Issue date: 2/2/09 Section: News

Claudia Rosa-Artis, a member of the Kenyetta Dance Company, performs during last year's African-American Heritage Banquet in the Grand Ballroom of the Martin Luther King Jr. University Union. (File / The Daily Eastern News)

African-American Heritage Month kicks off with the theme "Yes We Can! Celebrating that Past - Forging a New Future."

"We want the whole month to have people thinking about race," said Joycelynn Phillips, director of minority affairs. "We will have an open-mic night with poetry, instruments and songs about what people were thinking and feeling about the Obama election."

"Yes We Can: A Celebration of History in the Making" will be one of the first events in African-American Heritage Month.

"We thought 'What can we do that embraces the theme and brings people out?'" said Brenda Major, director of admissions, "It is an open-mic, but it is also a celebration for the new faces in the White House. And this is important because the youth vote was so vital in this particular election."

Faculty, staff, community members and Eastern students can come and share how they felt, whether it was about Grant Park, the inauguration or when Barack Obama won the actual election.

"Also, we will be polling the audience and asking what kind of change they plan to make," Major said.

There will also be a band put together for the event and the EIU Unity Gospel Choir will sing.

"It will give people in this area an opportunity to come together and share their experiences," Major said. "People can come and share their remarks any way they see fit."

A dozen clips, such as when Obama won, was sworn in, and clips showing him as a family man, will be shown as well.

"It will be a neat little variety show," Major said. "We even asked Panther Dining to make cookies with Obama's red, white and blue logo on it."

The event is at 7 p.m. tonight in 7th Street Underground.

Phillips said that "Eating for a Healthy Life and Soul" would be about the diet of the average African-American.

James Painter, chair of the School of Family and Consumer Science, and his graduate assistant Karen Armour will lead the event.

Painter said the presentation will introduce five or six healthy foods to reduce heart disease and how to implement those into diets, recipes and meal plans.

"I am the president of the organization for Peer Education on Nutrition," Armour said. "We worked closely with professors from dietetics in the FCS department and James Painter will be the speaker while Sarah Allen, another graduate student, will help present the topic and do food illustrations."

Armour thinks that not eating healthy is a big problem among children and college students.

"Because of the increase in child obesity and diseases like diabetes, it is important for children to learn how to make healthy snacks," she said

A handout with recipes and healthy eating tips will be handed out along with a demonstration on how to make certain foods with a few samples that will be handed out.

"It won't be a big tasting, though, like Rachael Ray or anything," Armour said. "People can learn that eating healthy isn't hard."

A film contest called "Conversations in Color" allows students to submit videos for the month.

"It's basically a contest about giving the students an opportunity to tell his or her story about their color," said Janice Collins, one of the coordinators for the video contest. "Whether they are white, black or yellow."

She said people can approach race by sharing their thoughts through stories, narratives, music, sound bites, etc.

"It should be however students feel they can get their message across," Collins said. "Being white in America gives you certain rights and privileges, but being white with a low income does not necessarily mean you have the same privileges."

Collins asked that if people had conversations in color, how would those people present themselves?

The entry forms for this contest are due by Feb. 9 and the completed video entries are due by Feb. 16.

Three contest winners will be presented on Feb. 20 and the entries can be a short film or audio-visual piece three to five minutes long about race, color or culture.

On Feb. 6, the African-American Heritage banquet will take place and will feature a one-man play called "A Killing in Choctaw."

Phillips said that this year, emphasis would be on the American aspect of African-American Heritage Month because of the election.

It all will start out with library display throughout the month of February called "Wrapped in Pride: the Ghanaian Kente and African-American Identity."



Other scheduled events for Heritage Month




Heather Holm can be reached at 581-7942 or haholm@eiu.edu.