Kwanzaa is an annual celebration of African-American culture from December 26 to January 1, culminating in a communal feast called Karamu, usually on the sixth day. It was created by activist Maulana Karenga, based on African harvest festival traditions from various parts of West and Southeast Africa. Kwanzaa was first celebrated in 1966. A 2015 survey of the United States found that 1.9% of those polled planned to celebrate Kwanzaa – about six million people.
Mark Z. Danielewski is an American fiction author. He is most widely known for his debut novel House of Leaves (2000), which won the New York Public Library's Young Lions Fiction Award. His second novel, Only Revolutions (2006), was nominated for the National Book Award.
Dame Margaret Drabble, Lady Holroyd, is an English biographer, novelist and short story writer.
The Pan-African flag is a tri-color flag consisting of three equal horizontal bands of red, black, and green. The Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League (UNIA-ACL) formally adopted it on August 13, 1920, in Article 39 of the Declaration of the Rights of the Negro Peoples of the World, during its month-long convention at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Variations of the flag can and have been used in various countries and territories in the Americas to represent Garveyist ideologies.
Maulana Ndabezitha Karenga, previously known as Ron Karenga, is an American activist, author and professor of Africana studies, best known as the creator of the pan-African and African-American holiday of Kwanzaa.
Josephine Edna O'Brien is an Irish novelist, memoirist, playwright, poet and short-story writer. Elected to Aosdána by her fellow artists, she was honoured with the title Saoi in 2015 and the biennial "UK and Ireland Nobel" David Cohen Prize in 2019, whilst France made her Commandeur de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2021.
Betty Edwards is an American art teacher and author best known for her 1979 book Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain. She taught and did research at the California State University, Long Beach, until she retired in the late 1990s. While there, she founded the Center for the Educational Applications of Brain Hemisphere Research.
Terry McMillan is an American novelist. Her work centers around the experiences of Black women in the United States.
Waiting to Exhale is a 1995 American romance film directed by Forest Whitaker and starring Whitney Houston and Angela Bassett. The film was adapted from the 1992 novel of the same name by Terry McMillan. Lela Rochon, Loretta Devine, Dennis Haysbert, Michael Beach, Gregory Hines, Donald Faison, and Mykelti Williamson rounded out the rest of the cast. The original music score was composed by Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds. The story centers on four women living in the Phoenix metropolitan area and their relationships with men and one another. All of them are "holding their breath" until the day they can feel comfortable in a committed relationship with themselves.
Autobiography of a Yogi is an autobiography of Paramahansa Yogananda published in 1946.
Lucille Clifton was an American poet, writer, and educator from Buffalo, New York. From 1979 to 1985 she was Poet Laureate of Maryland. Clifton was a finalist twice for the Pulitzer Prize for poetry.
"Exhale (Shoop Shoop)" is a song by American recording artist and actress Whitney Houston, featured on the soundtrack for the film Waiting to Exhale. It was released as the lead single from the soundtrack on November 6, 1995, by Arista Records. The song was written and produced by Babyface. A mid-tempo R&B and soul ballad, composed in the key of D-flat major, the song's lyrics speak about growing up and learning to let go. The song garnered mostly positive reviews from critics, many of whom noted Houston's vocal maturity in the song.
Kathryn Harrison is an American author. She has published seven novels, two memoirs, two collections of personal essays, a travelogue, two biographies, and a book of true crime. She reviews regularly for The New York Times Book Review. Her personal essays have been included in many anthologies and have appeared in Bookforum, Harper's Magazine, More Magazine, The New Yorker, O, The Oprah Magazine, and Vogue, Salon, and Nerve.
Holiday stamps are a type of postage stamp issued to commemorate a particular religious festival or holiday.
Love and Peace: A Tribute to Horace Silver is a 1995 studio album by Dee Dee Bridgewater, recorded in tribute to Horace Silver.
Deborah Baker is an American biographer and essayist.
Emily Rapp Black is an American memoirist. When she was six years old, she was chosen as the poster child for the non-profit organization March of Dimes, due to a congenital birth defect that resulted in the amputation of her left leg. She has written two memoirs, one that presents her life as an amputee and the other that tells the story of the birth of her son Ronan Christopher Louis and his diagnosis of Tay–Sachs disease. She is a former Fulbright scholar and recipient of the James A. Michener Fellowship. She is a professor at the University of California, Riverside, School of Medicine.
Meri Nana-Ama Danquah is a Ghanaian-American writer, editor, journalist and public speaker, whose name at birth was Mildred Mary Nana-Ama Boakyewaa Brobby. She is best known for her 1998 memoir Willow Weep for Me: A Black Woman's Journey Through Depression. Her short story "When a Man Loves a Woman" was shortlisted for the 2022 AKO Caine Prize for African Writing.
Jeri Keever "Bunny" Hull is an American songwriter, musician, and author. Her catalog includes music, film and television projects. She is a recipient of 20 Gold and Platinum Certifications, a Grammy Award and two nominations, an Emmy nomination, a GMA Dove Award, a BMI Performance Award, and multiple Parents' Choice Awards.
Davina Bell is an Australian literary editor and children's writer. Her 2020 book, The End of the World Is Bigger than Love, won a New South Wales Premier's Literary Award in 2021.
