The Inside of Good Luck is a series of short films conceived and convened by Mona Lisa Saloy and Rachel Breunlin and dedicated to longstanding Black Arts traditions in New Orleans poetry. The series features performances by Sunni Patterson, Quo Vadis Breaux, Kalamu ya Salaam, Karisma Price, and Arthur “Arturo” Pfister as well as Mona Lisa Saloy. Shot and edited by Percy Francois III and Ted Morée and featuring artwork by Tyler Rosebush, The Inside of Good Luck was organized by Neighborhood Story Project and made possible by the National Endowment for the Humanities, Mellon Foundation, National Park Service, New Orleans Jazz Museum, and University of California at Berkeley’s Division of Arts and Humanities.

This segment features Kalamu ya Salaam, an activist, educator, filmmaker, writer, editor and poet. He is the author of numerous books and pamphlets. His latest publications include PRECISE TENDERNESS (Third World Press 2023), The Magic Of Juju: An Appreciation Of The Black Arts Movement (Third World Press, 2016), New Orleans Griot—The Tom Dent Reader (University of New Orleans Press 2017), and Be About Beauty (University of New Orleans Press 2018).

The Inside of Good Luck is a series of short films conceived and convened by Mona Lisa Saloy and Rachel Breunlin and dedicated to longstanding Black Arts traditions in New Orleans poetry. The series features performances by Sunni Patterson, Quo Vadis Breaux, Kalamu ya Salaam, Karisma Price, and Arthur “Arturo” Pfister as well as Mona Lisa Saloy. Shot and edited by Percy Francois III and Ted Morée and featuring artwork by Tyler Rosebush, The Inside of Good Luck was organized by Neighborhood Story Project and made possible by the National Endowment for the Humanities, Mellon Foundation, National Park Service, New Orleans Jazz Museum, and University of California at Berkeley’s Division of Arts and Humanities.

This installment features Karisma Price, an assistant professor of English at Tulane University. A poet, screenwriter, and media artist, she is the author of I’m Always So Serious (Sarabande Books, 2023). Her work has appeared in publications including Poetry, Indiana Review, Oxford American, Four Way Review, Academy of American Poets Poem-A-Day Series, and elsewhere. She is a Cave Canem Fellow, was a finalist for the 2019 Manchester Poetry Prize, and was awarded the 2020 J. Howard and Barbara M. J. Wood Prize from the Poetry Foundation. A native New Orleanian, she holds an MFA in poetry from New York University, where she was a Writers in the Public Schools Fellow.

The Inside of Good Luck is a series of short films conceived and convened by Mona Lisa Saloy and Rachel Breunlin and dedicated to longstanding Black Arts traditions in New Orleans poetry. The series features performances by Sunni Patterson, Quo Vadis Breaux, Kalamu ya Salaam, Karisma Price, and Arthur “Arturo” Pfister as well as Mona Lisa Saloy.

This installment features Mona Lisa Saloy, former Louisiana Poet Laureate, who is an author, folklorist, educator, and scholar of Creole culture in articles, documentaries, and poems about Black New Orleans before and after Katrina, and Conrad N. Hilton Endowed Professor of English at Dillard University. Her first book, Red Beans & Ricely Yours, won the T.S. Eliot Prize and the PEN/Oakland Josephine Miles Award. Her second, Second Line Home, celebrates New Orleans Black Creole culture. Saloy’s newest collection, Black Creole Chronicles: Poems (University of New Orleans Press 2023) was chosen as the One Book, One New Orleans city-wide reading

The Inside of Good Luck is a series of short films conceived and convened by Mona Lisa Saloy and Rachel Breunlin and dedicated to longstanding Black Arts traditions in New Orleans poetry. The series features performances by Sunni Patterson, Quo Vadis Breaux, Kalamu ya Salaam, Karisma Price, and Arthur “Arturo” Pfister as well as Mona Lisa Saloy. Shot and edited by Percy Francois III and Ted Morée and featuring artwork by Tyler Rosebush, The Inside of Good Luck was organized by Neighborhood Story Project and made possible by the National Endowment for the Humanities, Mellon Foundation, National Park Service, New Orleans Jazz Museum, and University of California at Berkeley’s Division of Arts and Humanities.

This installment features Quo Vadis Gex Breaux—author, editor, and cultural activist—who has published poetry, essays and creative non-fiction in a number of anthologies including Uncommon-Place: An Anthology of Contemporary Louisiana Poets; Trouble the Waters: 250 Years of African-American Poetry; and many issues of the journal Nkumbo. A former Executive Director of the Center of Ethical Living and Social Justice Renewal, Quo Vadis worked with volunteers dedicated to the recovery of New Orleans post Hurricane Katrina.

The Inside of Good Luck is a series of short films conceived and convened by Mona Lisa Saloy and Rachel Breunlin and dedicated to longstanding Black Arts traditions in New Orleans poetry. The series features performances by Sunni Patterson, Quo Vadis Breaux, Kalamu ya Salaam, Karisma Price, and Arthur “Arturo” Pfister as well as Mona Lisa Saloy. Shot and edited by Percy Francois III and Ted Morée and featuring artwork by Tyler Rosebush, The Inside of Good Luck was organized by Neighborhood Story Project and made possible by the National Endowment for the Humanities, Mellon Foundation, National Park Service, New Orleans Jazz Museum, and University of California at Berkeley’s Division of Arts and Humanities.

