10 Music collaborations that changed the world

From the 1985 classic “We Are the World” to 2014′s agriculture anthem “Cocoa na Chocolate,” pop stars around the world have been coming together to make music for a cause for decades. Whether it’s to raise awareness for apartheid or funds for famine relief in Africa, benefit concerts and songs have rocked the hearts, minds and ears of activists – and helped make real and lasting change.

Here’s ten music collaborations that show how some of the world’s biggest artists used their voices for the humanitarian issues of their time: 

1. Concert for Bangladesh (1971)

George Harrison, The Beatles, Bob Dylan and more 

This sold-out concert, organized by George Harrison and Ravi Shankar, was the first benefit concert that brought artists ranging from the legendary Beatles to Bob Dylan for a humanitarian cause. The concert, held in New York City’s Madison Square Garden, raised awareness on the refugee crisis in Bangladesh after the 1970 Bhola cyclone, and more than $200,000 dollars for relief efforts. Most notably, it set a precedent for music as a tool of social change.

2. Gift of Song (1979)

Various, including ABBA, Rita Coolidge, Elton John and more

Pop music artists, including ABBA, Earth, Wind & Fire, Rod Stewart and Donna Summer, gathered at the United Nations General Assembly in New York City to sing a “Gift of Song” to the world’s children. Broadcasted in 60 countries and reaching over 200 million, the event served to kick-off the International Year of the Child, a year that brought awareness to children’s issues and eventually led to the first universal declaration of children’s rights. The single also raised $4 million dollars for UNICEF’s life-saving programs.

3. “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” and Live Aid (1984)

Band Aid, including Bob Geldof, Bono, Paul McCartney and others

Band Aid, a charity band founded by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure, first released “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” (1984) to raise money for the famine crisis in Ethiopia. It was no surprise that the collaboration with rock stars like Bono, Paul McCartney, Paul Young and more resulted in more than six million copies sold, raising $14 million dollars for relief. The single also peaked at No. 1 in more than 15 countries.

In 1985, the band held “Live Aid,” one of the most influential charity concerts. Two decades later, Geldof organized Live 8 Concerts (2005) which brought together more than 1,000 musicians in the US and UK. The concerts also served as political actions that coincided with the G8 summit on world poverty.

4. ”We Are the World” (1985)

USA for Africa, including Willie Nelson, Diana Ross, Billy Joel and more

Following Band Aid’s “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” single, USA for Africa produced ”We Are the World,” a song produced by Quincy Jones and written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie. The song features a number of renowned artists like Willie Nelson, Diana Ross and Billy Joel. The collaboration generated more than $100 million dollars  to fight a famine that killed nearly 1 million people in Africa between 1983 to 1984. USA for Africa foundation continues the legacy of philanthropy. 

5. Farm Aid (1985)

Various, including Bob Dylan, Billy Joel, B.B. King, Tom Petty and many more

Inspired by a remark by Bob Dylan at his performance at Live Aid, ”Wouldn’t it be great if we did something for our own farmers right here in America?” Willie Nelson, Neil Young and John Mellencamp organized Farm Aid. The concert, first held in Champaign, Illinois brought 80,000 music-lovers to raise awareness about the issues farming families faced, and raised more than $9 million dollars to assist America’s family farmers. To this day, Farm Aid  acts as an advocacy platform and resource network for farmers, while still producing an annual benefit concert.

6. “Sun City” (1985)

Artists United Against Apartheid, including Bruce Springsteen, Lou Reed, Peter Gabriel and others

Known as the most fervent political music single, “Sun City” brought 54 artists from across genres to take a stand against apartheid. From rock stars like Bruce Springsteen to hip-hop pioneers like Kurtis Blow, this collaboration drew attention to apartheid and urged artists to stop playing at venues that practiced the racist policy.

