https://digitallis.isg.siue.edu/files/original/42e26c6ed429c83320d838f32dffab7f.pdf 2520f51e64436d2ab9e72b7b75170451 PDF Text Text . • ,' mental ~,and phys lcal destruction of Black bumani ty. \ ~ \, fof ..dfecuss~n ' If a slavery is unpleasant, then, a consideration of . lyndh1ng ls horrifying. \ However, skilled teachers and students will maneuver judiciously through the rough waters of su~h sessions--keeping emotional delu ges to a minimum by ad mitting facts and cl ear interpretations. During such occasions, everyone must be on guard less the classroom becomes a courtroom. At the same time, a convener who cannot preside over vi g orous and thorough discussions of these painful events and details may find himself, at later junctures, trying to bridge even wider gu lfs of doubt, frustration, mistrust and alienation. Again, the teaching and studying of Black poetry (or any aspect of the Black Experience) assumes the complexities of tlle Black Experience itself. Neverth eless, t h e study of Black poetry is infinitely rewarding because it is a vehicle which distills t he particular insights and perspectives of Black Americans into concise and authentic forms: merJing the rich rural-Biblical-urban idioms with colorfully luscious imagery and (in many cases) peerless technical proficiency in the use of literary English and Hes tern poetic forms. \·J11en students are confronted with the various poems on lynchings, for example, study can be underscored by an examination of language , form, posture, poetic toolery and overall achievement or effe{p.veness of the poems. In Richard Wricht 1 s ~------ "Between t he Wor.ld and He" the Gcl;";iypoet becomes the persona; ...... the oak tree narrates t he l y nching in Dunbar's "The Haunted Oak." 14 �Cullen speaks as "I 11 in "Scottsboro, Too, Is 1·J orth Its Song 11 which admonishes wbite American poets for remaininc; silent over unjust treatment of Black men while they sing: sharp and pretty Tunes for Sacco and Vanzetti, I said: Here too 1 s a cause devinely spun For those whose eyes are on the sun, Here in epitome Is all dis grace And epic wrong, Like wine to brace The minstrel heart, and blare it into song. In McKo.y's 11 The Lynching" the killing of the Black man is made analaeous to the crucifixion; a sonnet, and awesome throu gh out, the poem descends to its rhyming couplet with a final ghostly irony: And little lads, lynchers that were to be, Danced round the dredful thing in fiendish glee. Certainly in these poems--and the dozens of others that employ the lynching theme--there is much fuel for papers, classroom discussion and teacher preparation. In the four poems mentioned, the poets span such diverse forms as the sonnet, the ballad (Dunbar) and free verse (Wright). Helpful in this area will be the additional inquiry, by teacher and student, into t he development of white hate groups such as the Ku Klux Klan • 15 �and the history of race riots in America. Riots in at least a dozen American communities in 1919, for example, helped spur McKay to write "If 1rJ'e J\'1us t Die 11 , a poignant sonnet with its even more poignant and popular ending couplet-Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack, Pressed to the wall, dying, but figbting back! --a poem which Winston Churchill read before the House of Commons, during World War II, to spark his countrymen in the dim hours; during the 1972 prison rebellion in Attica, N.Y., journalists found the poem scribbled on the wall of a cell and the national press attributed it to a prisoner! Of great assistance, too is a knowledge o:f tte history or slave revel ts ( many Black poets write about them) and the patterns or violence in America. Attuned teachers and students will want to consult sources such as 100 Years of Lynching (Ginzberg), back issues of Black and liberal white news journals and papers and especially past issues of The Crisis, the official news and opinion a.rm of the National Association For The Advancement of Colored People. The scholar, W.E.B. DuBois, one of tt.ie first Black men to receive a Ph.D., edited The Crisis for over 20. years :from its beginning in 1910. For further readings, the teacher can refer to my extensive bibliography plus appropriate sections of any of the numerous anthologies, textbooks and bibliographical sources available. VI