Celebrating Women's History Month...

A Liberated Woman in Politics

For more than a decade, Carol Moseley Braun has been breaking racial and gender barriers in the political arena. The Chicago native was elected Cook County Recorder of Deeds with more than one million votes cast in her favor, making her the first woman and the first African-American to hold executive office in Cook County government. Most notably, in 1993, Braun was elected to the United States Senate, becoming the first African-American female elected to the U.S. Senate.

 During her time in office, Braun did not take her position lightly. She was an advocate for healthcare and education reform-writing the Educational Infrastructure Act, designed to help bring education funding to low-income communities. Currently, as a mayoral candidate for the city of Chicago, Braun continues to serve her community by forming coalitions of people from all backgrounds who are committed to the same values of how government should best represent the people, which is the mark of a liberated woman.

We are The Pentagon Project.

$500 Book Scholarship

The Pentagon Project will accept applications beginning Monday, November 29^th and ending Monday, January 31st.

REQUIREMENTS:

• Open to Black female, full-time, 1^st – 4^th year undergraduates at Tennessee State University
• A minimum cumulative GPA of 3.0
• Minimum of 10 hours of community service
• One recommendation (recommendation may be from a faculty/staff member, community leader, or supervisor)
• One official transcript (from TSU Records Office - postmarked by Friday, January 28th)
• 250-500 word response to the following prompt:

“Black women have resilience, whether we like it or not." -Maya Angelou 
Do you agree? Tell us why or why not.

Click the links below:

2011 Scholarship Application



2011 Scholarship Applicant Recommendation Form


Questions ... E-mail us at thepentagonproject@gmail.com

"Whether you have a Ph.D., or no D, we're in this bag together. And whether you're from Morehouse or Nohouse, we're still in this bag together. Not to fight to try to liberate ourselves from the men -- this is another trick to get us fighting among ourselves -- but to work together with the black man, then we will have a better chance to just act as human beings, and to be treated as human beings in our sick society."

~Fannie Lou Hamer


I am a feminist.  Period.  A feminist.

And while we are in the labeling business, let me give a few more labels about me.

I am an educator.  I am a friend.  I am a daughter.  I am a sister.  I am a woman (duh).  And here comes the biggest, baddest, betcha didn't see this one coming.....I am a WIFE.

Oh yeah.  I am a wife.  Some man, and not just some man, a strong, educated man, chose to marry this card-carrying feminist.  And before you get into wondering what type of marriage we have, let me tell you that it is stable, happy, and full of love and submission.

The reason I bring this up because each of our lives are a series of labels that people cast upon us or sometimes that we cast upon ourselves.  A long time ago, I decided to add the label feminist to my growing list and in the process received flack and grief from others.  Instantly, people started checking to see if I was wearing a bra, and just knew that I was a ball-busting woman that would never get married because I despised men, specifically black men too much. 

To this I reveal another one of my labels: I am a Daddy's Girl. 

I do not hate men.  I never have and my goal is to never hate them. 

In today's society, we have a lot of female ball-busters.  Not feminists, ball-busters.  I have no desire to be politically correct and say "men-haters" so lets just call these women what they are. There is an epidemic emerging of women that love step on the ego, spirit, and nerves of every man around them. 

Contrary to popular labels, these women are not feminists.  If you examine the true definition of a feminist you will find that a feminist is merely a person that believes in equal and fair rights for all people and that no woman be judge or disenfranchised on the grounds of her gender. 

Go up to your nearby ball-buster, and when she gives you a moment to speak, ask her if she is a feminist.  Her response will most likely be no but if by chance she says yes, ask her for the definition. 

(Insert blank stare)

Most likely, you will not receive a solid definition.

I say all of this to say, many things.  The first being, kill the label sterotypes.  Okay, I am a feminist, but I still stopped while writing this blog to get my husband a drink of water from downstairs.  Would a ball-buster do that? We, feminists get a bad rap.

The second message in my madness refers back to Ms. Hamer's quote.  We as black people spend SOOOO much time pointing the fingering, blaming others for where we are but we never take the time to realize that the blame game leads to destruction.  Destruction of the self, the home, the race, and the community.  We are slowly but surely decaying into a group of finger-pointers, whiners, and ball-busters. 

Light-skin. Dark-skin. Rich. Poor. Bougie. Uppity. Ghetto. Urban. Man. Woman. Baby Mama.  Baby Daddy.

Lets do away with this.  Let us not dwell on the invidiual labels that continue to divide us, but instead focus on the one label that can potentially encompass everyone: I am the people. 

If you do it, I will even put the fire extinguisher to my bras and cook dinner for my husband.  For a while, we just need to wear one label.

I am the people. 

The Fact...

The fact that the adult African American female emerges a formidable character is often met with amazement, distaste and even belligerence. It is seldom accepted as an inevitable outcome of the struggle won by survivors, and deserves respect if not enthusiastic acceptance.  -Maya Angelou

Don't worry...