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There is a difference between being shy and being selective (92)

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“All animals allowed to live free and wildly protect something holy in the world” (88)

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Artistic Bio

Dancer/choreographer/video artist/musician Andrea E. Woods Valdés is Artistic Director of SOULOWORKS/Andrea E. Woods & Dancers. Woods is also an associate professor at Duke University and a former director of Duke In Ghana summer study 2012-2014. A native of Philadelphia, Woods began her dance training with Jean Williams at Germantown Dance Theater. After graduating magna cum laude from Adelphi University she danced with Clive Thompson, Mafata, Leni Wylliams and Saeko Icinohe. Andrea is a former dancer and rehearsal director of Bill T. Jones/ Arnie Zane Dance Co. (1989-1995).

Woods has received grants from: The Jerome Foundation, (NEFA) The National Dance Project, National Performance Network and Arts International. Woods is an American Antiquarian Society Fellow. Her artistic work and research have taken her to, The Cannes International Danse Festival, Taiwan, Russia, Senegal, Morocco, Korea, Poland, Singapore, Belize, The Domican Republic, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Trinidad, Barbados and throughout the US. She has done collaborative works with musicians: Randy Weston, David Pleasant, Tiyé Giraud, Madeleine Yayodele Nelson, Tia Hanna, Philip Hamilton, Julia Price and Shana Tucker and spoken word artist, hattie gossett. Andrea was part of the American Dance Festival Faculty 2000 - 2007.

In 1999, she completed her MFA in dance technology at The Ohio State University and currently creates live performance works as well as video dances. Her videodances have been screened at BRIC (Brooklyn Information and Culture), Brooklyn Arts Exchange, BAAD, Brooklyn Museum of Art MassMoCa and the Wexner Center. She has been guest faculty and choreographer at: Medgar Evers College, Howard University, Ohio University, Rhode Island College, California State University Long Beach, North Carolina School of the Arts, Hollins University, Spelman College and Goucher College. She was adjunct faculty at New York University Tisch School of the Arts teaching modern dance and Dance for the Camera (2002-2007). Andrea also holds an MAH from SUNY Buffalo in Caribbean Cultural Studies. She calls her dances SOULOWORKS because they are works from the heart, works from the soul.

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the amazing adventures of grace may b. brown

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Dancer/choreographer/video artist/musician Andrea E. Woods Valdés is Artistic Director of SOULOWORKS/Andrea E. Woods & Dancers. Woods is also an associate professor at Duke University and a former director of Duke In Ghana summer study 2012-2014. A native of Philadelphia, Woods began her dance training with Jean Williams at Germantown Dance Theater.

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A middle class African-American widow, Avey Marshall, has set off on a cruise with two of her friends from work on the "Bianca Pride," and becomes ill shortly after they have set sail. Avey disembarks in Grenada after experiencing disequilibrium, nausea, disturbing nightmares, and a feeling of being "clogged and swollen." Thus begins a journey of reclamation and healing of a past that has been largely forgotten or erased in her efforts to escape the poverty of her younger years and obtain the American dream of financial security and a white-defined respectability.

The novel is divided into four parts: Avey's growing distress on board the cruise ship, the intensification of nightmares and "visits" from her long-dead and very Afro-centric Great Aunt Cuney, and her decision to leave the cruise ship. The second section takes place in her hotel room where Avey confronts her rage and grief, not only over the death of her husband, but the utter waste in his drive for material success and the ensuing loss of their joy in each other and their heritage.

In the third section, Avey, getting lost on a walk, meets Lebert Joseph who convinces her to accompany him on the "Carriacou Excursion," an annual island festival honoring the long-time ancestors. Avey travels by small boat to Carriacou, becoming violently ill, and is cared for by a group of women on the boat, encouraging her in this "cleansing." This journey and her illness prompt Avey to think about the middle passage of slaves and the horrors they endured in countless journeys much worse than hers.

Once on the island, in the fourth section of the book, Avey is bathed and nursed back to health by Lebert Joseph's daughter, Rosalie Parvay. Finally, Avey joins the celebration (the "Big Drum"), witnessing and finally joining the important "Beg Pardon" and nation dances. This section brings the novel full circle as Avey experiences reconciliation with her past, her heritage, and herself.

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A middle class African-American widow, Avey Marshall, has set off on a cruise with two of her friends from work on the "Bianca Pride," and becomes ill shortly after they have set sail. Avey disembarks in Grenada after experiencing disequilibrium, nausea, disturbing nightmares, and a feeling of being "clogged and swollen."

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This video was filmed on November 15, 2012, as part of the National Geographic Live! Lecture series at National Geographic Society headquarters in Washington, D.C. Introduction
National Geographic photographer Paul Nicklen uses his camera to reveal the graceful and feared leopard seal, a species threatened by climate change. "I call myself an interpreter and a translator," says Nicklen. "I translate what the scientists are telling me. If we lose ice, we stand to lose an entire ecosystem. I hope we can realize through my photography how interconnected these species are to ice. It just takes one image to get someone's attention."

Whether he is ice diving among leopard seals in Antarctica, covering hundreds of miles of terrain in minus 40°F temperatures, or mastering aerial shots from his ultralight plane, Paul Nicklen has specialized in photographing polar regions since 1995.

A species with a bad reputation: why leopard seals are perceived as vicious (start-1:40 min.)

Getting in the water with a 12-foot seal (1:41-3:38 min.)

An amazing experience: a leopard seal tries to feed Nicklen a penguin (3:39-6:57 min.)
Strategies for Using Video in a Variety of Learning Environments
Have students preview several of the videos and choose the one they find most inspiring. Have students describe in writing a conversation they might have with the speaker(s).

Freeze the video on a relevant image. Have students observe details in the still image and jot down predictions of what the full video might address. Discuss students' ideas before and after watching the video.

Pose an open-ended question before students watch the video, and have them discuss their ideas before and after in small groups.

Have students determine what they think the key message of this video is. Was the speaker effective in getting his or her message across?

Show a short clip to engage students during class, and then have students watch the full video at home and write a paragraph responding to the content or a question you give them.

Have students note statements that represent facts or opinions, including where it's difficult to tell the difference. What further research might help distinguish facts vs. opinions? How might the speaker's viewpoint compare with others' viewpoints about a topic?

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Face-to-Face with a Leopard Seal | National Geographic Society

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This video was filmed on November 15, 2012, as part of the National Geographic Live! Lecture series at National Geographic Society headquarters in Washington, D.C. Introduction National Geographic photographer Paul Nicklen uses his camera to reveal the graceful and feared leopard seal, a species threatened by climate change.

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0:00 / 2:20•Watch full video

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FEMME SHARKS DON’T EAT OUR OWN.
FEMME SHARKS LIKE TO EAT THOUGH
FEMME SHARKS RECOGNIZE THAT FEMMES COME IN ALL KINDS OF SIZES AND EACH KIND IS LUSCIOUS. WE WORK TOWARDS LOVING OUR CURVY, FAT, SKINNY, SUPERSIZE, THICK, DISABLED, BLACK AND BROWN FINE-ASS BODIES EVERY DAY. WE REALIZE THAT LOVING OURSELVES IN A RACIST/SEXIST/HOMO/TRANSPHOBIC/ABLIST/CLASSIST SYSTEM IS AN EVERY DAY ACT OF WAR AGAINST THAT SYSTEM...........
Written by Founding Femme Shark Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha

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Writer

Alexis De Veaux has written in multiple genres-poetry, fiction, memoir, journalism, biography, children's literature and plays. Writing is a way she reimagines the inequities of race, gender, sexuality and class in black diasporic lives.

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Alexis De Veaux has written in multiple genres-poetry, fiction, memoir, journalism, biography, children's literature and plays. Writing is a way she reimagines the inequities of race, gender, sexuality and class in black diasporic lives.

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Not many people are turning to black feminist texts from the 1970s as their major strategy for addressing the current climate crisis we are facing, but why not? During the 1970s the OPEC embargo caused an oil shortage in the US, and now we are in the midst of a temporary "oil glut," after peak oil, but both periods in recent history cause us to ask the question: how do we create sustainable energy that doesn't destroy our environment? I believe that black women know something about energy. About how to keep energy circulating where everything tries to shut it down. About the energy that makes all life possible whether it is recognized or (usually) not.

There is work by Audre Lorde, the members of the Combahee River Collective and the Salsa Soul Sisters, the Sisterhood of Black Single Mothers, the Third World Women's Alliance, and many others that could offer us a 1970s black feminist understanding of what matters and what energizes, all of which would be relevant to the social and economic energy crisis we are facing today. But June Jordan addressed it very specifically in a never-before published talk she gave at UC Berkeley in 1977 at a conference about children's literature. (June Jordan's first publication was in the field of children's literature and she continued to be an important voice in children's literature and young adult literature throughout her career. She was also a frequent reviewer of children's literature for the New York Times.)