7. “Blackfella Whitefella” (1985)

Warumpi Band

1985 was sure the year of music collaborations for social change, and it did not stop there. Like “Sun City,” “Blackfella Whitefella,” a song by Australia indigenous group Warumpi Band, served as a political statement on racism against indigenous groups in Australia.

8. A Conspiracy of Hope (1986) and Human Rights Now! (1988)

Various artists including Bruce Springsteen, U2, Sting, Peter Gabriel and many more

Organized by Amnesty International, “A Conspiracy of Hope” (1986) and “Human Rights Now” (1988) were a series of global benefit concerts raising awareness on human rights atrocities around the globe and in 1988, the 40th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Artists included Tracy Chapman, Youssou N’Dour, The Police and local guest artists from each host country that participated. Most notable? The venuesincluded countries like Hungary, Costa Rica, India, Argentina, Zimbabwe and more.

9. “America: A Tribute to Heroes” (2011)

Various artists including Tom Petty, Willie Nelson, Neil Young and others

On the 10-year remembrance of September 11, 2001, a day we will never forget, artists from across genres came together for “America: A Tribute to Heroes.” The concert was not just a tribute to those who lost their lives but also a benefit to the September 11 Telethon Fund. The telethon raised more than $150 million for the victims of the terror attacks. In the video above Willie Nelson closed out the telethon with an ensemble version of “America the Beautiful.”

10. “Cocoa na Chocolate” (2014)

Various artists, including D’Banj, Femi Kuti, Tiken Jah Fakoly, Judith Sephuma

Africa’s hottest recording artists have come together to support our Do Agric campaign, and together have written and recorded the track “Cocoa na Chocolate.” The artists involved include some of the hottest artists from Africa, including D’Banj, Femi Kuti, Tiken Jah Fakoly, Judith Sephuma, Diamond and Omawumi. And get this – it’s the biggest music collaboration in Africa’s history. Their message is simple: agriculture in Africa has the potential to provide food, create jobs and boost economies, but African leaders need to invest now. The song dropped last month, and only time will tell whether it will ignite an agriculture revolution.

http://www.one.org/

Apartheid In South Africa

Work done by  Di Loreto, María Eva

                        Artaza-Martínez, Marianela

Civil Rights Movement

US Civil Rights Movement

Civil Rights Movements

Civil rights are personal liberties that belong to an individual, owing to his or her status as a citizen.

The civil rights movements aimed to eliminate slavery, racism, and social and religious discrimination. These movements had great, courageous leaders and participants who risked, and in some cases lost their lives for the sake of equality and racial justice. Leaders such as Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and Nelson Mandela planned and led non-violent campaigns in pursuit of liberty and equality.

The pioneer of these movements was Mahatma Gandhi. His name means “great soul” in Sanskrit. He was born in India in 1869, when this country was part of the commonwealth ruled by the British Empire. Indian population was divided due to geographical, racial, social, cultural, linguistic, and religious reasons, but also it was divided into rich and poor

He knew about racial discrimination in South Africa, where he moved after graduating as a lawyer in London. It was then the idea of truth and firmness what inspired him “inflicting oneself the suffering one would impose to the enemy”. It demands great control, every insult, beating, imprisonment should be born patiently, make the opponent see their wrongdoing.

True to his belief in peaceful and non-violent civil resistance, Gandhi devoted his life to make India an independent country. By the time he died at 78 years old, India had already celebrated its independence.

Quotes from Gandhi: “They may torture my body, break my bones, and even kill me. Then they will have my dead-body not my obedience; “An eye for an eye only ends up making the whole world blind”.

Deeply influenced by the works of Gandhi, King made the struggle for civil liberty for African-American in the U.S.A. his sole motto. Although King became involved in the civil rights movement from his university days, his first major success came only in 1955 in Alabama. That year a black woman named Rosa Parks was arrested by refusing to surrender her seat to a white passenger. In protest, African-American activists boycotted the state’s transport system and chose King as their leader. The boycott continued 383 days until the U.S.A. Supreme Court declared Alabama’s racial segregation laws unconstitutional. In December 1964, King was awarded the Nobel Peace prize. Delivering his Nobel lecture he said: “Non violence is a weapon unique in history, which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it”. Four years later, he was shot dead.

