Tuesday, July 14, 2020

BLASST 120: Aimaloghi, Ohiozele, & Ohireime Eromosele

TRACKLIST
1. Hope Tala - "Lovestained"
2. Leon Bridges - "Sweeter (feat. Terrace Martin)"
3. keiyaA - "I! Gits! Weary!"
4. Tom Misch & Yussef Dayes - "Tidal Wave"

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NOTES
Today's episode features a conversation I had with siblings Aimaloghi, Ohiozele, and Ohireime Eromosele, who are not only friends of mine but also members of the Rio Grande Valley's Black community. Aimaloghi is a UTRGV graduate (double majoring in Biology & Psychology) and community organizer who's been involved in the RGV's activism community for the past 6-7 years, Ohiozele is a Biology student at UTRGV with an eye on pursuing Public Health studies, and Ohireime is a graduate of the Howard University School of Law, where he studied patent law. 

The idea for this episode came after I watched an Instagram livestream that Aimaloghi did a week or so after the murder of George Floyd, where she spoke openly and critically about the Rio Grande Valley's activist response. In her stream, she explained how the Valley lacked the proper framework to build meaningful anti-racist direct action capacity and offered some critiques as well as different ways that activism can take shape when focused and properly organized. I resonated pretty deeply with all of this, considering the time I've spent around activists, as well as the fact that I also have had questions regarding how to move forward as a community that wishes to work toward an anti-racist future. Considering that at this very critical time, the focus of the movement throughout the country is to support and uplift Black lives and Black voices, it makes sense to me that I also look to Black voices in my own community for leadership in this kind of work. I'd already spent a few episodes speculating about this throughout the month of June, so when I saw Aima's stream, I thought it would make a great jumping point for a conversation on the show, where we could dive deeper into what we can do as a community to move forward.

When I asked Aima to be on the program, she asked if she could have her brothers Ohiozele and Ohireime join her, which I thought was a great idea. As a result, the discussion was able to grow beyond simply talking about the wave of anti-racist uprising around the country and local activism, but also about the experiences Aima and her brothers have had growing up as Black people in the Rio Grande Valley. Overall, the conversation had a very warm energy and provided everyone with open space to share, reflect, and of course, enjoy some excellent music selections.


For more information about Texas Rising, visit their website here.

For more information about URGE, visit their website here.

For more information about Advocates for Youth and YWOC, visit their site here.

As Aima recommended on the show, I've put together a Spotify playlist of (almost) all the music I played during June aka Black Music Month. You can listen to it below. 


As always, thanks for listening, take care of each other, and seeya next week.

AS

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