June Jordan's solution to whatever energy crisis you are facing, whether it is the impact of fracking, the unfair division of labor in our homes and on our campuses, or the overwhelming amount of energy that it takes to process the highly visible violence against black bodies at this time, is only three words. " Love is lifeforce."

In her essay "The Creative Spirit and Children's Literature," which is now in print for the first time ever in the anthology Revolutionary Mothering: Love on the Front Lines, June Jordan explains what she understands as the responsibility of adults to the children of the planet, the barriers to honest intergenerational relationships, and the sacred work of nurturing children with food, safety, and space to be the sincere creative beings that they are. But before that, in order to do all of that, she lays out her theory of life, and love and energy. I'll say it again because I say it every day: "Love is lifeforce."

Is it the science fiction we need? Is it theology? Is thermodynamics? I think it may be all of these things. And I find this concept so useful and necessary at this time that, in addition to working to have it in print and accessible this year (and hopefully for many years to come), I have also distilled the way that June Jordan articulates this simple and revolutionary theory into a manifesta, a declaration. Say it out loud, if not every day, at least today. If not in a group of people, at least with your mirror, and recalibrate your energy today! As we travel on the Revolutionary Mothering Book Tour, we are offering intergenerational "Love is Lifeforce Workshops" where we apply this aspects of June Jordan's wisdom to our everyday lives and our relationships with each other. I hope to see you at a workshop sometime soon. Since after she lays out her theory of love as lifeforce, June Jordan simply says, "That is what I believe," this manifesta distillation (below) of her powerful theory is called (in poetic collaboration with the Black Panther Party 10 Point Platform) What We Believe: Love Made Manifest.

Distilled from June Jordan's "The Creative Spirit and Children's Literature"
Love is lifeforce.

Love is all that supports life.

We run on love.

The creative spirit of the universe exists in each of us and is infinitely greater than any one of us.

The creative spirit is as much as process depending on our receptivity as it is a process depending on our willful conjuring up.

Other lives look to us for usable clues to the positive excitement of just being alive.

Within us there is an orderliness, a perpetual inclination to grow, to become manifest from an invisible beginning.

We are about the task of survival for ourselves and for those who may carry what we offer to them into their own lives.

Love is a serious and tender concern to respect the nature and the spontaneous purpose of other things and people.

Love will manifest a peaceable order among us such that fear, conflict, competition, waste and environmental sacrifice will have no place.

We have to make love powerful.
Love is lifeforce. We run on love.
Alexis Pauline Gumbs is a queer black troublemaker, a black feminist love evangelist, a prayer poet priestess and has a PhD in English, African and African-American Studies, and Women and Gender Studies from Duke University. Alexis was the first scholar to research the Audre Lorde Papers at Spelman College, the June Jordan Papers at Harvard University, and the Lucille Clifton Papers at Emory University, and she is currently on tour with her interactive oracle project "The Lorde Concordance," a series of ritual mobilizing the life and work of Audre Lorde as a dynamic sacred text. Alexis has also published widely on Caribbean Women's Literature with a special interest in Dionne Brand. Her scholarly work is published in Obsidian, Symbiosis, Macomere, The Routledge Companion to Anglophone Literature, SIGNS, Feminist Collections, The Black Imagination, Mothering and Hip Hop Culture, The Business of Black Power and more. Alexis is the author of an acclaimed collection of poems 101 Things That Are Not True About the Most Famous Black Women Alive and poetic work published in Kweli, Vinyl, Backbone, Everyday Genius, Turning Wheel, UNFold, Makeshift and more. She has several books in progress including a book of poems, Good Hair Gone Forever, a scholarly monograph on diaspora and the maternal, and an educational resource called the School of Our Lorde. She is also the co-editor of a forthcoming edited collection on legacies of radical mothering called This Bridge Called My Baby. Alexis is the founder of Brilliance Remastered, a service to help visionary underrepresented graduate students stay connected to purpose, passion, and community, co-founder of the Mobile Homecoming Project, a national experiential archive amplifying generations of Black LGBTQ Brilliance, and the community school Eternal Summer of the Black Feminist Mind. Alexis was named one of UTNE Reader's 50 Visionaries Transforming the World in 2009, was awarded a Too Sexy for 501-C3 trophy in 2011, and is one of the Advocate's top 40 under 40 features in 2012.

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June Jordan Solves the Energy Crisis: Love is Lifeforce

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Not many people are turning to black feminist texts from the 1970s as their major strategy for addressing the current climate crisis we are facing, but why not?

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What We Do

Conservation & Management

All Pacific white-sided dolphins are protected under the MMPA. Our work supports the protection and conservation of Pacific white-sided dolphins by:

Reducing interactions with commercial fishing gear

Minimizing the effects of vessel disturbance, noise, and other types of human impacts

Responding to dead, injured, or entangled dolphins

Learn more about our conservation efforts

Science

NOAA Fisheries conducts research on the biology, behavior, and ecology of Pacific white-sided dolphins to better inform management and policy. Examples include:

Undertaking stock assessments to determine the status of populations and/or sub-populations

Examining population structure, abundance, and dynamics using a variety of research techniques, including photo-identification and genetics

Investigating causes of mortality (especially in unusual cases)

Conducting ecosystem and habitat monitoring

Learn more about our research

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Pacific white-sided dolphins, known for the distinct coloring that give them their name, are a playful and highly social marine mammal. They are also sometimes known as the "hookfin porpoise" because of their large, curved dorsal fin, though they are not technically porpoises.

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West Africa’s coast is under stress from rampant development of coastal infrastructure, city expansions, population increase, and a blanket over use of natural resources. Development of Africa is important and should not be slowed. But we find that coastal degradation put people’s livelihoods are at risk, and in fact, the countries’ economies are also at risk.  According to an analysis of the World Bank, the degradation of the coast of Benin, Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal, and Togo cost $3.8 billion in 2017, or 5.3% of the four countries’ GDP.

How is the World Bank helping the countries in managing their coastal areas?

Regarding coastal erosion, there is an urgency in managing the sediment transport along the shore and around coastal infrastructure.  In West Africa, coastal infrastructure has an effect about 50 km downstream, and the challenge is therefore trans-national in nature.

The West Africa Coastal Areas (WACA) management program was launched in November 2018 to mitigate the consequences of coastal erosion, flooding and pollution caused by human activity, climate change-induced sea-level rise and storm surges. The WACA Program's vision is to create a dynamic space where both coastal countries and partners will work together, share knowledge, expertise, and mobilize finance to build long-term coastal resilience that supports prosperity and sustainability. The Program aims to achieve these goals in the spirit of collaboration and co-creation, and its success is dependent upon the commitment and contributions of all partners.

Countries and Regional Organizations are Taking Action!

It was about 10 years ago that West African environment ministers, convened by the West Africa Economic and Monetary Union, together with partners engaged in developing the West Africa Coastal Zone Management Scheme. This work, which has been updated recently, forms the basis for the WACA Program, and for the continued collaboration with the Abidjan Convention, the Centre de Suivi Ecologique, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature. It is somewhat of a complex matter to have countries work together and have the regional organizations play their part. However, countries continued dialogue and commitment to sustainability is the key ingredient for success in tacking the erosion, flooding and pollution.

In 2018, following technical assistance on risk assessment, institutions, and multi-sector investment plans, the World Bank Board approved $222 million dollars of financing to six countries - Benin, Cote d’Ivoire, Mauritania, Senegal, Sao Tome and Principe, and Togo - to build coastal resilience. Financing is also provided to WAEMU, IUCN, ABC, and CSE to assure the needed regional integration. Next the World Bank convened development partners to establish a WACA Scale-Up Platform so that solutions and finance is mobilized at the scale needed. Many partners are prepared to provide resources, because they see the benefit of working as part of large program where support is easy leveraged for broader impact.

In this way, WACA serves as a catalyst for cooperation and mobilizes technical expertise, financing, and political will to ease regional integration and scale up proven results.  Donors, youth, private sector, and grassroots organization contribute to the efforts and to the mosaic of interventions.

There is Space for Many Other Actors, What Can They Do?

We are pleased by leveraging World Bank Financing offers. Many have provided funds so far, and these should be recognized for supporting WACA, including the Global Environment Facility (GEF), Nordic Development Fund, GFDRR, GIZ, Korea-World Bank Partnership Facility, PROBLUE, and the NDC Support Facility. We facilitate discussions between countries and France, Spain, India, Korea, and Japan for channeling investment finance or technical assistance and expert to West Africa. These efforts are critical for the scale up.

There are non-traditional resources that can be unleashed. In February 2018, the private sector expressed the need to develop “a fund” that could provide technical expertise and knowledge as well as investment finance for profitable projects respecting sustainable coastal development , including managing erosion, flooding and pollution. We are convinced that there is an untapped resource of innovation and action from local level and youth, some of which may need new ways to be mobilized.

We need everyone engaged for sustainable West African coasts: Local communities, local governments, youth, private sector, national NGOs, regional organizations, and the development banks. WACA is not just a project, it is a movement to make every player do its part in sustainable coastal management.

