Sterling Notes Newsletter | Volume 4 Issue 1 by Sterling Notes

HOWARD UNIvERsITY

STERLING

NOTES

“PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE” As the end of another academic year draws near, the members of the Sterling Allen Brown Eng lish Society would like to welcome you to our Spring 2009 newsletter. This edition of Sterling Notes is cen tered upon the theme “Past, Present, and Future,” and delves into the work of writers, artists, and intel lectuals spanning generations and genres. Howard University students and faculty have composed works on film, literature, and music unified in their inten tion to show connections between people and ideas across tmie and place. We hope that as you read this collection of essays and creative writing pieces, you will gain a sense of what connects us all to the past, the present, and the future.

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2008-2009 Officers President: Kelly McCray Vice President: Maria Garrison Secretory: Zahra Gordon

Treasurer: Takeisha Carr

Newsletter Subcommittee Members Editor: RaShawn Mitchner Staffi Natasha Block, Dominique Daniels, Otibho Okojie, Brandon Graham, Shayla Monroe, Catherm Saunders, Britney Wilson, An astacia Mebane, and Sophia Adem

—RaShawn Mitchner

Faculty Advisor: Yasmin DeGout

Contributing Writers Students: Terrance Williams

CONGRATUEATIONS! The Department of English wishes to congratu late SABES President Kelly McCray, who has been se lected to receive a Fuibright award to teach in Thailand and also for membership in Phi Beta Kappa!

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The Department also wishes to congratulate Jamila Glad ney, a graduating English major who has been accepted to the How ard University School of Law! ;::.-.

Faculty: Drs. Eleanor Traylor, James Keil, Kristin Bergen, and Elisa Oh

INsIDE TEllS ISSUE: Faculty Spotlight

Department Leadership

Yesterday’s Paintbrush

Blackness and Time

The Revolution

‘Til Death

Richard Wright Essay

The Shadow

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Film Review

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W.E.B. DuBois Essay

Yesterday, Today, Tomor-

An Ideology Called Cool

Book Review

Swahili Program

Mary Wroth Essay

Heart’s Day Coverage

Toni Morrison Essay

Book Review

Puzzle

Rememory

Announcements

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FACULTY SPOTLIGHT: DR. ELEANOR TRAYLOR Dr. Eleanor Traylor, esteemed chair of the depart will be stepping down from her post at the English, of ment end of this academic year. As this edition of Sterling Notes looks at the past, the present, and the future, my recent dis cussion with Dr. Traylor concerns the history that led her to Howard University, her views on the current state of dis course, and the vision she has for students. Dr. Traylor’s interest in the field of education began early; she says her teachers “were among the most interesting and eccenthc and stimulating beings” in her life. Her devotion to academia was fostered at Spelman College, where she completed her undergraduate studies. (She later received her M.A. and Ph.D. from Atlanta University and Catholic Uni versity, respectively.) “My respect for the legacy of the de partment of English at Howard is huge,” Dr. Traylor says. “Even when I was a student at Spehnan College in Atlanta, Georgia, when persons like Dr. Howard Thurman, legendary dean of the chapel at Howard, and then-professor James Nabrit would speak at our morning requisite chapel services, I was in awe.” One of Dr. Traylor’s professors later wrote a letter

of recommendation to Sterling Brown for her to become a member of Howard’s jun ior faculty. “‘I’m sending my child to you,’” Dr. Traylor recalls the professor writing. Since that time, she says, she has revered the thought that has emerged from Howard University’s de partment of English and how that creativity has affected the world. She has “therefore viewed the chairmanship with a degree of wonder and a fierce sense of obligation to, if not live up to, at least aspire to what has been one of the most distinguished achievements of American scholarship.” With those achievements in mind, Dr. Traylor university’s English professors as well as their col the praises leagues in other departments. These are the individuals, she says, who have cultivated much of the discourse on such is sues as race, class, gender, and cultural critique. Dr. Traylor describes her engagement with students as “an ongoing con versation,” and asserts that they will be the ones to take on the task of furthering discourse in these areas. —RaShawn Mitchner

THE FUTURE LEADERSHIP OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH Dr. James Keil is the chair of the APT Committee of the Department of English and also recently served as chair ofthe Search Committee for the Chairperson of the Department of English. [Sterling Notes] asked me to speak about how the leadership of the Department is created, and I’ve decided to speak first about English departments generally rather than this department in particular. Department chairs are drawn from the ranks of the tenured faculty and usu ally have the support of the department faculty and university administration because of their reputations as teachers, scholars, and contribu tors to the past administration of their depart ment, college, and university. The support of the faculty is important to the success of the chair and the administration of the department because ten ured faculty cannot be fired, as workers can in the corporate world, for disagreeing with the direction the new boss is talc ing the department. Faculty members often have their own outspoken vision for the department, and chairs must seek to govern by consensus rather than fiat. Chairs usually serve a three-year term with the pos sibility of renewal for another term. The chair is paid a sti pend over and above their faculty salary, but it often doesn’t make up for the added aggravation that is heaped upon the chair. A chair must have a vision of what the department can be and herd the department’s many and noisy “cats” in that

direction. A chair must mediate between the demands of the university administrators and the needs of the department’s faculty and students. He or she must try to stick to a budget, justify the need for additional tenure lines, oversee a staff of non-faculty, and listen to parents’ concerns when little Johnetta isn’t doing as well in Sophomore Seminar as the par ents expected. All this on top of the usual demands he or she faces to publish, speak at conferences, work on committees, and teach courses. Therefore, after 3 or 6 years of this stress, chairs are usu ally anxious to hand over their title and stipend and return to a quieter life of teaching and scholarship—even though their vision for the department may not yet have been realized. At Howard, the faculty does not elect its own chairs but rather elects someone whom they recommend to the ad ministration. We are fortunate this year to have two highly qualified candidates standing for election, Drs. Shannon and Williams, and in an election in March, the faculty chose to recommend Dr. Williams. The Dean also makes a recom mendation, and both recommendations go forward to the provost and president. Ultimately, it is the president and board of trustees who will choose from one of these two can didates or some other faculty member the new leadership of the Department of English.

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AUTHOR INTERVIEW MARITA GOLDEN ON THE HiSTORY, THE PRESENT MOMENT AND THE FUTURE OF BLACK WRITING It’s the Tuesday of spring break, and the sun shines brightly through the blinds of my mother’s house. My heart beats with anticipation as the clock now reads 11:00 a.m., and I dial the number issued to me by the woman herself, Ms. Marita Golden. To describe Ms. Golden as any one thing seems con fining for a woman who has given her effort to projects in so many fields. A woman who would come to birth thirteen books—among them award-winning novels—Ms. Golden was born in Washington, D.C., began her higher education at American University, where she obtained a Bachelor of Arts, and continued on to Columbia Univer sity, where she earned her Masters in journalism. From there, Golden’s gift for writing would lead her on an extraordi nary journey that would span thirty years and counting. In addition to being an es teemed writer, Golden has taken it upon herself to use her innate gifts to enhance the writing of others. She has taught at several universities and also founded the Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Foundation. Golden’s articles and essays have appeared in Essence Magazine, the New York Times and the Washington Post. As a writer and literary activist, she has received many honors, including The 2002 Distinguished Service Award from the Author’s Guild, the 2001 Barnes and Noble Writers for Writers Award, an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Richmond, and the Woman of the Year Award from Zeta Phi Beta Sorority. Thus, Golden serves as a role model not only for African Americans and writers across the globe, but also for African American women who strive not only to be part of the realm of literature but also to take it by the reigns as gracefully as Ms. Golden has. Listing all the accomplishments of the esteemed Ms. Golden explains why my nerves seem to rattle as I anticipate our talk. However, after the phone rings for the third time, my nerves are soothed by a voice that is warm, crisp, articu late and welcoming. She asks me to hold, much to my relief; now I feel comfortable catching my breath. Then she is back and we begin. I begin by asking, “As for literature as a whole, what would you consider to be must reads?”

Ms. Golden feels that her summer reading has been profitable and wishes to share the titles of the books she has recently read. She begins by mentioning a memoir by a corre spondent of the New York Times, Helene Cooper’s House on Sugar Beach. She describes this piece as a “coming of age” tale and pronounces it “fascinating,” adding that this memoir con tains a significant amount of historical fact. Secondly, Ms. Golden suggests the book Beaut!fihl Struggle, by Ta-Nehisi Conies. She goes on to tell me that the author’s father worked at Howard in the Moorland-Spingarn Library and that this, too, is a coming of age story, one that centers around the relationship between a father and son. The final work that she mentions is Song Yet Sung, by James McBride, which deals heavily with the desire for freedom. Golden recommends these books to any and everyone seeking a good read. On the topic of literature, I ask Ms. Golden which author of the past she would meet, if she could do so. With little hesitation, she says Langston Hughes. She chooses Langston Hughes because he was, in her words, “an interna tionalist who traveled the world.” Having just finished reading Ms. Golden’s memoir, Don’t Play in the Sun, I know that she has done a significant amount of traveling herself, so I ask her if she thinks that Hughes’s experiences were different from hers. She responds that she believes their experiences would be both similar and different—different, of course, because of the differing time periods in which they traveled and similar because, in regard to international travel, in her words, “people are open to you if you are open to them.” After we had gone back in time, I then decide to ask Ms. Golden’s opinion of the current state of our country. I ask her, “What impact, if any, do you feel the new world will have on literature? (For clarity, the new world pertains to our new leadership with President Obaxna in office, the current economic situation, etc.).” Golden is quick to answer by suggesting that we are only at the brink of a new world and that it’s “too soon to impact literature.” However, she does say that she believes elements from modern times will “trickle down and inspire more imaginative stories.”

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AUTHOR INTERVIEW: MARITA GOLDEN ON THE HISTORY, THE PRESENT MOMENT , AND THE FUTURE OF BLACK WRITING It’s the Tuesday of spring break, and the sun shines Ms. Golden feels that her summer reading has been brightly through the blinds of my mother’s house. My heart profitable and wishes to share the titles of the books she has beats with anticipation as the clock now reads 11:00 a.m., recently read. She begins by mentioning a memoir by a corre and I dial the number issued to me by the woman herself, Ms. spondent of the New York Times, Helene Cooper’s House on Marita Golden. Sugar Beach. She describes this piece as a “coming of age” tale To describe Ms. Golden as any one thing seems con and pronounces it “fascin ating,” adding that this memoir con fming for a woman who has given her effort to projects in so tains a signifi cant amount of historical fact. Secondly, Ms. many fields. A woman who would come to birth thirteen Golden suggests the book Beautiflu Struggle, by Ta-Nehisi books—among them award-winning novels—Ms. Golden Coates. She goes on to tell me that the author’s father was born in Washington, D.C., began her higher education at worked at Howard in the Moorland-Spingarn Library and that American University, where she obtained a Bachelor of Arts, this, too, is a coming of age story, one that centers around and continued on to Columbia Univer the relationship between a father and son. sity, where she earned her Masters in The final work that she mentions is Song journalism. From there, Golden’s gift for Yet Sung, by James McBride, which deals writing would lead her on an extraordi heavily with the desire for freedom. nary journey that would span thirty years Golden recommends these books to any and counting. In addition to being an es and everyone seeking a good read. teemed writer, Golden has taken it upon On the topic of literature, I ask Ms. herself to use her innate gifts to enhance Golden which author of the past she the writing of others. She has taught at would meet, if she could do so. With several universities and also founded the little hesitation, she says Langston Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Hughes. She chooses Langston Hughes Foundation. because he was, in her words, “an interna Golden’s articles and essays have appeared in Essence tionalist who travele d the world.” Magazine, the New York Times and the Washington Post. As a Having just finished reading Ms. Golden’s memoir, writer and literary activist, she has received many honors, Don’t Play in the Sun, I know that she has done a significant including The 2002 Distinguished Service Award from the amount of traveling herself, so I ask her if she thinks that Author’s Guild, the 2001 Barnes and Noble Writers for Hughes’s experiences were different from hers. She responds Writers Award, an Honorary Doctorate from the University that she believe s their experiences would be both similar and of Richmond, and the Woman of the Year Award from Zeta differe nt—different, of course, because of the differing time Phi Beta Sorority. Thus, Golden serves as a role model not periods in which they traveled and siniilar because, in regard only for African Americans and writers across the globe, but to interna tional travel, in her words, “people are open to you also for African American women who strive not only to be if you are open to them.” part of the realm of literature but also to take it by the reigns After we had gone back in time, I then decide to ask as gracefully as Ms. Golden has. Ms. Golden’s opinion of the current state of our country. I Listing all the accomplishments of the esteemed Ms. ask her, “What impact , if any, do you feel the new world will Golden explains why my nerves seem to rattle as I anticipate have on literatu re? (For clarity, the new world pertains to our our talk. However, after the phone rings for the third time, new leadership with President Obarna in office, the current my nerves are soothed by a voice that is warm, crisp, articu economic situatio n, etc.).” late and welcoming. She asks me to hold, much to my relief; Golden is quick to answer by suggesting that we are now I feel comfortable catching my breath. Then she is back only at the brink of a new world and that it’s “too soon to and we begin. impact literature.” However, she does say that she believes I begin by asking, “As for literature as a whole, what elements from moder n times will “trickle down and inspire would you consider to be must reads?” more imaginative stories.”

