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The Worlds of Ntozake ShangeAND DIGITAL STORYTELLING

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Grappling with the “Postcolonial”

by Nadia 0 Comments

 

My Africana courses this semester have forced me to grapple with the term “postcolonial.” I have learned that this word is fraught because it describes a time period or phenomena which is defined or continues to be influenced by the traumas of colonialism.The Black World Editor’s Note summarizes this point well: “black people on both sides of the continent have very similar problems and a common source: that of colonialism and enslavement” (SOS 207). Even after countries have received independence, they still hold the burden of dealing with the effects of colonialism and, in many cases, watch a new breed, namely, neocolonialism, evolve.

Artists and writers have dealt with contemporary issues affected by colonialism in their work. In “To Make a Poet Black” Michelle Joan Wilkinson states, “the 1960s generation of Black Arts poets imagined themselves as black magicians making black poems in and for a black world” and “the new slogans included “art for people’s sake,” “art for survival,” and even “art for the revolution.” However, this type of activism through art does not only apply to the black community. Instead of allowing the postcolonial to be a divisive agent that separates people of different ethnic and racial backgrounds from each other, writers like Ntozake Shange (African American) and Victor Hernandez Cruz (Puerto Rican) display “diasporic consciousness and cross-cultural poetics” in their work, terms Ron Hernadez used to describe publications like Umbra magazine (Latin Soul 334).

Shange demonstrates her solidarity with those of the diaspora in Bocas: A Daughter’s Geography as a result of a shared colonial past:

there is no edge

no end to the new world

cuz i have a daughter/ trinidad

i have a son/ san juan

our twins

capetown & palestine/ cannot speak the same

language/ but we fight the same old men

the same men who thought the earth waz flat

 

In a similar way, Cruz’s writing reflects  “a poetics of tensions between Spanish/English, rural/urban, and vernacular/literary cultures” (Latin Soul 335). This poem La Lupe illustrates the connection between Cuba and New York:

 

She embodied in gowns, capes,

dresses, necklaces, bonnets,

Velvets, suedes, diamond-studded,

flowers, sequins,

All through which

she wanted to eat herself

She salvaged us all,

but took the radiation.

Each time she sang

she crossed the sea.

From the Bronx

she went back to Cuba,

Adrift on the sails

of a song.

 

 

On to the Schomburg! #BlackArchives

by Kim Hall 0 Comments

I hope everyone is having a bit of a breather this long weekend.   Our next class meets at the Schomburg Center for African-American Culture to introduce you to the wealth of resources at the Schomburg and continue the discussion of archival practice Shannon started with us during Ntozake’s visit.  I’d like us to follow the plan for the original visit, which was to read around in the “Black Sexism” special issue of The Black Scholar.  You don’t have to read it from cover to cover, but certainly look at enough to get a sense of the nature of the controversy in its time. Tiana wrote a blogpost on the Black Sexism debate when we were supposed to have visited the Schomburg in October. You can find both a link and full PDF on Courseworks.

We are extremely fortunate to have Steven G. Fullwood, Assistant Curator for the Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, as our collaborator and archival guide.  Steven has vast experience in acquiring, managing and promoting the use of archives from groups whose lives can escape the radar of traditional archival practice. Under his stewardship, the Schomburg has developed a robust “In the Life Archive” which acquires and preserves historical materials created by and about queer life of people of African descent.  He is most recently co-editor of the anthology, Black Gay Genius: Answering Joseph Beam’s Call, which is a finalist for a Lambda literary award. You can read an interview with Steven here.  Steve suggests looking at a 1989 episode of the Phil Donohue show on Black Women Writers featuring Ntozake, Maya Angelou, Angela Davis and Alice Walker– a rare moment of mainstream media attention to Black women intellectuals that shows how visceral the debate was years after for colored girls . . .

Obviously, Ntozake Shange’s main archive is here at Barnard (yeay!), but Steven will introduce us to other collections related to topics/people we have covered in class, such as the Michelle Wallace,  Larry Neal and Umbra collections.

The Schomburg is on Malcolm X at 135th street (across from Harlem Hospital)

515 Malcolm X Blvd, New York, NY 10037.  The closest transportation is 2/3 and M7 bus. From campus, you can also take the M60 to Malcolm X and walk uptown,

I know it’s off the beaten path for switching classes, but please do everything you can to get there on time.  I am going early, but if there is a group going together, the College will have a metrocard for you to share, so let me know.

For some reason, images aren’t uploading, so I will update later.

Questioning Binaries: Latin-Soul Music

by Nicole 1 Comment

In Rod Hernandez’s “Latin Soul,” he writes that the recognition of similarities in music between black and latino people has helped bring to light the crossings of their two cultures. The “shared musical sensibilities” of their music was heard most often in neighborhoods where black Americans and latinos shared similar disenfranchised spaces, such as in the South Bronx of New York City (335). Hernandez explains that the “varied musical traditions of the African diaspora were instrumental in bringing about greater awareness of blackness and brownness,” (335). Knowledge of the cross over between black and latino cultures has been suppressed because of color prejudice, but the influence of African culture on all types of music of the diaspora is one place where the similarities in culture are more easily recognized.

This discussion of black and latino cultures and the similarities in their music reminded me of a movie I saw called Chef (2014), about a struggling chef who drives his food truck from Miami all the way back to his home in California. In the soundtrack for the movie latin music style is mixed with jazz and blues and reflects the stops the protagonist makes on his journey back to California. Traveling between these two locations with large latino populations, California and Miami, the protagonist surveys the South and the food and musical traditions which it holds. The movie focuses on the locations of Miami, New Orleans and Austin as the locus of the changes in music. The soundtrack to the movie reflects this fusion of black and latino culture. Some of the songs are originally sung by black artists but have been reworked in the style of salsa. When I saw the movie I thought the soundtrack was the best feature, and I could not think why I had never heard black and latino music combined in this way. In the text, Hernandez says that what “is amazing about well groomed Salsa musicians is their ability to play all styles of music;” this soundtrack is emblematic of this statement (335). When I listened to this soundtrack the same emotions churned in me as when I listen the jazz my grandparents used to play for me as a child.