a really important milestone anniversary.
This is the 40th year for the event, which will take over Hart Plaza on the weekend of July 14th.
The festival is put on by the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History and it celebrates the arts and culture of the African Diaspora, "American Black Journal" contributor, Cecelia Sharpe of 90.9 WRCJ spoke with festival director, Njia Kai about this year's event.
- I am here with dear and respectfully called Mama Njia Kai, the authority on event production here in Detroit.
So, if you say Noel Night, Campus Martius concerts, Beacon Park, the dearly missed Detroit Festival of the Arts, African World Festival, you are the woman behind making those events happen.
So before we jump into the African World Festival, how did you get into event production?
- I graduated Cass Tech High School, went to DC for Howard University, and I moved myself from the pre-law program into the film directing program, and I really found myself there, and I lucked up on this little ad and it just a two line ad and said, you know, they were looking for a programming coordinator.
Then I thought, well, I can produce a film.
I'm sure I can produce an event.
I ended up with the University Cultural Center Association, and that's how I got involved with Detroit Festival of the Arts.
And I'm literally now completing maybe about at least 25 years as a consultant with what is now Midtown Detroit Inc., had been the University Cultural Center Association, and was the producer of Detroit Festival of the Arts, which was an event I just loved.
I'm so grateful to have been associated with that.
What's better in life than to do what I really love to do, and then it actually is a service and is appreciated and supports, you know, folks moving forward in their careers.
And I love when it does feed somebody.
- We have the African World Festival coming up, celebrating 40 years of the African World Festival.
Who were the minds behind the creation of the African World Festival.
Why was it so important for the African World Festival to be created in Detroit and how has it evolved?
- The first festival was held in August of 1983.
Catherine Blackwell, who is a revered ancestor from this city, she was the first chairperson for the very first African World Festival.
And I even saw the registration form for the first craftspeople who were making up the marketplace, and it was Ibn Pori Pitts who was the chair for the craftspersons.
So it was just a number of persons.
We are gonna definitely have all their names available at the event.
You know, we are really looking at the history this year, and we're going to actually have an installation, a big display on Hart Plaza during the festival weekend that the public can check out, the whole 40 year history of this event.
So we've been deep in the archives, and it has just been so thrilling to really recapture the story of its evolution.
- For those who are wondering what the experience is like at the African World Festival, take our hand and walk us through the tastes, sounds, and smells and sights of the African World Festival coming up this year.
- So this is a cultural arts event with something for everyone.
We have the Watoto Village, which focuses on our youth.
Watoto means children in Kiswahili.
We have Elder Village where we treat our elders as they should be respected.
We have Generation Next, which is where we really favor our older teens and young adults.
We have African cuisine, Caribbean cuisine, African American foods.
We have vegan and vegetarian foods.
We have specialty drinks.
And so we really look to focus on all of the arts, the theater, spoken word, dance, musical performance, both vocal and instrumental.
So we have all that going on, and we really work to bring a lot of different representations of the African world.
- I know that we have some internationally known, locally grown talent presenting and performing at the African World Festival.
- Of course, there's the main stage where Friday night as we're celebrating our 40th, we thought who else kicks off with the notion of a Afro future?
'Cause we're saying we're 40 years, but we're not stopping.
We plan to keep zooming.
And so who is that?
And sure enough, we were able to land Parliament Funkadelic featuring George Clinton.
We're really happy this year that one of our local internationally known groups, Underground Resistance, which is a organization that has fostered techno and hip hop all across the world from right here in Detroit, they're doing a special presentation on Saturday night to close the main stage.
And then our own Jessica Care Moore is curating the Friday night close of the Pyramid Stage, and she has Drey Skonie and The Clouds, and she has Somi who is not from Detroit, but a sister whose voice is so beautiful, we know that Detroiters who don't know her are gonna fall in love with her.
So I say the food, the entertainment, and the marketplace, those are the soul of the African World Festival, but the heart of the festival is the annual reunion because people come every year, bring their friends and family, and it's just a joy.
It's a beautiful spirit within this festival.
It's just an absolute pleasure to be able to provide opportunities.
And I'm that bridge.
I figured out at some point that I'm that bridge between people who have a talent or a skill or an interest and somebody who needs or wants that talent, skill, or interest, and I can plug it up and we can create something really beautiful.
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