Felipe Luciano

Felipe Luciano (born 1947, East Harlem, New York City) is a poet, community activist, journalist, media personality, and politician. He is of Afro-Puerto Rican heritage. He is known for his significant involvement in both the Young Lords Party and The Last Poets, and more generally, as "an early and important participant in the awakening of the new consciousness-raising radicalism among Puerto Ricans in New York and across the country in the late 1960s and 1970s."

Luciano later became a radio, television, and print journalist.

Early life Felipe Luciano was born "Phillip" in 1947 in Spanish Harlem and was raised by his mother, Aurora, who was a devout Pentecostal Christian. He feels that his childhood was cut short, in large part due to the absence of his father. This conviction is likely based on Luciano's own experience. Following his release, he attended Queens College as a political science major, was "An ensemble of African American and Afro–Puerto Rican poet-performers... known for the powerful and vigorous vernacular immediacy and rhythmic, spoken-word presentations of [their] street-wise, nimble verse, which preceded any formal articulation of a Nuyorican aesthetic and early anticipated the rap compositions of a later era." Luciano joined founding members Gylan Kain and Abiodun Oyewole who were looking to replace their third co-founder, David Nelson, who had left the group after disagreement about its structure and direction.

As for Luciano's role in the group in particular, editor of Puerto Rican Poetry: An Anthology from Aboriginal to Contemporary Times, Roberto Márquez writes that, "He was instrumental in its success in promoting an agenda of militant direct action and community empowerment, ethnic pride, and civil rights, which fought against the discriminatory typecasting of "Puerto Ricans as a community of rural immigrants.'" The poem uses nature imagery and includes themes of radical Black love, migration, and diaspora, and posits the "symbolic, time-honored icon" of the Jíbaro as Black, thereby asserting the centrality of Blackness in Puerto Rican national and cultural identity.

Political involvement Felipe Luciano ran as a Democrat for New York City Council in District 8 in 2001 and 2005.

In 1997, Luciano was appointed to "a task force created to facilitate discussions among civilians and police officers about police behavior."

Television

Felipe Luciano worked as a reporter for WNBC-TV's "NewsCenter 4," making him the first Puerto Rican news anchor of a major media network station in the United States.

In addition, Luciano is often thought of as representing many different groups at once. Writing about Luciano's background and upbringing, the New York Times reported, "Because he is Black and Puerto Rican, an ex-con and a poet, the father of a Navy man and the son of a single mother, Mr. Luciano can wear many hats with ease. With a Haitian, he debates the history of the Caribbean. With an African-American, he talks as if he had just come out of the ghetto (in fact, he has lived on the Upper East Side for many years). With Hispanic guests to his show, he reverts to short, endearing phrases in Spanish." In this way, his work, art, and activism connect to the larger project of fighting anti-Blackness within the Latinx community and to uplifting Black Latinx stories, experiences, art, and visions of liberation.

In response to the question of how he wants to be remembered, Luciano said, "as a scholar, a poet, a writer, and as a warrior for his people."

Films featuring Felipe Luciano – Right On!: Poetry on Film (Original Last Poets; directed by Herbert Danca) 1973 – Badge 373 (directed by Howard Koch) 1979 – Salsa: Latin Music in the Cities (directed by Jeremy Marre) 1994 – It Could Happen to You (directed by Andrew Bergman) 1996 – Palante, Siempre Palante (documentary on the Young Lords; directed by Iris Morales) 2006 – Yo soy Boricua, pa'que tu lo sepas! (I'm Boricua, Just So You Know!) 2009 – Latin Music USA (Episode 2) 2015 – Rubble Kings (documentary directed by Shan Nicholson) 2018 – "Mr. Soul!" A Documentary directed by Melissa Haizlip)