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AUTHOR INTERVIEW: MARITA GOLDEN ON THE HISTORY, THE PRESENT MOMENT, AND THE FUTURE OF BLACK WRITING these stories, writers should address issues that arise in inner Staying in the present, I ask another question: cities, such as “drugs, violence, sex and coming up hard,” you Do works. your “Popular culture is often discussed in Golden says. what on see elements of this ‘new world’ having any effect Now it is time for my last question: “In your auto the world perceives as beautiful?” biographical novel Don’t Play in the Sun, you say, ‘Like Zora, Golden answers quickly with a yes. She mentions in my mother I found perhaps one of the most important that popular culture has been able to “exploit the vision of beauty,” which she describes as very narrow. She says that she things a writer needs—permission from someone they love to venture into the unknown.’ For all aspiring writers out there doubts things will change entirely, but counter-argues that without a parental figure of encouragement, what would you She the presence of Michelle Obama will have some impact. say to christen their journey into the unknown?” suggests that seeing a woman of color and dignity Ms. Golden urges aspiring writers to take in a high position will enlighten some. writing classes and establish a writing group or “Your works share common themes of Lts community. In her words, “it’s hard to be a writer family, self-love,” I say, turning to another ques AU in solitude.” To provide a sort of nesting place for female black of the aspects tion, “and often reflect African-American writers, Golden has budding few of the experience in America, to name only a the Zora Node Hurston/Richard Wright founded ideas that recur in your pieces. Of all your themes, Foundation, which takes as its mission “training, what would you hope is conveyed most strongly? honoring and supporting writers.” Golden credits At the same time, your new book is entitled It’s All this organization with assisting “hundreds of writ Love. How did you arrive at this title?” in their craft and with “creating opportunities” ers” stating by response her Golden begins This same opportunity is available to us writers. for these behalf of the on that this is the second anthology published University: Howard here at for Hurston/ Wright Foundation. She traces the inspiration the title of the anthology to a newspaper article that discussed A Nurturing, Supportive Two-Day Workshop/Retreat the desire of a selection of African-American males from Southeast Washington, D.C., to be fathers. At the same time, Led by Acclaimed Author and Veteran Teacher of Writ ing Marita Golden (Presented by Words of Power LLC) though, they didn’t see the need for marriage. She says that I Want to Write! thus and lived where they they saw no functioning marriages This drew the conclusion that marriage was for white people. April 24./25, 2009 article got Golden thinking about marriage, and she decided July 17/18, 2009 that she wanted to refute this perception of marriage, which August 7/8, 2009 seemed to be growing among young black men. Since we are on the topic of her new book, I ask Ms. Location: Thurgood Marshall Ctr., 1816 12th Skeet N.W., Golden, “How is this book similar to and different from your Washington, D.C. 20009 other works?” Questions? Call: 301-459-2108 Golden states that this anthology still addresses the Time: Classes meet from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. each day. issue of community, which is common in all her works. With this anthology, however, Golden strays from the cliché be As I thank Ms. Golden for her time, she asks me ill cause, in her words, “writers seem to tell the same story.” “What I ask, Riture, of received her email informing sue of her upcoming writer’s Turning to the topic the next workshops. I say yes, and I remember being touched that a would do you hope to see from the black writers of the woman of her success desires to spread her gifts to others. I generation that you haven’t seen already?” inform her that Howard anticipates her visit in April, and I Golden says that she hopes black writers will write can hear her smile. stories that come out of the inner city. (She acknowledges In more). see hopes to but stories, urban some are that there

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YESTERDAY’S PAINTBRUSH Yesterday’s sky, though so far away, was painted a light blue. But the paint today seemed chipped away, leaving a darker hue. Yesterday’s trees stood ten times as strong, with their leaves painted green. But today, instead, when you look up ahead, nothing green can be seen. With one gush of wind and one blast of cold, today made itself known. It forced yesterday far away, and in its place ignorance had grown. As I sat on a bench alone in the park, the green grass no longer lush, An old woman appeared and suddenly feared the sight of yesterday’s paintbrush. She stopped where she was, gathered her sight, and asked, “What’s wrong with you?” But with sudden disgrace, I looked at her face. .and saw that her sky was light blue! .

I told her on yesterday, I was painted dark orange, as strong as the summer heat. But today, one can say, that I’ve been chipped away, the orange snatched from under my feet

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The woman explained that I struggled in vain to keep yesterday’s paintbrush entwined, When in reality, it’s true, all I needed to do, was leave yesterday’s paintbrush behind. Though she made it quite clear, that yesterday, so dear, should in no way be forgotten,

She did also mention that those in my condition should try not to have yester day “re-begotten.” With one final farewell, she left me alone to ponder the words she gave away. She was right, it’s true, all I’ve been trying to do, is repaint myself into yesterday. Though today my sky wasn’t painted light blue, for the first time I noticed its true tint. It was painted, instead, the color of hope, though dark, I knew what it meant. It was scarlet in one corner and navy in another, and as the sun started to decline,

I fathomed tomorrow with great optimism, as I left today’s paintbrush behind. No longer would I try to repaint a day, to make it resemble the past. Instead, I’ll highlight the beauty of each, all the way up to my last.

—Brandon M. Graham

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But today, instead, when you look up ahead, nothing green can be seen. With one gush of wind and one blast of cold, today made itself known. It forced yesterday far away, and in its place ignorance had grown. As I sat on a bench alone in the park, the green grass no longer lush, An old woman appeared and suddenly feared the sight of yesterday’s paintbrush. She stopped where she was, gathered her sight, and asked, “What’s wrong with you?” But with sudden disgrace, I looked at her face.. .and saw that her sky was light blue! I told her on yesterday, I was painted dark orange, as strong as the summer heat. But today, one can say, that I’ve been chipped away, the orange snatched from under my feet. The woman explained that I struggled in vain to keep yesterday’s paintbrush entwined, When in reality, it’s true, all I needed to do, was leave yesterday’s paintbrush behind. Though she made it quite clear, that yesterday, so dear, should in no way be forgotten, She did also mention that those in my condition should try not to have yesterday “re begotten With one fmal farewell, she left me alone to ponder the words she gave away She was right, it’s true, all I’ve been trying to do, is repaint myself into yesterday. Though today my sky wasn’t painted light blue, for the first time I noticed its true tint. It was painted, instead, the color of hope, though dark, I knew what it meant. It was scarlet in one corner and navy in another, and as the sun started to decline, I fathomed tomorrow with great optimism, as I left today’s paintbrush behind No longer would I try to repaint a day, to make it resemble the past. Instead, I’ll highlight the beauty of each, all the way up to my last.

—Brandon M. Graham

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BIACKNESS AND TIME: WE, OUR, US “What Ellison is alluding to is that blackness gives one a different sense of time.” I love it when, out of the blue, a professor just takes it to the bottom of the ocean, blows my mind, gets me to thinking. blackness and time. Like Effison’s novel Invisible Man, this topic conjures sounds and images of jazz and box ers and ghosts. I left my professor’s class thinking about Blackness and time, my thoughts eventually landing squarely in my childhood at my Aunt Dorothy’s table. Aunt Dorothy was responsible for handing down the oral histories of our fam ily, and in her mouth, those histories were alive. We were brought over. We escaped. We overcame. We, our, us. Our ancestors were not distinguished from the living by time. Nothing separated them from us, not even death; for there was no them, only us. Blackness and time: we, our, us. Without even knowing it, my professor had set me off. Now I had ques tions. How could people born centuries ago be us? Do Afri can Americans have a warped sense of time? Is this the rea son why black people (even though we won’t publicly admit it) routinely interact with the dead like it’s the most natural thing on earth? Are we a haunted people? I grabbed a note book and took off for Locke Hall. I wasn’t sure who could solve the mystery, but it all sounded pretty philosophical to me, so I walked right into Dr. Goodin’s office, introduced myself and asked for his opinion. “Why did you pick me?” he asked. “Because when you click the link for Howard’s philosophy department, your picture comes up.” That got him laughing, which was good because what I hadn’t told him was that word of his hardcore reputa tion had reached my ears many moons ago. I put my ques tions on the table. He mulled them over, philosopher style, and answered the question of pronouns first. Part of it was the overlapping of generations. DuBois died three years after Dr. Goodin was born. You wouldn’t necessarily put the distance of time between yourself and someone with whom you shared the earth, even briefly. So when you speak of the struggle, the race, the pronoun we may simply be evi dence of the way generations overlap, he explained. I could buy that, but what about black folks and our emotional in volvement in the past? “That is remembrance, valuing the past that formed you as a people,” Dr. Goodin said. “There is no rigid line between past, present and future. It is fluid.” To hear an anthropological take on the “we” ques

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tion, I went to the Cobb

Laboratory in Douglass Hall and spoke to Professor Mark Mack. Fittingly, we were utterly surrounded by real bones. “It is the shared history of oppression that makes us a we. There were so many times when African Americans could have died out. The collective we is the main ingredi ent of our survival. If we were not a we, we would be ex tinct.” His words, and this new dimension of we, warmed me until he said, “But we’ve lost that now.” I felt like I still had it, I explained, because the “we” language had been passed down to me. Then I asked him about the differences in cultural concepts of continuity. I’m from Memphis, an entire city that seems to love nothing more than to dialogue about race. We dialogue at the library and town ball, in the park, on the news, in the mall. We’re the talkin’est damned town you ever did see. But even as a teenager, I noticed why these prolific dialogues were not going anywhere: each side was using different pro nouns. White people were saying, “I’m not a slave owner; you’re not a slave. They [my ancestors] enslaved them [your ancestors] a long, long time ago and that has nothing to do with now.” Black people were saying, “Stop trying to wig gle out of the fact that y’all enslaved us. Then y’all Jim Crowed us. We have been putting up with y’all for 400 hun dred years.” Is this what happens when blackness meets time? Professor Mack’s answer was sociological: “The American identity is focused on the individual. Individualism does not allow for looking into the past. It allows one to say, ‘Don’t blame me for slavery. The advantage of past generations has nothing to do with my present success.’” The link to mate rial wealth was profound. It doesn’t behoove the descen dents of slave owners to refer to their ancestors as we unless they’re ti-yingto give up some kind of reparations, which they’re not. I left the lab full of bones and sought a historical perspective at the Founders Library. I tracked down histo rian Dr. Greg Carr, who answered from a scientffic perspec tive: “A friend of mine, a professor at Fisk, likes to remind r

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descendents of slave owners to refer to their ancestors as we advent of clocks. Time takes on new meaning in Europe in unless they’re trying to give up some kind of reparations, the I 700s when you see these big clock towers placed right in which they’re not. the center of every town. Time becomes more important I left the lab full of bones and sought a historical per with the rise of the Industrial Revolution. You’re building all spective at the Founders Library. I tracked down historian these big factories, and you need those workers to be on Dr. Greg Carr, who answered from a scientific perspective: time. “A friend of mine, a professor at Fisk, likes to remind his fe Whoa. So, you mean I been running around trying student male that as a woman, you have all your future gen to figure out the deal between black folks and time and this erations in your womb right now. As we speak, you are car whole “time” thing is not even for real? rying your grandchildren and your great grandchildren inside According to Dr. Carr, it depends on what kind of your ovaries. time you’re talking about: “Well, you have to remember, we Damn. If that don’t make you think in terms of we, invented the calendar, based on nature, the rhythm of real then nothing will. ity.” (Okay, you heard that, right? That big,fat “we”?) He went Now, speaking of generations, there was a slightly on, “We gave the world the ways in which to measure time. taboo subject I had to bring up with all three thinkers. Seri There’s no dimension of time that we are unfamiliar with, ously, what’s up with black but we are not bound, or people tallcmgto the dead7 ruled, by artificial time. It’s Dr Goodin confirmed what a matter of chronology ver ( I’d already suspected_that sus genealogy. Chronology J our natural tendency to think is a relationship to an abstract $ of our dead as still here is an notion of time, a non-human Africamsm that baptismal entity. Genealogy is the rela waters could not quite wash f tionship between human away during our conversion. beings. I have family members who “There is rhythmic time and carry on full conversations there’s artificial time. with people who died dec Rhythmic time is based on ades ago, and no, we’re not nature. Artificial time, me from Haiti, Florida or New chanical time, is an iniposi L Orleans. Don’t act like you lion on nature In rhythmic don t know what I m talking jS.. time, you re thinking in about. terms of sunrise and the sun “You don’t have to tell me,” Dr. Goodin assured With set. artificial time, you let this little machine [a watch] me. “I’m from Jamaica. As far as interaction with the tell you what to do, and the hourly focus causes anxiety.” dead....” Many people of African descent, he told me, live So, was Ellison onto something? Do Americans of lives in which their dead ancestors are active participants. Is African descent really have a different cultural sense of time it real? Reality might be beside the point. than the larger culture in which we live? “Sometimes black people used talking to the ances “Absolutely,” Dr. Carr said. “There’s the old joke tors as a means of speaking on issues that they couldn’t other that when Europeans arrived on the shores of Africa, Africans wise speak openly about.” These interactions don’t have to thought that time was a god the Europeans worshipped, the be valid either. “You can have an intelligent conversation sailors checked their clocks so much. Take ‘CP time.’ It is with something inside your mind as easily as you can with based on one’s relationship to other human beings as opposed someone in front of you.” Dr. Goodin said that time itself to one’s relationship to a non-human entity [artificial time]. wouldn’t separate the living from the dead, real or imagined: The meeting will begin when we all meet up and agree that “You can move between these two realms, and it doesn’t it’s time to begin, not when the clock says, but when we say. have anything to do with time.” We move according to when it’s important in terms of people. As far as what is real and imagined, Professor Mack We might not be at work on time every day, but on Election questioned the reality of time itself: “Time is a human con Day, the polls opened at 7 o’clock; we were there at 4 a.m. struct. There’s a book by Eric Wolf called Europe and the We agreed that it was important.” People Without History. In it, he explains how time became a I recalled telling Professor Mack during the course European construct, and how their society changed with the of our conversation that I’d often felt like I had an adversarial -

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descendents of slave owners to refer to their ancestors as we unless they’re trying to give up some kind of reparations, which they’re not. I left the lab full of bones and sought a historical per spective at the Founders Library. I tracked down historian Dr. Greg Carr, who answered from a scientific perspective: “A friend of mine, a professor at Fisk, likes to remind his fe male student that as a woman, you have all your future gen erations in your womb right now. As we speak, you are car rying your grandchildren and your great grandchildren inside your ovaries.” Damn. If that don’t make you think in terms of we, then nothing will. Now, speaking of generations, there was a slightly taboo subject I had to bring up with all three thinkers. Seri ously, what’s up with black people talking to the dead? Dr. Goodin confirmed what I’d already suspected—that our natural tendency to think of our dead as still here is an Africanism that baptismal waters could not quite wash away during our conversion. I have family members who : carry on full conversations with people who died dec ades ago, and no, we’re not from Haiti, Florida or New Orleans Don t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about. “You don’t have to tell me,” Dr. Goodin assured me. “I’m from Jamaica. As far as interaction with the dead....” Many people of African descent, he told me, live lives in which their dead ancestors are active participants. Is it real? Reality might be beside the point. “Sometimes black people used talking to the ances as means of speaking on issues that they couldn’t other tors a wise speak openly about.” These interactions don’t have to be valid either. “You can have an inteffigent conversation with something inside your mind as easily as you can with someone in front of you.” Dr. Goolin said that time itself wouldn’t separate the living from the dead, real or imagined: “You can move between these two realms, and it doesn’t have anything to do with time.” As far as what is real and imagined, Professor Mack questioned the reality of time itself: “Time is a human con struct. There’s a book by Eric Wolf called Europe and the People Without History. In it, he explains how time became a European construct, and how their society changed with the

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advent of clocks. Time takes on new meaning in Europe in the I 700s when you see these big clock towers placed right in the center of every town. Time becomes more important with the rise of the Industrial Revolution. You’re building all these big factories, and you need those workers to be on time. Whoa. So, you mean I been running around trying to figure out the deal between black folks and time and this whole “time” thing is not even for real? According to Dr. Carr, it depends on what kind of time you’re talking about: “Well, you have to remember, we invented the calendar, based on nature, the rhythm of real ity.” (Okay, you heard that, right? That big,fat “we’2) He went on, “We gave the world the ways in which to measure time. There’s no dimension of time that we are unfamiliar with, but we are not bound, or ruled, by artificial time. It’s a matter of chronology ver sus genealogy. Chronology is a relationship to an abstract notion of time, a non-human entity. Genealogy is the rela tionship between human beings. “There is rhythmic time and there’s artificial time. Rhythmic time is based on nature. Artificial time, me chanical time, is an imposi tion on nature. In rhythmic time, you’re thinking in terms of sunrise and the sun set. With artificial time, you let this little machine [a watch] tell you what to do, and the hourly focus causes anxiety.” So, was Ellison onto something? Do Americans of African descent really have a different cultural sense of time than the larger culture in which we live? “Absolutely,” Dr. Carr said. “There’s the old joke that when Europeans arrived on the shores of Africa, Africans thought that time was a god the Europeans worshipped, the sailors checked their clocks so much. Take ‘CP time.’ It is based on one’s relationship to other human beings as opposed to one’s relationship to a non-human entity [artificial time]. The meeting will begin when we all meet up and agree that it’s time to begin, not when the clock says, but when we say. We move according to when it’s important in terms of people. We might not be at work on time every day, but on Election Day, the polls opened at 7 o’clock; we were there at 4 a.m. We agreed that it was important.” I recalled telling Professor Mack during the course our of conversation that I’d often felt like I had an adversarial ,...