Related links:

Subscribe to our Sustainable Communities newsletter

Follow @WBG_Cities on Twitter

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What is happening on West Africa’s coast?

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West Africa’s coast is under stress from rampant development of coastal infrastructure, city expansions, population increase, and a blanket over use of natural resources. Development of Africa is important and should not be slowed.

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What if we could realize ourselves from an internalized time clock and remember that show is efficient, slow is effective, slow is beautiful” (141)

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Before we go underwater, we must slow ourselves, our heartbeats. We must listen to our hearts. Can I hear the world between my heartbeats? (141)

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A reef is a ridge of material at or near the surface of the ocean. Reefs can occur naturally. Natural reefs are made of rocks or the skeletons of small animals called corals. Reefs can also be artificial-created by human beings.

Artificial Reefs

People create reefs for three chief reasons. The first is to protect the coastline. Reefs act as barriers between the coast and powerful ocean storms. In this way, reefs also protect coastlines from erosion. The Maldives, an island nation in the Indian Ocean, has constructed reefs to protect its low-lying coral islands from cyclones and other factors that may lead to beach erosion.

The second reason people construct reefs is to promote sea life for recreation and aquaculture. A reef ecosystem is very diverse. Plants, plankton, algae, sponges, eels, fish, crabs, and sea turtles are just some of the organisms that thrive in healthy reefs. The wide variety of fish (including sharks) make recreational fishing popular in reef ecosystems. Brightly colored fish, sea anemones, and sea stars also make reefs popular with scuba divers and snorkelers. Artificial reefs off the Atlantic coast of the U.S. states of Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina have contributed to the area's wildlife and encouraged tourism.

Aquaculture is the art and science of cultivating ocean life for food and industry. The reef's size and shape provide shelter for different kinds of fish, so fish farmers can increase their catch by investing in reefs. Japan creates artificial reefs to encourage the growth of schools of snapper, for instance. Artificial reefs can also prepare sedentary creatures, such as clams and oysters, for harvest. Japan is also a leader in creating artificial reefs for pearl-producing oysters.

A third reason for building reefs is to create a wave pattern that promotes the sport of surfing. Surfers ride boards on top of waves. Engineers have experimented with reef shapes to improve surfing conditions. These reefs are usually located far offshore and have the benefit of creating a larger, safer swimming area near the coast. El Segundo, California, was the first area to try an artificial reef to improve surfing. Australian beaches at Perth and the Gold Coast have also constructed artificial reefs for this purpose.

People have constructed underwater barriers for thousands of years. Coastal communities relied on artificial reefs for protection. Two thousand years ago, the Greek historian Strabo reported that Persians built reef barriers across the Tigris River to prevent pirates from India from crossing it.

Ancient civilizations like the Persians built artificial reefs out of organic material like trees and inorganic material like rocks. These days, people use a much wider-and much weirder-variety of materials for reef-building.

Sunken ships have provided reef structures for hundreds of years. Now, these galleons are joined by retired aircraft carriers, oil rigs, and even New York City subway cars. These vehicles are not simply sunk-careful attention is paid to the chemicals they may emit to the surrounding ocean and seabed. The structures are therefore decontaminated: all plastic and toxic materials are stripped from them. (Most toxic chemicals are found in insulating material that kept the vehicles from getting too cold or too hot when in use.) Carefully placed explosive devices detonate and sink the structures in a precise location. The aircraft carrier USS Oriskany is now a reef in the Gulf of Mexico. Subway cars have been sunk for reefs along the East Coast of the U.S. from New Jersey to Georgia.

In warm waters, life on these types of metallic artificial reefs is encouraged by a process called mineral accretion. An electric charge is applied to the structure. This charge causes a mineral, limestone, to build up (accrete) directly on the surface of the metal. Corals attach themselves to the limestone and add to it.

Reef balls are another type of artificial reef structure. Reef balls are circular structures with holes and nodules for organisms to swim through and live in. They are constructed using concrete and a special type of chemical compound called microsilica. Microsilica helps prevent corrosion and adds strength to the structure. Reef balls are used for completely artificial reefs, reef restoration, and erosion control. Reef balls have been used in places from Prince William Sound, Alaska, to the waters off the Persian Gulf of the United Arab Emirates.

Natural Reefs

There are several types of natural reefs. "Live-bottom" reefs are ledges or outcroppings of rock. Organisms such as sea anemones and seaweeds attach themselves directly to this rock, forming a live-bottom reef for fish and plants. The jagged rocks provide overhangs and protection for fish and other marine life, such as seals.

Oyster beds, also called shellfish reefs, are a unique type of live-bottom reef. Oyster larvae attach themselves to large adult oysters at the bottom of the reef, building layers into huge oyster columns. Oyster shells, not rocks, provide the hard surface on which reef organisms like sponges can grow. They provide protection for fish like gobies and a food source for animals like turtles. Oyster beds can be seen at low tide in the Chesapeake Bay in the U.S.

The most familiar type of natural reef, however, is the coral reef. These multicolored limestone ridges are built by tiny sea animals called corals. Their hard outer skeletons (exoskeletons) are what make up coral reefs. There are many different kinds of corals. The ones that build reefs are known as hard, or stony, corals. Corals that do not produce exoskeletons are known as soft corals.

Coral reefs grow slowly, usually at the rate of only a few centimeters each year. Some have formed over millions of years and measure hundreds of meters thick. The largest is the Great Barrier Reef off the northeast coast of Australia. It stretches for 3,000 kilometers (1,600 miles).

Coral reefs provide shelter for thousands of kinds of sea animals. As the reefs build up along coastlines and form new islands, they change the face of the Earth.

Coral Reef Formation

A coral is known as a polyp. It grows no larger than a human fingernail and is often only the size of a pinhead. It has a simple, tubelike body with tentacles at one end.

Most hard corals reproduce by budding, a process of forming small buds that develop into new polyps. The polyps build hard, cup-shaped skeletons around their soft bodies. Sometimes, corals reproduce from eggs. A larva hatches from an egg laid by an adult polyp. The larva drifts through the water until it reaches a spot it can attach itself to, usually part of an existing coral reef or other limestone structure. The young polyp produces a material called calcium carbonate, also known as limestone. This hardens around the polyp and joins it to the reef.

The exoskeletons protect corals from enemies. Some predators, however, can wear right through the hard material, a process known as bioerosion. The parrotfish, for example, has a beak-like mouth that tears through the exoskeleton to the coral within. While eating, the parrotfish chews and eats the limestone, which is then ejected as sand.

Corals usually live together in large groups, called colonies. Colonies are typically made of millions of genetically identical corals-natural clones produced by budding. Side by side, the polyps build their exoskeletons. As the animals die, more polyps build exoskeletons on top of the remains.

Different species of corals build formations in different shapes. Some look like branching trees or bushes. Others look like large domes, fans, or antlers. The bodies of living polyps are often vivid colors of pink, yellow, blue, purple, and green.

Coral colonies usually only grow in shallow water, often no deeper than 46 meters (150 feet). This is because tiny organisms called algae live inside most coral polyps. Algae are vital to these coral because they produce chemicals that help polyps make calcium carbonate. Algae need sunlight to survive, so the corals will not grow in water deeper than sunlight can penetrate. Algae are also what give corals their bright colors. Because the algae that live in coral thrive only in warm water, coral reefs grow mostly in the ocean waters of the tropics.

In addition to warm water, coral needs water that is clear. Water filled with silt or other sediment would suffocate the polyps.

Some corals, however, do not need algae to survive. These corals can live in much deeper, colder water. Cold-water coral reefs, also known as deep ocean reefs, are found from Norway to the Aleutian Islands.

There are three kinds of coral reefs: fringing reefs, barrier reefs, and atolls.

A fringing reef forms along the edge of a coast and is attached to land. It extends outward from shore like a shelf, just below the surface of the water. A fringing reef is composed of a reef flat and a reef slope. The reef flat is nearest to shore. Due to heavy sediment, few live corals live in the reef flat. It is mostly made of exoskeletons. The reef slope faces the open ocean. Most marine life is found on the reef slope. Fringing reefs are the most common type of coral reef.

A barrier reef is separated from the shore by a lagoon. The reef forms a barrier between the coast and the open ocean or sea. Some barrier reefs consist of chains of smaller reefs separated by narrow waterways. The Great Barrier Reef is constructed this way.

An atoll is a reef in the open sea that surrounds a lagoon. This kind of reef forms when a ring of coral builds up on the sides of an undersea volcano that has risen above the ocean surface. The volcanic peak gradually erodes and sinks below the water's surface, and the reef continues to build. Over time, parts of the reef appear above the sea as a ring-shaped island or chain of islets.

Reefs are broken and eroded by fast-moving, powerful waves that crash into them. When waves break down the hard coral of a reef, they pound it into a fine sand. Such sand covers many tropical beaches and helps form new land.

