"Letter from a Birmingham Jail [King, Jr.]"
16 April 1963
My Dear Fellow Clergymen:
While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities "unwise and untimely." Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work. B… Continue

In this series, the MIAMI HERALD unveils the Black experience through a journey to Nicaragua, where a quiet but powerful civil and cultural rights movement flickers while in neighboring Honduras, the Black Garifuna community fights for cultural survival, to the Dominican Republic wher… Continue

(Keynote Presentation, Conference “Afro-Latinos: Global Spaces/Local Struggles” University of California at Los Angeles, March 6-7, 2008)


Last week there were two conferences in U.S. universities concerned with people we call Afro-Latinos. The counterpoint between a conference at H… Continue

BLACK THOUGHTS: A Political Ideological Perspective for Afro Latinos
Part VI: Word Power

By: Kevin Alberto Sabio


People understand very little about the power of words…

I remember one incident in my youth, during my late teens/early twenties, when I was hanging out with some friends of mine (at the time) from high school, in which I was supposed to be forming a musical group with (they were to be the singers in the group, and I was to be the emcee). We were having a conv… Continue

¡Ah, desgraciado! Si el dolor te abate,
si el cansancio tus miembros entumece,
haz como el árbol seco: ¡reverdece!
y como el germen enterrado: ¡late!

Resurge, alienta, grita, anda, combate,
vibra, ondula, retruena, resplandece...
Haz como el río con la lluvia: ¡crece!
y como el mar contra la roca: ¡bate!

De la tormenta al iracundo empuje,
no has de balar, como el cordero triste,
sino rugir, como la fiera ruge.

¡Levántate! ¡revuélvete! ¡resiste!
Haz como el toro acorralado: ¡muge!
o como el to… Continue