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BLACKNESS AND TIME: WE, OUR, US relationship with time. I was always late; I was always pressed; there was never enough time to eat, sleep and you know what. All this time I’d been hating time, how much of my power had I given over to. nothing? “In African thought,” Dr. Carr continued, “time is cyclical. Nothing lives outside the cycle of existence, not even God. If we didn’t get it done today, well, the sun will come up tomorrow.” It is the notion of a cycle of existence that ties all the threads of this mystery together. Both Dr. Goodin and Dr. Carr told me that in African thought, death is merely a transformation into a different state of being, not the end of existence. This explains the pres ence of ancestors in the lives of peo ple who believe that their ancestors are there. “You cannot experience your birth, and you cannot experi ence your death, but you know that one was real and one will be real,” Dr. Goodin said. (Truth be told, this is the one part where he kind of lost me, but it’s a really good quote, so I kept it. I think he was commenting on the subjectivity of reality, but i’m not really sure because I don’t have a PhD.) In light of all these insights (Howard professors dropping knowledge like bombs), I finally felt like I had a satisfactory grasp of blackness and time. We do have a distinct sense of time, but is it unique? Yes and no. If you consider and compare the black American orientation of time with that of the much larger white population, then yes, our sense of time is unique. If you expand the question to include other ethnic groups, however, you’ll find similarities between the African Diaspora’s sense of time-continuity and that of Native Americans and Asian Americans, as Dr. Yasmin DeGout pointed out to me before I began the whole inquiry. Globally, many cultures coexist with and interact with their ancestors in a way that renders time, as Western ers know it, moot. The indigenous Australians, for example, are aware of a parallel dimension they call “The Time of the .

THE REVOLUTION

Ancestors,” where they can cross into another time and access their ancestors for guidance. All of these ways of negotiating the world, says Dr. Goodin, are just as valid as Christianity. Many of them have been combined with Christianity. Seen this way, it is not our Afro-derived sense of continuity that is unique; it is that Western/Eurocenthc aesthetic that stands out as, in this case, the minority, according to Dr. Carr. Then you have to consider that there is personal time orientation as well as cultural time orientation. Profes sor Mack, for instance, has honed a highly developed personal sense of tirnm “I believe that time IT’S A 6SML is malleable. I can look at the way RYER Lljrn LAST) a crowd of people is moving or iut TuRH!) notice how cars are moving in traf fic, and I can move through them, around them, and get to where I want to be. It’s almost like you can stop time by understanding how others move through it.” Dr. Carr’s personal sense of time is also metaphysical: “Time is not something that you can have. You say, ‘I have two minutes.’ No, you don’t have two minutes. What you have is yourself.” I was nearly finished with this article when, on my way home, I stopped to have dinner at an Ethiopian café. An elderly proprietor and a young woman, his daughter perhaps, were about to close up when I went to pay with a credit card. Their machine was broken. I quickly gave the daughter my driver’s license and promised to go around the corner and get cash from an ATM, when the father waved me off and said, “Just stop by sometime tomorrow and pay.” He didn’t know me from a can of paint, but he kept insisting that I “stop by tomorrow,” and I kept insisting on going to the ATM so that I could pay him promptly. Finally, he gave me this beautiful look—the look old folks give you when they think you’re pitifully stupid but they love you anyhow. “Why?” he asked with a patient smirk. “Is tomorrow not coming?” .

-Shayla Monroe

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I heard em’ say The revolution won’t be televised so pray tell what we’re gonna do cuz it must be publicized internalized and demystified for those who’ve been hypnotized for the duration of their lives for it to reach every block and corner every household and jail cell every boom box, blog, iPod, Zune, car antenna and delivery cell we must raise our voices like our fists and proclaim it loud and well yet we will not yell we will unify our voices so we make a continuous resounding scream and the world will pause and know that once again we are on the scene TV screens Will not rule how far our message is carried We will travel with it in our hearts and minds ‘Til the day we are dead and buried Pass it on to our children like inheritance money And proclaim it in the streets whether Hurricane Katrina is blowing or the sky is clear and sunny And like the second coming it will demand the attention of all hearts and minds And our pens shall be the flaming swords which cut through the rhetoric and lies And our cause shall be carried to every corner where living creatures dwell No it won’t be televised But the world will know our revolution And they will know it well —Terrance Williams

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THE REVOLUTION I heard em’ say The revolution won’t be televised so pray tell what we’re gonna do cuz it must be publicized internalized and demystified for those who’ve been hypnotized for the duration of their lives for it to reach every block and corner every household and jail cell every boom box, blog, iPod, Zune, car antenna and delivery cell we must raise our voices like our fists and proclaim it loud and well yet we will not yell we will unify our voices so we make a continuous resounding scream and the world will pause and know that once again we are on the scene TV screens Will not rule how far our message is carried We will travel with it in our hearts and minds ‘Til the day we are dead and buried Pass it on to our children like inheritance money And proclaim it in the streets whether Hurricane Katrina is blowing or the sky is clear and sunny And like the second coming it will demand the attention of all hearts and minds And our pens shall be the flaming swords which cut through the rhetoric and lies And our cause shall be carried to every corner where living creatures dwell No it won’t be televised But the world will know our revolution And they will know it well —Terrance Williams

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‘TIE DEATH I wanna make love to your thoughts I wanna touch your mind like a Concubine and conceive in you the words that live in me [minel Carry my seed Take the essence of me farther away than my mind can travel Lift me up through space and time Take me to a place where I can stop and rewind Relive the moments that have you in them Replay the images that get the question ‘Oh, girl, is that him?’ I’ll be your secret agent Globetrotting and continent hopping to bring to you pieces of the other seven wonders Because you are both 8 and 9 The wonders you contain couldn’t be explained all at one time For you I would commit the ultimate crime Attempt to Italian job your heart the way you’ve already done to mine I’m a glutton for punishment and yours is my favorite kind Surrender to you all my watches and clocks because it’s always your time Arrow filled and love sick my heart is yours ‘til death Refusing to be acquitted for a crime uncommitted in order to be your prisoner until my last breath —Terrance Williams

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STERUNG NOTES

THE ALLEGORY OF THE CAVE IN RICHARD WRIGHT’S “THE MAN WHO LIVED UNDERGROUND”: TALES OF INNOCENCE AND EXPERIENCE Reality is our perception of how we view the world cannot see each other. Socrates describes the hostages’ cir in which we live. Two people can live on the same continent, cumstances: “To them, I said, the truth would be literally in the same country, state, or even the same city, but the nothing but shadows of images” (388). The only reality the realities they live every day can be drastically different. Plato hostages have ever known is the illusion created by the shadwas a classical Greek philosopher who spent much of his time ows and the sounds they hear. developing discourse on metaphysics. In Plato’s Allegory ofthe The idea that Blacks will be treated equally to Cave, the character Socrates describes a scenario in which a Whites is the illusion Daniels faces in his reality. In “The Man member of the oppressed community has the opportunity to Who Lived Underground,” Daniels is living in the urban leave the cave in which he has been held hostage all his life North of the early 1940s—a reality constructed largely by a and experience the world above ground. Similarly, Richard racist society in which there are clear separations between Wright addresses the same aspect of metaphysics in “The Man Whites and Blacks and in which prejudge overrules equality. Who Lived Underground “ In Wright describes this realty, “as he PLATO’S ALLEGORY OF THE CAVE Wright’s allegory, Fred Daniels, a put it, ‘sprawling centers of steel black man living in the 1940s, is and stone’ as cold and unyielding as wrongfully accused of murder and the South” in which Daniels is “[a] I beaten until he signs a confession, isabused of his expectation that life then after running from the police, in the North ‘could be lived with he finds a manhole and takes refuge dignity...’” (1399). When white in the sewer. Whereas the freed police officers physically force hostage in Allegory of the Cave Daniels to sign a confession to a makes discoveries about his new murder which he did not commit, reality by ascending from the cave there is no way for Daniels to seek into the light of day, in “The Man recourse, for the law committed the Who Lived Underground,” Daniels injustice. Instead of going to jail or travels through an underground fighting to clear his name, Daniels world in order to come to terms chooses to flee from the police. with a new reality. However, both of the protagonists come Daniels transitions into his new world by entering an to terms with their new realities in a similar fashion, and once underground street sewer, leaving the world above to enter a aware of their new realities, the protagonists can never again modern day cave of sorts. Wright describes the sewer as a assimilate within their original communities. “misty cavern, sounding the water with the pole. By the faint In order to understand how the protagonists dislight of another manhole cover he saw, amid loose wet brink cover a new truth, we must first examine the truths that they damp earth, a hole with walls of damp earth leading into knew originally. In “The Allegory of the Cave,” there are hos- blackness” (1438). Daniels is now surrounded by utter dark tages who are enchained in their seats in a cave they have been ness but is able to strike matches to reveal the nuances of his in the cave since birth, and they can only look at the wall of cave. With darkness fueling his curiosity, Daniels travels the cave that is directly in front of them. Behind the hostages through his cave and makes discoveries about his new envi is a fire, and behind the fire is a raised slope similar to a wall, ronment. Just as the hostage who is freed from the cave, he stemming from the ground, but it does not reach higher than must acquire knowledge about his new world. the prisoners’ heads. There are people behind the raised slope Like the hostage who is freed in Plato’s allegory, holding different objects, and some of these people are talkDaniels transitions into a world that is new to him—a world ing. The seated hostages can only see the shadows of the ob- beyond random sounds and two-dimensional shadows. Here, jects reflected onto the cave wall and can only hear are the he sees other people for the first time, hears sounds in the sounds of human speech. They cannot see the actual objects form of language, and sees his own reflection. He has to learn because they cannot turn their heads, and they cannot see the to comprehend the shadows he sees as mere reflections of men holding the objects because of the slope. In fact, they tangible objects. Also analogous to Plato’s hostage, the most

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STERLING NOTES

THE ALLEGoRY OF THE CAVE IN RICHARD WRIGHT’S “THE MAN WHO LIVED UNDERGROUND”: TALES OF INNOCENCE AND EXPERIENCE Reality is our perception of how we view the world cannot see each other. Socrates describes the hostages’ cir in which we live. Two people can live on the same continent, cumstances: “To them, I said, the truth would be literally nothing but shadows of images” (388). The only reality the in the same country, state, or even the same city, but the Plato hostages have ever known is the illusion created by the shaddifferent. can drastically live every be day realities they his time ows and the sounds they hear. was a classical Greek philosopher who spent much of The idea that Blacks will be treated equally to developing discourse on metaphysics. In Plato’s Allegory f the Whites is the illusion Daniels faces in his reality. In “The Man Cave, the character Socrates describes a scenario an which a member of the oppressed community has the opportunity to Who Lived Underground,” Daniels is living in the urban North of the early 1 94Os—a reality constructed largely by a leave the cave in which he has been held hostage all his life racist society in which there are clear separations between and experience the world above ground. Similarly, Richard “The Man Whites and Blacks and in which prejudge overrules equality. in of metaphysics aspect Wright addresses the same Wnght describes this realty, “as he Who Lived Underground “ In PLATO’S ALLEGORY OF THE CAYE put it, ‘sprawling centers of steel Wright’s allegory, Fred Daniels, a and stone’ as cold and unyielding as black man living in the 1940s, is the South” in which Daniels is “[d] wrongfully accused of murder and ‘i” isabused of his expectation that life beaten until he signs a confession; in the North ‘could be lived with then after running from the police, dignity...’” (1399). When white he finds a manhole and takes refuge police officers physically force in the sewer. Whereas the freed Daniels to sign a confession to a hostage in Allegory of the Cave murder which he did not commit, makes discoveries about his new there is no way for Daniels to seek reality by ascending from the cave for the law committed the recourse, Man day, of in “The the light into Instead injustice. of going to jail or Daniels Who Lived Underground,” clear to fighting his name, Daniels travels through an underground chooses to flee from the police. world in order to come to terms Daniels transitions into his new world by entering an with a new reality. However, both of the protagonists come to terms with their new realities in a similar fashion, and once underground street sewer, leaving the world above to enter a aware of their new realities, the protagonists can never again modem day cave of sorts. Wright describes the sewer as a “misty cavern, sounding the water with the pole. By the faint assimilate within their original communities. dislight of another manhole cover he saw, amid loose wet brink In order to understand how the protagonists cover a new truth, we must first examine the truths that they damp earth, a hole with walls of damp earth leading into knew originally. In “The Allegory of the Cave,” there are hos- blackness” (1438). Daniels is now surrounded by utter dark tages who are enchained in their seats in a cave they have been ness but is able to strike matches to reveal the nuances of his cave. With darkness fueling his curiosity, Daniels travels in the cave since birth, and they can only look at the wall of them. through his cave and makes discoveries about his new envi the hostages Behind of in front is directly that the cave wall, Just as the hostage who is freed from the cave, he ronment. raised to a slope similar is a fire, and behind the fire is a stemming from the ground, but it does not reach higher than must acquire knowledge about his new world. Like the hostage who is freed in Plato’s allegory, the prisoners’ heads. There are people behind the raised slope Daniels transitions into a world that is new to him—a world holding different objects, and some of these people are talking. The seated hostages can only see the shadows of the oh- beyond random sounds and two-dimensional shadows. Here, he sees other people for the first time, hears sounds in the jects reflected onto the cave wall and can only hear are the objects see form of language, and sees his own reflection. He has to learn cannot the actual They speech. sounds of human the to comprehend the shadows he sees as mere reflections of because they cannot turn their heads, and they cannot see tangible objects. Also analogous to Plato’s hostage, the most men holding the objects because of the slope. In fact, they