Hhile I admit that in:formation and opinions contained in 16 �tbis handbook reflect my own biases as a teacber, critic, activist, and poet, the prescribed patterns for teaching and studying Black poetry are ones generally adhered to across the country. Tbe organization of any course is certain to mirror at least a minimum amount of the teacher's own political and critical biases. Consequently, when lecturing on or pre- paring curricula for Black poetry, I normally allow for a flexible outline, including options in both textbook use and period emphasis. The same holds true for concentration or saturation of study with regards to individual poets. Teachers, naturally, will have personal preferences; in fact, like the students, teacl1er s may oven have developed attaclw1ents to specific poets, attitudes about t he poets or prejudices toward poets who do n ot reflect what they feel is a correct posture for Black poetry. Just as there is great and healthy diversity in the poetry and the poets, there will be divergent attitudes and critical points of vie'w amonc teachers and students. Some of the differentiations will be due to age differences (the "generation gag"?), as is the case with the poets, and some will occur regardless of age. The Black or wbite teacher should ar m himself to the best of bis ability with t he tools of criticis m and a knowledge of Black culture. He must have some idea of what part "duality" plays in t110 lives of Blacks and hm-1 sucb "twoness II is manifest in Black poetry; he should recognize the key issues be ing raised by and de bated runonc Black artists, sch olars and 17 �activists--and have some feel for the historical circun1stances out which t h ese issues and debates grew; he oucht to understand Baraka I s rc.ference to s01ne Black poets as and 11 11 inte grationists 11 a.rty poe ts 11 ; lie uill have to know Hhat man:r of the ITew 11 Black po et s 1:-,ean Hlie n t h ey say t 11 ey 1'eject Hes tern and I'l.Jft ~se to t e: judge<.:' 1·)y for1~1s 11 ul1 i te st au<J. n.rcls (Baruka, for e x m:p le, talks about post-American forms); he will also want to recognize Black in-house humor and intracomrnunal disparaGement in wo1.,ds and phras es like 11 nigger, "oreo, 11 "colored, 11 "the man , a nut, 11 11 11 11 11rother, "Mr. Charley. 11 11 11 11 11 negro, 11 11 "Uncle Tom, 11 bad mouth, 11 "bust "main squeeze, 11 and dicty, crumbcrushers, 11 11 (For further i ndication of this dictional and ph onoloc;ical rich ness and the breadtb of Black Lan Guac;e, see T110 Dictio nary of .l\. mericnn Slane; , I' fo.jor's Dictionary of Afro-American Slun G, the "Glossory of Selected Terms" in The P::iycholoc;y of Black Laneuar,:e (Haskins and Butts), Abraham's Deep Down in the Junisle, Andrews' and Owens' Black Languac;e, Claerbout 1 s Black Jnr c on in White America, Twi ges' Pan-African Lanc;uaee in the Uestern IIemispher~, Welmers I African Lanr:t~~~ Structures, Kochman's Rappin 1 and Stylin' Out, and Dillard's Blac k English. Additionally the teacher or student will want to know the motivations of some of the poets. All poets, for example , do not rate being called "poets" in the traditional (white or Black) senso. Reddin g , in a recent Muhammad Speaks interview, accu::ied ::iome of tl10 new Black writers of lac kin~ 'moral and 1. G �esthetic t integrity I E',nd called them 'literary bustlersM Observing tl1at Baralrn recently s ic;ned a 10-year contract wi tb Random House, Redding said such an act is inconsistent with the poet's nationalistic assertions and positions. In a recent plack Worl~ article, novelist and poet Ishmael Reed spoke dispara~ingly of some of the new Black critics ("Blackopaths11) and poets ( 11 nationtime poets, 11 was the reference). Poet-essayist Lee has chided poet Nikki Giovanni for beinc.; an 11 individual 11 who lacks technical abilities; and in a recent issue of Jet magazine a reader irately asked if Miss Giovanni deserved respect after accepting a Homan-of-the-Year award from a national white woreen•s organization. Miss Giovanni and Reed were nominated for Pulitzer Prizes in 1973. a member of the older c;roup of poets, who was only Hayden, 17 years old when the Harlem Renaissance burned out, feels that Lee (praised by Gwendolyn Brooks, Hoyt Fuller of Black World, Randall and Baraka) has potential as a poet but lacks discipline and seems unable to separate poetic technique from ideological rantinc.;. On the other hand, Stephen Henderson, author-editor of Understand The New Black Poetry praises Lee relentlessly and says his popularity is "tantamount to stardoJo/.