Cornbread, Fish and Collard Greens

Khafre K. Abif has been thriving with HIV for 24 years, and is a father of two college aged young men. He holds a master’s degree in Library and Information Science from the University of Pittsburgh, and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Africana Studies from the University of Pittsburgh. Abif is the Founder/Executive Director of Cycle for Freedom, a national mobilizing campaign founded in 2010, to reduce the spread of HIV among African Americans and Latinos. During the 75-day campaign, Cycle for Freedom will engage fourteen (14) African American and Latino communities along the Underground Railroad Bicycle Route by developing strategies designed to increase HIV testing, and confront HIV-related stigma, homophobia, and lack or mis-education. www.cycleforfreedom.org Abif is one of five men in the inaugural class of The HEALTH (Health Executive Approaches to Leadership and Training in HIV) Seminar Program, a year long program designed to enhance knowledge, skills, and abilities for assuming leadership/management positions in the field of health with a particular focus on HIV for the next generation of African American MSM leaders and community based organizational practices.Abif also serves as Community Educator/Test Counselor for ONE Life of Pittsburgh, PA, as well as the Georgia HIV Prevention Community Planning Group. He formerly served on the Pennsylvania HIV Prevention Community Planning Group and was the Community Co-Chair for the New Jersey HIV Prevention Community Planning Group where he ensured PIR for the group.As a librarian, Abif managed Children’s Services for Brooklyn Public Library and was the first recipient of the Black Caucus of the American Library Association (BCALA) Dr. John C. Tyson Emerging Leader Award. As former Director of the Langston Hughes Library for the Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) at the former Alex Haley Farm in Clinton, Tennessee, Abif was responsible for meeting the library’s mission to serve as the intellectual commons of the movement to Leave No Child Behind®. Publications include co-editing with Teresa Y. Neely, In Our Own Voices: The Changing Face of Librarianship, and is contributing author in the anthologies Poor People and Library Services, and Handbook of Black Librarianship. Forthcoming work includes Raising Kazembe, and Fall to Grace. Visit Abif at TheBody.com http://www.thebody.com/content/art60852.html