Dismantling Racism- A Toolkit for Parents (February Event)

TulsaKids Magazine, OSU-Tulsa and Tri City Collective are thrilled to welcome the authors and illustrator of "Opal's Greenwood Oasis" to February's Dismantling Racism event!

This event will take place on Facebook live. It will be streamed directly to OSU-Tulsa's Facebook page and shared to TulsaKids Magazine's page. Viewers are encouraged to bring their own questions and comments to the discussion!

"Opal's Greenwood Oasis," a new picture book written by Quraysh Ali Lansana and Najah-Amatullah Hylton allows readers to experience what it may have been like to live in Greenwood just prior to the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921. Illustrator Skip Hill's vibrant collages bring Opal and her story to life.

According to Quraysh Ali Lansana, "We chose to highlight Black excellence over Black pain, and to provide children an opportunity to see themselves happy and loved."

The book is available for purchase at https://thecalliopegroup.com/product/opal/ and will be officially released in February 2021.

About Skip Hill: Skip Hill is a mixed-media visual artist in Tulsa, Oklahoma whose art is in public and private collections throughout the U.S., Europe, and Latin America. His early inspiration for making was established in childhood through a love for reading and when his father introduced Hill to the collage works of Romare Bearden (1911 –1988). Beyond his artistic innovation, Bearden’s activism and commitment to the Civil Rights Movement influenced Hill’s commitment to using art and art education as a vehicle for affirming positive personal and social change. That commitment and inspiration is at the heart of his process and in every line of the illustrations for Opal’s Greenwood Oasis.

About Najah-Amatullah Hylton:

Najah-Amatullah Hylton teaches English in Oklahoma City Public Schools. Her goal is to encourage kids to let their creativity work for them instead of getting them in trouble. She also seeks to bridge the gap between teachers, students and the community.

Hylton has written for several magazines and online publications– The Loop Magazine, OKC.net, VANE Magazine, Urban Roots and Soul Medicine among them. Her first poetry book, The Risk to Bloom, was published in 2014. In 2015, Hylton wrote the poem “Black Future” for the hip-hop artist Jabee, who turned the poem into an album: “In the Black Future There’s a Place So Dangerously Absurd,” released in 2016. Hylton is also a member of Tri-City Collective, an education and arts group.

About Quraysh Ali Lansana:

Quraysh Ali Lansana is the author of eight books of poetry, including The Skin of Dreams: New and Collected Poems 1995-2018 from Calliope, in addition to textbooks and works for children, including A Gift from Greensboro, also illustrated by Skip Hill.

A former faculty member of both the Writing Program of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Drama Division of The Juilliard School, Lansana served as Director of the Gwendolyn Brooks Center for Black Literature and Creative Writing at Chicago State University and was an Associate Professor of English/Creative Writing.

Lansana currently fills several roles at Oklahoma State University-Tulsa: Acting Director of the Center for Truth, Racial Healing and Reconciliation; Writer in Residence for the Center for Poets & Writers; Lecturer in English and Africana Studies. He is also a Tulsa Artist Fellow and the co-founder of Tri-City Collective.