\ Henderson, who holds a Ph.D., is currently chairman of the new Humanities division at Howard University where Lee is a writer-in-residence. Miss Brooks gives Lee credit (in her introduction to The Poetry of Black America) for spawning much of tl10 contemporary Black consciousness literature . • 19 �~ Any seriouS~dealing with the development of Black poetry as a body of wri tine0 must be aware of these intense feelings and positions. One must also orc;anize orderly discussions or readings around the divergent views; in this way the classroom or rap sessions do not become melees and participants 1 get a complete picture of the richness and vastness of Black poetry and the political, social and historical tensions out of which the poetry is generated. \Jritinc; on the New Black Poetry, (The United States in Literature, Hiller, Hayden and 0 1 Neal), Hayden says: The emerc ence of a so-called school of Black Poetry in America has been one of the significant literary developments of the modern period. Althou 6h tlle Harlem Renaissance of the 1920 1 s brouc;ht certain Afro-American poets into prominence, it was not until the intensification of the civil rights struggle during the 1960 1 s that a separate group of black poets began to take shape. Avowedly nationalistic (that is~ racially proud) and scornf'ul of western aesthetics, these poets continued the protest tradition, historically associated with Negro writers. But they were more radical in outlook than their predecessors. Unlike the Harlem group, they rejected entry into the mainstream of American literature as a desirable c;oal. They insisted that their poetry • 20 �could not be judged by white standards, urging its importance as an expression of black consciousness. LeRoi Jones--the most influential of the young activist poets--Don L. Lee, Nikki Giovanni, Sonia Sa nchez, Nari Evans, Etherid ge Knight, and David Henderson attune their lyres to the 'black esthetic.' Not ye t satisfactorily defined, this term, orig inating in the sixties, Llay be interpreted as a sense of t h e spiritual nnd artistic values of bla ckness. It is, perh aps, n lo Gical (some would sny 'chauvinistic') reaction to nec;ative Ameri can racial attitudes. Perhaps the concept :l. :J best summarized by t11e slogan 'Black j :J beautiful.' Those who accept this point of view regard Hegre subject matter as their exclusive domain, feelin o; that only those who have shared 'black experience' can articulate it. Older poets wb6se work shows souie alignment with the Hew Black Poetry inc lud o Hargaret Walker and Gwendolyn Brooks, winner of the Pulitzer in 1950. 1.vhctber poetry should be valued primarily for the unique inner experience it can provide or for its effectiveness as polit ical or social statement 13 a question 21 �t h at often recurs in discussions of true function of art today. Hayden's openin3 comments, then, corrob orate the opening sentence to tl)is introduction--that Black poetry , re gardless of one's position on it, is one of the most important movements on t he liter a ry scene today. Yet, while it is excitin g to study this "poetry in process" (if you please), the enthusiast must be on guard not to skip the tradition (the folk precedents) in favor of plunging into a Black poem that heaps wi-•ath on Water gate conspirators, or urban policemen who shoot rioters and looters. Swirling around and through the whole range of Black poetry, then, is the complex and multi-leveled nature of Black life. VII Hany of the "literary hustlers" to whom Redding refers have capit a lized on the topical and episodic issues--with little or no training in the Black tradition or writing. Henc e , the student mu st assume that just because a statement is "relevo.nt, 11 it is poetry! Th e Black or white research er will "dig ••• deeper to the gold 11 --in the words of James David Carruthers-- and "es tablish " a sound tradition ac;ainst which to measure the Blac k poetry of today. If the Black poet in question fails, he fails because he collapses from t h e wei c;h t of the past--instead of being buoyed up by it. In estab lishing this sound tradition, the teachers and students must realize, first, that the Black Experience is not monolithic--although 22 �recurring trends and broad i mp lications do exist in the areas of langua ge , reli g ion, humor, dance, music and general life style. Oddly enough, however, there is often more consistency in what Blacks lmou about popular "American II culture. 