers. Based on his blogs from The Huffington Post, Waters speaks truth to relevant current events with his edgy but truthful perspectives. Sample chapters include: Glory: A New Day for Family and Fatherhood in Hip Hop Culture With Deepest Regret: A Letter to the Ancestors An Odd Future for Faith in Hip-Hop The Liturgy of Trayvon Martin They Reminisce Over You (T.R.O.Y).
Social Media for Strategic Communication: Creative Strategies and Research-Based Applications Second Edition teaches students the skills and principles needed to use social media in persuasive communication campaigns. This book combines cutting edge research with practical, on-the-ground instruction to prepare students for the real-world challenges they’ll face in the workplace. By focusing on strategic thinking and awareness, this book gives students the tools they need to adapt what they learn to new platforms and technologies that may emerge in the future. A broad focus on strategic communication – from PR, advertising, and marketing, to non-profit advocacy—gives students a broad base of knowledge that will serve them wherever their careers may lead. The Second Edition features new case studies and exercises and increased coverage of diversity and inclusion issues and influencer marketing trends.
A new start always comes at a price. Dante 'Worlds' is fresh from the joint. Leaner but more importantly... wiser. He's smart enough now to not get 'caught up' again. But also knows a life of crime is unsustainable. His main goal now is to return to the old game but with a few new tricks. Ones that will keep him off radar to the authorities. Once he's stashed away enough coin... its the 'straight and narrow' for him. Meanwhile a new 'connect' Worlds made in prison named Fredd aids him in organizing a venture that is sure to pay off very robustly for Dante. Getting him out of 'the life' for good. Fred's past however is a murky one. Filled with the usual betrayals and lies one commits to survive in the streets. When his enemies hear of his new dealings with Worlds. He becomes their prime target, along with those closest to him. Enter Dominique. She wants a life with Worlds but upon finding out he's back to his old ways she threatens to depart. Without his protection she's a sitting duck for Fredd's enemies who're now, Worlds enemies. Worlds must now close this new deal quickly. His future and hers... depends on it.
Reality first appeared in the late 1980s—in the sense not of real life but rather of the TV entertainment genre inaugurated by shows such as Cops and America’s Most Wanted; the daytime gabfests of Geraldo, Oprah, and Donahue; and the tabloid news of A Current Affair. In a bracing work of cultural criticism, Eric Harvey argues that reality TV emerged in dialog with another kind of entertainment that served as its foil while borrowing its techniques: gangsta rap. Or, as legendary performers Ice Cube and Ice-T called it, “reality rap.” Reality rap and reality TV were components of a cultural revolution that redefined popular entertainment as a truth-telling medium. Reality entertainment borrowed journalistic tropes but was undiluted by the caveats and context that journalism demanded. While N.W.A.’s “Fuck tha Police” countered Cops’ vision of Black lives in America, the reality rappers who emerged in that group’s wake, such as Snoop Doggy Dogg and Tupac Shakur, embraced reality’s visceral tabloid sensationalism, using the media's obsession with Black criminality to collapse the distinction between image and truth. Reality TV and reality rap nurtured the world we live in now, where politics and basic facts don’t feel real until they have been translated into mass-mediated entertainment.
Posthuman Rap listens for the ways contemporary rap maps an existence outside the traditional boundaries of what it means to be human. Contemporary humanity is shaped in neoliberal terms, where being human means being viable in a capitalist marketplace that favors whiteness, masculinity, heterosexuality, and fixed gender identities. But musicians from Nicki Minaj to Future to Rae Sremmurd deploy queerness and sonic blackness as they imagine different ways of being human. Building on the work of Sylvia Wynter, Alexander Weheliye, Lester Spence, LH Stallings, and a broad swath of queer and critical race theory, Posthuman Rap turns an ear especially toward hip hop that is often read as apolitical in order to hear its posthuman possibilities, its construction of a humanity that is blacker, queerer, more feminine than the norm.
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