VOLUME 4-, ISSUE

significant change for Daniels is the sun. Socrates shows that the freed hostage would now view the light of the sun but as “the guardian of all that is in the visible world, and in a certain way the cause of all things which he and his fellows have been accustomed to behold” (389). The cave was fueled by dark ness, while the world above ground is a world of light, life, growth and enlightenment. Although the freed hostage and Daniels both dis cover worlds different from the ones they once knew, the freed hostage discovers a new world by coming up from the cave into daylight; in contrast, Daniels discovers his alternate world through living underground. Where the freed hostage had the aid of the sun to introduce him to the new world, Daniels must become blind in order to heighten other senses that will guide his journey in the sewer. With the absence of light, Daniels is able to open his mind and see aspects of his former world differently. He hears the familiar sounds of women singing songs about freedom and hope and cannot help but laugh at “the sight of those black people groveling and begging for something they could never get” (1439). When Daniels is exposed to a light source, he doesn’t merely look at what is going on; curiously, he sees the larger picture. In later excursions Daniels views a boy getting beaten for a crime that this boy didn’t commit. He thinks to himself, “Perhaps it was a good thing that they were beating the boy; perhaps the beating would bring to the boy’s attention, for the first time in his life, the secret of his exis tence” (14-58). He sees now that everyday actions in the world above affect the mentality of Blacks. Circumstances that Daniels would have accepted before in the world of light he now realizes are unacceptable and detrimental to Blacks In Plato’s allegory, the freed hostage begins to rec ognize the flaws of his former reality when he emerges from the darkness of the cave into the sun. The light from the sun guides the freed hostage to understand how two very differ ent worlds can exist simultaneously. The freed hostage would “turn his neck round and walk and look towards the light, he will suffer sharp pains; the glare will distress him, and he will be unable to see the realities of which in his former state he had seen the shadows” (388). The light does not only make objects of the world become real, but it shines a new aware ness on existence. The freed hostage suddenly has a purpose in the world: “...he would first see the sun and then reason about him. And when he remembered his old habitation and wisdom of the cave and his fellow-prisoners, do you sup pose that he would felicitate himself on change?” (389). The freed hostage views his new life as authentic. The hostages in the cave only sit and stare at the cave wall. They cannot make decisions about their existence, and they do not think for themselves or ask questions about their purposes in the world, because they only know of a singular purpose. Choice ..

PAGE 12 is not an option. The hos tages in the cave are not living an authentic and indi vidual existence; they are simply complying with the lives they were given. Through Daniels’ underground journey, he discovers that Blacks aboveground are living an exis tence that is nearly parallel to that of the hostages in the cave. When their lives and perceptions are condi tioned by racism, Blacks are not living their own lives; rather, they are complying with the unjust ideologies that society deems correct. With Daniels’ new found wisdom, he devises a plan to introduce his findings to the world aboveground, his place of former existence. Due to Socrates’ explanation of the dual reality, it is impossible for Daniels to reappear in the world above; however, he develops such confidence in his new reality that he believes the police will listen and believe his testimonials: “Yes, he had been running away from the police. But why? His mind was blank.. .why worry?” (1453). When Daniels emerges from his cave, his reunion with light makes him continue to unravel: “A low whine broke from him and he was in the act of uncoiling” (1460). Daniels goes to the police, the very men who drove him into the under ground world, and he tells them about what he discovered in the sewer. Daniels convinces the police to follow him to his place of enlightenment in hopes of spreading his newly found knowledge, but just as he descends again, the police shoot him and thus end his existence all together. Although the freed hostage does not die when he returns to the cave, his knowledge is useless, and his capacity to relearn the ways of the cave is more than limited. He is paralyzed, not only physically (for he is chained again to his seat) but also mentally. Returning to a place of ignorance is so damaging to the formerly freed hostage that it turns his soui evil: “How eager he is, how clearly his paltry soul sees the way to his end; he is the reverse of blind, but his keen eye sight is forced into the service of evil” (390). In “Allegory of the Cave,” although Plato depicts two realities, he never iden tifies one as the correct reality; instead, he leaves the reader to decide. In contrast, in “The Man Who Lived Under ground,” Daniels’ original reality is corrupt, malicious and unfair. Which is a better existence? Living in a state of ex perience, in which all of the admirable as well as detestable qualities of the world are presented to you, and the way you coexist in a land of such qualities is completely your decision? Or living in a state of innocence, in which you have no

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STERLING NOTES

THE ALLEGoRY OF THE CAVE IN RICHARD WRIGHT’S “THE MAN WHO LIVED UNDERGROUND”: TALES OF INNOCENCE AND EXPERIENCE knowledge of reason, and all one can do is comply? What is made certain in the works of both authors is that the state of ex perience makes one unfit to return to a state of innocence; such an attempt will surely lead to demise. Works Cited Plato. The Republic VII. Great Books of the Western World: The Dialogues of Plato. Ed. Robert Hutchins. Chicago: Oxford, 1952. 388-391. Wright, Richard. “The Man Who Lived Underground.” The Norton Anthology of African Amer ican Literature. 2nd ed. Ed. Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Neffie Y. McKay. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2004. 1436-1470. —Dominique Daniels

THE SHADOW I am a walking shadow on a page Black ink with legs A stroke I am a factory of synonyms and antonyms who carries puns in of rage his head The memory I bleed black of a day sweat blue or the vision and cry red of a night where the walking shadow my short strokes and scratches carry more weight than a ton takes flight of bricks to the head I carry no lead —Terrance Williams they will call me heat long after Smith and Wesson is dead I penetrate farther than any hollow tipped armor piercing laser guided miniature missile could ever hope to travel vi the land of the living or the dead I hail from peacocks and spit out John Hancock’s without a second thought I am a poet’s mascot I liberate white lines by filling them with end rhymes and without reconsideration single handedly and knowingly cause loss of habitat to defor estation by inducing inspiration within even the simplest minds causing those who despise my art to fill to the brims of the eyes with what may start as a drop

f t

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STERLING NOTES

THE ALLEGoRY OF THE CAVE IN RICHARD WRIGHT’S “THE MAN WHO LIVED UNDERGROUND”: TALES OF INNOCENCE AND EXPERIENCE knowledge of reason, and all one can do is comply? What is made certain in the works of both authors is that the state of ex perience makes one unfit to return to a state of innocence; such an attempt will surely lead to demise. Works Cited Plato. The Republic VII. Great Books ofthe Western World: The Dialogues of Plato. Ed. Robert Hutchins. Chicago: Oxford, 1952. 388-391. Wright, Richard. “The Man Who Lived Underground.” The Norton Anthology of African Amer ican Literature. 2nd ed. Ed. Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Nellie Y. McKay. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2004. 1436-1470. —Dominique Daniels

THE SHADOW I am a walking shadow on a page Black ink with legs A stroke I am a factory of synonyms and antonyms who carries puns in of rage his head The memory I bleed black of a day sweat blue or the vision and cry red of a night where the walking shadow my short strokes and scratches carry more weight than a ton takes flight of bricks to the head I carry no lead —Terrance Williams they will call me heat long after Smith and Wesson is dead I penetrate farther than any hollow tipped armor piercing laser guided miniature missile could ever hope to travel in the land of the living or the dead I hail from peacocks and spit out John Hancock’s without a second thought I am a poet’s mascot I liberate white lines by filling them with end rhymes and without reconsideration single handedly and knowingly cause loss of habitat to defor estation by inducing inspiration within even the simplest minds causing those who despise my art to fill to the bnrns of the eyes with what may start as a drop

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SANKOFA: APPRECIATING THE PAST IN THE PRESENT The word san.kofa comes from the Akan people in Ghana and means “to claim one’s past in order to move forward in one’s future.” Ethiopian-born filmmaker and former Howard professor Haile Gerima wrote and directed a movie which he named Sankofa. It is the story of Mona, a modern-day African-American model who both discovers, and, as the title suggests, learns to appreciate, her rich African heritage. Unex pectedly, however, she does this through the experience of living in the past. At the beginning of the film, Mona, played by Oyafunmike Oguniano, lacks a connection with her past; she does not understand the plight of her ancestors and lives a rather lost life, perpetuating American ideologies of White superiority instead of accepting the culture into which she was born. Then Mona is taken from the present and embarks upon a surreal journey into the past. When she enters a cave—her portal to the past—she is stripped naked, beaten, chained, and taken through the Middle Passage to the United States—the journey many West Africans were forced to take during the era of Triangular Trade. Mona then becomes Shola, a house slave on the Lafayette sugar plantation in Louisiana. Sankofa depicts the experiences of slaves in the New World, which very often included witnessing and being inflicted with beatings, brutal rapes and arduous labor, and losing loved ones (through either death or deportation to another plantation). Shola’s lover, Shango, a rebellious West Indian slave, tries to persuade Shola to poison her slave owner. Nevertheless, despite the fact that she is being continuously brutally raped by her master, Shola has strong moral standards and refuses to poison him, believing that killing is wrong. Shola looks up to Nu Nu, another rebellious slave who is native to Africa and is a matriarch of the plantation. Nu Nu s son Joe is a product of rape by a slave master and has a more privileged slave life because of his light complexion and blue eyes. Joe can be considered a tragic mulatto because he is tortured by his mixed race and mixed identity, and he is brainwashed into believing that his mother is a devil. This indoctrination comes, in part, from the pictures of the Virgin Mary at the church where he confides in Father Rafael, a white priest who fosters Joe’s hatred toward his mother and his Af rican heritage. This narrative is used to depict the negative connotation of blacks and blackness that is seen in many films and literary works, in contrast to which whiteness demonstrates sainthood and purity. Joe does not verbally express his pain and frustration, but rather uses anger and violence. As the film continues, the audience follows Shola through her trials as a slave. However, a turning point occurs toward the end of the film, when Shola raises a knife to a sleeping overseer—an act that signals a noticeable difference in Shola, who once refused to harm her masters and overseers. This scene forces viewers to reconsider whether or not killing another person is justified in this context and to question the moral stance once accepted by Shola. In fact, the episode re veals that a shift has occurred in the moral and cultural values of both Shola and the present-day Mona. Once Shola returns to the present, she rejects her White photographer, which is also her rejection of the White aesthetic and other values that drew her further from the heritage she chose to ignore. She is then seen in more traditional Alrican attire listening to the African chant heard in the beginning of the film. The difference now is that she is aware of her African culture and can appreciate the chant, which asks her to “claim [hen story.” ‘

—Anastacia Mebane

i.S1 f5

STERLING NOTES

[TENSE (PAST, PRESENT, FUTURE) AND THE LANGUAGE OF DUBOIS]: HOW “THE PROBLEM OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY” EXCEEDS THE TWENTIETH CENTURY, IN BOTH DIRECTIONS [Dr. Kristin Bergen is an assistant professor in the Department ofEnglish at Howard, having joined thefaculty this past schoolyear. She specializes in American literature, with an emphasis on literary theory, and teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses. She here offers an excerptfrom a work in progress on DuB ois and temporality, undertaking a close reading of wording used by DuBois particularly verb tense, in order to situate hisfamous pronouncement in the past, the present, and thefuture.] It remains to be seen, now that the twentieth century has ended, whether twenty-first century critics of W. E. B. Du Bois will signal that centenary transition with a stylistic change, modifying however subtly the grammatical tense in which they invoke what surely has been his most paraphrased dictum, that “the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line.” Critics writing from within the twentieth century tended to characterize Du Bois’s pronounce ment as prophetic, it having first been uttered just at that century’s inauguration and not having been disproved after its close, and in paraphrase they have tended to conjugate its copula in order to accommodate their characterization. Thus we have, for example, Paul Gilroy’s Du Bois predicting that “the problem of the twentieth century was going to be the problem of the colour line”; or David Lever ing Lewis, whose equally prescient Du Bois is found “memorably proclaiming, at the dawn of the century, that the problem of the twentieth century would be the problem of the color line.” Of course these critics are not wrong: after all, the twentieth century came and went and did not take with it the problem of the color line so much as transpose1 it into what Du Bois would have called a new “phase” (“significantly and fatally new,” he would have added).2 So in this sense the sentence was served, so to speak, by empirical history; it was or became true, as if Aristotle’s famous “sea-battle” in fact took place3 (and somehow continues to rage). But what are we now to say, retrospectively, of a century at last legible in its finitude: that Du Bois turns out to have got it right after all and that the problem of the twentieth century was—indeed——the problem of the color line? What if, instead, we were to hear in his statement not prophecy but proposition, not prediction but predicate? That is, what if we were to take seriously the active linguistic choices Du Bois made in stripping the verb “to be” to its simplest logical form and distributing the figure of “the problem” to either term of his equation?4 To take Du Bois at his word, to attend to his deliberate syntactical nuances of repetition and tense, would be to hear not an epistemological but an ontological claim. As such, it belongs to a category not subject to proof or disproof by compari son with the subsequent empirical history; we need not wait for the sea-battle to evaluate the ‘truth’ of the claim, as if by correspondence. Such a claim produces an effect: once asserted, it becomes true, in a way, because it provides the analytic ‘Here I mean to emphasize that the problem is transposed rather than transformed. I will point to the ways in which Du Bois’s language suggests that the Problem does not undergo essential change but rather maintains its identity but with new meanings accorded by the specffic historical context in which it functions. 2Hardt and Negri, for instance, distinguish the structure of the Du Boisian color line, identified with the logic of the “modern” or colonial stage of capitalism, from the newer mode of racism proper to postmodernity or “Empire”: “[a]s Du Bois said nearly one hun dred years ago, the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line. Imperial racism, by contrast, looking forward per haps to the twenty-first century, rests on the play of differences and the management of micro-conflictualities within its continually ex panding domain” (Empire 195). 3Cf. De lnterpretauone 9 on necessity and the truth-value of future singulars.