4 There are several reasons for such a paradoxical i mb alance and lack of focus-- many or tbe:11 locked in the enigmatic see-saw of Black history. Ellison observed in the 19401s that if Black leaders ever unraveled the puzzle of the zoot suit and the dark glas ses (meaninr; the secret of Black urban 11 stylin rs " habits), they could, perhaps, take the political and psychologi cal reigns of Black masses from whites. observation was accurate. Ellison 1 s James Baldwin has written that, in Europe, he looked at the groat Renaissance masterpieces and felt as hame d t ha t his race had not produced such work. S/1t;.;IJ"" Baldwin was not aware that the great~TtallB.11 painter, Pablo '-I Picasso, hnd borrowed he avily fro m African motifs, nor that the architect, Le Corbousier, was greatly influenced by thatched-roof huts used in Africa by Balwinfs ancestors. The implications of this po.rt of my discussion a.re many and far reaching because central to the idea of teachine and learning is what teachers and students expect from each other. 4. Ellison's, For an exciting recitation and indictme nt via a "cultural quiz", listen to poet-critic Stanley Croucb 1 s Ain't Ho Ambulances for no 1Ti13c:ahs Tonicllt (Fly ine Dutchman). 23 �Crouch ' s and Baldwin's ob ser vations are ti mely and i mportant. They sug~es t to us t hnt many, if not most, of t he students who arc in Dlack poe try (Black Studies) classes do not h ave a working know l edc e of tbe tradition out of which t h e poetry grei-1. It has b e co me popular, in sol!le quarters, to i gn ore this fact which Ellison and otbers have so painfully and poignantly expressed. The teacher ~ 10 assumes that a class of Black (or white) students is knowledg eable about tbe Black literary tradition is in for real trouble and many disappointments. The fore going point cannot be stressed too often or too emph atically. I nteresti ngly enough , the majority of the persons wh o want to know something about Black poetry are not preoccupied with t he craft of poetry--,-1i th the hows and wh~rs of poetry. K.Rather =t;:;e students and casual readers, Black and wh ite, seem to be more interested in the sociolo g ical (some teach ers say "path olo gical 11 ) aspects of the poetry. Tbe s i tua.tion varies, of course, fro m campus to campus, from atmosph ere to at mosphere, und frot il Black to white to int.erracial settinc;s. Here again the enthusiast has to draw t h e line and keep the persuit of the poetry by 11 ti Ght 11 in terms of the discipline de ma nded the poetry itself, Another proble m~ investi gators confront is how to organize se Gments when an appreciation of the material is what is souc;ht. Tlie "appreciation" approach could be t h e result of one's initial conception of the poetry or dictated �by level of interest and preparation. A casual reader, for example, ·would not study the same poems with the same intensity as would a senior or graduate-level English major. ~ evertheless, ~ teach er, students and poetry lovers must bear in mind that th ey are investigating Black poetry and not mere ly some literary imitation of traditional Western poetry--even thou gh the two conver ge time and time a gain. Here, too, t he point cannot be over-emphasized because in the context of racial and intellectual mixtures, the melting pot ls all too often likely to boil over. Example: white students, well gr ounded in their own literary tradition and having a skeletal knowledge of Black Culture will want to surge abead. Hot recognizing that many Black ( and some w1) i te) students do not know the meanings of simple poetic devices (such as metapbor s , similes, alliteration and onomatopoeia), the inse nsiti ve t each er and "aggressive" students could press on to the point of premature destruction of group participation. Such situations occur over and over. Even t h e best teachers of literature often tak~ for granted that every student has been