As regard Nelson Mandela, he was a son of an African’s tribal chief, and he became leader of the African National congress, political party that called for racial equality. In 1964, after sabotaging the government many times, he was sent to prison; there he became a symbol of South Africa’s struggle against apartheid.

Civil rights movements were successful at least by some measures. The movements were also an inspiration; they evoked and embodied high moral ideas of racial equality and justice. Technology played a key role in these movements by making the struggles of protesters highly visible. The world could not help but recognize the righteousness of the protesters cause and the evil, violent repression necessary to subdue the wish for justice.

Students:

Cuello, Ana

Orieta Bertolotti, M. Cecilia


Other posts on the subject: Pioneer in India; A bird in a cage;   America also needs equality; Human Rights. 

Rock 80-90s and Solidarity

Word done by Pagnotta and Maldonado

A view of South Africa

The following power point presentation is a letter written by a South African woman who grew up in the Apartheid era...she wrote it for us.

Growing up during the apartheid era

More on Apartheid in an older post.

South Africa and Apartheid

Apartheid

• Afrikáans words meaning separateness.
• It was a system of legal racial segregation enforced by the National Party government in South Africa between 1948 and 1994
• Apartheid classified inhabitants into 4 racial groups “Black", “White", “Coloured", and "Indian“.

Precursor of Apartheid

• The British colonial rulers introduced a system of Pass Laws during the 19th century. This stemmed from the regulation of black people's movement from the tribal regions to those occupied by white and coloured people, ruled by the British.
• These laws prohibit the black people’s movement from one district to another without a signed pass.

Election of 1948

• Racial segregation in South Africa began in colonial times, but apartheid as an official policy was introduced following the general election of 1948.

• The Reunited National Party under the leadership of Daniel Francois Malan campaigned on its policy of apartheid. They won the election and Malan became the first apartheid prime minister.

Apartheid Legislation

• The first grand apartheid law was the Population Registration Act (1950), which formalized racial classification and introduced an identity card for all persons over the age of eighteen, specifying their racial group.
• The second pillar of grand apartheid was the Group Areas Act (1950). It determined where one lived according to race. Each race was allotted its own area.
• The Prohibition of Mixed Marriages Act of 1949 prohibited marriage between persons of different races.
• Immorality Act of 1950 made sexual relations with a person of a different race a criminal offence
• The Reservation of Separate Amenities Act (1953) established the separation of municipal grounds, transport and civil facilities for the different races.

Homeland System

• Under the homeland system, the South African government attempted to divide South Africa into a number of separate states, each of which was supposed to develop into a separate nation-state for a different ethnic group. The Prime Minister Verwoerd came to believe in the granting of independence to these homelands -Bantustans-
• Ten homelands were ultimately allocated to different black ethnic groups. Four of them accepted so-called independence
• The Black Homeland Citizenship Act of 1970 changed the status of black people living in South Africa so that they were no longer citizens of South Africa, but became citizens of one of the ten autonomous territories.

Forced Removals

• During Apartheid time, the government implemented a policy of 'resettlement', to force people to move to their designated "group areas“. Armed police and Army were used to force people move.
• Sophiatown, one of the few black urban areas, was removed and destroyed. Residents were forced out of their homes and taken to Meadowlands.Sophiatown was destroyed and in its place was built a white suburb, Triumph.

Petty Apartheid

• It describes the era of the 1950s when laws prohibited inter-racial sex and marriage and strictly segregated residential areas, schools, trains, buses, beaches, toilets, parks, stadiums, ambulances, hospitals, and cemeteries
• Blacks were excluded from living or working in white areas, unless they have a pass “dompass”. Without it, the person could be being arrested and trial for being an illegal migrant.