As it grows, a coral reef provides homes for a vast number of living creatures. Coral reefs are among the richest, most varied communities of life found anywhere in the ocean.

Many reef creatures, including the coral polyps themselves, are nocturnal. They are active only at night. During the day, the corals close up inside their skeletons to hide from predators such as sea stars. After dark, the corals open and extend tentacles, which are covered with stinging cells. (These cells, called cnidocytes, manufacture a venom and inject it into the body of the victim as the coral's tentacles grab it.) Waving in the water, a coral's tentacles catch and sting plankton. Plankton are the tiny organisms (plants, animals, and algae) that the coral polyps eat.

Other reef animals survive by blending in with their surroundings. Many tropical reef fish, for example, are brilliantly colored. They match the bright colors of warm-water coral.

Natural Reefs and People

For centuries, reefs have supplied people with fish and other seafood. Today, some human activities threaten the health of reefs. As people along coasts plow the earth to plant crops or bulldoze it to build homes and roads, they loosen the soil. Rain washes much of it into rivers, which carry it to the ocean. There, the soil forms sediment that can suffocate and bury coral reefs.

Construction and agricultural industries also release harmful chemicals into rivers and drains that empty into oceans. Many coastal cities dump sewage and other wastes into the ocean. Such pollution causes certain types of algae to grow so rapidly that they form thick mats on top of the ocean. These harmful algal blooms block sunlight. This can be fatal to a living coral reef.

Reefs have been harmed by underwater mining and oil drilling. Some have been damaged by explosives used to clear out channels in the seabed for ships to pass through.

People have overfished some reefs. Cold-water coral reefs are especially vulnerable to overfishing because of the technology used. Huge trawling nets drag along the bottom of the ocean, destroying vulnerable coral habitats. Overfishing and habitat destruction have made shellfish reefs among the most endangered aquatic habitats on Earth.

Killing tropical fish for sport or collecting them live to sell to aquarium dealers puts tropical coral reefs at risk. Other reef creatures, such as the Hawksbill sea turtle ( Eretmochelys imbricata), have been collected for their shells in such numbers that many are now endangered. The turtle was hunted for use in tortoiseshell jewelry. Red and orange species of coral are also valuable material for jewelry.

Some artificial reefs have proven disastrous for the environment. Osborne Reef, near Fort Lauderdale, Florida, United States, was constructed of more than a million used car and truck tires. Few animals adapted to life around the rubber reef. The tires were not fastened properly and many broke loose. Heavy tires crashed into natural coral reefs nearby, damaging the ecosystem. Hurricanes and storm surges carry tires from South Florida to beaches as far away as North Carolina.

Climate change is also a threat to coral reefs. Global warming is the current period of climate change, owing to an increased greenhouse effect. Carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases trap sunlight in the Earth's atmosphere. As more greenhouse gases are released through industry and vehicle emissions, more sunlight is trapped. Global warming and the greenhouse effect have been associated with rising ocean temperatures. Since corals thrive in warm water, the changes it brings about may be surprising.

Rising ocean temperatures do not encourage more coral growth. In fact, warmer waters cause corals to expel the algae that lives inside them. Without the algae, corals lose their color. This is called coral bleaching. Coral bleaching threatens the entire reef ecosystem. Fish and shellfish that were camouflaged by the brightly colored algae can no longer hide from predators. Without their algae, corals will die. The Seychelles, an island nation in the Indian Ocean, has lost almost all of its living coral reefs and atolls due to coral bleaching.

Coral bleaching does not kill coral immediately, however. As ocean warmth returns to more comfortable temperatures for the coral, they may regain their algae, and their color. Bleached coral usually takes weeks or months to regain its color. The Great Barrier Reef experienced a bleaching event in 2002, but most corals recovered.

Protecting delicate reef ecosystems is a global task. Scientists are studying types of algae that can survive warmer ocean temperatures. Chemicals or other qualities that allow these corals to resist bleaching may help damaged reefs survive. Many countries place limits on the amount of pollutants released into streams and drains. Governments, companies, and individuals are working to reduce the effects of global warming.

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A reef is a ridge of material at or near the surface of the ocean. Reefs can occur naturally. Natural reefs are made of rocks or the skeletons of small animals called corals. Reefs can also be artificial-created by human beings. Artificial Reefs People create reefs for three chief reasons.

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Media Credits

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Jewels of the Caribbean | National Geographic Society

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Media Credits The audio, illustrations, photos, and videos are credited beneath the media asset, except for promotional images, which generally link to another page that contains the media credit. The Rights Holder for media is the person or group credited. Editor Producers other

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Ida B. Wells-Barnett was a prominent journalist, activist, and researcher, in the late 19 th and early 20 th centuries. In her lifetime, she battled sexism, racism, and violence. As a skilled writer, Wells-Barnett also used her skills as a journalist to shed light on the conditions of African Americans throughout the South.

Ida Bell Wells was born in Holly Springs, Mississippi on July 16 th, 1862. She was born into slavery during the Civil War. Once the war ended Wells-Barnett's parents became politically active in Reconstruction Era politics. Her parents instilled into her the importance of education. Wells-Barnett enrolled at Rust College but was expelled when she started a dispute with the university president. In 1878, Wells-Barnett went to visit her grandmother. While she was there Wells-Barnett was informed that a yellow fever epidemic had hit her hometown. The disease took both of Wells-Barnett's parents and her infant brother. Left to raise her brothers and sister, she took a job as a teacher so that she could keep the family together. Eventually, Wells-Barnett moved her siblings to Memphis, Tennessee. There she continued to work as an educator.

In 1884, Wells-Barnett filed a lawsuit against a train car company in Memphis for unfair treatment. She had been thrown off a first-class train, despite having a ticket. Although she won the case on the local level, the ruling was eventually overturned in federal court. After the lynching of one of her friends, Wells-Barnett turned her attention to white mob violence. She became skeptical about the reasons black men were lynched and set out to investigate several cases. She published her findings in a pamphlet and wrote several columns in local newspapers. Her expose about an 1892 lynching enraged locals, who burned her press and drove her from Memphis. After a few months, the threats became so bad she was forced to move to Chicago, Illinois.

In 1893, Wells-Barnett, joined other African American leaders in calling for the boycott of the World's Columbian Exposition. The boycotters accused the exposition committee of locking out African Americans and negatively portraying the black community. In 1895, Wells-Barnett married famed African American lawyer Ferdinand Barnett. Together, the couple had four children. Throughout her career Wells-Barnett, balanced motherhood with her activism.

Wells-Barnett traveled internationally, shedding light on lynching to foreign audiences. Abroad, she openly confronted white women in the suffrage movement who ignored lynching. Because of her stance, she was often ridiculed and ostracized by women's suffrage organizations in the United States. Nevertheless, Wells-Barnett remained active the women's rights movement. She was a founder of the National Association of Colored Women's Club which was created to address issues dealing with civil rights and women's suffrage. Although she was in Niagara Falls for the founding of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), her name is not mentioned as an official founder. Late in her career Wells-Barnett focused on urban reform in the growing city of Chicago. She died on March 25 th, 1931.

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Pioneering journalist Ida B. Wells-Barnett battled sexism, racism, and violence, particularly working to shed light on the conditions of African Americans throughout the South. Read her story on womenshistory.org.

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Grace Lee Boggs, who has spent much of her life advocating for civil rights and labor rights, became such a noted figure in Detroit's Black Power movement that people assumed she must be partially black. In some of her FBI files, Boggs, who is Chinese-American, was described as "probably Afro Chinese."

(We'll let that sit with you for a moment.)

And that's not the only assumption she's defied. For almost a century - she turned 100 Saturday - she's challenged how people think about their own activism.

Many people - in and out of Detroit - have been honoring her life this year. Her own organization, the Boggs Center, hosted events and lectures all this week to celebrate her life; the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center shared a hundred of Boggs' best quotes, one for each of her years; and the James and Grace Lee Boggs School, a charter school she helped start a few years ago, threw her a birthday party.
The Start Of Her Revolution
Born in Providence, R.I., to Chinese immigrants in 1915, Boggs studied at Barnard College and went on to earn her Ph.D. in philosophy from Bryn Mawr College. For years, she pored over the work of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Karl Polanyi and Karl Marx, and even translated three of Marx's essays from German to English. She was transfixed by the process and challenge of thinking through complicated ideas.

After finishing grad school, Boggs struggled to find work - any work, she told a group of students in 2012. "Even department stores would say, 'We don't hire Orientals,' " she recalled. So she moved to the Midwest, where she found a job with the University of Chicago's philosophy library. It paid only $10 a week, a stipend so low she was forced to find free housing in a rat-filled basement.

But even the rats had an upside. One day, as Boggs was walking through her neighborhood, she came across a group of people protesting poor living conditions - which included rat-infested housing. This, Boggs recalled, connected her with the black community for the very first time.

"I was aware that people were suffering, but it was more of a statistical thing," Boggs said. "Here in Chicago I was coming into contact with it as a human thing."