drilled in the use of fi gurative language. Ironically, many of t he students have been "drilled" in the figures; but, the holes opened by the drilling allowed the information to g o in one ear and out the other! :Many students, in the whir of words in the classroom and e;roup discussions will not say they do not know the names of poetic devices-especially if they h appen to be Black students and t h ink t h e j �instructor expects them to be 11 experts 11 on the Black Experience. On the other' h and, the intellectual snobbery that often accompanies t be development of student 11 clicks 11 sbould not be allowed to pre vai l in a course in Black poetry. Luckily, for teacher, student and general reader, t h e curve s and crests and peaks in t he study of Black poetry keep br ingi ng all aspects of human nat ure full circle. 26 �CHAPTER II THE BLACK AND UNKNOWN BARDS 0 black and unknown bards of long ago, How came your lips to touch the sacred fire? -- James Weldon Johnson I Origj_ns of Black Expression : In this chapter, as in subsequent ones, I will attempt to place the Black creative mind within the spirit and letter of an African-American cultural tradition. Unfortunately, many early scholars either played down or ignored African influences on Black American poetry. these early scholars. This was certainly not true of all For while some gloated over tbe "findings" of "Southern whites 11 --purpott ing to prove that the S piri tua:\-s were derived solely from English (Hymns and Psalms) sources-Johnson (Book of American Negro Spirituals, 1925), Professor Hork (Folk Song of the American Ne gro, 1915), and others, displayed faultless proof of Africanisms ~xisting in practically all Black American folk materials. The approach to this chapter will be via the philosophical concerns, updating some of the thinking on traditional African views and mannerisms in Black America • . Then brief consideration will be given the major trunks of the folk poetry: and the Seculars (or religious folk poetry and everyday workand-play folk poetry). I have included a fair representation of the original folk poetry. Tnis is appropriate, of course, 27 J The Spirituals �since most antholo gies of Black literature and poetry omit these items; and because without a knowled ge of them one will be hard-pressed to understand the Black poet 1 s use of folk materials ( se e Dunbar, Johnson, Brown, Hugh es, Hayden, Walker and othe rs). Howe ver, before discussing the ori gins of Black expression, we sh ould g ive mention to the role of t h e i;riot-or story teller--in pr e -industrial African (and other) societies. The Black poet, as creator and ch ronicler, stems from the group • of artisans known as griots--human records of fa mily and national lore. Ori ginally trained to recite--without flaw--the g ene- alogies, eulog i e s, v ictories and calamities of t h e folk, t h e griot (like t h e lead sing er of Spirituals) had to spice his ?' • reportag e with dramatic excitement. Hardly a Black youngster grew up (even in recent times) without input from a sort of 7 griot (uncl e , gra ndmoth er, bi g brother or sister, moth er o~ ::;:--- father, prea che r, e tc). The job of the gri(¢ like that of ) the ma~ er-cer emonial drummer, wa s so important that in many anci e nt societies a mistake could cost him his life. The griot began at a very early a ge his mastery of tec h nique and ini'ormation. Like the drummer, he u nderstudied an elder states man of the trade . His training demanded a certain psycholo gic a l adjustment to the si gnificance of h is job-which was to co ntain (and give advice on) t b e of the community. 11 heirloo ms 11 As years and centuries passed, t h is 11 factual" information was conv ert ed into a lore, m:r t h ology, cos molo c,-y and le gend; it became a part of the vast we b of racial co nscious- • 28 �ness and memory. It became the leg acy with which every new born child entered the world. Clearly, then, the myth-and lege nd- bu ilding Black poet has a past into which to dip and a future to predict, project and protect. And any violation of the past, present or future constitutes a serious cri me against one's ancestors--against one's parents, a Gainst one's blood, against one's god. So it follows that the poet--griot-- is not some haphaz/ardly arrived hipster or slick-talker