Founder of Say It adds girls

From Seoul to Soul: A Mother’s Journey, A Daughter’s Dream and Who Said You Look Like A Model? by China Robinson
From Seoul to Soul: A Mother’s Journey, A Daughter’s Dream and Who Said You Look Like A Model? by China Robinson

Correction: The Soul Experience, a concert featuring Velvet Kente and Butterfly and the Irie Soul and scheduled for 7 p.m. Oct. 19 at River Market Pavilion, costs $15 per person at brownpapertickets.com. A portions of the proceeds will go to Neighborhood Renew. The concert’s admission price was omitted in this story.

The child-oriented literacy programs of Little Rock based Say It Loud! Readers and Writers have, heretofore, been strongly geared toward boys.

Founder Patrick Oliver began to rethink this after encountering a girl, who looked to be 8 or 9 years old, who visited his vendor’s booth at the 2012 African Festival of the Arts in Chicago. The booth featured books for boys.

“She was so cute … and she was demanding,” Oliver recalls. “She was looking for books, too, and she wanted to read. … She actually went through my books trying to find something she could possibly like.” The girl chided him for not having girls’ books.

Now, Oliver is offering something for female adults and youths.

“Promoting Personal, Educational and Career Development” is the theme of the Say It Loud! Women and Girls Empowerment Series. The series kicks off Friday and will continue through March, concluding with a special Women’s History Month celebration.

Events, and their dates, include:

Lunch and Learn, noon Friday, Shorter College Library, 604 N. Locust St., North Little Rock. Featured speaker will be Stephanie Helms Pickett of Raleigh, N.C., educator and administrator at Duke University and author of Later Never Came Until Now. Pickett is the director of assessment and professional development programs in the Division of Student Affairs at Duke. Her first book explores academic disciplines through the word of God and personal narrative.

Excellence in “Education Through God’s Words,” a lecture by Pickett, 10 a.m. Saturday, President’s Dining Hall, Arkansas Baptist College, 1621 Dr. Martin Luther King Drive, Little Rock.

Power of One and Owning Your Dreams with China Robinson, 6 p.m. Oct. 15, Reynolds Library and Technology Center, Philander Smith College, 900 W. Daisy L. Gatson Bates Drive in Little Rock. Robinson is the author of From Seoul to Soul: A Mother’s Journey, A Daughter’s Dream and Who Said You Look Like A Model? A business and fashion consultant as well as motivational speaker, Robinson is the mother and onetime manager of Victoria’s Secret supermodel Chanel Iman. From Seoul to Soul, Robinson’s latest book, is a memoir about a black woman struggling with an identity crisis because of her Asian features.

The Soul Experience with Velvet Kente along with Butterfly and the Irie Soul, 7 p.m. Oct. 19, River Market Pavilion. The event will be hosted by Sweet Soul restaurant.

All events are free. The authors will sign copies of their books at their appearances.

Oliver says the series is designed as a follow-up to past endeavors and “a public request for me to support young girls” - particularly, requests from mothers and young girls. “They both saw … the activities I was doing for boys” - activities that used the components of education, personal empowerment and career development.

People wanted Oliver to do something similar to the literary events he coordinates throughout the United States, such as the author pavilion he co-organized recently at the annual Congressional Black Caucus Legislative Conference. The more than 70 authors featured included novelist Terry McMillan, The View talk-show co-host Sherri Shepherd, economist Julianne Malveaux and actress Victoria Rowell. But efforts on this scale, he says, take “time, money, organization and effort. Encouraged by my hope is that once we started, we’ll get more support and see more community organizations like churches and nonprofits” when it comes to doing such events locally.

Oliver also laments the negative images of women and girls he sees on TV reality shows. He wants to bring in guests who will demonstrate to audiences that they don’t have to go in this direction, he says. In the coming months, the Say It Loud! Women and Girls Empowerment Series will include a book club for girls in third-fifth grades, and appearances by such authors as financial coach Lynn Richardson, law professor Gloria Browne-Marshall, and a to-be-named social media specialist.

Mothers are urged to take daughters, mentors are urged to take the girls they mentor and church members are urged to take their young parishioners, Oliver says. “It’s an intergenerational experience.”

For more information, email Oliver at [email protected].

Family, Pages 34 on 10/09/2013

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