A00012 - Malik Bendjelloul, Oscar Winner for "Searching for Sugar Man"

Bendjelloul, Malik

Malik Bendjelloul (September 14, 1977 – May 13, 2014) was an Algerian Swedish Academy-Award-winning  documentary filmmaker, journalist and former child actor. He is best known for his 2012 documentary, Searching for Sugar Man, which won an Academy Award and a BAFTA Award.

A00011 - Nazim al-Haqqani, Sufi Spiritual Leader

Nazim al-Haqqani or Mehmet Nâzım Adil (Arabic: محمد ناظم الحقاني ‎, April 21, 1922  / Sha'ban  23, 1340 AH – May 7, 2014), formally referred to as Muhammad Nazim Adil al-Qubrusi al-Haqqani (Turkish: Nazım Kıbrısi), often called Shaykh (or Sheikh) Nazim, was a Turkish Cypriot Sufi Sheikh and leader of the Naqshbandi-Haqqani Order.

A00010 - Hunein Maassab, Developer of Nasal Spray Flu Vaccine

Hunein Maassab (b.  June 11, 1926, Damascus,  - d.  February 1, 2014, North Carolina) was the developer of nasal spray flu vaccine.  He was born on June 11, 1926, in Damascus. His father was a jeweler. He enrolled at the University of Missouri, where he received a bachelor’s degree in biology in 1950 and a master’s in physiology and pharmacology in 1952. He then moved to Michigan, where he earned a master’s degree in public health in 1954 and his doctorate in epidemiology in 1956.

"John" Hunein F. Maassab was a Professor in the Department of Epidemiology at the University of Michigan since 1960 and served as the chairman from 1991-1997. He founded and directed the Hospital and Molecular Epidemiology program in the Department of Epidemiology. Dr. Maassab was a member of several scientific organizations including the American Public Health Association and the American Society of Microbiology and was a Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology. Dr. Maassab had over 170 publications that range from studies on the basic biology of viruses to research on the development of methods to control viral infections.

Dr. Maassab was awarded patents for the development of a cold-adapted influenza virus and for an attenuated respiratory syncytial virus. Dr. Maassab received the 1997 Award for Science and Technology from Popular Science for the development of the cold-adapted influenza virus. This discovery led him to develop a flu vaccine that can be administered by a nasal spray as an alternative to the "flu shot."

Influenza, commonly called "the flu," is an infection of the respiratory tract caused by the influenza virus. Compared with most other viral respiratory infections, such as the common cold, influenza infection often causes a more severe illness. Most people who get the flu recover completely in one to two weeks, but some people develop serious and potentially life-threatening medical complications, such as pneumonia. Between 25-50 million people in the United States are infected each year with the influenza virus. In an average year, infection with influenza virus is associated with 20,000 deaths nationwide and more than 100,000 hospitalizations. Approximately 90 million workdays are lost and 30 million school days are missed each year as a result of influenza.

Vaccination can prevent disease caused by influenza. Unlike vaccines used against other viruses such as measles, mumps, rubella and varicella, people need to be vaccinated annually against influenza. This is because the influenza virus often changes its genetic composition to evade the immune system of its host. Thus, people are susceptible to influenza virus infection throughout life. The current vaccine used for flu is a "killed" virus vaccine that is administered by injection. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends a flu shot for healthy adults over age 50 and high-risk children and adults. Unfortunately, less than one percent of healthy children and less than 30 percent of healthy adults, are routinely vaccinated. Achieving adequate flu protection is difficult because each year a new vaccine must be developed that is appropriate for the specific strainsof influenza likely to circulate. Currently, there is concern n the public health community regarding the timely supply of vaccine for the coming flu season.

