3:36BNo, it’s kind of like the Liverpool of Pan, you know.
3:40AThe Liverpool of Pan?
3:41BWell, you got one place all those great, great people come out of, and it’s the same thing here.
3:45AWonderful. The Liverpool of Pan, Trinidad and Tobago. Wonderful. Asa, what you got to say?
3:51CBrazil.
3:52AOkay, you got something coming up.
3:55CYes, from St. Thomas in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Rising Stars Steel Orchestra has a special groove Let’s listen as these young panists do a Lord Kitchener composition, Toco Band, arranged by Sean Steele, from the album Pan Sweet Pan: Steel Orchestras of the Caribbean on the Sanj label. When we come back, we will be in this Steel Pan Vibes Spotlight with Dwayne Akio Wong Omowale.
4:23AOkay folks, we’re in the Steel Pan Vibe Spotlight with Dwayne Akio Wong Omowale. And by the way, thank you so much for agreeing that the steel pan is extraordinary. Extraordinary. That’s what it is, man. Gotta give Jack his jacket. So, Dwayne, how are you today?
9:56BI’m doing good.
9:57ADoing good, doing good. You know, we have a lot of questions for you, so we’re not wasting any time. We want to know, because some of our listeners are new -- I know that for a fact -- then I want you to give them a summary of the types of books you’ve written. and why you, you stick with that genre or that type of, um, literature?
10:18BYeah, the main type of books that I write are, um, books on African and African diaspora history. And the reason why I write about, uh, this topic -- and I’ve written, um, 17 books, you know, working on 18 right now -- and the reason why I’ve written on this topic and I’ve written so much is because after I graduated high school, I realized I didn’t really know very much about my own history, about the history of Africa, African people. So when I got to college, for me college was an experience of just studying, learning our history, our culture, and where we came from. And what inspired me to start writing these books is I also want to share that information with other people because when I was in college I had access to all of the files and the database that the university has, but I know for most people it’s very difficult to have access to information on African history. So for me, writing these books was a way of getting that information out there and making it more available for people.
11:10AWell, you’ve done an excellent job so far.
11:12BThank you.
11:13AAnd you’re not 30 yet, right?
11:14BNot yet.
11:15AMy goodness.
11:15BA few more years.
11:16AOh my, the guy’s 27 years old. Anyway, um, you’re about to complete your first year in law school. Has law school met your expectations and how do you see being an attorney or a career as an attorney? How do you see that fitting into the needs of our community?
11:37BLaw school has actually exceeded my expectations, and one of the reasons for that, and that’s why I like that question, because they’re not -- at my university, they’re not just training us to be attorneys, but they’re stressing the fact that we have to be ethical in the way that we approach law and to recognize that, you know, as lawyers, we’re not just doing this to make money. We’re doing it to represent clients. And I had one professor who described being an attorney as being a champion for a person’s cause. When you have a client, you’re not just -- the client isn’t just coming to you to provide income and give you money. That person is coming to you with a particular problem. And at that point, the professor says you become a champion of that person’s cause. So I went into law school with the mentality that this is something I wanted to do to benefit the community. The way they’re educating us so far and training us to be lawyers is from the perspective of what we’re doing is bigger than ourselves. What we’re doing is something that is beneficial for the community.
12:35AHave you decided on any particular area of law?
12:39BNot yet, because -- and this is the other reason why it’s exceeded my expectations -- I’m taking different classes, and to me they’re all very interesting. At this point, I’m just, you know, going through my classes, figuring out, you know, what interests me in terms of law, which is a lot more than I expected would interest me about law.
12:59AOkay. So you’re involved with the African Federation organization. What’s the proper name?
13:07BFederation of African Liberation.
13:08AFederation of African Liberation. And African Liberation Day is coming up in May. And it’s been celebrated since 1963. What is its significance, particularly to African descendants? Could you tell our listeners about that?
13:26BWell, yes, the significance was, um, originally it was supposed to be a commemoration of the founding of the Organization of African Unity, and since then it’s spread to be a celebration of the independence and liberation of African people globally. And the Federation for African Liberation is one organization that I work with, but I also work with another organization called Africans Rising, which is based on the African continent. And last year I worked with them to put together an African Liberation Day initiative, and, you know, altogether we organized African Liberation Day events in over 50 countries around the world, both on the African continent and in the African diaspora. So that’s what we’re trying to organize again this year. And the significance of African liberation is it’s an event that brings African people together. So not only are we commemorating the struggles that we fought and and the struggles that we still need to fight to obtain our liberation, but also I look at it as a way to bring us together and to recognize our commonalities as people of African descent.
14:24AAll right. Well, folks, you just stay where you are. We’ll be right back after this word from Robbie’s Shoe Repair.
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15:08A[number removed]. Okay folks, uh, we’re back in Steel Pan Vibe Spotlight with Dwayne Akio Wong Omowale. He’s a Pan-Africanist, he’s not 30 years old yet, he is a law student, and he’s written 17 books. Hmm, I can’t even get one off the ground, but here we are with a very bright and talented -- I’m encouraged though. He’s an inspiration to me. Duane, I want you to help listeners understand why you developed the Facebook page Restoring Your African Mind, who is its audience, and what kind of feedback are you getting?
