Introduction / Walter Mosley -- Dealing to do doable films: Life as a very independent independent filmmaker / Spike Lee -- Giving back / Walter Mosley -- As serious as first love: building Black independent institutions / Haki Madhubuti -- Get on-line! / George Curry -- Blood money or money and bloods / Melvin Van Peebles -- Simple living: an antidote to hedonistic materialism / Bell Hooks -- Wall Street, Main Street, and the side street / Julianne Malveaux -- Educating on behalf of Black public health / Joycelyn Elders -- Prison abolition / Angela Davis -- Holding the media accountable / Farai Chideya -- Straighten up and fly right: an improvisation on the podium / Stanley Crouch -- Public lives, private selves: toward an open conversation / Anna Deavere Smith -- Perfecting our democracy for the benefit of the Black world / Randall Robinson.