A few years later, in the 1940s, she moved to Detroit to help edit the radical newsletter Correspondence. There, she met a charismatic auto worker and activist named James Boggs.

"When he rose to speak his mind, he would speak with such passion, challenging all within hearing to stretch their humanity ... he would often bring down the house," Boggs wrote in 1998 in her autobiography, Living For Change.

They married in 1953.

Together, the couple became two of the city's most noted activists, tackling issues related to labor and civil rights, feminism, Black Power, Asian Americans and the environment. In 1974, they wrote Revolution And Evolution In The Twentieth Century; in 1998, she published an autobiography, Living For Change; and in 2011, she co-wrote The Next American Revolution: Sustainable Activism For The Twenty-First Century with Scott Kurashige, a professor and author.
A Human Experience
Though many of the Boggs' ideas centered around revolution, her personal philosophies were guided more by human experience - and the individual's own ability to transform his or her world - than overthrowing a system.

As I've grown older, I've realized that philosophy has to do with how we value ourselves as human beings, and how we look at ourselves, and how we relate to reality.

In 2012, she gave a lecture at the University of California, Berkeley, with the activist Angela Davis. A group of students applauded her when the conversation turned to using non-violence - which Boggs endorses - in protest.

Boggs, who pairs her heady intellectualism with a wry humor, was quick to interject.

"All of you who are clapping, I suggest you do some more thinking," she told the crowd in a gently mocking reprimand.

She suggested they react with reflection, instead of an automatic response.

"It's a philosophical question - it's not just a tactical question.... As I've grown older, I've realized that philosophy has to do with how we value ourselves as human beings, and how we look at ourselves, and how we relate to reality."

Boggs has helped shape the thinking of generations of activists, including Tawana Honeycomb Petty, a writer and community organizer who also serves on the Boggs Center board.

"There isn't a go-along-to-get-along [attitude]," Petty says. "She invites and challenges and provides us opportunity to share what we're thinking, and we can struggle back and forth."
Re-Creating Herself
James Boggs died in 1993, when Grace was 78. After her husband's death, Grace became even more active in Detroit's activist communities.

"I was still trying to figure out what I was going to do on my own or, indeed, whether there was any 'my own.' That is what often happens when you lose the person with whom you have lived and worked closely for decades," she wrote in her autobiography. "Especially if you are a woman, you need time to re-create yourself, to discover who you are."

I was still trying to figure out what I was going to do on my own or, indeed, whether there was any 'my own.'

In 2005, she began writing a weekly column for the Michigan Citizen, a Detroit-area newspaper, until she was 98. Two years ago, keeping in line with her dedication to working with young people, she helped start the James And Grace Lee Boggs School, a charter school that weaves Detroit - and its issues - into its curriculum.

Boggs, who is in hospice care and was unavailable for an interview, has talked publicly about aging - and the changing waves of activism she's been through. In the documentary American Revolutionary, which was about Boggs' life, she acknowledged that she was dying, and said that living longer than everybody else made for a lonely life. But she remained optimistic.

"To me that's not a terrible thing. ... I see this as a period of transition that I can make a transition by the things that I choose to engage in," she said. "I don't know what the next American revolution is going to be like, but we might be able to imagine it if your imagination were rich enough."

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Grace Lee Boggs, Activist And American Revolutionary, Turns 100

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Grace Lee Boggs, who has spent much of her life advocating for civil rights and labor rights, became such a noted figure in Detroit's Black Power movement that people assumed she must be partially black. In some of her FBI files, Boggs, who is Chinese-American, was described as "probably Afro Chinese."

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Rest is resistance and sleep is political (89)

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The Disability & Intersectionality Summit (DIS) is a biennial national conference that centers the multiple oppressions that shape the lived experiences of disabled individuals, as told by disabled people, in a setting organized by disabled activists.

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DIS2018: Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha "Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice?"

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Jan 16, 2019 Miles rated it really liked it

Again, I cannot believe it took me this long to find this woman's work. I struggle to think of very many writers who do the short story better; there are no writers who do a better job writing short stories about young Black people. Part of what I appreciated in the difference between Sea Birds and, say, Gorilla, My Love, is the turned attention to other Black peoples of the world. This collection felt more international than GML, though each are heavily invested in centering the Black experienc Again, I cannot believe it took me this long to find this woman's work. I struggle to think of very many writers who do the short story better; there are no writers who do a better job writing short stories about young Black people. Part of what I appreciated in the difference between Sea Birds and, say, Gorilla, My Love, is the turned attention to other Black peoples of the world. This collection felt more international than GML, though each are heavily invested in centering the Black experience.
My incredibly minor critique is I wish the last short story was, well, longer.
...more

Jun 06, 2020 Carrie Laben rated it it was amazing

Published in 1977, this book is not only still relevant in terms of content (most of the stories center around Black women active in community/political life) but glorious in its celebration of language and non-linear form.

Aug 08, 2018 KL rated it really liked it

Slice of life stories about really well-realized characters. Really good. Often sad. As timely today as it was when it first came out.

Oct 21, 2009 Erssie rated it it was ok

A must for enjoyable and educational reading
I read this when I did a newspaper article on the Women's Press fiction. A must for enjoyable and educational reading
I read this when I did a newspaper article on the Women's Press fiction. ...more

Toni Cade Bambara, born Miltona Mirkin Cade (March 25, 1939 – December 9, 1995) was an African-American author, documentary film-maker, social activist and college professor.
Toni Cade Bambara was born in New York City to parents Walter and Helen (Henderson) Cade. She grew up in Harlem, Bedford Stuyvesant (Brooklyn), Queens and New Jersey. In 1970 she changed her name to include the name of a West
Toni Cade Bambara, born Miltona Mirkin Cade (March 25, 1939 – December 9, 1995) was an African-American author, documentary film-maker, social activist and college professor.
Toni Cade Bambara was born in New York City to parents Walter and Helen (Henderson) Cade. She grew up in Harlem, Bedford Stuyvesant (Brooklyn), Queens and New Jersey. In 1970 she changed her name to include the name of a West African ethnic group, Bambara.

Bambara graduated from Queens College with a B.A. in Theater Arts/English Literature in 1959, then studied mime at the Ecole de Mime Etienne Decroux in Paris, France. She also became interested in dance before completing her master's degree in American studies at City College, New York (from 1962), while serving as program director of Colony Settlement House in Brooklyn. She has also worked for New York social services and as a recreation director in the psychiatric ward of Metropolitan hospital. From 1965 to 1969 she was with City College's Search for Education, Elevation, Knowledge-program. She taught English, published material and worked with SEEK's black theatre group. She was made assistant professor of English at Rutgers University's new Livingston College in 1969, was visiting professor in Afro-American Studies at Emory University and at Atlanta University (1977), where she also taught at the School of Social Work (until 1979). She was writer-in-residence at Neighborhood Arts Center (1975–79), at Stephens College at Columbia, Missouri (1976) and at Atlanta's Spelman College (1978–79). From 1986 she taught film-script writing at Louis Massiah's Scribe Video Center in Philadelphia.

Bambara participated in several community and activist organizations, and her work was influenced by the Civil Rights and Black Nationalist movements of the 1960s. She went on propaganda trips to Cuba in 1973 and to Vietnam in 1975. She moved to Atlanta, GA, with her daughter, Karma Bene, and became a founding member of the Southern Collective of African-American Writers.

Toni Cade Bambara was diagnosed with colon cancer in 1993 and died of it in 1995, at the age of 56.

(from Wikipedia)

aka Toni Cade
...more

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We are one.

We are one. That is the central message pulsing through this web that's spinning forth from me and that I'm being woven into, this confluence of sound and image through and across waves of various types (marine, sound, brain...) that, for now, is called Whale Whispering. I'm singing to and with humpback whales in Bahia, Brazil, birthing songs to contribute to the mending of the shattered collective spirit of humanity and support the protection, recovery, and homeostasis of the environment we share with the other beings of Earth--by tuning in to water. I am healing myself in the process, which is integral to the process, and learning more and more from water about how to heal water and heal with water. Training my attention on the messages contained within the humpbacks' songs. Tapping into whale medicine, this music of the seas, as a way to address and transmute the trauma and systemic brutality that the legacies of colonization and enslavement have wrought globally on people of African descent and indigenous folks while fomenting institutionalized disregard for and harm to the planet itself. Trolling the Atlantic for aural remedies to the disastrous delusion of division.

I've said in the past that the initial flicker for this undertaking appeared decades ago when I first heard the singing of humpback whales, though what's more true is that this is (part of) an ancestral assignment I was born to fulfill. The sonant imprint of my ancestors trills unmistakably in my blood, which is why I can identify its traces without hesitation in the songs of the whales (the source of the Blues...the Middle Passage moan)...And why I know too, without a doubt, that those ancestors who made that crossing came ashore with strains of whale hymns incorporated into the singing they would need to do in order to sustain a current of certainty in miracles flowing toward multi-directional freedoms and transformations.