15:50BThe reason why I created the Facebook page, and it wasn’t just a page, I was trying to initiate an entire movement around Restoring Your African Mind because I realized one of the main things that hinders the progress of African people is just our mentality. I mean, obviously we can talk about the self-hatred. There’s still a lot of people of African descent that really aren’t proud of their identity, but on a deeper level what I realized is there’s also a feeling of powerlessness that comes with being African. A lot of us feel that as a people we can’t organize and accomplish anything on our own. So we always come from a mentality of sitting around and waiting for someone else to fix the problems in our community. So the way I looked at the movement for restoring the African mind was I want to change the thinking of African people and to get us to become more proactive in fixing our problems and realizing that we don’t have to sit down and wait for other groups of people to fix our problems or to handle stuff. We are perfectly capable of solving our own problems in our communities.
16:47AAbsolutely. Okay, talk a little bit about the recent flooding in Mozambique. Not much coverage on mainstream. As far as you know, is the African-American and Caribbean communities involved in relief efforts? And if not, why not?
17:07BAnd that’s part of one of the things I want to do with Restoring the African Mind, because what I’ve noticed, especially in media coverage, if there’s a tragedy in Europe, the American media, you know, gives it lots of coverage. When it’s a tragedy in Africa, there’s not much coverage from the media. And that impacts the way we as people of African descent even think about our own issues, because that sends a very subliminal message to us that the lives of African people are somehow less significant than other people. So the situation that happened in Mozambique -- and Mozambique was the country that was most impacted, but it’s also impacted other countries like Zimbabwe and Malawi. And what’s happened is not only is there not a lot of media coverage, But it also impacts the relief effort because they’re not really getting the funding and the aid that they should be getting. And there are the people, African Americans and Caribbean people who are interested in the African continent, are very aware of that, but overall I don’t really see that awareness. And even among us here in the diaspora, when I was at Steel Pan Vibes, I believe this was 2000 --
18:15A2008.
18:16B2017, shortly after, you know, hurricane had come by and devastated, you know, there’s a couple of hurricanes that devastated some of the islands and Barbuda being one of them. I remember I spoke a little about that here on Steel Pan Vibes and I’ve been in contact with some of the people in Barbuda and they’re still struggling to recover and this hurricane hit the island in 2017 and it’s a similar situation. One of the issues for them is they’re just not getting the relief. and the funding that they need. So the issue with the media coverage is not only that it creates the message that the lives of African people aren’t as important, but also makes it very difficult for certain countries to get the aid and support that they need.
18:56ASo what can we do? How do we get to address these problems? How do we become active in addressing these problems?
19:06BI mean, the main thing that we can do is find organizations that are working to raise funds and support them. But the other thing that we can do, and this is why we can become very close to some of the people in Barbuda, because they really appreciate the links that I’ve gone to to just raise awareness. Because you’d be surprised, a simple thing like just sharing this information on social media and getting the word out there means a lot to people in these countries that typically just feel ignored and they feel like people don’t care about their problems. So I know for a lot of people it might be difficult to you know, provide, uh, the funds because we have our own struggles here in terms of, you know, bills and trying to pay the rent. So I know not everyone has the resources and the money available to support in that way, but anyone could, you know, just share the word, you know, share it on social media, and that goes a long way to, you know, helping those causes as well.
19:56AOkay. Yesterday I learned about a lawsuit in which, uh, Harvard University was being sued for profiting from photos of enslaved Africans. Could you just explain to listeners what’s going on here? Have you read anything on it?
20:13BYeah, I’ve read a little bit on it. You know, one of the downsides of being in law school is I’m not on top of the news as much as I would like, but from what I’ve read about the situation, what it is is that a professor at Harvard had taken pictures of some enslaved Africans And the purpose of taking these pictures was to use, you know, these people as an example of the primitive nature of African people, and it was used to promote white supremacy. So the issue now is that Harvard still has these photos in their possession and is still profiting from these pictures. So the descendants of these enslaved people are, you know, bringing this lawsuit. Essentially, the issue is that they don’t -- they have a problem with the fact that Harvard is continuing to profit from what was essentially the humiliation of their ancestors because, you know, these people weren’t willing, you know, willingly taking these photographs. They were kind of coerced into taking photographs that were meant to be humiliating and demeaning. So it’s an issue of even though slavery has ended, there’s still institutions that are profiting from the humiliation and the suffering of our ancestors.
21:17AHere’s another legal inquiry. There’s an organization I know you’re familiar with, American Descendants of Slavery. That group, I think their position basically is African descendants who are not Americans should pursue reparations on their own. Is that correct? Ados?
21:42BYeah, but because it’s a very large social media movement, and, um, I know for me one of the challenges with that organization is movement, there’s so many people involved, there’s all kinds of different voices, and people are demanding different things, but the main thing that they all seem to be united on is they want reparations, you know, for slavery. Mm-hmm.
22:02AWell, that’s good.