In 1967, Dr. Maassab published a paper in the journal Nature describing the adaptation of an influenza virus for growth at a low temperature in culture. Importantly, this "cold-adapted" virus does not grow at higher temperatures such as those found in the lungs. However, the cold-adapted virus can replicate in the nasal passages where the temperature is lower. The cold-adapted virus cannot survive in the lungs where the body temperature is higher, and therefore cannot cause disease. The limited viral growth seen in the nasal passages may stimulate an immune response that may protect a person from infections from influenza viruses. This protection also prevents the spread of influenza to others.

Dr. Maassab developed an intranasal cold-adapted live virus vaccine that may provide promising alternative to the "flu shot." Using a nasal mist, an attenuated (weakened) live form of the influenza virus is sprayed into the nasal passages, where influenza viruses enter the body.

The public health significance of this finding for the development of an influenza vaccine was apparent. By using nasal mist technology to eliminate the fear of injections, this method may offer the first practical way to immunize children and adults on a large scale annually in the near future.

A00009 - Maryam Durani, Afghan Human Rights Activist

Maryam Durani: (Arabic: مَریَم دورانی), is an Afghan activist. Daughter of Haji Mohammad Eisa Durani, Maryam Durani was born in 1987. Hailing from the Muhammadzai tribe, Maryam is a graduate of the business department of American University of Afghanistan and currently she is a third class student of Law and Political Science at Noor University. Maryam Durani was also Kandahar people’s representative in the provincial council. She has served in different positions such as director of Khadijatul Kubra women's association for culture, owner of Merman Radio (special women radio) and as founder of the Kandahar woman advocacy network. She received the World Ten Brave Women’s award on March 8, 2012 as well as a World 100 Influential Figure’s award on April 20, 2012.  She has also received the Brave Woman award from the State of Pennsylvania, the Women Rights Protector’s award from Washington and an Iraq and Afghanistan Female Peace Activist’s appreciation letter from Turkey. She is a broadcaster and the manager of the Merman Radio of Kandahar. On April 6, 2013, she founded the Women's Network (Advocacy) in Kandahar. Maryam also established the Malalai Maiwandi Internet cafe a free women's internet cafe to connect more women to the world in a safe and comfortable space. she opened Malali Maiwandi internet cafe on September 25, 2013 which is the first of its kind in the Afghanistan.  There Afghan women could use the cafe for getting information about current affairs and obtain educational material, which is the main reason why she established the women's cafe. In 2012, she was chosen by Time Magazine as "The 100 Most Influential People in the World".  According to Time, "As the owner and operator of a radio station (Merman Radio) that focuses on women's issues and as a member of the Kandahar provincial council, Durani stands up for the region's women with remarkable bravery." On March 8, 2012, she became a recipient of the prestigious United States Secretary of State’s International Women of Courage Award.

A00008 - Samira Ibrahim, Egyptian Activist

Samira Ibrahim (Arabic: سميرة إبراهيم‎) (born c. 1987) is an Egyptian activist who came to prominence during the Egyptian revolution .

On March 9, 2011, she participated in a sit-in at Tahrir Square in Cairo. The military violently dispersed protest participants, and Samira and other women were beaten, given electric shocks, strip searched, and videotaped by the soldiers. They were also subjected to virginity tests. The tests were allegedly carried out to protect the soldiers from claims of rape.

After succeeding in placing the case in front of a civilian court, a court order was issued in December 2011 to stop the practice of “virginity tests”. However in March 2012, a military court exonerated Dr. Adel El Mogy from charges laid in connection with the virginity testing of Ibrahim.

Ibrahim vowed to take her case to the international courts.

In early March 2013, Ibrahim came under criticism after Samuel Tadros, writing in The Weekly Standard, accused her of posting anti-Semitic and anti-American statements on her Twitter account. These statements included quoting Adolf Hitler, writing: "I have discovered with the passage of days, that no act contrary to morality, no crime against society, takes place, except with the Jews having a hand in it. Hitler.” In reaction to a suicide bombing of a bus of Israelis in Bulgaria, she wrote "Today is a very sweet day with a lot of very sweet news.” In 2012, on the anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, she tweeted "Today is the anniversary of 9/11. May every year come with America burning".