The shape of this project as it currently exists has sprouted from a collective visioning process between myself and the whales; their intentions and ideas are as integral to it as are mine, and as difficult as it will be for some people to accept, the realization of this vision can only occur as a result of the telepathic communication that exists in this evolving relationship. This is totem work, and I am clear that not only is interspecies communication possible, it is necessary for what must be a collaborative effort to mitigate the effects of climate change on the ecosystems of the planet. While humans are responsible for causing the harm that has been inflicted, we must understand ourselves as part of the natural world in order to effectively participate in healing the damage to it (ourselves included). Listening to nature is key to developing that understanding. This is an elementary component of the vast majority of indigenous worldviews, but the modern, Western, corporate mindset and the media it fuels have worked wonders at erasing/blocking this awareness from far too many minds. The whales are speaking in the "language we all understand," to quote Stevie Wonder-music. I am among those who are listening, and am compelled to combine my songs, which are seasoned by the songs of my ancestors, with theirs, which are seasoned by the songs of their ancestors as well as mine. We sing songs together, the whales and I, come together on the open sea to share them, and invite the world to listen and watch and sing along.

This is a holistic process leading to more holistic processes and products; it spans the reaches between the surface and the depths, just as the whales do. In order for me to effectively complete my part in this creative mission, in order to truly tune in to the language of the whales and bring through lyrics, melodies and arrangements that do justice to their expressions, in order to be impactful in supporting the detoxification of the waters, I must dive fully into my own process of detoxification, and share that through this work. Detoxify my lifestyle of practices that are harmful to both the external environment and to my own person. Make the point that this is what is required for us to truly transform the situation in which we find ourselves globally-we must transform ourselves in order to transform our environment. We must heal ourselves in order to heal the world. I want the sharing of my journey of transformation (truly committing to being much less dependent on oil and plastics, overcoming sugar addiction, and doing the ongoing spiritual, physical, emotional and mental work of freeing myself from the twisted knots of ancestral trauma, for example) to be part of the story that is told through Whale Whispering. This blog is one of the ways I intend to share the process as it unfolds. Eventually there will be recordings and a documentary film related to this project, but I've come to understand that this work is about so much more than those specific outcomes. (For those who are new to Whale Whispering and would like to read the original description of the project and trace its trajectory from its inception, follow this link. I invite readers and supporters to journey with me, to accompany me as I peel back successive layers of this creative work, the whales' songs, and myself. I invite readers and supporters into this healing space with me; We are One.

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We are one. That is the central message pulsing through this web that's spinning forth from me and that I'm being woven into, this confluence of sound and image through and across waves of various types (marine, sound, brain...) that, for now, is called Whale Whispering.

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How to Survive the End of the World • Feb 19, 2020

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Guest Podcast: Decolonizing the Crone by How to Survive the End of the World

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Guest Podcast: Decolonizing the Crone by How to Survive the End of the World

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North Carolina Poet Laureate Jaki Shelton Green drops blessings like ripe mango into our laps. Walls breathe a heavy sigh of relief as she shreds the puny narratives we have about who we are and our power to reanimate and reclaim our medicine... our magic.

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The suffering and endangerment of marine mammals is a direct result of the extractive, destructive processes and consequences of capitalism (101)

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dat Black Mermaid Man Lady

Sharon Bridgforth

Enter

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The goal of this project is to offer art as a transformational tool. To honor Black women as leaders. To celebrate queer bodies. To document the lives of LGBT families of color. To venerate Ancestors of African descent and their legacies of peace & Spiritual practices. To assert that traditi

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Key points

Dolphin researchers found the first case of identity perception by taste alone in animals.

Jackdaw researchers discovered that when the birds take flight en masse, sometimes up to 40,000, it is done because the majority agree.

I'm always looking for new and fascinating studies of nonhuman animal (animal) behavior, and just learned about two very interesting research projects. The first is a study of bottlenose dolphins by Jason Bruck and his colleagues titled "Cross-modal perception of identity by sound and taste in bottlenose dolphins," published in Science Advances and available for free online, and the second is a study by Damien Farine called "Collective behaviour: Jackdaws vote to leave with their voice" published in Current Biology, not available for free online. ¹

Dolphin "Pee-Pals"

While the title of the study of dolphins didn't alert me to what the researchers actually learned, a popular account's report on it, called "Pee Pals: Dolphins Taste Friends' Urine To Know They're Around" did. I was especially intrigued because I hadn't previously imagined dolphins (or other aquatic animals) would use taste to do very much, no less use urine to recognize their friends.

I'm particularly interested in how other animals, including dogs, use scent and perhaps taste (gustation)- pee-mail -to recognize other dogs, so imagining dolphins doing something similar made me want to know more. It's also known that dolphins recognize other individuals by their unique "signature whistles."

Bruck and his colleagues' creative research entailed learning more about dolphin chemosensation (gustation) and preferences for other individuals in three steps by analyzing: (1) differences in investigation time-open mouth sampling time-when individuals were presented with samples of water or of dolphin urine; (2) vocalizations of the urine-sampling dolphin; and (3) the time spent sampling urine from familiar and unfamiliar individuals.

The researchers learned that all dolphins explored urine from familiar animals for longer amounts of time than urine from unfamiliar dolphins. Neither sex nor age was important. When there was whistling, dolphins produced more whistles in response to urine from a familiar individual.

Finally, in what is called an "expectation violation paradigm," Bruck and his colleagues wrote, "After pouring a urine sample in front of a dolphin close to an underwater speaker, we played either the signature whistle of the urine donor (matched presentation) or a signature whistle of another known individual (mismatched presentation)."

They learned that all but one dolphin remained close to the playback speaker longer when chemical and signature whistles matched than when they didn't.

Summarizing their important findings, the researchers noted, "Our study presents the first case of identity perception by taste alone in animals." They fully recognized that there were limitations to their study-only captive animals were studied, including only two females-but I still think the results of this research are notable and exciting. I look forward to similar research on wild animals and more females and on more species, terrestrial and aquatic.

Jackdaw Democracy and Collective Group Decisions

A summary of this intriguing research project can be found in a BBC essay called "'Democratic' jackdaws use noise to make decisions." It turns out that when thousands of jackdaws-maybe as many as 40,000-take to the sky en masse, it's because the majority agree it's time to do so. The volume of the sound and how fast it reaches a crescendo are the two main variables underlying this collective behavior.

These results are interesting and important because they tell us more about jackdaws and because human noise might affect this and other behavior patterns that influence individual and group behavior and, ultimately, the populations of these and other birds. Maybe being called a " birdbrain" isn't that much of an insult after all.

The more we study other animals, the more we learn about their cognitive, emotional, and moral capacities. If we keep open minds, maybe what we learn about other animals isn't really all that surprising but rather a reflection of our narrow thinking about who these amazing beings truly are.

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Dolphins Use "Pee Mail" to Recognize Friends-and Birds Vote

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Dolphin researchers found the first case of identity perception by taste alone in animals. Jackdaw researchers discovered that when the birds take flight en masse, sometimes up to 40,000, it is done because the majority agree. I'm always looking for new and fascinating studies of nonhuman animal (animal) behavior, and just learned about two very interesting research projects.

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KEIKO CONSERVATION Another dolphin has died at Sea Life Park. He was the 140th dolphin to die in their care.
WAIMANALO, HAWAII, February 28th, 2019- A Pacific bottlenose dolphin named Kamoana has died at Sea Life Park. He was one of the facility's last surviving wild captured dolphins, having been captured in 1971.

His death is the 140th cetacean death at the park since its opening. An additional 50 bottlenose dolphins, 5 hybrid "wholphins," 11 false killer whales, 3 melon-headed whales, 9 rough-toothed dolphins, 9 short-finned pilot whales, 13 pan-tropical spotted dolphins, 3 pygmy killer whales, and 36 spinner dolphins have died in the park's care.

The park told local news that Kamoana- who was considered the "grandpa" of Sea Life Park due to his old age- passed away of "natural causes," but a necropsy will be done to officially confirm the cause of death. It is unlikely that they will release it to the public or report it to National Marine Fisheries Service.

Sea Life Park has reported worrisome causes of deaths to National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) over the years that include drowning, suffocation, "killed by another dolphin," food poisoning, trauma, "jumped out of tank," died at capture, and malnutrition. The park is under investigation by the local Labor Department and was fined $130k by the Hawaii Occupational Safety and Health Division. It is unclear if this is related to a reported tip from an anonymous engineer who alleged park management covered up knowledge of the imminent collapse of three structures on the property while keeping them open to the public.

We urge you to join us in asking Hawaii's tourism industry to stop supporting Sea Life Park by signing the petition here.