simply mouthing tired old phrases. )/ To the Black g riot-sing er- ;< poet the job of unraveling the complex network of his past and present-future worlds is a painful but rewarding labor of love. We can say, then, that the Black Experience in the United States continues via the African Continuum: a complex of mythical ( see Jahn), linguistic (see Twiggs), gestural (see Emery, Black Dance), psychological, sexual, musical, physical and religious forms. This complex is evidenced in the day-to-day attitudes and activities of Blacks: their sacred and secular (or ganized and random) expressions, their physical appearances, their dress patterns and their fa mi ly life. Not only in the United States, but in the Caribbean, in the West Indi e s, in Latin America, in all areas of the world where Blacks live in substantial numb ers--they exhibit characteristics peculiar to the nature and culture of indigenous Africans. Naturally, general Black expression evolves from the myriad components of Black culture; and the artistic (son g , poetry) expression--traditional Black (African) 29 �c01;11nuni ties did r..ot s e parate life fro m art--is a more sophtsticate d for m honed fro m the ge neral "storehouse. Ho one ff has y ot put t l1 eir h ands on exactly Hhat moment i n ti r,1e ancl Hher c t lie f i rs t Af ri c an sou:1c1 :=.i or- ,,: ov er e nts He r e i ncorpo1,ated into 11 Hb i t e 11 0 1, 1!e ste r n fra mes of references or vice ve rsa; but 11e d o lm ou t 11 a t it did b app e n. Unfortunately , lnept reportin g on t be Black Experience bas muddied t h e waters so much t11at one is r e pul s ed and horrified b:r observations and conclusions of son:e Black and 1.1h i te "researchers. 11 In an un.flinchingly brilliant analysis of Black African Oral Lit erature, presented at the First World Festival of Ne gro Arts (1966) in Dakar, Senegal, Basile-.Juleat Fouda, notin g that 11 phrase oral literature is as old as creation," coined the 11 Arch ival Literature of Gesture. important revelations, Fouda □ aid: 11 Concluding his "Thus in tbe Black Africa. of tradition, literary art is an anonymous art because it is a social art; lt is a social art because it is a functional art; and it is functional because it is humanist. research is not bounded by color. 11 Good Bl~ck sociologist E. Franklin Frazier (Black Bour r;eosis) held(wrongly) that there were no significant carryovers (cultural transplants) from Africa to the Unit ed States. (Slavery, Frazier said, African of his culture and 11 11 s tr•ipped II the destroyed 11 his personality.) Wbite anthropologist Melville Herskovits (Tbe :Myth of the Ne gro Past) proved witbout a doubt tbat tbere were African operating daily in Black Americans culture. survivalisms 11 (For more thou ght • 30 11 �on this see Jahn• s Nuntu, Work I s findings, memoirs of Katherine Dunham, wor ks of Lorenzo Dow Turner, Negro Folk Music of Africa and America (Folkways, Lp) and others. ) Rudimentary Black expression and the numerous folk for ms J it produced (field h ollers, vendors shouts, chants, wor~songs, Sp irituals, blues , Gospels , jazz, rhythm 1 n blues, soul musi c) form the linguistic and modal bases for most Black poetry. The early song and chant for ms were almost always accompanied by what 1.-10 have come to call "dramatic ideograms 11 --or dances. Dance became one of the three basic artistic modes encapsulated by folk expression. The other two are Song and Drum. Aside fro m being the first means of communicating over distances, the drum also played a major role in the social lives of traditional African peoples. The career drummer, like the Black American musician today, went through year s of grue ling practice and preparation--learning not only drrnrunin13 techniques but the lec;ends, t11e myths, the meanings and symbols of which the drum was derivative. Dance always accompanied song--Fouda refers to the "acoustical phonetic alpl1abet"--so that the complex web of oral nuances was illustrated vividly and graph ically. Obviously, when teaching or entertainin~, the artist/teacher had to present his material in interesting and exciting ways so as not to bore tbe audience. Thus repetition became a backbone of Black expression--a flexible, buoyant repetition that was designed to reinforce and increase group participation. The three