The United States State Department subsequently announced that it would not be giving the International Women of Courage Award to Samira Ibrahim in light of these comments.

Initially, Ibrahim claimed that her Twitter account had been "previously stolen" and that "any tweet on racism and hatred is not me”. However, she later stated "I refuse to apologize to the Zionist lobby in America regarding my previous anti-Zionist statements under pressure from American government therefore they withdrew the award." The United States State Department later stated that Ibrahim had since left the United States to return to Egypt.

On March 8, 2013, a spokeswoman for the United States State Department stated that "Upon further review, the department has decided not to present her with the award" as American officials "didn't consider some of the public statements that she had made appropriate. They didn't comport with our values" while adding that "There were obviously some problems in our review process, and we're going to do some forensics on how that happened."

A00007 - Amiri Baraka, Polarizing African American Poet

Amiri Baraka, also called Imamu Amiri Baraka, original name (until 1968) (Everett) LeRoi Jones     (b. October 7, 1934, Newark, New Jersey — d. January 9, 2014, Newark, New Jersey), was an African American writer who presented the experiences and anger of black Americans with an affirmation of black life.

Jones graduated from Howard University (B.A., 1953) and served in the U.S. Air Force. After military duty, he joined the Beat movement, attended graduate school, and published his first major collection of poetry, Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note, in 1961. In 1964, his play Dutchman appeared off-Broadway to critical acclaim. In its depiction of an encounter between a white woman and a black intellectual, it exposes the suppressed anger and hostility of American blacks toward the dominant white culture. After the assassination of Malcolm X, Jones took the name Amiri Baraka and began to espouse black nationalism.

In 1965, Baraka founded the Black Arts Repertory Theatre in Harlem. He published much during this period, including Black Art (1966) and Black Magic (1969). In addition to poetry and drama, Baraka wrote several collections of essays, an autobiographical novel (The System of Dante’s Hell [1965]), and short stories. In the mid-1970s he became a Marxist, though his goals remained similar. “I [still] see art as a weapon and a weapon of revolution,” he said. “It’s just now that I define revolution in Marxist terms.” In addition to writing,  Baraka taught at several American universities. The Autobiography of LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka was published in 1984.

The works of LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka include:

Poetry

• 1961: Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note
• 1964: The Dead Lecturer: Poems
• 1969: Black Magic
• 1970: It's Nation Time
• 1970: Slave Ship
• 1975: Hard Facts
• 1980: New Music, New Poetry (India Navigation)
• 1995: Transbluesency: The Selected Poems of Amiri Baraka/LeRoi Jones
• 1995: Wise, Why’s Y’s
• 1996: Funk Lore: New Poems
• 2003: Somebody Blew Up America & Other Poems
• 2005: The Book of Monk

Drama

• 1964: Dutchman
• 1964: The Slave
• 1967: The Baptism and The Toilet
• 1966: A Black Mass
• 1969: Four Black Revolutionary Plays
• 1978: The Motion of History and Other Plays

Fiction

• 1965: The System of Dante's Hell
• 1967: Tales
• 2006: Tales of the Out & the Gone

Non-fiction

• 1963: Blues People: Negro Music in White America
• 1965: Home: Social Essays
• 1968: Black Music
• 1971: Raise Race Rays Raize: Essays Since 1965
• 1979: Poetry for the Advanced
• 1981: reggae or not!
• 1984: Daggers and Javelins: Essays 1974–1979
• 1984: The Autobiography of LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka
• 1987: The Music: Reflections on Jazz and Blues
• 2003: The Essence of Reparations

