Reflecting Group 6

This time period was rawer and everyone told the truth about what they were going through and about the things that were going on around them. There are many great authors in the time period Literature Since 1975.

1. Pick your favorite author and one of their poems and analyze it?
Or
2. Pick one of the authors that you do not like and analyze one of the poems you do not like?
This is my response to the question above, posted by Lakeshia…
One of my favorite authors of this time period is Maya Angelou
Still I Rise, by Maya Angelou, she describes the basic feelings and descriptions of a person that does not need loathing or people to try and lift her up. She shows us that she and all those oppressed in general are strong. We are shown some of the thoughts and feelings people have displayed against her, but the reality is she won't let them get her down. Her moral opulence allows her to rise above where her ancestors fell to slavery, carrying herself as a strong woman. Her ancestors' dream was to have a life in society without fear of what might happen (to them). The author is portrayed as this dream - this gift - her ancestors imagined. Still I Rise is a sublime, straightforward poem that acknowledges that we need not depend upon anyone else's opinion but our own. Maya expresses not only her good qualities, but also her unfavorable ones, yet even these are turned into positive ideas. This poem can only be read by us now because she has confidence in herself, her writing, and can express it so freely.

Black Arts Era

This is my response to Kelly McCann, her question was… Discuss how the civil rights movement and the difficulties it faced affected the literature of the time period using examples from the assigned readings.
The Civil Rights movement faced a lot of adversity during its active years, especially in the Southern states where segregation and racial tension were still evident. Members of the Civil Rights movement were often arrested and imprisoned, despite the fact that they often used nonviolent demonstrations to promote their cause. Nonviolence was often countered with violence, which administered tremendous pressure on the Civil Rights movement to find the strength to stand up and continue fighting for their cause. The Civil Rights Movement took place between the years of 1955 and 1968, making it an integral part of the Black Arts era. The Black Power movement was initiated simultaneously along with the Civil Rights movement and helped broaden the objectives that the Civil Rights movement sought to achieve. Among these objectives were desegregation and freedom from racial oppression. Some of the organizations that had a hand in the Civil Rights movement included the NAACP, CORE, SNCC and SCLC. Some of the well known individuals who were heavily involved in the Civil Rights movement included Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., W.E.B. DuBois, Malcolm X, and Rosa Parks. Perhaps the most active and outspoken advocate for the Civil Rights movement, Dr. King won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964. Due to the immense impact that the Civil Rights movement had on the African American community at the time, its effect on the Black Arts era literature was inevitable. Some examples of the influence that the Civil Rights movement had on the assigned readings include “In Memoriam: Martin Luther King, Jr.” by June Jordan, and “Riot” by Gwendolyn Brooks. Both of these poems were based on the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., the aforementioned leader of the Civil Rights movement.

Sonia Sanchez: Blog 11

My blog is about Sonia Sanchez and some of her works. Sonia was born in Birmingham, Alabama. She attended Hunter College. At the beginning she was an integrationist poet, until she heard a speech from Malcolm X and her views became more geared towards vernacular poetry. In the late sixties she helped forward the movement for black studies at San Francisco State College. In 1972 she formally entered into the nation of Islam. Her book homegirls & handgrenades won the American Book Award in 1985. In her poem Homecoming I think she is talking about the difference of how things are when she was there before and how they are now that she has come home. She talks about the Niggers are killing themselves with drugs and how the females looked like they lost all aspirations for their dreams. Then she finishes by saying “ain’t like they say in the newspapers”. With that statement I’m guessing that the newspapers are saying that everything is well, it’s not reporting the bad things going on. In her poem “for our lady” she is addressing Billie Holiday, a jazz vocalist frequently referred to as Lady Day. She is talking about how much better Billie Holiday’s music could have been. For the first half she talks about if someone would have loved Billie from her younger days that her music would have been that much better. The second half she talks about is a man would have been in her life and treated her right; her music would have been that much better. I think Sanchez made this because she feels like maybe Billie Holiday was dealt a rough life. And she feels like with different situations that Billie Holiday could have been that much better of a Musician.