Blog 8/Impact of Gender & Sexual Orientation

By Andrea Williams

As a writer, one of the difficulties of owning up to sexuality or race in literature is that you now need to add another label to what is already a complex narrative. In the chapter “Black (W)holes and the Geometry of Black Female Sexuality,” Evelynn Hammonds says that adding the label of “queer” to her already cumbersome title would bog down her identity even further: “Now would I be a black, queer, feminist, writer, scientist, historian of science, and activist?” Where would the labels end? Does defining one’s self take away from the story that is being told?

She notes that her white lesbian counterparts don’t have to face these issues. They can write about sexuality without having it layered with racial complexities. Hammonds also says that finding articles or text on black female sexuality, as a lesbian, can be challenging. These stories are different.

In a “Black Man’s Place in Black Feminist Criticism,” Michael Awkward expresses a similar identity crisis. What’s more, he talks about having to explain his motivations for being a male feminist. As a male, his literary writings and criticisms are questioned because of his gender. Then, eventually, they are respected because he’s a good writer.

Blog 7/Final Paper Progress

Information for Final Paper

By Andrea Williams

I have chosen Maya Angelou’s Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now, as the subject of my final paper. This collection of essays covers a range of topics. In one essay, “In All Ways a Woman,” Angelou writes about how women must be both tender and tough. In another essay, “Passports to Understanding,” Angelou talks about the need for humans to place an emphasis on our similarities instead of focusing on our differences. In other words, we must understand and accept other cultures to become better overall human beings and friends. In her essay, “Style,” she writes that style is not something to be copied; it is something to be developed. Taken together, these essays demonstrate the strength and power of women.

Angelou wrote these essays, and other works, without apologizing for the work. In other words, she writes about black women, unflinchingly, as a way to document the black female narrative. Her works have been noted for being “aesthetically pleasing.” In Journey she balances both the African American and female experience without denigrating men or other races. In these so-called “wisdom pieces,” she writes about the total human experience. These types of writings will be the focus of my paper.

Angelou, the writer, professor, and poet, has created several literary works, including I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, And Still I Rise, On the Pulse of Morning, and Phenomenal Woman.

Angelou, who died earlier this year at the age of 86, was a professor at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Another claim to fame was her recitation of the poem, “On the Pulse of Morning,” at President Clinton’s Inauguration in 1993.

Research and Sources, to date

1. Elsie B. Washington, offering the perspective of author and reviewer
2. Random House, Angelou’s publisher
3. Wake Forest University, where she was the lifetime Reynolds Professorship of American Studies
4. Her collection if essays, Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now

Paper One Progress/Baraka and Lorde

Blog 3: Paper One Progress/Baraka and Lorde

My first paper will focus on Amiri Baraka and Audre Lorde and how they fit the mold of the Black Aesthetic. Both are activists, writers, and poets. Their politics vary, but their impact on the Black Arts Movement is legendary.

Baraka is also a professor, playwright, and publisher who founded the Black Arts Movement, which was a platform for black writers to express themselves.

Lorde was also a professor who authored a variety of works, including the award-winning project, The Cancer Journals, which explored the meaning of life and work while she battled cancer.

My sources will include texts assigned in class including The Black Woman: An Anthology and the Anthology of Modern American Poetry.

Baraka Epitomizes Black Arts Movement

In his essay, “Expressive Language,” Amiri Baraka drives home a remarkable yet refined message: words can either unite or divide different types of people. Baraka, an activist, playwright, poet, and founder of the Black Arts Movement, uses his words in different mediums to bolster the black aesthetic.

Baraka made an impact on several areas of the Black Arts Movement. He wrote fiery poetry, powerful books, and thought-provoking plays. To extend his literary reach and to promote the black aesthetic even further, he went into publishing, starting Totem Press, which housed a diverse group of writers.

In “Expressive Language,” Baraka talks about how language can be shaped and colored by the speaker, or as Baraka writes, “words have users, but as well, users have words.”

Take, for example, Baraka’s take on money and wealth. He notes that when you ask a poor person with only 70 cents to his name if he has money, he will tell you, “Yes, of course I do.”  But when a Rockefeller says, “I have money,” he means an entirely different thing. Same phrase, different meaning.

Baraka provides another example with the phrase “God don’t never change.” A wealthy person using these words means, “God don’t never change,” as in “keep things the way they are.” But when a black, poor person says it, it’s considered a complaint, a vent, as in “why doesn’t God ever change?” 

Through words and various literary mediums, Baraka left an indelible mark on the Black Arts Movement.

Baldwin: Relevant Then and Now

By Andrea Williams


In his book “The Fire Next Time,” James Baldwin touches on several universal yet hot-button subjects—education, race, religion, police brutality, poverty—in crafting his narrative of the black community, a narrative that sadly remains entrenched in some parts of our society.   

For example, Baldwin’s gloomy perspective on education still rings true today, especially in a lot of economically depressed communities. He asks the reader to ponder this question: Just how useful is education? Of his childhood, Baldwin writes, “ … I no longer had any illusions about what an education could do for me; I had already encountered too many college-graduate handymen (18).” 

Education is often looked at one of two ways: It can remedy a lot of issues within the black community; or it is an unrealistic and unattainable goal for those who are struggling to make it day to day, and, as such, it is a bogus waste of time.

For some, education has been a saving grace, lifting entire generations of family members out of poverty. Shamefully, there are still pockets of the black community where education is mocked, where being smart will get you teased, and where carrying home schoolbooks will get you bullied.

Baldwin is also not shy about sharing his views on the economics of the black community. Many of the economic strides made by blacks were shaken or derailed by the 2008 economic crisis, a financial mess that impacted most Americans, but especially minorities who often didn’t have a lot of economic leeway or privilege to withstand economic hiccups and extended periods of joblessness.

This brings to mind another way in which Baldwin’s “Avenue” compares with today’s avenue—there’s a sense of hopelessness for many members of the economically ostracized community, both now and then. In speaking of the underemployed in “The Fire Next Time,” Baldwin notes,  “Presently, one found them in twos and threes and fours, in a hallway, sharing a jug of wine or a bottle of whiskey, talking, cursing, fighting, sometimes weeping (18).”

This notion isn’t so far-fetched. Drive your car through certain neighborhoods in the middle of the workday, and you’re bound to see groups of grown, capable men hanging on street corners (with and without the whiskey and the weeping).

Baldwin’s racial commentary tends to focus primarily on blacks and whites, which is understandably relevant for his time. For me, however, “race” has shifted—

broadened, really—to encompass blacks, whites, and a plethora of other races, as well as recent immigrants to this country, interracial unions and the children they produce, and even different segments of the black community (“old school” blacks, folks from the Caribbean, Dominicans, recent African immigrants, etc.)

I believe most folks would agree that in our relationships with one another, we seek fairness and impartiality from different races. I also believe there’s been enough progress that we are legitimately disappointed when unfair treatment permeates our society.

And in these unfortunate instances, Baldwin candidly offers this note of advice that some may find relevant today, “Most Negroes cannot risk assuming that the humanity of white people is more real to them than their color (67).”

If we forget our color, he posits, the white man will be sure to remind us.