SI Leeds Literary Prize is a new award for unpublished fiction by Black and Asian women resident in the UK aged 18 years and over.  The prize has been created and is being run by Soroptimist International of Leeds, in partnership with two well established and highly regarded literary organisations, the Ilkley Literature Festival and independent publishers Peepal Tree Press.  ...

GEORGE PADMORE INSTITUTE in association with NEW BEACON BOOKS Invite you to the launch of THE NEW CROSS MASSACRE STORY - INTERVIEWS WITH JOHN LA ROSE prologue by Linton Kwesi Johnson and epilogue by Gus John on Thursday 17 November at 6.30pm George Padmore Institute, 76 Stroud Green Road, London N4 3EN The New Cross Massacre Fire took place on18 January 1981 at 439 ...

The N Word... Sick of mama screaming that “Get a job, nigga” Pressed to the limit, got to rob me a nigga Simple and plain, my man scooped me in a hooptie Wispered in his ear “This is what we got to do, G” Got to bang a nigga and bang a nigga good So I can cop a Benz and ...

Call for Papers Writing Slavery after Beloved Literature, Historiography, Criticism International Symposium Université de Nantes – France March 16-17, 2012 Can Toni Morrison’s Beloved (1987) be considered as a watershed in the contemporary representations of slavery and the slave trade, not only in the literary field, but also in historiography and Cultural Studies? This Symposium will attempt to assess whether this major ...

  I & I: The Natural Mystics: Marley, Tosh and Wailer By Colin Grant Published by Jonathan Cape on 27th January 2011 in hardback, priced £20   Over one dramatic decade, a trio of Trench Town R&B crooners, Peter Tosh, Bunny Wailer and Bob Marley, swapped their 1960s Brylcreem hairdos and two-tone suits for 1970s battle fatigues and dreadlocks to ...

   For those of you who have followed this site  from the beginning, will know that over the last couple of years I have been an active contributor. Recently though, I haven't been around as I needed some time to gather my thoughts following the recent death of my father.   This post isn't asking ...

Aminata Diallo, an 11-year-old child, is taken from her village in West Africa and forced to walk for months to the sea in a coffle � a string of slaves. Eventually, she arrives in South Carolina where she begins a new life as a slave. Years later, she finds freedom, serving the British in the ...

As it's Black History month in October here in the U.k a question has been raised as to the relevance of BHM. I have outlined my feelings in Black history Month, why we still need it. However, I want to know how other people feel about it. I asked Toyin Agbetu, founder of ...

� CLR (Cyril Lionel RobertJames was a Marxist writer, political commentator, and Cricket lover. One of his most famous works is "The Black Jacobins"; a biography of "Tousaint Louverture" the Haitian Revoloutionary. Born in Trinidad, he attended the Queen's Royal College on the island before becoming a cricket journalist and also writing fiction. In 1932, ...

This is a Contributed Article by Minna Salami from http://www.msafropolitan.com/ I like the perspective that India.Arie and Akon have in 'I am not my hair'.It's not a new song, most of you have heard it, danced to it, chanted it, maybe even as a spiritual practice of sort! Jokes aside, a very powerful message often goes missed in ...

Occasionally here at blackpresence we get sent manuscripts advertising upcoming books. We always try to support quality work our online community, none more so than the upcoming book "Almost British" from Author Olivea M Ebanks. The Passion that this book is written with shines through. Olivea's determination, not just to take on the establishment and win, ...

Dear All, I am pleased to inform you that we now have a Summer Promotion on "The Sound of Running Water" with a free delivery service. Information on "The Sound of Running Water" " The Sound of Running Water " is a Pocket-sized gift book of Proverbs and Quotations aimed to inspire our minds into great heights of ...

Black non-profit organisations are fighting for air as they currently feel the financial squeeze. Funding, funding and more funding is what nearly every non-profit organisation wants or fears they may not receive. The other pulling factor is that their valuable work is not being recognised. So what you will find is that many organisations end ...

Eleven artists have now been selected for the first round of this annual programme from a long-list of 40 nominated by members of the Black Routes network, alongside producers, promoters, DJs and other industry professionals. This July, the group will undertake an intensive week of training in the beautiful and inspirational surroundings of Dartington Arts ...

Rev Carl F Ellis is founder of Project Joseph. He is a well known Afro-American speaker and teacher from the USA, editor of "Saving Our Sons" and also editor of the well known 'Precepts for Living' a leading personal study guide and annual commentary. He has a ministry advising Afro-American pastors on the challenges affecting ...

'Go to the ant', is a Simple but effective guide for day-to-day money management. Inspired by Martin Lewis's (money experts) quick wit and mind challenging money saving ideas, family man and entrepreneur Isaac Carter thought it was time to embark on a new journey. This journey would consist of giving the people around him key money ...

As part of our collaboration Project Black Presence is continuing to publish articles about other Black websites. Keep the Faith Magazine is the U.K's leading Black Christian Magazine. Below is a message from Marcia Dixon introducing you to the magazine. This month's Keep The Faith, Britain's leading magazine about black faith, is filled with ...

As part of our new collaboration theme, black Presence are please to introduce Africa Awakening! Africa Awakening was established by Tony Tokunbo Fernandez in the summer of 2000. This online medium provides a wealth of information, news and entertainment for our growing audience in The UK, The States, South Africa and many parts of West Africa. ...

NO PLACE TO HIDE How I Put The Black In The Union Jack Errol Christie with Tony McMahon Seeing my future crumble before my eyes, I grasped for the rope. Before my eyes, I saw an eight year old kid at the Standard Triumph putting on gloves for the first time. A teenage schoolboy champion effortlessly destroying ...

Yesterday I received an email from the ligali website. Ligali describes itself as a Pan Africanist human rights Organisation. Ligali Often send me their updates and newsletters, which depending on whether I have a moment to myself I read and digest or sadly leave them to quickly disappear in the the tides of messages in ...

BlackPresence website is now 12 years old and many changes have befallen the internet since its inception. We have gone from a time when there was hardly any black presence on the Internet to having a massive amount of black owned, black run websites, all singing their own songs. It has long occurred to me that ...

William Edward Burghardt Du Bois was born on (February 23, 1868? he was an American civil rights activist,Pan-Africanist,sociologist,historian,author, and editor. He grew up in Great Barrington, a predominately Anglo American town. His Mother, Mary Silvina Burghardt's family was part of the very small free black population of Great Barrington, having long owned land in the state. ...

Call for submission open to poets, writers, journalists, bloggers and graphic artists from all backgrounds and origins. We invite you to write in solidarity for Haiti. You can send us poems, song lyrics, short stories, opinion pieces, drawings, paintings or photographs. The work must be about or inspired by Haiti, its people and its culture. The ...

John La Rose is a political and Cultural activist. He came to Britain from Trinidad where he had been working as General Secretary to the West Indian Independence Party. John La Rose is a political and Cultural activist. He came to Britain from Trinidad where he had been working as General Secretary to the West Indian ...

Ben Okri O.B.E. is a Booker Prize winning Author and Poet. Okri was awarded the Booker Prize for Fiction for his novel The Famished Road (1991). Set in a Nigerian village <p>Ben Okri was Born in Nigeria in 1959. He is a journalist and writer by trade. He traveled to Britain when he was just four years ...