essential modes --drum, song and dance~- h eigbtened 31 �the i mmediate experience, which was ecstatic, therapeutic, spiritual, visceral and revelatory. Added to these intricate and vary ing modal patterns were the colorful costumes, make-up, props and i mportant subject matter. Tbe achievement was not just t h e vicarious experience but one of the act and symbol being actualized tog ether. \ln1ile such a prospect boggles the mind, a serious study of these forms and the general tradition will prove eye -o pening for many a disbeliever. Early Black American oral and gestural art for ms inherit ed t he qualities described thus far. In language, in danc e , and, more i mportantly, in points of view (attitudes) tmrnrd time, life and death, the cosmology of Africa "continued 11 (with some modifications) in the Black culture of the Western Hemisphere. S pecifically, information was conveyed by way of aph oris ms, riddles, parables, tales, enigmatic dances and · sound s (tonal scales), jokes and poetry. 6b lique and cry ptic utterances, puzzles, The pattern rerna1.ns it\jact today. Jahn's l1untu d ocuments many examples of t h e African "carry overs" and 11 survi valis ms 11 operating in t h e Western He misph ere. 1. One can Ii1or a brilliant and COGent statement on t li is aspect of Black expression see Samuel Allen's "The African Heritage" in the Jan., 1971, issue of Black World. Allen--also known as Paul Vesey--is an acknowled ged authority on b oth African and Afro-American culture. 11 In the article, he finds African carry overs 11 in t h e Black American cburch (Baldwin), literature (Sterlin g Brown, Cleaver) and secular life. 32 �find the tradition in Black poets, in the sermons of Black ministers and in family and otber social gatherings. Tbe scintillatine Black poet Tolson operates in the old enigmatic (word-fencj_ ng ) frame when in "An Ex-Judge at tbe Bar• 11 he says: Bartender, make it straight and make it twoOne for the you in me and one for the me in you. Tolson (known to carry this Black nature into his teaching at Langston University where he reportedly gave a student an "F" to the 20th power) ends the poem with an equally eni gmatic mock: Bartender, make it straie;ht and make it threeOne for the Negro ••. one for you and me . In the Spirituals (to be discussed) one finds similar debts to the African tradition of Sonc;, Dance and Drum. So too in the shouts and hollers where actual African words and phrases were often used. 2 Hence we can say that the traditional African phonolo~y and ritual, modified on the anvil of slavery , were operatin0 and continue to be represented in different forms of Black American expression. The African slave, forced to acquire functional use of Enclish and to reject surface aspects of his religion, went "underground" so to speak and became bi-lingual and bi-physical. 2. Hence, while much of the The fine poet Raymond Patterson (26 Ways of Looking at a Black Man) is currently assembling a book listing several hundred African words that are used daily in the American 33 �th ematic material of the Black folk tradition is taken from the harsh difficulties the slave encountered in America, the for m, spirit and phonology were essentially African. Th e use of poly-rhythms 3 and the introduction of syncopation, the reliance on various rhythmic instruments (drum-related and sometime s invented), tbe adherence to a non-European tonal scale and the employment of the blue tone, the development of a distinct body of folklore and a rich langua Ge to convey the lore--all represent the African's resourcefulness. Cross-cultural inputs are also evident, however, in--for examp le--the Spirituals which, in many cases, were influenced by t he English Hymn and the Psalm. Other considerations in- clude the slave's use of European instruments (Baraka points out, in Blac k Mus ic, that the piano was the last instrument to be mastered by the Black musician. L~ The reason ought to be obvious.), th e Black adaptation of songs heard in the "big house, 11 the continual r e -styling of American fads and the vocabulary. See bib liography for more on('§)li ttle known area of scholarship. 3. Isaac Faggett, a young Black composer-band director in Sacrame nto, Calif., has said that the word "poly-rhythm" (Le., many rhyth ms overlapping each other) should perhaps b e replaced by or alternated with the words 4. 