INFO@KEIKOCONSERVATION.COM

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Kamoana's Death Marks 140 Dolphins That Have Died in Sea Life Park's Care - Keiko Conservation

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE KEIKO CONSERVATION ANIMAL RIGHTS HAWAI'I Another dolphin has died at Sea Life Park. He was the 140th dolphin to die in their care. WAIMANALO, HAWAII, February 28th, 2019- A Pacific bottlenose dolphin named Kamoana has died at Sea Life Park. He was one of the faci

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Sea Life Park is Hawaii's best wild life and wild animal park. Whether you want to swim with dolphins or pet sharks, there's something here for everyone!

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(Image credit: vkilikov | Shutterstock.com)

DENVER - Humans aren't the only species whose members speak to their babies in the womb. Dolphin mamas appear to sing their own name to their unborn calves.

New research suggests that dolphin mothers teach their babies a "signature whistle" right before birth and in the two weeks after. Signature whistles are sounds that are made by individual dolphins, which the animals use to identify one another. Calves eventually develop their own signature whistle, but in the first few weeks of life, mothers seem focused on teaching their offspring their signature sound, the scientists said.

"It's been hypothesized that this is part of an imprinting process," Audra Ames, a doctoral student at the University of Southern Mississippi, said here on Friday (Aug. 5) at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association. [ Deep Divers: A Dolphin Gallery]

Dolphin chatter

Earlier studies had shown that mother dolphins start whistling their signature whistle much more in the days before birth, and then in the calf's first two weeks of life, Ames told Live Science. There are multiple theories about why, including that perhaps moms are trying to get babies to develop their own signature sound.

But no one had studied signature-whistle rates not only before and after birth, but also in the same dolphin mother, Ames said. She and her colleagues had the opportunity to do that in late 2012 and early 2014, when a baby dolphin named Mira was born to a 9-year-old mother at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom in Vallejo, California.

The researchers captured a total of 80 hours of recordings from the two months before and the two months after the dolphin's birth. They recorded the mom and the calf as well as the five dolphins housed with them. It was important to capture the noises of the mother's peers to understand whether the communication was exclusive to the mother-baby pair, Ames said.

Learning mom's name

The recordings showed that the increased signature-whistle production was, in fact, the purview of the mother dolphin. She began increasing her signature whistle two weeks before the birth, possibly starting the learning process while her calf was still in utero.

A seemingly related phenomenon has been observed during human pregnancies, according to Ames. "We actually do see that human babies develop a preference for their mother's voice in the last trimester," she said. "We don't know if that's something that's going on here, but it could be something similar." [ Photos: World's Cutest Baby Wild Animals]

The mother dolphin also produced her signature whistle at high rates until two weeks after the calf's birth, after which she tapered off. Interestingly, Ames said, the other dolphins in the group didn't produce their own signature whistle at very high rates during the first two weeks of the calf's life. But after mama stopped the repetitions of her own whistle, the other members of the group started producing their own whistle at higher rates.

"What the other dolphins might be doing here is remaining quiet so the calf does not imprint on the wrong signature whistle," Ames said.

Baby dolphins don't usually develop their own signature whistle until they're around the age of 2 months, with much variation in timing, Ames said. The baby's whistle tends not to be similar to the mother's or to the other dolphins in the group.

"You don't want to have a signature sound that is going to be similar to someone else you're around quite often," Ames said.

Ames and her colleagues are now studying other sounds in the mother-calf repertoire of communication, and they're studying other marine mammals such as beluga whales as well as dolphins.
Original article on Live Science.

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Mama Dolphins Sing Their Name to Babies in the Womb

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(Image credit: vkilikov | Shutterstock.com) DENVER - Humans aren't the only species whose members speak to their babies in the womb. Dolphin mamas appear to sing their own name to their unborn calves. New research suggests that dolphin mothers teach their babies a "signature whistle" right before birth and in the two weeks after.

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How to Identify a Bull Shark | Raging Bull Shark

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fog cast before the moon
soft fingers that can’t touch her face
this river of our righteous tears
earth women bear this weight

fog on a full fat moon
fragments converge into something new
what we release has a gravity
let go of what’s not true

sweet and fog clearing moon
show me this dirt is not so bleak
lift up your skywide veil
promise me: there’s always light
(brown, 2022)

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freedom is not a secret. it's a practice. (gumb, 2020)

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adrienne maree brown

awe. liberation. pleasure.

adrienne maree brown grows healing ideas in public through her multi-genre writing, her music and her podcasts. Informed by 25 years of movement facilitation, somatics, Octavia E Butler scholarship and her work as a doula, adrienne has nurtured Emergent Strategy, Pleasure Activism, Radical Imagination and Transformative Justice as ideas and practices for transformation. She is the author/editor of several published texts , cogenerator of a tarot deck and a developing musical ritual.

Founded in the wake of adrienne publishing the sacred movement text Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds, the Emergent Strategy Ideation Institute is a collective of facilitators, mediators, trainers and curious human beings interested in how we get in right relationship with change.

I have been blessed in this life to find people who expand my mind and heart while also loving me and letting me love them. I wanted to uplift some of these friends and teachers here so you can learn more about these people I quote, uplift and collaborate with most frequently.

Autumn Brown

Autumn Brown is a brilliant facilitator whose work is steeped in consensus, Black feminism, apocalypse and survival, healing justice, revolutionary mothering, radical love and liberation. She is also one of my two sisters, both of whom teach me everything.

Toshi Reagon

Toshi Reagon is a radically free musician and scholar of Octavia E. Butler. For the last decade, she has been forging the parables path, bringing Octavia E. Butler's The Parable of the Sower: The Opera to collaborative venues around the world and spreading the word: "God is change."

Prentis Hemphill

Prentis Hemphill is the breathtaking thinker who cofounded The Embodiment Institute in 2021 after years as a gifted movement mediator, healer and therapist. Prentis is the host of Finding Our Way and a dear friend who is teaching me the deep work of boundaries.

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adrienne maree brown - awe. liberation. pleasure.

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Skip to content adrienne maree brown awe. liberation. pleasure. adrienne maree brown grows healing ideas in public through her multi-genre writing, her music and her podcasts. Informed by 25 years of movement facilitation, somatics, Octavia E Butler scholarship and her work as a doula, adrienne has nurtured Emergent Strategy, Pleasure Activism, Radical Imagination and Transformative Justice as ideas and practices for transformation.

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FEMME SHARKS DON'T EAT OUR OWN.
FEMME SHARKS LIKE TO EAT THOUGH
FEMME SHARKS RECOGNIZE THAT FEMMES COME IN ALL KINDS OF SIZES AND EACH KIND IS LUSCIOUS. WE WORK TOWARDS LOVING OUR CURVY, FAT, SKINNY, SUPERSIZE, THICK, DISABLED, BLACK AND BROWN FINE-ASS BODIES EVERY DAY. WE REALIZE THAT LOVING OURSELVES IN A RACIST/SEXIST/HOMO/TRANSPHOBIC/ABLIST/CLASSIST SYSTEM IS AN EVERY DAY ACT OF WAR AGAINST THAT SYSTEM.
FEMME SHARKS DON'T THINK ANOREXIA IS CUTE.
WE THINK EATING A BIG-ASS MEAL IS SEXY.
WE SAY SCREW "HEIGHT WEIGHT PROPORTIONATE PLEASE" IN CRAIGSLIST WOMEN SEEKING WOMEN ADS AND IN LIFE.

WE HAVE BIG MOUTHS AND WE KNOW HOW TO USE
THEM. DON'T FUCK WITH US! ASK US IF WE WANT TO FUCK THOUGH !

FEMME SHARKS WILL RECLAIM THE POWER AND DIGNITY OF FEMALENESS BY ANY MEANS NECCESARY.
WE'RE GIRLS BLOWN UP, TURNED INSIDE OUT AND REMIXED.

FEMME SHARKS ARE OVER WHITE QUEERS OBLIVIOUSNESS TO QUEER OF COLOR, TWO SPIRIT AND TRANS OF COLOR LIVES.
WE KNOW THAT WE ARE A CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE
WE'RE OVER WHITE FEMMES AND BUTCHES WHO THINK THAT FEMME ONLY COMES IN THE COLOR OF BARBIE.
WE'RE OVER BUTCHES AND BOYS AND OTHER FEMMES TELLING US WHAT WE NEED TO DO, WEAR OR BE IN ORDER TO BE "REALLY FEMME."

FEMME SHARKS RECOGNIZE THAT FEMMES, BUTCHES, GENDERQUEER AND TRANS PEOPLE
HAVE BEEN IN COMMUNITIES OF COLOR SINCE FOREVER.
THAT BEFORE COLONIZATION WE WERE SEEN AS SACRED
AND WE WERE SOME OF THE FIRST FOLKS MOST VIOLENTLY ATTACKED
WHEN OUR LANDS WERE INVADED AND COLONIZED.
FEMME SHARKS WON'T REST UNTIL WE RECLAIM OUR POSITIONS
AS BELOVED FAMILY WITHIN OUR COMMUNITIES.