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PAGE 15

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4Addressing the third annual meeting of the Alexander Crummel’s American Negro Academy in March of 1900, Du Bois un veiled a primitive edition of the claim, and one better adapted to the prophecy characterizations, that “the color line belts the world and

PAGE 15

STERLING NOTES

[TENSE (PAST, PRESENT, FUTURE) AND THE LANGUAGE OF DUBOIS]: HOW “THE PROBLEM OF ThE TWENTIETH CENTURY” EXCEEDS THE TWENTIETH CENTURY, IN BOTH DIRECTIONS [Dr. Kristin Bergen is an assistant professor in the Department ofEnglish at Howard, having joined thefaculty this past schoolyear. She specializes in American literature, with an emphasis on literary theory, and teaches both undergraduate and graduate courses. She here offers an excerptfrom a work in progress on DuBois and temporality, undertaking a close reading of wording used by DuBois, particularfr verb tense, in order to situate hisfamous pronouncement in the past, the present, and thefuture.] It remains to be seen, now that the twentieth century has ended, whether twenty-first century critics of W. F. B. Du Bois will signal that centenary transition with a stylistic change, modifying however subtly the grammatical tense in which they invoke what surely has been his most paraphrased dictum, that “the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line.” Critics writing from within the twentieth century tended to characterize Du Bois’s pronounce ment as prophetic, it having first been uttered just at that century’s inauguration and not having been disproved after its close, and in paraphrase they have tended to conjugate its copula in order to accommodate their characterization. Thus we have, for example, Paul Gilroy’s Du Bois predicting that “the problem of the twentieth century was going to be the problem of the colour line”; or David Lever ing Lewis, whose equally presdent Du Bois is found “memorably proclaiming, at the dawn of the century, that the problem of the twentieth century would be the problem of the color line.” Of course these critics are not wrong: after all, the twentieth century came and went and did not take with it the problem of the color line so much as transpose1 it into what Du Bois would have called a new “phase” (“significantly and fatally new,” he would have added).2 So in this sense the sentence was served, so to speak, by empirical history; it was or became true, as if Aristotle’s famous “sea-battle” in fact took place3 (and somehow continues to rage). But what are we now to say, retrospectively, of a century at last legible in its finitude: that Du Bois turns out to have got it right after all and that the problem of the twentieth century was—indeed—-the problem of the color line? What if, instead, we were to hear in his statement not prophecy but proposition, not prediction but predicate? That is, what if we were to take seriously the active linguistic choices Du Bois made in stripping the verb “to be” to its simplest logical form and distributing the figure of “the problem” to either term of his equation?4 To take Du Bois at his word, to attend to his deliberate syntactical nuances of repetition and tense, would be to hear not an epistemological but an ontological claim. As such, it belongs to a category not subject to proof or disproof by compari son with the subsequent empirical history; we need not wait for the sea-battle to evaluate the ‘truth’ of the claim, as if by correspondence. Such a claim produces an effect: once asserted, it becomes true, in a way, because it provides the analytic 1Here I mean to emphasize that the problem is transposed rather than transformed. I will point to the ways in which Du Bois’s language suggests that the Problem does not undergo essential change but rather maintains its identity but with new meanings accorded by

the specffic historical context in which it functions.

2Hardt and Negri, for instance, distinguish the structure of the Du Boisian color line, identified with the logic of the “modern” or colonial stage of capitalism, from the newer mode of racism proper to postmodernity or “Empire”: “[a]s Du Bois said nearly one hun dred years ago, the problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line. Imperial racism, by contrast, looking forward per haps to the twenty-first century, rests on the play of differences and the management of micro-conflictualities within its continually panding domain” (Empire 195). 3Cf. De Inteipretatione 9 on necessity and the truth-value of future singulars. 4Addressing the third annual meeting of the Alexander Crummel’s American Negro Academy in March of 1900, Du Bois un veiled a primitive edition of the claim, and one better adapted to the prophecy characterizations, that “the color line belts the world and

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4, ISSUE 1

framework with which to interrogate its terms. “The problem of the color line” might thus be seen to function as the figure for the sort of inaugural periodizing decision Fredric Jameson has described as positing “an absolute historiographic begin ning, that cannot be justified by the nature of the historical material or evidence, since it organizes all such material or evi dence in the first place.” As such, it organizes the historical material or evidence of the present and future—which is not the same as predicting it—as well as of the past_which is not the same as describing it. It is in this sense that Du Bois’s claim can flmction retroactively, as is suggested by the critical—and critically ne glected—lines that follow its most prominent enunciation in Souls ?f Black Folk (1903): The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line,—the relation of the darker to the lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea. It was a phase ofthis problem that caused the Civil War...

How can the problem of the twentieth century have an effect on the nineteenth? The effectivity is coherent only if we under stand it in terms of what Althusser has called a “structural causality,” in which neither the structure nor effect is exterior to or precedes the other, in which the structure is immanent in—indeed has no existence apart from—its effects. In this sense, the Du Boisian “Problem” introduces not simply a local, empirical description but rather a universal structure of analysis, in terms of which the Civil War itself becomes legible only retroactively, after the owl of Minerva has flown. Slavoj Ziek describes this specffic sort of interpretive Nachtthglichkeit as an implicit application of Marx’s allegorical claim that “[hjuman anatomy contains a key to the anatomy of the ape,” adding that [t]bis interpretive procedure is the very opposite of teleology [which] relies on a linear evolutionary logic in which the lower stage already contains in nuce the seeds of the higher stage, so that evolution is simply the unfolding of some underlying essential potential, while here, the lower (or, rather, previous) stage be comes readable only retroactively, in so far as it is itself ontologically ‘incomplete’, a set of traces without meaning, and thus open to later reappropriations. Ziek’ s unremarked conflation of “lower” and “previous” contains a key to how the procedure works in that it suggests the way such an abstract historical category as the Marxian mode of production—or, I want to suggest, the Du Boisian “Problem”—functions outside the opposition of synchrony and cliachrony, in a mode for which Ernst Bloch has coined the term Ungleichzeitigkeit or “nonsynchromdty.” On the one hand, such categories denote distinct syncbronic historical forma tions; on the other hand, because any given moment consists in the historical coexistence of several such formations, the cate gories do not function synchronically. Of the classic Marxian sequence of modes of production, Jameson has pointed out that [t]hese distinct forms are no longer to be considered “states” in some linear or evolutionary narrative which would be the “story” of human history, nor are they “necessary” moments in some teleological historical process.... The local and empirical “transition” from one of these forms to another.. demands reconstruc tion, not as a narrative of emergence, but rather.. .as a genealogy. .

I want to suggest first that we read the Du Boisian “Problem” as just such a structure, with just this level of abstraction, and that we might reconstruct—or more precisely that we might follow him in reconstructing—the empirical history of moder nity as a genealogy: a thoroughly racialized genealogy, which is simultaneously a genealogy of racialization. In Du Bois’s use, “the problem of the color line” denotes neither a transcendent timeless structure nor simply an empirical historical formation, but—like the Marxian mode of production—flmctions rather as a differential concept that structurally implies all the other stages—_Du Bois calls them “phases”—past and future alike. Moreover, as a universal struc ture, it posits not just a temporal but a spatial totality, again conceived differentially as “the relation of the darker to the lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea.” Just as it was a “phase” of the problem of the twentieth century that caused the Civil War, in Du Bois’s 1906 formulation, “[tjhe Negro problem in America is but a local that the social problem of the twentieth century is to be the relation of the civilized world to the darker races of mankind” (“The Present Outlook for the Dark Races of Mankind” 48; qtd. in Sundquist 547). But by July, in a speech to the inaugural Pan-African Congress in London’s Westminster Town Hall (‘To the Nations of the World” 639), he had arrived at the formulation he was to reiterate for the rest of his career, which is to say for a good part of the century in question. In this form it appears most famously in The Souls ofBlack Folk (1903)—once in the “Forethought” and twice again as bookends to the second chapter, “Of the Dawn of Freedom” (previously published in slightly different form as “The Freedmen’s Bureau” [1901]). Other iterations appear in “The Color Line Belts the World” (1906); “Worlds of Color” (1925); Black Folk Then and Now (1939), where it concludes the text having absorbed an explicitly Marxist inflection; and “The Problem of the Twentieth Century Is the Problem of the Color Line” (1950).

STERLING NOTES

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[TENSE (PAST, PRESENT, FUTURE) AND THE LANGUAGE OF DUBOIS]: HOW ‘THE PROBLEM OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY” EXCEEDS THE TWENTIETH CENTURY, IN BOTH DIRECTIONS phase of a world problem”; instructively, he follows this assertion with an immediate reiteration of his celebrated claim. By 1940, he will describe the problem of the color line as “the central prob lem of the greatest of the world’s democracies and so the Problem [sic] of the future world.” But even this level of generality describes “but a local phase” of the Problem, which ultimately names a more radically universal structure of difference in which all culture and consciousness—and thus implicitly history or bistoricity itself—is grounded: What now was this particular social problem which, through the chances of birth and existence, became so peculiarly mine? At bottom and in essence it was as old as human life. Yet in its revelation, through the nineteenth century, it was signifi cantly and fatally new: the differences between men; differences in their appear ance, in their physique, in their thoughts and customs; differences so great and so impelling that always from the beginning of time, they thrust themselves forward upon the consciousness of all living things. Culture among human beings came to be and had to be built upon knowledge and recognition of these differences. With reference to this same passage, Nahum Chandler has suggested that it is in order to give an account of the specific his toricity of “the problem of the twentieth century” that Du Bois must first formulate the question of that problem’s general possibility; “[t]his question,” in turn, “leads, certainly in Du Bois’s discourse, to the formulation of a question that, in its radi cality, broaches a questioning of the status of the relation of identity and difference as such.” At the same time, in formulating this radically universal structure, Du Bois nevertheless must articulate it in radically specific terms (the autobiographical, the present). As Du Bois goes on to explain, what was “fatally new” about the nineteenth-century phase of the Problem was, in fact, that it was fatally old. In what primafade appears to be an unlikely digression,5 he moves to a broadly drawn history of scientific method, as conceived in the seventeenth century, then “applied to man” in the eighteenth; “[un the nineteenth cen tury[,] however[,j came the revolution of conceiving the world not as a permanent structure but as a changing growth[,I and then the study of man as changing and developing physical and social entity had to begin.” However, and here Du Bois names the decisive historical contradiction, the mind clung desperately to the idea that basic racial differences between human beings had suffered no change; and it clung to this idea not simply from inertia and unconscious action but from the fact that be cause of the modern African slave trade a tremendous economic structure and eventually an industrial revolution had been based upon racial differences between men; and this racial difference had now been rationalized into mainly a difference of skin color. That the scientific—and specifically sociological—revolution Du Bois describes is contemporaneous with the emergence of ideologies of scientific racism seems paradoxical only if we neglect the way the latter function to rationalize and justify a spe cific regime of accumulation.6 Just at a moment when so much else melts into air, the concept of racial difference becomes solid or, more pre 5Du Bois, in fact, frequently turns to a discussion of scientific method when he tries to account for the genealogy of racism; see “My Evolving Program for Negro Freedom” (1944); Arnobiography (1968); “The Conservation of Races” (1897); 6Du Bois had remarked about a similar contradiction in his 1909 biographyJohn Brown, in which he juxtaposes Brown’s 1859 martyrdom after the notorious failed raid at Harper’s Ferry with the coincident publication of Darwin’s Ori8in of Species: “Since that day tremendous scientific and economic advance has been accompanied by distinct signs of moral retrogression in social philosophy” (281). He attributes this contradiction to a reappropriation of the ‘splendid scientific work of Darwin, Weissman, Galton and othersj, which] has been widely misinterpreted as meaning that there is essential and inevitable inequality among men and races of men, which no philan thropy can or ought to eliminate” (281-82). But it is not until the 1962 republication of the biography that Du Bois accounts for the reap propriation in materialist terms, adding in a new concluding section that

PAGE 17

STERLING NOTES

[TENSE (PAST, PRESENT, FUTURE) AND THE 1ANGUAGE OF DUBOIS]: HOW “THE PROBIEM OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY” EXCEEDS THE TWENTIETH CENTURY, IN BOTH DIRECTIONS phase of a world problem”; mstructively, he follows this assertion with an immediate reiteration of his celebrated claim. By 1940, he will describe the problem of the color line as “the central prob lem of the greatest of the world’s democracies and so the Problem [sic] of the future world.” But even this level of generality describes “but a local phase” of the Problem, which ultimately names a more radically universal structure of difference in which all culture and consciousness—and thus implicitly history or historicity itself—is grounded: What now was this particular social problem which, through the chances of birth and existence, became so peculiarly mine? At bottom and in essence it was as old as human life. Yet in its revelation, through the nineteenth century, it was signifi candy and fatally new: the differences between men; differences in their appear ance, in their physique, in their thoughts and customs; differences so great and so impelling that always from the beginning of time, they thrust themselves forward upon the consciousness of all living things. Culture among human beings came to be and had to be built upon knowledge and recognition of these differences. With reference to this same passage, Nahum Chandler has suggested that it is in order to give an account of the specific his toricity of “the problem of the twentieth century” that Dii Bois must first formulate the question of that problem’s general possibility; “[t]bis question,” in turn, “leads, certainly in Du Bois’s discourse, to the formulation of a question that, in its radi cality, broaches a questioning of the status of the relation of identity and difference as such.” At the same time, in formulating this radically universal structure, Du Bois nevertheless must articulate it in radically specific terms (the autobiographical, the present). As Du Bois goes on to explain, what was “fatally new” about the nineteenth-century phase of the Problem was, in fact, that it was fatally old. In what primafacie appears to be an unlikely digression,5 he moves to a broadly drawn history of scientilic method, as conceived in the seventeenth century, then “applied to man” in the eighteenth; “[i]n the nineteenth cen tury[,] however[,] came the revolution of conceiving the world not as a permanent structure but as a changing growth[,j and then the study of man as changing and developing physical and social entity had to begin.” However, and here Du Bois names the decisive historical contradiction, the mind clung desperately to the idea that basic racial differences between human beings had suffered no change; and it clung to this idea not simply from inertia and unconscious action but from the fact that be cause of the modern African slave trade a tremendous economic structure and eventually an industrial revolution had been based upon racial differences between men; and this racial difference had now been rationalized into mainly a difference of skin color. That the scientific—and specifically sociological—revolution Du Bois describes is contemporaneous with the emergence of ideologies of scientific racism seems paradoxical only if we neglect the way the latter function to rationalize and justify a spe cific regime of accumulation.6 Just at a moment when so much else melts into air, the concept of racial difference becomes solid or, more pre Du Bois, in fact, frequently turns to a discussion of scientific method when he tries to account for the genealogy of racism; see “My Evolving Program for Negro Freedom” (1944); Autobiography (1968); “The Conservation of Races” (1897); 6Du Bois had remarked about a similar contradiction in his 1909 biographyJohn Brown, in which he juxtaposes Brown’s 1859 martyrdom after the notorious failed raid at Harper’s Ferry with the coincident publication of Darwin’s Origin of Species: “Since that day tremendous scientific and economic advance has been accompanied by distinct signs of moral retrogression in social philosophy” (281). He attributes this contradiction to a reappropriation of the “splendid scientific work of Darwin, Weissnian, Galton and others[, which] has been widely misinterpreted as meaning that there is essential and inevitable inequality among men and races of men, which no philan thropy can or ought to eliminate” (281-82). But it is not until the 1962 republication of the biography that Du Bois accounts for the reap propriation in materialist terms, adding in a new concluding section that