Edited works

• 1968: Black Fire: An Anthology of Afro-American Writing (co-editor, with Larry Neal)
• 1969: Four Black Revolutionary Plays
• 1983: Confirmation: An Anthology of African American Women (edited with Amina Baraka)
• 1999: The LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka Reader
• 2000: The Fiction of LeRoi Jones/Amiri Baraka
• 2008: Billy Harper: Blueprints of Jazz, Volume 2 (Audio CD)

Filmography

• One P.M. (1972)
• Fried Shoes Cooked Diamonds (1978) .... Himself
• Black Theatre: The Making of a Movement (1978) .... Himself
• Poetry in Motion (1982)
• Furious Flower: A Video Anthology of African American Poetry 1960–95, Volume II: Warriors (1998) .... Himself
• Through Many Dangers: The Story of Gospel Music (1996)
• Bulworth (1998) .... Rastaman
• Pinero (2001) .... Himself
• Strange Fruit (2002) .... Himself
• Ralph Ellison: An American Journey (2002) .... Himself
• Chisholm '72: Unbought & Unbossed (2004) .... Himself
• Keeping Time: The Life, Music & Photography of Milt Hinton (2004) .... Himself
• Hubert Selby Jr : It'll Be Better Tomorrow (2005) .... Himself
• 500 Years Later (2005) (voice) .... Himself
• The Ballad of Greenwich Village (2005) .... Himself
• The Pact (2006) .... Himself
• Retour à Gorée (2007) .... Himself
• Polis Is This: Charles Olson and the Persistence of Place (2007)
• Revolution '67 (2007) .... Himself
• Turn Me On (2007) (TV) .... Himself
• Oscene (2007) .... Himself
• Corso: The Last Beat (2008)
• The Black Candle (2008)
• Ferlinghetti: A City Light (2008) .... Himself
• W.A.R. Stories: Walter Anthony Rodney (2009) .... Himself
• Motherland (2010)

A00006- Yusef Lateef, Pioneer of World Music

Yusef Abdul Lateef (born William Emanuel Huddleston, October 9, 1920 – December 23, 2013) was an American jazz multi-instrumentalist, composer and educator. He became a member of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community after his conversion to the Ahmadiyya sect of Islam in 1950.

Although Lateef's main instruments were the tenor saxophone and flute, he also played oboe and bassoon, both rare in jazz, and also used a number of non-western instruments such as the bamboo flute, shanai, shofar, xun, arghul and koto. He is known for having been an innovator in the blending of jazz with "Eastern" music.

Lateef wrote and published a number of books including two novellas entitled A Night in the Garden of Love and Another Avenue, the short story collections Spheres and Rain Shapes, along with his autobiography, The Gentle Giant, written in collaboration with Herb Boyd. Along with his record label YAL Records, Lateef owned Fana Music, a music publishing company. Lateef published his own work through Fana, which includes Yusef Lateef's Flute Book of the Blues and many of his own orchestral compositions.

Lateef was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee. His family moved, in 1923, to Lorain, Ohio and again in 1925, to Detroit, Michigan, where his father changed the family's name to "Evans".

Throughout his early life, Lateef came into contact with many Detroit-based jazz musicians who went on to gain prominence, including vibraphonist Milt Jackson, bassist Paul Chambers, drummer Elvin Jones and guitarist Kenny Burrell. Lateef was a proficient saxophonist by the time of his graduation from high school at the age of 18, when he launched his professional career and began touring with a number of swing bands.

In 1949, he was invited by Dizzy Gillespie to tour with his orchestra. In 1950, Lateef returned to Detroit and began his studies in composition and flute at Wayne State University. It was during this period that he converted to Islam and became a member of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community.

Lateef began recording as a leader in 1957 for Savoy Records, a non-exclusive association which continued until 1959. The earliest of Lateef's album's for the Prestige subsidiary New Jazz overlap with them. Musicians such as Wilbur Harden (trumpet, flugelhorn), bassist Herman Wright, drummer Frank Gant, and pianist Hugh Lawson were among his collaborators during this period.

