Chicago Defender

Local high school dancers preparing for big show

gearing up for their first senior dance concert.

“Genesis: The Next Generation of Chicago Dancers, Emerging Artists Empowered by Citywide Partnership & Collaboration” is a presentation by the first graduating dance class at ChiArts and a tribute to the vibrant dance community that has nurtured the artistic development of the school’s dancers over the past four years. Genesis will feature repertory from the River North Dance Chicago and Ensemble Español as well as three new works from local choreographers Brandon DiCriscio, Lizzie MacKenzie and Hubbard Street Dance Chicago’s Penny Saunders.  

ChiArts’ first ever senior concert March 20, 2013 will begin with a prelude that offers audience members a glimpse into the journey of a dance student then will kick into high gear with contemporary movement that highlights the dancers’ youthful vigor and athleticism.  

"Genesis" will be held at Benito Juarez Community Academy, 1450-1510 W. Cermak. Tickets are $8 for students/seniors and $12 for adults and are available online at chiarts.org or at the door one hour before the show.

Venus Williams has her sport wardrobe all lined up

NEW YORK — You know the whole thing about a woman's prerogative to change her mind? Venus Williams can't do it — at least not when it comes to her tennis wardrobe.

She already knows that come August at the U.S. Open, she'll be wearing a black floral tennis dress, and for tournaments earlier in the summer, it'll be pink python prints. Williams wears almost exclusively her own line called EleVen, which she has helmed since 2007. Both looks are part of the fall collection, which Williams offered a preview of on Monday at a Manhattan photo studio. The spring collection that goes into stores later this month has some tie-dye prints, nautical stripes and a more painterly watercolor floral.

"When we are designing, I am narrowing down which ones I'm wearing. I have got to plan ahead. ... The retailers want to know right away which ones I'll be wearing," she says. This decisiveness works for her and her busy life, she adds. "I have to be effective with my time."

Last week, she was in South America playing in the Brazil Cup. Williams maintains a full schedule of tennis tournaments and appearances, although she did announce that she was diagnosed in 2011 with an autoimmune disease that slows her down.

Eventually, she'd like to take all of her tennis outfits — including the "grandma floral" skirt her mother made her for her first pro match when she was only 13 years old — and join them with the on-court wardrobe of her sister Serena for some sort of museum exhibit.

Williams, 32, says she absorbs trend reports and keeps her eye on the runways for ideas, but some things just don't translate to athletic clothes: the Victorian boudoir trend, for example. "Yeah, that one, with all the lace, didn't work for sport, and I'm not sure about menswear, either."

Designing EleVen has also made her more aware of what's in her closet, including a lot of white, black, green and floral prints. She steers pretty clear of purple and magenta, and it took her a while to warm up to red, orange and turquoise, but, Williams says, her collection can't be only her favorite colors and styles. "I'm loosening up."

South suburban native now doing 'More' for women

Pictured, from left: Sherlyn Dorsey, “Women of Power: You’re More Than Their Mother” panelists Rhea Patton, Germayne Cade, Tamara McClain, LaTasha Kenley, Kenya Truman and Marketa Wilder.

Just ahead of Women’s History Month, Chicagoland-native Sherlyn Dorsey - who now lives in Dallas - brought her message of empowerment to town for a one-day conference that boasted “You’re More Than Their Mother.” The human resources specialist took a dive into the entrepreneur side last year, establishing her foray into motivational speaking, and crisscrossed the South and Midwest with her message.

On Feb. 16 the former south suburban Harvey resident hosted the conference, featuring a moving spoken word presentation by Chicago’s K’Love and a panel of local career women who offered for inspiration and as testimonials their personal stories of economic and professional triumph. It was held at CISC Ralph Ellison school.

The conference sought to empower women to “move beyond everyone else’s expectation of why you ought to be and living the life of your dreams.”

Biden leads re-enactment of voting rights march 


Vice President Joe Biden and other lawmakers lead a group across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala., Sunday, March 3, 2013. They were commemorating the 48th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, when police officers beat marchers when they crossed the bridge on a march from Selma to Montgomery. (AP Photo/Dave Martin)

SELMA, Ala. — The vice president and black leaders commemorating a famous civil rights march on Sunday said efforts to diminish the impact of African-Americans' votes haven't stopped in the years since the 1965 Voting Rights Act added millions to Southern voter rolls.

More than 5,000 people followed Vice President Joe Biden and U.S. Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma's annual Bridge Crossing Jubilee.

The event commemorates the "Bloody Sunday" beating of voting rights marchers — including a young Lewis — by state troopers as they began a march to Montgomery in March 1965. The 50-mile march prompted Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act that struck down impediments to voting by African-Americans and ended all-white rule in the South.

Biden, the first sitting vice president to participate in the annual re-enactment, said nothing shaped his consciousness more than watching TV footage of the beatings. "We saw in stark relief the rank hatred, discrimination and violence that still existed in large parts of the nation," he said.

Biden said marchers "broke the back of the forces of evil," but that challenges to voting rights continue today with restrictions on early voting and voter registration drives and enactment of voter ID laws where no voter fraud has been shown.

"We will never give up or give in," Lewis told marchers.

Jesse Jackson said Sunday's event had a sense of urgency because the U.S. Supreme Court heard a request Wednesday by a mostly white Alabama county to strike down a key portion of the Voting Rights Act.

"We've had the right to vote for 48 years, but they've never stopped trying to diminish the impact of the votes," Jackson said.

Referring to the Voting Rights act, the Rev. Al Sharpton said: "We are not here for a commemoration. We are here for a continuation."

The Supreme Court is weighing Shelby County's challenge to a portion of the law that requires states with a history of racial discrimination, mostly in the Deep South, to get approval from the Justice Department before implementing any changes in election laws. That includes everything from new voting districts to voter ID laws.

Attorneys for Shelby County argued that the pre-clearance requirement is outdated in a state where one-fourth of the Legislature is black. But Jackson predicted the South will return to gerrymandering and more at-large elections if the Supreme Court voids part of the law.

Attorney General Eric Holder, the defendant in Shelby County's suit, told marchers that the South is far different than it was in 1965 but is not yet at the point where the most important part of the voting rights act can be dismissed as unnecessary.

Martin Luther King III, whose father led the march when it resumed after Bloody Sunday, said, "We come here not to just celebrate and observe but to recommit."

One of the NAACP attorneys who argued the case, Debo Adegbile, said when Congress renewed the Voting Rights Act in 2006, it understood that the act makes sure minority inclusion is considered up front.

"It reminds us to think consciously about how we can include all our citizens in democracy. That is as important today as it was in 1965," he said.

Adegbile said the continued need for the law was shown in 2011 when undercover recordings from a bribery investigation at the Alabama Legislature included one white legislator referring to blacks as "aborigines" and other white legislators laughing.

"This was 2011. This was not 1965," he said.