inner city
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Woman of the Ghetto: marlena shaw dealing the cold truth
I just found a copy of “Woman of the Ghetto” by Marlena Shaw for 4 bucks! Killer Chicago single from 1969. The song has been sampled multiple times, among them: St. Germain sampled from “Woman of the Ghetto” from Live at Montreux used in “Rose Rouge” on Tourist (2000) 9th Wonder and Buckshot also sampled…
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Operation Breadbasket, the seed of PUSH
I have dedicated a number of posts here at Darkjive to the PUSH Expo, a 1970s exercise in Black Economic Empowerment (or Black Power as it was then known). The PUSH Expo phenomenon was borne from the seed of Operation Breadbasket (a department of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference), but the roots…
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Another Beautiful Struggle
“We took comfort in the rebel music that was pumped into the city from up North. Hip-Hop was the rumble of our generation, unveiling all our wants, fears, and disaffections. But as the fabled year of ’88 came upon us, we saw something more in the music, a deeper thing that interrogated our random lives…
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Portraits of Black Chicago: Cool Off
Black youngsters cool off with fire hydrant water on Chicago’s South Side in the Woodlawn community… June 1973 “…The kids don’t go to the city beaches and use the fire hydrants to cool off instead. It’s a tradition in the community, comprised of very low income people. The area has high crime and fire records. From…
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The History of Gangs in Chicago
A Communiversity Course beginning next week… This course examines the history of gangs in Chicago through the lens of racism and social movements. Rather than explain Chicago’s history of gangs as a one-sided story of criminality, the course looks at how gangs have played political roles in Chicago and have changed in response to local…
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Portraits of Black Chicago: High School Student
A student at the Westinghouse Industrial Vocation School on Chicago’s West Side. May 1973 “…A student at the Westinghouse Industrial Vocation School on Chicago’s West Side*. She is one of the nearly 1.2 million black people who make up over a third of the population of Chicago**. It is one of the many black faces…
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Life and Death of the West Side
Life And Death of the West Side: a Communiversity Course Dates: March 12 – April 30 (8 weeks) A Community Theatre Project In this course, participants will create an original theatrical stage production based on the Chicago West side Riots of April 6-8, 1968 (that were in response to the assassination of Martin Luther King…
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This Love’s For Real
This is a Local Chicago record also recorded by The Impressions (and written by Leroy Hutson). Very obscure. Very Lincoln-Continental-with-the-suicide-doors Gangster. Enjoy.
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Teddy (1971)
(runtime 00:16:16) Produced by the University of California at Los Angeles, Extension Media Center, and Directed by Richard Wells. This is a beautifully raw short film shot in 1971. The opening scene portrays kids, fresh out of high school, but already short on hope. The public domain film presents the first-person experiences of a black…