By 1961, with the recording of Into Something and Eastern Sounds, Lateef's dominant presence within a group context had emerged. His 'Eastern' influences are clearly audible in all of these recordings, with spots for instruments like the rahab, shanai, arghul, koto and a collection of Chinese wooden flutes and bells along with his tenor and flute. Even his use of the western oboe sounds exotic in this context; it is not a standard jazz instrument. Indeed, the tunes themselves are a mixture of jazz standards, blues and film music usually performed with a piano/bass/drums rhythm section in support. Lateef made numerous contributions to other people's albums including his time as a member of saxophonist Cannonball Adderley's Quintet during 1962–64.

Lateef's sound has been claimed to have been a major influence on the saxophonist John Coltrane, whose later period free jazz recordings contain similarly 'Eastern' traits. For a time (1963–66) Lateef was signed to Coltrane's label, Impulse. He had a regular working group during this period, with trumpeter Richard Williams and Mike Nock on piano.

In the late 1960s, Lateef began to incorporate contemporary soul and gospel phrasing into his music, still with a strong blues underlay, on albums such as Detroit and Hush'n'Thunder. Lateef expressed a dislike of the terms "jazz" and "jazz musician" as musical generalizations. As is so often the case with such generalizations, the use of these terms do understate the breadth of his sound. For example, in the 1980s, Lateef experimented with new age and spiritual elements.

In 1960, Lateef again returned to school, studying flute at the Manhattan School of Music in New York City. He received a Bachelor's Degree in Music in 1969 and a Master's Degree in Music Education in 1970. Starting in 1971, he taught courses in autophysiopsychic music at the Manhattan School of Music, and he became an associate professor at the Borough of Manhattan Community College in 1972.

In 1975, Lateef completed his dissertation on Western and Islamic education and earned a Ed.D. in Education from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. In the early 1980s, Lateef was a Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Nigerian Cultural Studies at Ahmadu Bello University in the city of Zaria, Nigeria. Returning to the United States in 1986 he took a joint teaching position at the University of Massachusetts and Hampshire College.

Lateef's 1987 album Yusef Lateef's Little Symphony won the Grammy Award for Best New Age Album. His core influences, however, were clearly rooted in jazz, and in his own words: "My music is jazz."

In 1992, Lateef founded YAL Records. In 1993, Lateef was commissioned by the WDR Radio Orchestra Cologne to composeThe African American Epic Suite, a four-part work for orchestra and quartet based on themes of slavery and disfranchisement in the United States. The piece has since been performed by the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.

In 2010, Lateef received the lifetime Jazz Master Fellowship Award from NEA, the National Endowment for the Arts, an independent federal agency.

The Manhattan School of Music, where Lateef earned a bachelor's and a master's degree, awarded him a Distinguished Alumni Award in 2012.

Lateef's last albums were recorded for Adam Rudolph's "Meta Records". To the end of his life, he continued to teach at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and Hampshire College in western Massachusetts. Lateef died on the morning of December 23, 2013 at the age of 93 after suffering from prostate cancer.

The discography of Yusef Lateef include the following:

Savoy 1957-1959

• Jazz for the Thinker (1957)
• Jazz Mood (1957)
• Jazz and the Sounds of Nature (1957)
• Prayer to the East (1957)
• The Dreamer (1959)
• The Fabric of Jazz (1959)

Impulse! 1963-1966

• Jazz 'Round the World (1963)
• Live at Pep's (1964)
• 1984 (1965)
• Psychicemotus (1965)
• A Flat, G Flat and C (1966)
• The Golden Flute (1966)

Atlantic 1967 -1991

• The Complete Yusef Lateef (1967)
• The Blue Yusef Lateef (1968)
• Yusef Lateef's Detroit (1969)
• The Diverse Yusef Lateef (1969)
• Suite 16 (1970)
• The Gentle Giant (1971)
• Hush 'N' Thunder (1972)
• Part of the Search (1973)
• 10 Years Hence (1974)
• The Doctor is In... and Out (1976)
• Yusef Lateef's Little Symphony (1987)
• Concerto for Yusef Lateef (1988)
• Nocturnes (1989)
• Meditations (1990)
• Yusef Lateef's Encounters (1991)