22:03BThat’s good stuff. Yeah, I do support that. There are some things in the movement I don’t necessarily support because, you know, I’m a Pan-Africanist, so I don’t necessarily feel that we should segment ourselves based on who’s an American and who’s a Caribbean. So I do have those issues, but I’m definitely supportive of reparations.
22:20AVery good, very good. I wanted to ask you a question about, you know, we’re at the end of Women’s History Month, and I know a lot of women have inspired you and so on. You want to share some of that with our listeners?
22:34BYes, actually, um, for Women’s History Month, I wrote an article recently just, you know, talking to different women that have inspired me as a Pan-Africanist. We were talking earlier in the studio, but Funmilayo Akute, who’s an activist in Nigeria. She was one of the leading figures in Nigeria’s struggle for independence. She was also the mother of Fela Kuti, you know, that famous Nigerian musician. And he’s well known for his songs protesting against corruption and the mismanagement of the Nigerian government. And one of the reasons why he was so outspoken and vocal against injustice and so conscious of his African identity was his mother’s influence because, you know, she was like that. She’s a very outspoken activist and very proud of her African identity. Nigeria hadn’t yet become independent, so she grew up in colonial Nigeria. And if you ever see pictures of her, she’s always wearing traditional African clothing. She refused to wear a colonial British outfit. So that was the kind of uncompromising and proud African woman that she was. And we see that influence in Fela Kuti’s music.
23:38AAbsolutely. She also was like the first woman to drive a car.
23:42BYeah, first woman to drive a car. First woman to drive a car in Nigeria, and I believe also the first Nigerian woman to travel to China.
23:49AReally? Wow, interesting. And her name is Fumilayo Kuti?
23:55BYeah.
23:55AVery good. So you hear that, folks? You gotta check out Fumilayo Kuti. Serious sister. You know, where does the time go? We almost at the end. Is there anything you’d like to emphasize or remind listeners about?
24:12BI would just like to emphasize the importance of just getting out there and being involved in the community and doing what you can to affect change. Like I said, I know one of the challenges a lot of people run into is that they don’t feel like they can really do much because the money isn’t there. So the message I just want to get across is, you know, do what you can and you’ll never know what comes out of it. So for me, getting into law school wasn’t necessarily something I planned. It’s something that came out of, you know, my work in the community.
24:40ATell us where we could get your books, some of the titles, so that listeners who are interested in raising their Pan-African IQ could go and check them out.
24:52BAll of my books are available on Amazon, and the easiest way to find it is just to put my name in, African Dwayne Wong. Omowale, and all the books will be there. Some of the titles include Kingdoms and Civilizations of Africa, which is a very short book, it’s about 40 pages, but I wrote that as a quick introduction for people who aren’t familiar with African history. Another book is One Caribbean and Other Essays, and that’s a collection of different essays I wrote on, you know, the importance of unity in the Caribbean. That one specifically targets -- targeted towards, you know, the West Indies and the need for unity.
25:26AAnd you’ve written on Malcolm X as well?
25:29BYes, that book is called Malcolm X, Bob Marley, and Other Essays, and that’s a book about Malcolm X, Bob Marley. I actually wrote about Fumulayo Akutu in that book as well.
25:38AWhich of your books are getting the most traction?
25:43BI wrote a book called Yekola Lingala, which is a book to introduce people to Lingala language in the Congo. That’s actually been my best-selling book since I wrote it. Really?
25:54AWow.
25:54BSo that shows a lot of people are interested in becoming familiar with an African language.
26:00AExcellent, excellent. Okay, before you go, I know you like the pan. I don’t know if you’ve ever played it. What have you discovered recently about the instrument?
26:10BIt’s funny that you mentioned me not playing it because I haven’t played it, but one of the things that I know about the steel pan is very, um, very relaxing. So I can just imagine how relaxing it must be to actually play a pan. And why I mention that is because I saw recently -- this is a story from December of last year -- the Franklinton Preparatory Academy, which is an academy for high school students, actually has a steel band. And the reason why they instituted that is not only to provide an outlet for students to express creativity, but also an outlet to reduce stress among the students because a lot of these students come from impoverished backgrounds, have a lot of problems at home. So, um, the school decided that, you know, steel pan was a great way for these students to relieve themselves of stress. And like I said, I know just from listening to the steel pan, it’s a very relaxing instrument, so I can only imagine how relaxing and, you know, stress-relieving it must be to actually play one.
27:04AThat’s great, that’s great. It releases stress. Relax and play a pan. That’s what it is. Dwayne, I just want to thank you for coming into the Steve Pandwa Spotlight. We’re always very happy to see you. We’re always inspired by what you say and more importantly what you do. And we want to wish you continued success at law school.
27:26BThank you.
27:27AOkay, so folks, what’s the last word? The last word comes from Maya Angelou, and this is what she says. Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it. Taking us home is the Pan Messiah, Len Bugsy Sharp, and Phase 2 Pan Groove doing Woman Is Boss from the album B Sharp on the Sanj label. Until next time, let your brilliance shine. Stay strong, stay focused, be encouraged. Have an extraordinary weekend. May God bless you all.
28:12BThank you.