Coloured Classification

• The Population Registration Act was implemented to determine the 4 different racial groups but the system of classification was not reliable. For example, members of the same family found themselves in different race groups.
• The Coloured group included people of mixed Bantu, Khoisan, and European descent. They were forced to live in separate townships.
• They played an important role in the anti-apartheid movement.

Women under apartheid and Other minorities

• Women suffered racial and gender discrimination. They had few or no legal rights, no access to education and no right to own property. African women can only work as agricultural or domestic workers.
• East Asian population didn’t belong to any of the 4 racial groups. Chinese people were classified as non white, whereas immigrants from Japan and Taiwan were considered “honorary white” and they have the same privileges as normal whites.

Conservatism.

The government alongside apartheid implemented a conservative social programme:

- Vices, like gambling and pornography, were banned.

- Most of businesses, shops selling alcohol couldn’t operate on Sundays.

- Abortion, homosexuality and sex education were restricted.

- Television wasn’t introduced until 1976 because the government viewed as dangerous.

Internal Resistance

The government responded to a series of popular uprisings and protests with police brutality, which in turn increased local support for the armed resistance struggle. Internal resistance to the apartheid system in South Africa came from several sectors of society and saw the creation of organizations dedicated variously to peaceful protests, passive resistance and armed insurrection, such as:

• ANC (African National Congress) 1949

• PAC (Pan Africanist Congress) 1950 formed by a group of disenchanted members of ANC.

• Black Consciousness Movement in 1970. It was created by tertiary students influenced by the American Black Power movement. Its leader was Steve Biko.

In parallel, there were uprisings (Soweto) and protests (students, labour unions, and workers).

International relations

Commonwealth: In 1960 Verwoerd announced a referendum on whether the country should become a republic. 52 percent of population voted “yes”. As a consequence of this change of status, South Africa needed to reapply for continued membership of the Commonwealth. African and Asian member states of Commonwealth opposed South Africa due to its apartheid policies. As a result, South Africa withdrew from the Commonwealth on 31 May 1961, the day that the Republic came into existence.

United Nations: On 6 November 1962, the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 1761, condemning South African apartheid policies. In 1966, the UN held the first of many colloquiums on apartheid. On 7 August 1963 the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 181 calling for a voluntary arms embargo against South Africa, and in the same year, a Special Committee against Apartheid was established to encourage and oversee plans of action against the regime. In 1973, the United Nations adopted the Apartheid Convention which defines apartheid and even qualifies it as a crime against humanity which might lead to international criminal prosecution of the individuals responsible for perpetrating it. Besides, economic sanctions against South Africa were also frequently debated as an effective way of putting pressure on the apartheid government.

Organization for African Unity (OAU): In 1966, Prime Minister, Vorster, tried to redress South Africa's isolation and to revitalise the country's global reputation by the “Outward-looking” policy. The buzzwords for his strategy were "dialogue" and "détente", signifying a reduction of tension. In 1967, Vorster offered technological and financial aid to any African state prepared to receive it, asserting that no political strings were attached.

Western Influences

Nordic countries provided moral and financial support for the ANC. Countries like Sweden pronounced against the Apartheid: Olof Palme, Sweden’s Prime Minister declared: "Apartheid cannot be reformed; it has to be eliminated."

Other Western nations adopted a different position. Thatcher and Reagan followed a 'constructive engagement' policy with the apartheid government. Then Thatcher declared the ANC s terrorist organization. But by 1989, US favoured economic sanctions against South Africa, the release of Nelson Mandela and a negotiated settlement involving the ANC.

Total onslaught

By 1980, international opinions turned decisively against the apartheid regime. Then, considerable effort was put into circumventing sanctions, and the government even went so far as to develop nuclear weapons, with the help of Israel. In 2010, The Guardian Newspaper released South African government documents that revealed an Israeli offer to sell Apartheid South Africa nuclear weapons. Shimon Peres denied it.