11 poly-me ter 11 or "poly- metrics. Eileen Southern, in Th e }~sic of Black Americans, sets fort h a t ho rough and accurate discussion of these points. 34 She 11 �employme nt of Biblical i ma gery and langua ge in songs and sermons. Langston IIugbes noted tbat the Blues usually dealt with the theme of the rejected lover and personal depression. Hughes' first volume of poe ms , in fact, was entitled The Weary Blues. However, th e Blues, like the Spirituals, do not simply preacb resignation or submissiveness. Rather, as J ~ and Howard Thurman (The Nec;r o Spiritual Speaks of Life and Dao.th) note, underneath the comp laint is a "plaint": or change! tbin gs mu st e; et better For as the slave said: Freedom, oh Freedom, how I love thee! Freedom, 011 Freedom, how I love thee! And before I'll be a slave I'll b e buried in my grave And go h ome to my Maker and be Freel II Black Folk Roots in America: rrGet it together or leave it alone" --Jackson Five Black poets have been writing in the English literary tradition since the middle of the ei gh teenth century. But notes with some detail bow the Africans (made slaves) had to learn to use t he instrwnents of the New World. Professor Southern also relates b ow Black music influenced whites in the ear ly days of America. 35 \ �it is the folk lit erature--those productions of the everyday people--which must be examined before a literary or poetic tradition can be viewed in its entirety. There are few persons in the United States who have not been touched or influenced ( in one way or• another) by the folk express ion of Black America. 1,n1i t e .Americans began collectine; Black folk lyrics and s to1.,i es in the early :,B ars of t he ni neteentl1 century (see bib lio Gr aphy). In the same century, this aspect of Black culture reached wide audiences via at least three major vehicles. '11he first was the abolitionist movement which featured Black pootn (Francis E.W. Harper, Jame s 1foi tf ield, Benjamin Clark, and others), orators and prose writers (David 1valker, Frederick Douglass, etc.), and journalists (John Rus swurm , etc). The second vehicle was the national and Euro pean tours (i n the 1 87o•s) of student choirs fro m Hampton Institute and F is k (~10 Jubilee Singers) University. The abolitionist n1ovement popularized anti-slavery and freedom songs and the college choirs gave wide exposur e to the Spiri tuals, consi dered by most scholars (of Black· culture) to be the first 7> ~ authentic poetry of Black America. Tlrn third major vehic le was the publication ( in t he late nineteenth century) of Br1 'er Ra1 )b i t tales by J oe l Chandler Harris. In studies and writincs, Harris reco cn iz ed tl'ic r.-1ytbi c 1101,th in Black folktales \ at i d , exposed ' readers to su cl1 cl1aractor c as Frcr ':L1errapin, Drer B0ar , nrcr ~ ~ ~ \ r 1.fo lf and ot}; crs . Fox, Erc n Hany of tlrnso tales and clrn. r·a cters have African co unterpar ts. 36 � Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Eugene B. Redmond Digital Collection Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Text Any textual data included in the document Text Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context EBRWritings_08_12 Title A name given to the resource Copy of Drumvoices: The Mission of Afro-American Poetry: A Critical History, p. 14-36, typed manuscript with handwritten edits Description An account of the resource Copy of Drumvoices: The Mission of Afro-American Poetry: A Critical History, p. 14-36, typed manuscript with handwritten edits. Draft includes part of section V, section VI, and the beginning of Chapter II. The Black and Unknown Bards. Relation A related resource Eugene B. Redmond Digital Collection Language A language of the resource English Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource For digital rights and permissions, see <a href="https://www.siue.edu/lovejoy-library/about/policies.shtml">https://www.siue.edu/lovejoy-library/about/policies.shtml</a> or contact <a href="mailto:library@siue.edu">library@siue.edu</a> for direct inquiries. In copyright. <a href="http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/">http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/</a> Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Redmond, Eugene B.