FEMME SHARKS AREN'T JUST DIMEPIECES AND TROPHY WIVES
FUCK THAT!
WE MIGHT BE YOUR GIRL,
BUT WE'RE OUR OWN FEMMES.
WE RECOGNIZE THAT FEMMES ARE LEADERS OF OUR COMMUNITIES.
WE HOLD IT DOWN, CALM YOUR TEARS, ORGANIZE THE RALLY, VISIT YOU IN JAIL, GET CHILDCARE HOOKED UP, LOAN YOU TWENTY DOLLARS.
FEMMES ARE WELDERS, AFTERSCHOOL TEACHERS, ABORTION CLINIC WORKERS, STRIPPERS, WRITERS, FACTORY WORKERS, MOMS, REVOLUTIONARIES DEDICATED TO TAKING THE SYSTEM THE HELL DOWN SO WE CAN BE FREE!

FEMMES ARE LEADERS IN TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS/ DEFENDING OUR QUEER AND TRANS OF COLOR COMMUNITIES.
WE USED OUR STILETTOS AS WEAPONS AT STONEWALL.
WE WERE THE TRANSWOMEN WHO FOUGHT BACK AT THE COMPTON
CAFETERIA
WE'RE THE GIRLS WHO STARE DOWN ASSHOLES STARING AT OUR LOVERS AND FRIENDS ON THE SUBWAY.
WE WALK EACH OTHER HOME
ACT CRAZY ON THE BUS TO GET ASSHOLES TO MOVE AWAY
AND KNOW HOW TO BREAK SOMEONE'S LEGS
WE SHARE WHAT WE KNOW.

FEMME SHARKS STAND UP FOR THE NEW JERSEY FOUR AND EVERY OTHER QUEER AND TRANS PERSON OF COLOR IN THE PRISON INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX FOR DEFENDING OUR LIVES.
WE BELIEVE IN SELF-DEFENSE AND SELF-DETIRMINATION.
WE BELIEVE THAT WE HAVE A RIGHT TO DEFEND OURSELVES AND OUR COMMUNITIES
AGAINST ANY KIND OF ATTACK-
FROM ASSHOLES ON THE STREET
TO RACIST WHITE CLUB OWNERS WHO WANT THREE PIECES OF ID
TO FOLKS WHO INSIST THAT WE'RE STRAIGHT.
TO PEOPLE WHO TAKE OUR LAND.

WE REMEMBER OUR DEAD- SAKIA GUNN, GWEN ARAUJO, AND MANY OTHER QUEER AND TRANS POC WHO DIED BECAUSE OF RACIST, HOMO/TRANSPHOBIC VIOLENCE
NOT AS A POLITICAL STATEMENT
BUT AS WOMEN WE LOVED IN REAL LIFE
WOMEN WHO COULD'VE BEEN US OR OUR LOVES.

WE ARE NOT GOING TO BE LEFT OUT OF "THE STRUGGLE."
NOT THIS TIME.
WE'RE NOT JUST A PRETTY FACE.

FEMMES GODDAMN WELL KNOW HOW TO STRAP IT ON, CHANGE THE OIL IN THE CAR AND PUT UP SHELVES.
WE CAN DO ANY GODDAMN THING WE WANT!
THAT'S WHY WE'RE FEMME SHARKS!
FEMME IS NOT THE SAME THING AS BEING OUR MOMS
FEMMES ARE BEAUTIFUL AND STRONG WHEN WE BOTTOM
AND WE'RE HOT AS HELL WHEN WE TOP
OUR BOTTOMING AND TOPPPING ARE BOTH GIFTS TO BE MET WITH RESPECT.
WHEN WE TAKE OUR LOVERS FIST ALL THE WAY INSIDE
ASK FOR WHAT WE WANT
BE THE BEST DIRTY GIRL
OR MAKE OUR LOVERS FLIP
WE'RE A FUCKING MIRACLE.
IN THE WORDS OF JILL SCOTT, "YOU GOTTA DO RIGHT BY ME. IT'S MANDATORY, BABY."

FEMME SHARKS SHOP AT ROSS, FOXY LADY, VALUE VILLAGE, THE HM $5 RACK, TORRID AND THE DOLLAR STORE , AND KNOW HOW TO SHOPLIFT
WE CONCOCT BRILLIANT STRATEGIES TO LOOK FINE
ON TEN DOLLARS OR LESS.
WE'RE ONLY "INVISIBLE" IF YOU DON'T KNOW HOW TO LOOK FOR US.

WE TAKE CARE OF EACH OTHER
RECOGNIZE THAT FEMMES ARE EACH OTHERS' WEALTH
HOS BEFORE BROS, ALWAYS!
FEMME SOLIDARITY AND LOVE FOR EACH OTHER
IS A REVOLUTIONARY FORCE
WE BELIEVE IN GIRLS LOVING GIRLS, RESPECTING EACH OTHER'S BRILLIANCE
NOT FIGHTING OVER BOIS OR BUTCHES
NOT TRYING TO BE THE ALPHA FEMME
WE'RE ANTI-DRAMA
BELIEVE IN THE POWER OF COMMUNITIES THAT HEAL HURT, APOLOGIZE, LISTEN TO EACH OTHER AND MAKE THINGS RIGHT.
WE BELIEVE IN BUILDING OUR QTPOC COMMUNITIES STRONG

FEMME SHARKS WERE THERE WHEN FRIDA KAHLO HOOKED UP WITH HER
GIRLFRIENDS
WHEN JOAN NESTLE, CHRYSTOS, JEWELLE GOMEZ, ALEXIS DE VEUX, SYLVIA RIVERA, DOROTHY ALLISON, MINNIE BRUCE PRATT AND AMBER HOLLIBAUGH MADE QUEER FEMME HISTORY
WHEN ZAPATISTA WOMEN HOOKED UP
WHEN OUR COUSINS WERE MAKING OUT IN THE WOMEN'S SECTION OF THE MASJID
WHEN OUR GRANDMAS AND QUEER AUNTIES SNUCK OUT AT NIGHT
DIDN'T GET MARRIED TIL LATE- OR AT ALL
HAS A BEST GIRLFRIEND
AND STOOD UP FOR HER
FEMME SHARKS WERE THERE.

FEMME SHARKS ARE IN THE BODIES OF COUNTLESS SEX WORKERS, NEIGHBORS AND LADIES WAITING FOR THE BUS AND IN THE LINEUP AT CENTURY 21.
AT RIIS BEACH, FUNKASIA, LOVERGIRL NYC, BUTTA, MANGO, MANHATTAN'S, DESILICIOUS, AND BIBI!
FEMME SHARKS LIVE ON THE REZ, IN CAPETOWN, NEWARK, OAKLAND!!!!!, THE SOUTH SIDE, NEW ORLEANS, COLOMBO, JUAREZ AND BROOKLYN SUBURBIA, THE FARM, AND LITTLE SMALL TOWNS.
WE'RE IN FOSTER CARE, THE PSYCH WARD, JUVIE, AND ABOUT TO BE EVICTED.

WE ARE SURVIVORS WHO ARE MORE THAN WHAT WE SURVIVED.
WE ARE FIGURING OUT HOW TO HEAL
AND HOW TO MAKE IT SO THAT NO ONE
WILL HAVE TO SURVIVE SEXUAL VIOLENCE EVER AGAIN.
WE BELIEVE IN THE TOTAL DESTRUCTION OF THE SYSTEM AS WE KNOW IT
TO MAKE SOMETHING MUCH MO BETTA
AND WE BELIEVE IN MAKING OUR OWN WAYS TO FIGHT AND RESIST
ON THE DAILY.

A FEMME SHARK IS ANY GIRL
WHO IS TOUGH, HUNGRY, FIGHTS FOR HERSELF AND HER FAM
AND IS WORKING ON BECOMCNG THE KIND OF GIRL
WHO FINDS GOD IN HERSELF
AND LOVES HER FIERCELY

WE'RE YOUR BEST GIRLFRIEND AND YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE

LOVE AND RAGE
THE FEMME SHARKS

FEMME SHARKS ARE ON PATROL!
JOIN THE MOVEMENT! SHARK SHARK IT UP!

FOR MORE INFORMATION, EMAIL

THEFEMMESHARKS@GMAIL.COM

Written by Founding Femme Shark Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha

The Femme Sharks are an idea that was dreamed up by SBBFFF (Slutty Brown Best Femme Friends Forever) Zuleikha Mahmood and Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha in March of 2008, Oakland, CA.

This work is shared under a Creative Commons license- feel free to share if you give credit where cred is due.

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FEMME SHARKS DON'T EAT OUR OWN. FEMME SHARKS LIKE TO EAT THOUGH FEMME SHARKS RECOGNIZE THAT FEMMES COME IN ALL KINDS OF SIZES AND EACH KIND IS LUSCIOUS. WE WORK TOWARDS LOVING OUR CURVY, FAT, SKINNY, SUPERSIZE, THICK, DISABLED, BLACK AND BROWN FINE-ASS BODIES EVERY DAY.