This installment features Sunni Patterson is an internationally acclaimed poet, performer, and an initiated priestess and minister. She currently serves as a Resident Artist for both the City of New Orleans’ Claiborne Corridor Cultural Initiative and Junebug Productions. She also works as a Community Health Worker and Artist Influencer with Ashé Cultural Arts Center. Sunni is co-founder of the Environmental Arts and Public Health Organization, Breath is Lyfe, along with Scientist and Atmospheric Chemist, Cherelle Blazer, where they create programming and events that translate science through art, culture, and community action. Patterson is most recently the author of We Know This Place (University of New Orleans Press 2022).

A performance of the Lizette Suite by Les Cenelles that reimagines and recontextualizes the traditional arrangement by Camille Nickerson. This film is distributed by Neighborhood Story Project and An Open Classroom on New Orleans Culture with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Mellon Foundation, and the Division of Arts and Humanities at the University of California, Berkeley.

This lecture by Ned Sublette—historian, musicologist, and documentary producer—addresses the development of an Afro-Orleanian culture under slavery. It focuses on the city’s colonial past, the transatlantic slave trade, and the influence of various African nationalities, particularly those from the Senegambia and Kongo-Angola regions, on the city’s culture. New Orleans was shaped by French, Spanish, and American rule, each with distinct slave regimes and Black populations. The slave trade brought Africans from different regions, primarily Senegambia and Kongo-Angola, to Louisiana. The Senegambians at one time made up two-thirds of the city’s enslaved population, and had a crucial early influence. Senegambian music, with its melismatic style, swing rhythms, and ornamentation, resonated with French musical tastes and contributed to the distinctive New Orleans sound. The arrival of the Kongo people during the Spanish period added another layer to the city's music. Kongo music, with its straight rhythms and syllabic style, blended with the existing Senegambian influence. Under Spanish rule, New Orleans saw a more relaxed slave regime, which included the right to self-purchase. However, a covert slave trade also existed, with privateers like Jean Lafitte illegally selling enslaved Africans. In the nineteenth century, after the Louisiana Purchase, the United States ban on the international slave trade led to a booming domestic slave trade, with enslaved people from the Upper South, particularly Virginia, being transported to Louisiana, further shaping the city's demographics and culture. Despite its complex and often brutal history, New Orleans developed a vibrant and resilient culture, with African contributions playing an indisputably central role.

This lecture is distributed by An Open Classroom on New Orleans Culture. It was created with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Google Education, New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts, the Department of Mass Communication at Xavier University of Louisiana, and the Division of Undergraduate Education at the University of California, Berkeley.

This film was co-produced by Neighborhood Story Project with the Big Chief and Master Designer of the Mandingo Warriors, Victor Harris and Jack Robertson to demonstrate how to sew in the Fi Yi Yi tradition. This film is made possible by funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Mellon Foundation, and the Division of Arts and Humanities at the University of California at Berkeley.

This lecture by Matt Sakakeeny (Associate Professor, Music, Tulane University) explores the history of jazz music in New Orleans, focusing on the interplay between tradition and innovation. It begins by acknowledging New Orleans’s rich musical heritage and the enduring popularity of traditional jazz, but questions whether this focus on preservation has overshadowed the city's continued role as a source of musical innovation. The lecture traces the roots of jazz to the post-Emancipation era, highlighting the contributions of African American musicians and the unique cultural environment of New Orleans. It emphasizes the importance of improvisation and musical literacy in the development of jazz, citing Louis Armstrong as a prime example of a musician who skillfully blended tradition and innovation. The lecture also discusses the evolution of brass bands in New Orleans, from their origins in jazz funerals and second-line parades to their incorporation of modern genres like funk and hip-hop. It concludes by celebrating the ongoing creativity of New Orleans musicians and calling for a broader recognition of their contributions to the contemporary music scene. The lecture challenges the notion of New Orleans as a mere repository of musical traditions and instead positions the city as a dynamic and evolving hub of musical innovation.

This lecture is distributed by An Open Classroom on New Orleans Culture. It was created with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Google Education, New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts, the Department of Mass Communication at Xavier University of Louisiana, and the Division of Undergraduate Education at the University of California, Berkeley.

This introductory film to gwoka music in Guadeloupe draws on the long-term friendship and research collaboration between Creole linguist Kathe Managan (based in Louisiana) and Franck “Zagalo” Geoffroy, one of the leaders of Kan’nida, one of the leading gwoka bands in Martinique. The film incorporates archival footage with contemporary gatherings for the bode a nwel celebrations during the Christmas season. The film is narrated by Zagalo entirely in Guadeloupean Creole, with subtitles in both Creole and English, to give students an opportunity to hear and see the differences between Creole languages in Louisiana and the Caribbean. The film is produced and distributed by Neighborhood Story Project and An Open Classroom on New Orleans Culture with support from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Mellon Foundation, and the Division of Arts and Humanities at the University of California, Berkeley.

This essay by Pascale Boucicault—ethnographer, curator, and doctoral student in Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley—provides an introduction to Zora Neale Hurston's research in New Orleans and in particular to her engagement with four prominent spiritual leaders in the city. In 1928, Hurston arrived in New Orleans to study Hoodoo culture. Hurston discovered the importance of the Spiritual Church movement in the city, which was significantly shaped by Black women who led congregations as Reverend Mothers, including Leafy Anderson, the founder of the Eternal Life Spiritualist Church, known for invoking the spirit of Black Hawk, a symbol of resistance against white domination, and Mother Catherine Seals, who founded the Temple of the Innocent Blood. Hurston also engaged the legacy of the legendary Marie Laveau, a powerful Hoodoo practitioner, who has been recognized as a significant influence on the development of Spiritualism in New Orleans.