_____

VOLUME 4-, ISSUE 1

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cisely, reified in the service of the mode of production, which is thereby itself exposed VE5KLV. 5, I77. as wholly racialized. A race concept from an earlier moment, petrffied and preserved, persists into a later moment where it acquires a profoundly and fatally new meaning: in fact it gives that moment its meaning.7 Put differently, a generalized concept of human difference becomes racialized within modernity—exactly to the degree that modernity is identical with a specific mode of production—such that modernity itself can only be understood in terms of racialization. Du Bois’s crucial intervention is his insistence that the emergence of the modern concept of racial distinction out of the arbitrary “differences between men” must not be understood as what Ziek has called “the un folding of some underlying essential potential.” Rather, those ancient differences are in themselves “ontologically ‘incomplete’, a set of traces without meaning, and thus open to later reappropriations.” What Du Bois provides is a genealogy of those reappropria tions and the specific economic history that both produced and was produced by them. 0., Indeed, at the time of the previous World War, Du Bois had already insisted that “[tjhe .L REMOVAL. Negro slave trade was the first step in modern world commerce, followed by the mod- JAPAcIE. em theory of colonial expansion.” When Du Bois formulates “the problem of the twentieth century,” he implicitly proposes both a whole history of difference as well as a forward-loolcing program for freedom, in each case at the level of the global. It is for this reason, then, that to call his dictum prophetic is to underestimate the degree to which it functions not just epistemologically but ontologi -_______

[i]t was this itch for larger private capital in Britain and France together with the sugar monopoly in the West Indies and the Cotton Kingdom in the United States that made West Europe and North America seek scientific justification for despising the mass of mankind and refusing to admit them to the new democracy. Those who desired large incomes through ownership of capital used Darwin’s doctrine to excuse the growing reduction of the majority of the world’s laborers to the cheap use of their toil and land for the increasing profit of capitalism. The result was colonial imperialism built on the new technique of Western industry, fed by free land and raw materials in Asia and Africa and especially capped by the cheapest of labor. (298)

Here Du Bois connects racism to colonial or monopoly capitalism in a relation that is constitutive rather than simply causal, in the sense that neither structure precedes the other: on the one hand, the abuse of Darwin is a result of colonial capitalism; on the other hand, the reverse is also the case. 7As Du Bois had put it forty years earlier in Souls of Black Folk (1903), “The world-old phenomenon of the contact of diverse races of men is to have new exemplification during the new century. Indeed, the characteristic of our age is the contact ofEuropean civilization with the world’s undeveloped peoples” (119, emphasis added).

YESTERDAY, TODAY, TOMORROW, FOREVER Yesterday is only reminiscences Today begins to fade into remembrance Tomorrow slowly becomes into existence But Forever brings lessons learned, long laughs, Hard cries, betrayals, friendships, and forgiveness.

—Sophia Adem P,d

STERLING NOTES

PAGE 19

AN IDEOLOGY CALLED COOL: GWENDOLYN BROOKS AND LUBE FIASCO IN CROSS-GENERATIONAL CONVERSATION

Fancy clothes. High-end automobiles. Fifty and hundred dollar bills gracing the insides of supple leather wal lets. These are among the images that may come to mind when one considers that rendering of success in contempo rary American popular culture. Although the path to such success may consist of college and a career for some, oth ers—those seeking to attain riches at a faster pace—take another road. The block proves to be the wall/street of the inner city neighborhood, which sends traffickers along a side street. Instead of aiming to go to college, some youth aim to obtain the status of the neighborhood entrepreneur or hus tler. The desire to obtain the fast life is creatively featured in the works of poet Gwendolyn Brooks and rapper Lupe Fiasco. World-renowned poet Gwendolyn Brooks, the first African American to receive the Pulitzer Prize for poetry, has without a doubt influenced many lives, espe cially those of aspiring writers. Perhaps more notable is the late author’s influence on Gramniy Award-winning rap mogul Lupe Fiasco. Fiasco’s latest album, The Cool, was released on December 13, 2007 and may be perceived as an extension of Brooks’ prophetic eight-line poem “We Real Cool.” Although conceived to address two seemingly different generations, both works accurately reflect and effectively critique the lust for fast life, which, despite its toxic nature, is still portrayed in popu lar culture as “cool.” In her poem “We Real Cool,” through four couplets,

Brooks depicts characteristics of living the “cool” life, which shed light upon the culture of the “cool.” For example, the persona boasts, “We left school” (line 2), an action which is presented as an attribute of being “cool.” Lack of education, however, may also result in disempowerment in other areas of life, confining the dropouts to their roles on the street. This is seen in subsequent activity described by the speaker: “We / Lurk late. We / Strike Straight” (3-1-). These lines depict aspects of a lifestyle that, once chosen, is rather sirictive. The list of negative activities goes on until Brooks reaches the last and, ironically, the shortest line of the poem:

“Die soon” (8). Prior to the concluding line, the short, sharp lines appear, as a list does. The speaker is casual and boastful, offering what may be seen as a confession—one that abruptly fatally crashes into a wall of truth at the end. Lupe Fiasco elaborates on a similar concept in his eighteen-track LP as seen, for example, in the song “The Coolest,” in which Fiasco raps, “match made in heaven set the fires in hell.” This “match made in heaven” may be inter preted as describing young people (males especially) in love with the fast life. The image of the fires in hell being sparked suggests that the union being discussed is unnatural. More over, because what goes on in the heavens is most likely unknown in hell, the line suggests that those who dwell within the fast life are unaware of and perhaps even tinconcerned with the turbulence they cause in the lives of others. This is also hinted at in Brooks’ poem through the persona’s as sertion that the members of the group “sing sin” (5). Fiasco conveys a similar theme in “Intruder Alert,” a song which describes a wounded woman who, in essence, was violated by men in the past. However, the song may also be interpreted as suggesting that this woman was violated by the system that fosters the entrepreneurship prevalent among misguided young urban men living the fast life. “Intruder Alert” also depicts the lives of men in this cornmurnty: “No one ever loved him, that’s why he gets high enough to touch the heavens above him.” This passage of the song speaks to one of the activities associated with life in the fast lane: drug use. Fiasco expands this concept by suggesting that this “sin” has roots in a deeper cause, that cause being lack of self-love. In Brooks’ poem, every line contains the word we; every line except the last line, that is. The last line speaks of an untimely death but contains no we. Through this omission, Brooks suggests that the early death of the members of the group is something that is endured alone, although the other activities are pursued with others. (The captain and the crew are supposed to go down with the ship. If only the captain goes down, then perhaps that captain never had much of a .,‘..

STERLING NOTES

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AN IDEOLOGY CALLED COOL GWENDOLYN BROOKS AND LUBE FIASCO IN CROSS-GENERATIONAL CONVERSATION Fancy clothes. High-end automobiles. Fifty and hundred dollar bills gracing the insides of supple leather wal lets. These are among the images that may come to mind when one considers that rendering of success in contempo rary American popular culture. Although the path to such success may consist of college and a career for some, oth ers—those seeking to attain riches at a faster pace—take an other road. The block proves to be the wall/street of the inner city neighborhood, which sends traffickers along a side street. Instead of aiming to go to college, some youth aim to obtain the status of the neighborhood entrepreneur or hus tler. The desire to obtain the fast life is creatively featured in the works of poet Gwendolyn Brooks and rapper Lupe Fiasco. World-renowned poet Gwendolyn Brooks, the first African American to receive the Pulitzer Prize for poetry, has without a doubt influenced many lives, espe cially those of aspiring writers. Perhaps more notable is the late author’s influence on Grammy Award-winning rap mogul Lupe Fiasco. Fiasco’s latest album, The Cool, was released on December 13, 2007 and may be perceived as an extension of Brooks’ prophetic eight-line poem “We Real Cool.” Although conceived to address two seemingly different generations, both works accurately reflect and effectively critique the lust for fast life, which, despite its toxic nature, is still portrayed in popu lar culture as “cool.” In her poem “We Real Cool,” through four couplets, Brooks depicts characteristics of living the “cool” life, which shed light upon the culture of the “cool.” For example, the persona boasts, “We left school” (line 2), an action which is presented as an attribute of being “cool.” Lack of education, however, may also result in disempowerment in other areas of life, confining the dropouts to their roles on the street. This is seen in subsequent activity described by the speaker: “We / Lurk late. We / Strike Straight” (3-4-). These lines depict aspects of a lifestyle that, once chosen, is rather strictive. The list of negative activities goes on until Brooks reaches the last and, ironically, the shortest line of the poem:

“Die soon” (8). Prior to the concluding line, the short, sharp lines appear, as a list does. The speaker is casual and boastful, offering what may be seen as a confession—one that abruptly fatally crashes into a wall of truth at the end. Lupe Fiasco elaborates on a similar concept in his eighteen-track LP as seen, for example, in the song “The Coolest,” in which Fiasco raps, “match made in heaven set the fires in hell.” This “match made in heaven” may be inter preted as describing young people (males especially) in love with the fast life. The image of the fires in hell being sparked suggests that the union being discussed is unnatural. More over, because what goes on in the heavens is most likely unknown in hell, the line suggests that those who dwell within the fast life are unaware of and perhaps even un concerned with the turbulence they cause in the lives of others. This is also hinted at in Brooks’ poem through the persona’s as sertion that the members of the group “sing sin” (5). Fiasco conveys a similar theme in “Intruder Alert,” a song which describes a wounded woman who, in essence, was violated by men in the past. However, the song may also be interpreted as suggesting that this woman was violated by the system that fosters the entrepreneurship prevalent among misguided young urban men living the fast life. “Intruder Alert” also depicts the lives of men in this community: “No one ever loved him, that’s why he gets high enough to touch the heavens above him.” This passage of the song speaks to one of the activities associated with life in the fast lane: drug use. Fiasco expands this concept by suggesting that this “sin” has roots in a deeper cause, that cause being lack of self-love. In Brooks’ poem, every line contains the word we; every line except the last line, that is. The last line speaks of an untimely death but contains no we. Through this omission, Brooks suggests that the early death of the members of the group is something that is endured alone, although the other activities are pursued with others. (The captain and the crew are supposed to go down with the ship. If only the captain goes down, then perhaps that captain never had much of a ‘.

VOLUME

4, ISSUE 1

crew.) Therefore, by omitting camaraderie in the last and defining line, perhaps Brooks is conveying a link between the desire to be “cool” and the lack of self-love, as seen in Fiasco’s song. If one cannot love oneself, then one cannot love oth ers; therefore the “cool” die alone. Fiasco’s CD opens with a spoken word introduction entitled “Babba Says Cool for Thought,” which highlights vio lence, gentrification, drugs, and unmarked cars as elements of “cool.” Arguably the most powerful line of this introduc tion occurs when a female voice says, “Check your ingredi ents before you overdose on the coo1.” This passage suggests that “the cool” may be a part of one’s unconscious, like an ingredient in a favorite food (or drug) that one isn’t even

PAGE 20 aware of consuming. This passage is found at the beginning of the CD and expresses the central theme of Fi asco’s album and essentially the theme of Brooks’ poem: Awareness of the potentially devastating effects of the desire for “the cool” is crucial because the fast lane on a wall/street can be fatal. Likewise, if one is not aware of the past, then one is bound to repeat it. -

Catherine Saunders

“LEARNING THE HARD WAY” BOOK REVIEW OF OCTAVIA BUTLER’S KINDRED Any student who has ever wondered about the importance of history class has un doubtedly been told that “those who don’t learn their history are doomed to repeat it.” This explanation usually makes sense in terms of the benefits of learning from past mistakes, break ing bad habits, or even making political decisions. However, few people would think to apply this adage to slavery. Octavia Butler’s Kindred seems to suggest that simply learning one’s his tory in the form of reading books or memorizing facts does not suffice, for the only way to truly learn is through experience. In Kindred, Dana and Kevin Franklin, an interracial couple, have recently moved into their new home in 1970s California. While unpacking books and putting them onto the book shelf, Dana suddenly faints. She wakes up in the middle of the woods and sees a young boy drowning in the river nearby. Dana rescues the boy and subsequently defends herself against his hysterical mother and gun-toting father. Just as the father is about to pull the trigger, Dana passes out again and wakes up back in her living room in the 1970s. On her next trip to the unknown, after saving the same slightly older boy from cur tains that he has set on fire, Dana discovers that she is on a plantation in 19th -century Mary land. She eventually figures out that Rufus Weylin, the little boy she keeps rescuing, is the son of the plantation owner and is her great-grandfather. She also realizes that he “calls” her back to the past whenever he is in danger. During a series of peril ous journeys, including one during which she has to pretend to be her husband’s slave, Dana experiences the brutality of slav ery firsthand and learns all the horror and complexity that can be found within her family history. Dana slowly changes her opinions about the behavior of some slaves on the plantation as she begins to fully under stand their suffering. She learns to see the subservience of some as necessity rather than weakness, and she realizes that the depth and origin of the anger and the resentment of others is a manifestation of their pain. It is by sharing in their pain that Dana and her ancestors become family. Many young African Americans have thought about how they would have responded if they had been slaves. Some people insist that they would have been the Harriet Tubmans or the Nat Turners who resisted bondage or led others to free dom; others cannot even comprehend such torture and have no idea how they would have reacted. Kindred keeps this debate going by giving us a scenario to consider. By reconnecting Dana and her generation_which might have felt removed from the struggle of their ancestors—back to their past, the novel does the same for every other generation of people who read it. As a result, Kindred makes it possible for us to be not haunted by our history but forever humbled by it. -Britney Wilson

PAGE 21

STERLING NOTES

THE SWAHILI FLAGSHIP PROGRAM: LANGUAGE FOR THE AGES I have always had trouble retaining foreign lan guages. In the fourth grade my mom signed me up for French classes, but I could not comprehend a word past bonjour. In the seventh grade I tried my hand at Spanish, but I was lost by the time Senora counted to cinco. Now, the bulk of my foreign language experience lies in Latin, and although Latin is a dead language, the strife that it brought me is very much alive. Despite having taken six years of Latin, all that I can show for it is knowledge of com mon phrases such as carpe diem and quid pro quo. Therefore, when I pondered what lan guage to study my first semes ter at Howard University, all that came to mind was a de clining grade point average. Then, after an entire two minutes of language ponder ing, I decided Swahili would be the culprit. After a mere 100 hours of experiencing Swahili, I was distraught, but thank fully, it was in my Swahili I class that I first heard about the Swahili Flagship Program from Mwalimu (teacher) Lyabaya. It consists of exten sive classes in which students spend more time with the language fewer days a week—a method which is supposed to help students retain the infor mation for longer periods of time. I was hesitant about ap plying to the Swahili Flagship Program because I did not be lieve that I could keep up with that level of work, but for the $5,000 stipend, I would surely try. So, I applied. I wrote the essay and got the recom mendations. I got accepted. Now, oniy two months into the Swahili Flagship Program, I can honestly say that I can speak and comprehend more Swahili than I ever imagined. ft’s incredible. Sometimes I find myself taking notes in Swahili or greeting my peers with a warm habari ghani instead of good morning. If anyone looked back on my track record of learn ing languages, that person would not believe that the Domi mque of the past could have accomplished all that I have in only two months of Swahili! I sat down with Mwalimu to find out exactly how this unbelievable program works.