YAL Records 1992-2002

• Tenors of Yusef Lateef and Von Freeman (1992)
• Heart Vision (1992)
• Yusef Lateef Plays Ballads (1993)
• Tenors of Yusef Lateef and Archie Shepp (1993)
• Woodwinds (1993)
• Tenors of Yusef Lateef & Ricky Ford (1994)
• Yusef Lateef's Fantasia for Flute (1996)
• Full Circle (1996)
• CHNOPS: Gold & Soul (1997)
• Earth and Sky (1997)
• 9 Bagatelles (1998)
• Like the Dust (1998)
• Live at Luckman Theater (2001)
• Earriptus (2001)
• So Peace (2002)
• A Tribute Concert for Yusef Lateef: YAL's 10th Anniversary (2002)

Meta Records

• The World at Peace (1997)
• Beyond the Sky (2000)
• Go: Organic Orchestra: In the Garden (2003)
• Towards the Unknown (2010)
• Voice Prints (2013)

Other labels

• Before Dawn: The Music of Yusef Lateef (Verve, 1957)
• The Sounds of Yusef (Prestige, 1957)
• Other Sounds (New Jazz, 1957)
• Lateef at Cranbrook (Argo, 1958)
• Cry! - Tender (New Jazz, 1959)
• The Three Faces of Yusef Lateef (Riverside, 1960)
• The Centaur and the Phoenix (Riverside, 1960)
• Lost in Sound (Charlie Parker, 1961)
• Eastern Sounds (Moodsville, 1961)
• Into Something (New Jazz, 1961)
• Autophysiopsychic (1977, CTI Records)
• In a Temple Garden (1979, CTI Records)
• Yusef Lateef in Nigeria (Landmark, 1983)
• Influence with Lionel and Stéphane Belmondo (2005)
• Roots Run Deep (Rogue Art, 2012)

With Cannonball Adderley

• The Cannonball Adderley Sextet in New York (Riverside, 1962)
• Cannonball in Europe! (Riverside, 1962)
• Jazz Workshop Revisited (Riverside, 1962)
• Autumn Leaves (Riverside, 1963)
• Nippon Soul (Riverside, 1963)

With Nat Adderley

• That's Right! (Riverside, 1960)

With Ernestine Anderson

• My Kinda Swing (1960)

With Art Blakey

• The African Beat (1962)

With Donald Byrd

• Byrd Jazz (Transition, 1955)
• First Flight (1957)

With Paul Chambers

• 1st Bassman (1961)

With Art Farmer

• Something You Got (CTI, 1977)

With Curtis Fuller

• Images of Curtis Fuller (Savoy, 1960)
• Boss of the Soul-Stream Trombone (Warwick, 1960)
• Gettin' It Together (1961)

With Grant Green

• Grantstand (Blue Note, 1961)

With Slide Hampton

• Drum Suite (1962)

With Louis Hayes

• Louis Hayes featuring Yusef Lateef & Nat Adderley (1960)

With Les McCann

• Invitation to Openness (1972)

With Don McLean

• Homeless Brother (1973)

With Charles Mingus

• Pre-Bird (aka, Mingus Revisited, 1960)

With Babatunde Olatunji

• Drums of Passion (1960)

With Sonny Red

• Breezing (Jazzland, 1960)

With Leon Redbone

• Double Time (Warner Bros., 1976)

With Clark Terry

• Color Changes (1960)

With Doug Watkins

• Soulnik (New Jazz, 1960)

With Randy Weston

• Uhuru Afrika (Roulette, 1960)

With Frank Wess

• Jazz Is Busting Out All Over (1957)