Cross-border Raids

South Africa had a policy of attacking guerrilla-bases and safe houses of the ANC, PAC and SWAPO (South West Africa People’s Organization) in neighboring countries beginning in the early 1980s. These attacks were in retaliation for acts of terror such as bomb explosions, massacres and guerrilla actions (like sabotage) by ANC, PAC and SWAPO guerrillas in South Africa and Namibia.

State Security

Black townships became the focus of the struggle between anti-apartheid organisations and the Botha government. The focus of much of this resistance was against the local authorities and their leaders, who were seen to be supporting the government. By 1985, it had become the ANC's aim to make black townships "ungovernable" (a term later replaced by "people's power") by means of rent boycotts and other militant action.

On 20 July 1985, State President P.W. Botha declared a State of Emergency in 36 magisterial districts. During this state of emergency about 2,436 people were detained under the Internal Security Act. This act gave police and the military sweeping powers. On 12 June 1986, the state of emergency was extended to cover the whole country. In 1987, the State of Emergency was extended for another two years. Much of the violence in the late 1980s and early 1990s was directed at the government, but a substantial amount was between the residents themselves.

The state of emergency continued until 1990, when it was lifted by State President F.W. de Klerk.

Final years of Apartheid

In 1978 the defense minister of the Nationalist Party, Pieter Willem Botha, became Prime Minister. The new government noted that it was spending too much money trying to maintain the segregated homelands that had been created for blacks and the homelands were proving to be uneconomic. In the early 1980s, Botha's National Party government started to recognise the inevitability of the need to reform apartheid. In 1983, a new constitution was passed implementing a so-called Tricameral Parliament, giving Coloureds and Indians voting rights and parliamentary representation in separate houses – the House of Assembly (178 members) for whites, the House of Representatives (85 members) for Coloureds and the House of Delegates (45 members) for Indians.

Black homelands were declared nation-states and pass laws were abolished. Black labor unions were legitimized; the government recognized the right of blacks to live in urban areas permanently and gave blacks property rights there.

Early in 1989, Botha suffered a stroke. He was succeeded as president by F. W. de Klerk. He moved decisively towards negotiations to end the political stalemate in the country and announced that he would repeal discriminatory laws and lift the 30-year ban on leading anti-apartheid groups.

De Klerk also promised to release ANC leader, Nelson Mandela, from jail. On 11 February 1990, Nelson Mandela was released from Victor Verster Prison after more than 27 years in prison.

Apartheid was dismantled in a series of negotiations from 1990 to 1993, culminating in elections in 1994, the first in South Africa with universal suffrage.

In 1993, de Klerk and Mandela were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize "for their work for the peaceful termination of the apartheid regime, and for laying the foundations for a new democratic South Africa".

Finally, on 27 April 1994 an election was held and went off peacefully throughout the country as 20,000,000 South Africans cast their votes. The ANC obtained 62.65% and Nelson Mandela became the President of South Africa.

Work presented by Martínez and Paulenko

Growing up during the Apartheid Era

As I posted in the previous entry, whenever we can listen to or read about someone who gives us first hand experience on a historical event we have to take advantage of that situation to know and even "feel" what it was all about.
Some time ago I asked my South African friend Marianne Pieterse to write something about her memories of growing up during the Apartheid_the barbaric set of laws that made racism legal in that country for years_ and she committed to the task with such a zeal and dedication that we got into her skin and we could get a glimpse of what it was like to live in South Africa in those times.
To read what Marianne sent us, click here and to dowload the PPP I prepared for the class, click here.

I think that all of us learned a lesson...

No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.Nelson Mandela


I detest racialism, because I regard it as a barbaric thing, whether it comes from a black man or a white man. Nelson Mandela

I dream of an Africa which is in peace with itself.Nelson Mandela

Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.Nelson Mandela

The last one is one we should believe in!!!