Dominique: Habczri ghani, Mwalimu. Mwalimu: Nzuri, mwanaJiinzie. D: How did the Swahili Flagship Program get started? M: The Swahili Flagship Program, which comes under Afri can languages, came from Wisconsin with Dr. Antonia Skyler. She got a grant for both Arroba and Swahili, and she decided that Swahili should be taught at Howard. How does the program work? M: The first two years will get you to some level, and then there is an outside evaluator who will evaluate when you’re ready to go to Tanzania, Uni versity of Zimbabwe, where you continue with your disci pline—meaning area of study—and at the same thne keep up Swahili. They insist that the Flagship students should be taught differently. For years people are taught different languages, and no one remembers anything. The purpose of the Flagship is that we use this approach; in four years you should be language superior—native-like. D: What are the goals of the program? M: To teach those who have been accepted to reach the supe rior level of language proficiency so that they can use the lan guage as a second language. We are preparing them for the global market so that the students continue their areas of study [in conjunction] with Swahili. D: What criteria must students meet in order to be a part of the Swahili Flagship Program? M: Have a 3.2 GPA or higher. We want students who are willing to spend two semesters outside of the U.S.A. We want students who are committed to working with the lan guage inside the classroom, outside the classroom, and out side the university, meaning that they should spend time per fecting the language. D: How will study abroad benefit the students? M: It will benefit them by making them ambassadors of to morrow. For example, if you are a political science major and you become a graduate of Swahili Flagship, it opens up a job for you in the global market. It broadens you linguistically as

PAGE 21

STERliNG NOTES

THE SWAHILI FLAGSHIP PROGRAM: LANGUAGE FOR THE AGES I have always had trouble retaining foreign Ian guages. In the fourth grade my mom signed me up for French classes, but I could not comprehend a word past bonjour. In the seventh grade I tried my hand at Spanish, but I was lost by the time Senora counted to cinco. Now, the bulk of my foreign language experience lies in Latin, and although Latin is a dead language, the strife that it brought me is very much alive. Despite having taken six years of Latin, all that I can show for it is knowledge of com mon phrases such as carpe diem and quid pro quo. Therefore, when I pondered what lan guage to study my first semes ter at Howard University, all that came to mind was a de clining grade point average. Then, after an entire two minutes of language ponder ing, I decided Swahili would be the culprit. After a mere 100 hours of experiencing Swahili, I was distraught, but thank fully, it was in my Swahili I class that I first heard about the Swahili Flagship Program from Mwalirnu (teacher) Lyabaya. It consists of exten sive classes in which students spend more time with the language fewer days a week—a method which is supposed to help students retain the infor mation for longer periods of time. I was hesitant about ap plying to the Swahili Flagship Program because I did not be lieve that I could keep up with that level of work, but for the $5,000 stipend, I would surely try. So, I applied. I wrote the essay and got the recom mendations. I got accepted. Now, only two months into the Swahili Flagship Program, I can honestly say that I can speak and comprehend more Swahili than I ever imagined. It’s in credible. Sometimes I find myself taking notes in Swahili or greeting my peers with a warm habari ghanz instead of good morning, if anyone looked back on my track record of learn ing languages, that person would not believe that the Domi nique of the past could have accomplished all that I have in only two months of Swahili! I sat down with Mwalimu to find out exactly how this unbelievable program works.

Dominique: Habaii ghani, Mwalimu. Mwalimu: Nzuri, mwanafunzie. D: How did the Swahili Flagship Program get started? M: The Swahili Flagship Program, which comes under Afri can languages, came from Wisconsin with Dr. Antonia Skyler. She got a grant for both Arroba and Swahili, and she decided that Swahili should be taught at Howard. D: How does the program work? M: The first two years will get you to some level, and then there is an outside evaluator who will evaluate when you’re ready to go to Tanzania, Uni versity of Zimbabwe, where you continue with your clisci pline—meaning area of study—and at the same time keep up Swahili. They insist that the Flagship students should be taught differently. For years people are taught different languages, and no one remembers anything. The purpose of the Flagship is that we use this approach; in four years you should be language superior—native-like. D: What are the goals of the program? M: To teach those who have been accepted to reach the supe rior level of language proficiency so that they can use the lan guage as a second language. We are preparing them for the global market so that the students continue their areas of study [in conjunction] with Swahili. D: What criteria must students meet in order to be a part of the Swahili Flagship Program? M: Have a 3.2 GPA or higher. We want students who are willing to spend two semesters outside of the U.S.A. We want students who are committed to working with the lan guage inside the classroom, outside the classroom, and out side the university, meaning that they should spend time per fecting the language. D: How will study abroad benefit the students? M: It will benefit them by making them ambassadors of to morrow. For example, if you are a political science major and you become a graduate of Swahili Flagship, it opens up a job for you in the global market. It broadens you linguistically as

________ _______

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PAGE 22

well as culturally. It makes you understand how other people derful opportunity to be a part of the nation’s first Swahili Flagship Program. study and think in order for you to deal with any problem. The problems that we are having in the Third World—they are better understood if people are language efficient. In the —Dominique Daniels language you are also learning the culture and how to work with people. So if you see them doing certain things, it is because of the culture... It makes you not only a better per son but better at your profes sion. You can’t work with Common Swahili Phrases other people without respecting their culture and English Swahili what they’re all Jambo Hello about. You are the How are you? Ha ban? pioneers of the Swa Fine Mzuri Sana hili Flagship, and it is Goodbye Kwaheri through you that we May I come in? Hodi? will learn what to do Come in, near Ka ri bu and what not to do. Please Tafad hail I was de Bring me hot water please Lete mail moto, tafadhali lighted to learn the Thank you Asante sana Ndio history behind the Yes Hapana program, ands it fills No Leo Today me with a great Leo usiku Tonight sense of pride to Kesho Tomorrow know that I am Iko wapi among the first stu Where is Ngapi? dents of the Swahili How much? How many? Ngapi shillings? Flagship Program in How much is it? N gojea the nation. My peers Wait Pole pole down (caution) Slow and I will set the picha? picture? Nikupige your May I take tone for an entirely Bibi Mrs. new look at the way Toto Infant, child students learn lan Mzee Elder (one with wisdom) guages. science major, Matthews, a political Blair freshman says, “I enjoy Flagship. You learn a lot at a faster rate because you are here for such a long time. You speak one on one with a teacher. It is less of a classroom setting and more of a tutor ing session, and you get a lot of help individually.” Shavonne Holnian, a freshman psychology major, “Flagship is a very innovative program. We have an ef says, fective learning pattern. Mwalimu has a unique style of teach ing. With Kiswahili as a third language, I have grown to love it. I recommend that students join the program.” I could not agree more with Blair and Shavonne. I am a prime example of Swahili Flagship success. The inten sive classes, combined with cultural learning and a fresh teaching style, are what it took for me to finally retain a for eign language. Before Flagship, I dreaded the idea of learning a foreign language, but today, I can honestly say that Swahili will forever be a part of my life, and I owe it all to this won-

STERLING NOTES

PAGE 23

“[TIHE ART TO DESIFER THE TRUE CARACTER OF CONSTANCY”: FEMALE SILENCE IN MARY WROTH’S URANIA Dr. Elisa Oh joined the Department of English as an assistant professor last August as a specialist in British literature. Here she ojfers an excerptfrom an article she is working on about early I 7”-century British writer Mary Wroth which deciphers women’s silence in the work.

[Selections from the Introduction: Reading l7thCentury Ciphers] In a c. 1617 portrait of Queen Anna of Denmark, the queen displays three jewels on her ruff that form letter ciphers.’ They refer indirectly to specific people and ideas that inform this silent representation of her identity: a crowned “S” stands for her mother, Sophia of Mecklenberg; a crowned “C” surrounding a “4” indicates her brother, Christian IV of Denmark; and the “IHS” monogram encodes her rumored Catholic sympathies. At first glance, these symbols do not convey their precise familial and ideological allusions, but they do imme diately proclaim the existence of a semi-hidden sig nificance. If, however, the viewer is able to decipher their meanings, then the portrait reveals new dirnen sions of the queen’s otherwise intangible loyalties and her self-representation. Using a literary trope that is equivalent to such encoded signs of interiority, Lady Mary Wroth creates her own discourse of feminine silences, which function as multivalent “ciphers.” In her prose romance The Countess ofMontgomery’s Urania, Part 1(1621) and Part II (unpublished), each description of a female character who chooses to be silent in place of expected speech advertises the existence of a complex gendered subject position and partially conceals its meaning.” *

Lady Mary Wroth (c. 1587-c. 1651) was the niece of poet and courtier Sir Philip Sid 1586), and continuing the literary tradition of her family, Wroth published a long (155+ney (and scandal-producing) prose romance in 1621 and a sonnet sequence, “Pamphilia to Amphi lanthus,” which is unusual for being written from a woman’s perspective. Also a courtier, Wroth performed in several of Queen Anna’s court masques. Early modern women were enjoined by sermons, conduct books, literature, and popular culture to be “silent, chaste, and obedient,” and many critics have considered these to be inter changeable feminine virtues. The present study focuses upon how early modern female silences signify many additional ideas and are diverse, powerful forms of discursive agency. By discussing the way to “read” female characters’ silences in the Ura nia, I wish to reveal the manner in which Wroth not only incorporates elements of the dominant discourse of feminine si lence as chaste, obedient virtue, but also engages in constant, creative dialogue with it. While embracing many conservative gender values, her female characters’ silences also sustain more dissident meanings, such as erotic love, resistance to patriar ‘National Portrait Gallery (NPG) 127. See Roy Strong, Tudor andJacobean Portraits (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1969), plate 17. In Afrer Elizabeth: The Rise ofJames ofScotland and the Strugglefor the Throne ofEngland (New York: Ballantine, 2005), Leanda De Lisle comments on Anna’s “persisting love of jeweled ciphers” (198d) and notes that during her years in Scotland, James gave her “a large number of diamond ciphers. Her favorite was ‘A’ for ‘Anna’” (57). The “S” and “C” appear in other portraits of Anna; see for example NPG 4010 and Roy Strong, The English Icon: Elizabethan andJacobean Portraiture (London: Paul Mellon Foundation for British Art, 1969), 283, 299.

“I refer throughout to Mary Wroth, The First Part of The Countess ofMontgomery’s Urania, ed., Josephine A. Roberts (Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1995) and The Second Part of The Countess ofMontgomery’s Urania, eds., Josephine A. Roberts, Suzanne Gossett, and Jane1 Mueller (Tempe, AZ: Renaissance English Text Society and Arizona CMRS, 1999).

STERliNG NOTES

PAGE 23

“[TIHE ART TO DESIFER THE TRUE CARACTER OF CONSTANCY”: FEMALE SILENCE IN MARY WROTH’S URANIA Dr. Elisa Oh joined the Department of English as an assistant professor last August as a specialist in British literature. Here she ffers an excerptfrom an article she is working on about early I 7th -century British writer Mary Wroth which deciphers women’s silence in the work.

[Selections from the Introduction: Reading 17”-Century Ciphersi In a c. 1617 portrait of Queen Anna of Denmark, the queen displays three jewels on her ruff that form letter ciphers.’ They refer indirectly to specific people and ideas that inform this silent representation of her identity: a crowned “S” stands for her mother, Sophia of Mecklenberg; a crowned “C” surrounding a “4-” indicates her brother, Christian W of Denmark; and the “IHS” monogram encodes her rumored Catholic sympathies. At first glance, these symbols do not convey their pr’’ familial and ideological allusions, but they do imme diately proclaim the existence of a semi-hidden sig nificance. If, however, the viewer is able to decipher their meanings, then the portrait reveals new dimen sions of the queen’s otherwise intangible loyalties and her self-representation. Using a literary trope that is equivalent to such encoded signs of interiority, Lady Mary Wroth creates her own discourse of feminine silences, which function as multivalent “ciphers.” In her prose romance The Countess of Montgomery’s Urania, Part 1(1621) and Part II (unpublished), each description of a female character who chooses to be silent in place of expected speech advertises the existence of a complex gendered subject position and partially conceals its meaning.” *

Lady Mary Wroth (c. 1587-c. 1651) was the niece of poet and courtier Sir Philip Sid ney (1554-1586), and continuing the literary tradition of her family, Wroth published a long (and scandal-producing) prose romance in 1621 and a sonnet sequence, “Pamphilia to Amphi lanthus,” which is unusual for being written from a woman’s perspective. Also a courtier, Wroth performed in several of Queen Anna’s court masques. Early modern women were enjoined by sermons, conduct books, literature, and popular culture to be “silent, chaste, and obedient,” and many critics have considered these to be inter changeable feminine virtues. The present study focuses upon how early modern female silences signify many additional ideas and are diverse, powerful forms of discursive agency. By discussing the way to “read” female characters’ silences in the Ura nia, I wish to reveal the manner xi which Wroth not only incorporates elements of the dominant discourse of feminine si lence as chaste, obedient virtue, but also engages in constant, creative dialogue with it. While embracing many conservative gender values, her female characters’ silences also sustain more dissident meanings, such as erotic love, resistance to patriar ‘National Portrait Gallery (NPG) 127. See Roy Strong, Tudor andJacobean Portraits (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1969), plate 17. In After Elizabeth: The Rise ofJames ofScotland and the Strug,qlefor the Throne ofEngland (New York: Ballantine, 2005), Leanda De Lisle comments on Anna’s “persisting love of jeweled ciphers” (198d) and notes that during her years in Scotland, James gave her “a large number of diamond ciphers. Her favorite was ‘A’ for ‘Anna’” (57). The “S” and “C” appear in other portraits of Anna; see for example NPG 4010 and Roy Strong, The English Icon: Elizabethan and Jacobean Portraiture (London: Paul Mellon Foundation for British Art, 1969), 283, 299. “I refer throughout to Mary Wroth, The First Part of The Countess of Montgomery’s Urania, ed., Josephine A. Roberts (Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1995) and The Second Part of The Countess ofMontgomery’s Urania, eds., Josephine A. Roberts, Suzanne Gossett, and Janel Mueller (Tempe, AZ: Renaissance English Text Society and Arizona CMRS, 1999).

