Spare Change News

Author: Jacques Fleury

  • “Pedagogy of the Oppressed”: Teaching, Learning and the Immigrant Experience Part III

    Jacques Fleury Spare Change News “Knowledge emerges only through invention and re-invention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other.” Paulo Freire In my previous articles, I explored the teaching techniques and ideologies in Paulo Freire’s book: “Pedagogy of the Oppressed,” a text…

  • “Pedagogy of the Oppressed”: Teaching, Learning and the Immigrant Experience, Part II

    Jacques Fleury Spare Change News “Knowledge emerges only through invention and re-invention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other.” –Paulo Freire In my previous article, I compared my experiences as a student at a Catholic school for boys in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, to…

  • The Skeleton in Madame Simote’s Closet

    Jacques Fleury Spare Change News It remains a mystery as to how and why Madame Simote’s husband actually died. Jean Herbie Simote was the handsome town doctor and was perceived to be a philanderer. He was rumored to have had affairs with a plethora of Madame Simote’s female friends and even some of her relatives.…

  • Local Music Scene: Some Sweet Sounds from Sweet Wednesday

    Jacques Fleury Spare Change News I met the folk musical group Sweet Wednesday back in 2007. I invited them to perform live on my then television show, “Dream Weavers with Jacques,” at Cambridge Community Television (CCTV). They are a rare breed of individuals reminiscent of the best of the 1960s and ’70s peace and love…

  • Discovering Fiction: The Lost of Innocence in James Joyce’s “Araby” and Ernest Hemingway’s “Indian Camp”

    Jacques Fleury Spare Change News Ah, Childhood, a time when our slates were clean and fresh like the morning dawn; a time when we saw life very much as we saw a new toy, something to be observed and explored. This innocence lasts up until that moment when, one day, everything changes; the tooth fairy’s…

  • Under the Cover of Night

    Jacques Fleury Spare Change News The full moon permeates the darkened street where Chiro sprints to hide under the bridge, the rolling waves of the ocean muffling the footsteps trailing behind him. Exhausted from fear and the run itself, he leans against the wall to catch his breath as the hooligans pursuing him get close…

  • A Dialogue on Race Relations in America

    Jacques Fleury Spare Change News I recently joined a writer’s group from the website meetup.com. The first day I attended the group, I was considerably late. Upon entering, a la true Jacques fashion with my cyborg glasses, looking like the black guy from Star Trek, the members (who happened to be all white) looked up…

  • The Legacy of the Black Soldiers of the Civil War

    In honor of Black History Month Jacques Fleury Spare Change News “Cowards die many times before their deaths, the valiant never taste of death but once.” — Shakespeare, Julius Caesar (II, ii, 32-37) The contributions and achievements of black people throughout American History have often been overlooked in traditional history textbooks. Although I was educated…

  • How Haiti Earned Its Place in Black History

    The first independent nation in Latin America and the first Black-led republic in the world shaped the African-American identity Jacques Fleury Spare Change News “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” -Martin Luther King Jr. In the two years since the earthquake that devastated Haiti, a country already marred by political depravity and economic…

  • Haitian Folk Tales: The Snake and the Pauper

    Jacques Fleury Spare Change News It was a beautiful sunny day in the forest of Carfou, a small town in the outskirts of Port-au-Prince, Haiti’s capital city. The birds were chirping and the trees were swaying in a sing-song sort of way. Di Dim, a local farmer, strolled down the winding dirt road, occasionally stumbling…