STERLING NOTES

PAGE 24 chal authority, and righteous anger. *

The process of reading mysterious ciphers in the Urania has the same signifying pattern and goal as the description of intentional female silences—to publicize interiority in an encoded message and then to teach appropriate readers how to un derstand it. Wroth’s ciphers and female characters’ silences present a material symbol or behavior that simultaneously con ceals and promises to reveal an intangible, autonomous subject position. This delay in comprehension is key to the moral and aesthetic success of each cipher or silence, and Wroth sets up a pattern of ideal encoders and decoders of nonverbal signs and symbols. Encoders gain virtue and prestige by artfully concealing their true identity or intentions, and decoders gain virtue by penetrating the disguise intuitively and tactfully. *

[Selection from Part I: The Embroidery Pattern as Cipher] Through the material metaphors of copying embroidery patterns and reading written symbols, Wroth unfolds her theory of the relationship between outwardly visible social signs and the abstractions they represent. Both the main female character, Painphilia, and her chronically unfaithful love interest, Amphilanthus, de r scribe the work of studying to learn to read the “ciphers” of constancy in love. Amphi ,r• —.:? -i_ lanthus boasts that he will set an example of constancy that women will be unable to imitate: “Well, I fear onely that I shall sett you all such a patterne of Constancy, as the wourke will bee soc hard floe woeman can learne itt, pick itt out” (2.28). In response to his textile metaphor, Pamphilia replies, .‘..

I hope wee [women] may in time [imitate you].. and then growne cunning in that wourck, sett a new way to express our learning for men, who have nott the art to desifer the true Caracter of Con stancy, which (beeleeve itt, my Lord) would bee quickly learnte if you wowld sett your mmdc to itt. (2.28)

;r:

•) .,

1.’..

‘v’”

“[TiHE ART TO DESIFER THE TRUE CARACTER OF CONSTANCY”: FEMALE SILENCE IN MARY WROTH’S URANIA veiled in black. Their hidden faces have the same semiotic effect as the encoded and therefore delayed meanings of ciphers. Similarly providing a suspenseful delay, their verbal silences prolong the process of “reading” or deciphering their disguised identities and corresponding emotional estrangement. This scene dramatizes the lovers’ incremental penetration of the code of disguise and their reestablishment of a sort of intimacy. However, this reunion does not result in unadulterated happiness. Wrath describes Amphilanthus’ exterior appearance and actions, suggesting that his trembling arises from the erotic anxiety of meeting a potentially hostile mistress and guilt for his betrayal. In comparison, a variety of emotions coexist in Pamphilia’s silence: “fear,” “infinite passions,” and the conflicting desires to behave with kindness and unkindness toward her unfaithful lover. Like ideal, courtly readers of ciphers, they eventually recognize each other’s identities—which are partly but not entirely hidden by their disguises—but out of tactful reserve and emotional uncertainty, they do not immediately penetrate beyond the surface of their respective “veils.” The scene progresses from completely covered faces and bodies to exposed and recognized hands and faces, and finally to silent eye contact that reveals hidden thoughts and feelings. Pamphiuia initiates this process when she pulled of her glove to lift up a great Vaile she had on, which beeing thick, kept her close and hott... “I pray Sir,” sayd she, “if itt bee nott to unseemly an office for a knight to help the dressing of a lady to assiste mee in taking of this vaile.”

Soc pulling ofif] his gantletts, hee soc tenderly and gently pulled of her Vaile as if hee had binn bred in a ladys chamber. His hands bare, she was soone assured who it was. (2.197)

STERLING NOTES

“Madame,” sayd hee, “if all Vailes were taken away, and truthe only knowne, then showld my best blessings shine.”

Pamphilia’s reply turns into a gendered criticism of Amphilanthus and all men, assert .JL ing that women will surpass men in the practice and expression of constancy. She re verses the gendered hierarchy imagined by Arnphilanthus. He playfully depicts himself .1 I. • creating an inaccessible “pattern” of constancy that is so complex that all women can not understand how it was made—”learne itt”—or reproduce it themselves—”pick itt out.” Pamphilia, however, counters this metaphor with one in which women are the ones who produce a superior semiotic system: not only will they “grow cunning in that wourck,” but they will “sett a new way to express our learning for men.” This new feminine mode of expressing constancy consists of ciphers or “Caracters” that are not immediately decipherable, but, unlike Amphilanthus’s pattern, are accessible to those who make the effort to learn them. *

PAGE 25

[Selection from Part II: Reading Ciphers in a Scene from Urania] The Urania’s discourse of multivalent, cipher-like feminine silences culminates in Pamphilia’ s intentional silence lasting for 189 pages in Part II. This prolonged principled silence gives rise to extended silent Amphilanthus, toward “conversations” in which they must decipher one another’s ambivalent silences. The lovers meet by accident, and both char acters’ faces are obscured, but each also guesses the other’s identity during this silent scene of progressive unveilings: Hee kept his beaver close, and his new shield and devise changed did the better cover him.. .They saluted each other, and the Emperour helpt his deerest lady ashoar, though trembling as if bee had binn in the wa ter. .She tooke his help, butt trembling to[o], her infinite passions beeing such and soc full as she feard the breaking of them. To kindnes she must nott afforde them.. .yett kindnes must nott bee, and unkindnes she Vowed showid never bee, nor appeere from her to him. (2.196-7) .

Amphilanthus has rendered himself a cipher with the new “devise” of a giant’s head on his shield, while Pamphilia is heavily

Wroth draws attention to the literal and metaphoric significance of the characters’ unmasking with Amphilanthus’ comment about removing “all Vailes”to reveal the “truthe.” Suddenly the intimate action of a man helping a woman remove an article of clothing not only has an emotional and erotic meaning, but it also represents the epistemological problem at hand. Just as Amphilanthus must take off Pamphilia’s black veil in order to read her silent but truthful facial expressions, other obscured truths about their estrangement must also be unveiled and understood. The truth of Pamphilia’s fidelity was veiled from Amphilanthus by the false servant Forsandrus, and Amphilanthus’ love for Pamphilia is veiled by the news of his liaison and bigamous marriage in Candia. As the characters’ hands, faces, and subjective intentions are revealed, Wroth again shows her readers that meaning is not immediately available on the surface of ciphers, disguises, and intentional silences, but is intended for only privileged readers to access and interpret.

PAGE 25

STERLING NOTES

“mHE ART TO DESIFER THE TRUE CARACTER OF CONSTANCY”: FEMALE SILENCE IN MARY WROTH’S URANIA veiled in black. Their hidden faces have the same semiotic effect as the encoded and therefore delayed meanings of ciphers. Similarly providing a suspenseful delay, their verbal silences prolong the process of “reading” or deciphering their disguised identities and corresponding emotional estrangement. This scene dramatizes the lovers’ incremental penetration of the code of disguise and their reestablishment of a sort of intimacy. However, this reunion does not result in unadulterated happiness. Wroth describes Amphilanthus’ exterior appearance and actions, suggesting that his trembling arises from the erotic anxiety of meeting a potentially hostile mistress and guilt for his betrayal. In comparison, a variety of emotions coexist in Pamphilia’s silence: “fear,” “infinite passions,” and the conflicting desires to behave with kindness and unkindness toward her unfaithful lover. Like ideal, courtly readers of ciphers, they eventually recognize each other’s identities—which are partly but not entirely hidden by their disguises—but out of tactful reserve and emotional uncertainty, they do not immediately penetrate beyond the surface of their respective “veils.” The scene progresses from conipletely covered faces and bodies to exposed and recognized bands and faces, and finally to silent eye contact that reveals hidden thoughts and feelings. Pamphilia initiates this process when she pulled of her glove to lift up a great Vaile she had on, which beeing thick, kept her close and hott... “I pray Sir,” sayd she, “if itt bee nott to unseemly an office for a knight to help the dressing of a lady to assiste mee in taking of this vaile.” “Madame,” sayd hee, “if all Vailes were taken away, and truthe only knowne, then showld my best blessings shine.” Soe pulling ofjfj his gantletts, hee soe tenderly and gently pulled of her Vaile as if hee had binn bred in a ladys chamber. His hands bare, she was soone assured who it was. (2.197) Wroth draws attention to the literal and metaphoric significance of the characters’ unmasking with Amphilanthus’ comment about removing “all Vailes” to reveal the “truthe.” Suddenly the intimate action of a man helping a woman remove an article of clothing not only has an emotional and erotic meaning, but it also represents the epistemological problem at hand. Just as Amphilanthus must take off Pamphilia’s black veil in order to read her silent but truthful facial expressions, other obscured truths about their estrangement must also be unveiled and understood. The truth of Pamphilia’s fidelity was veiled from Amphilanthus by the false servant Forsandrus, and Amphilanthus’ love for Painphilia is veiled by the news of his liaison and bigamous marriage in CandJa. As the characters’ hands, faces, and subjective intentions are revealed, Wroth again shows her readers that meaning is not immediately available on the surface of ciphers, disguises, and intentional silences, but is intended for only privileged readers to access and interpret.

I PAGIi 26

15TH

STERLING NOTES

ANNUAL HEART’S DAY GALA: LEGACY, GENEALOG’ç AND TONI MORRISON

A room overflowing with anticipation, dim lights setting the mood, chatter moving between the dishes that adorned the tables to the enthusiasts that surrounded them—out day of Toni Morrison had ar rived. Friday, February 3”, 2009, Howard University celebrated its fifteenth annual Heart’s Day Conference and Gala, entitled “A Daugh ter’s Return: The Fiction of Toni Morrison.” The honoree that day was Howard University’s own Toni Morrison, and a day of incredible schol arship had culminated in a night brimming with excitement. A spotlight shone in the back of the room. The African Heri tage Dancers and Drummers entered. The pulsating rhythm beating from their drums enticed its listeners. Our gaze followed them from their point of entry until their arrival at the foot of the stage in the front of the room. Then, Toni Morrison was led in, and the excitement reached a feverish pitch. Cameras flashed like strobe lights. Necks were being strained to get just one glimpse of the Nobel Laureate. After Professor Morrison was seated, the master of ceremo nies Mr. Tyrone Barksdale guided us through an evening of heartfilled words sung and spoken, delivered by the likes of Provost Alvin

The Department of English at Howard University i presents

‘DAY “AL The Fiction of 9

Lord (PAUL). Dr. Eleanor Travior chair of the English Department, y, Febniarv 13,2009 gave the occasion and graced us with her flair of exceptionally written c 0(1- 1du1 and delivered oratory. Kehembe Valerie Eichelberger sang a grace that could bring Howani Univemlty tears to one’s eyes and chills that ran clear from one end of the spine to the other. The musical stylings of the Howard University Jazz Ensem ble and Sassy soothed us through dinner and dessert. Dr. Johnnetta B. Cole (President Emerita at Spelman College and Bennett College), Dr. Carolyn Denard (founding president of the Toni Morrison Society), and Dr. Paula Giddings (E.A. Woodson professor of Afro-American Studies at Smith college) all gave tributes to Toni Morrison—the woman, the scholar, the novelist. Two of the “surprising” highlights of the night—specifically for those of us who had not read the program before hand—were the tribute poems delivered by Arniri Baraka and Sonia Sanchez. The words flowed like fluid from their lips. Baraka teased Professor Morrison about their days at Howard University together, while Sanchez provided a lyrical exaltation of Professor Morrison—who and what Morrison represents, as well as how she does so. The night reached its climax when Toni Morrison, escorted by COAS Student Council president Brian Smart and HUSA vice president Kellen Moore, stood at the podium, gracefully allowing us to smother her with smiles, cheers, ap plause, adoration. Professor Morrison took out her latest novel, A Mercy, and read to us. From the expressions on the faces of the people in that room, I knew that they were lingering on her every word the same way that I was. I felt myself morphed into a temporal childhood, where my mother, Toni Morrison, was reading me my favorite book, my favorite nan-a tive. Whether or not it mirrors the creative texture surrounding a character like Florens, a scholar and professor like Eleanor Traylor, or a Nobel Laureate like Toni Morrison, the narrative legacy of that night rendered us all witnesses to the genealogy of literary and scholarly excellence. .

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-Natasha Block

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THE PEDAGOGY OF READING: TONI MORRISON’S A MERCY Dr. Eleanor W. Traylor, chair of the Department of English, opened the keynote panel at the Heart’s Day Confrrence on i February 13, 2009. This panel greets “The Return of the Daugh L ter,” the theme of this con ference, by welcoming our honoree and this magnificent audience. We convene, cer tainly, to congratulate the morning panels for brilliant examples of scholarship on the fiction of Toni Morrison and on the kind of teaching that advances the reading of a narrative project that has, arguably, redirected our literary imaginary and re-charged the world of story. For readers growing up after 1970, Pecola of The Blu est Eye is as vivid a reference sign as is “Goldilocks and the Three Bears,” and if one has revealed the other as an imperial story, then that is a byproduct. For the same readers, Sethe of Beloved is as vivid as Scarlet of Gone with the Wind, and the Tar Baby has become a beautiful woman called Jadine. Seven sentences into the newest Morrison novel, called A Mercy, a voice asks, “Can you read?” (1). But before that question is uttered, we, the hearer/reader, have already asked the crucial questions to be asked of anything: Who? What? Where? How? When? So we read/hear on to dis cover who is speaking and to whom. This is one of the most important discoveries to make of any novel written by our honoree. Voice and address is one keynote that distinguishes fiction written after 1970, at least by African-American nov elists. In A Mercy, the voice opening the narrative is the voice of a sixteen year-old girl called Florens, speaking! writing not to the world, not to you and me (except as im plied), but to whom she hungers for: she says, “My head is light with the confusion of two things, hunger for you and scare if I am lost” (6). She is speaking to the man she loves. This is all we know about her before we know her name, full of curi except that she calls her telling “a confession (4). We dreams” also that read osities familiar only in know ing, for her, means reading signs like whether the groundhog sees his shadow or, as she says, when “a pea hen refuses to brood.” She and we understand that “other signs need more time to understand” (4). Rapidly, we learn that Florens’ sixteen year-old self can’t wait to be grown; she is what grown-ups call fast—a .

girl wanting desperately to be grown, loving highheel shoes. We know that in the place where she grew up, women are called senhoras, and she calls her mother a minha mae, but her confession, which she calls her “telling,” is also called an auto biography, and some readers who know may also call it a slave narrative, but they would be wrong. Yet such knowl edge is to be gained from “other signs which need more time to understand” or explain. The answers to the questions who and whom have been partially answered by page 2 of the narrative, but they will increase, grow in detail as we read further or as our knowledge base increases. As determined by this panel’s Howard University presenters, this is the method— incremental expansion of the knowledge base—that the Mor rison novel encourages. This, in the language of A Mercy, is “the magic in learning”_another keynote of the Morrison novel. Florens’ “confession” is, among other fascinations, a revelation of a journey which teaches her “never again [to] unfold my limbs to rise up and bare teeth” (1). This she tells us in the first sentence of her utterance. This journey pro ceeds through a wilderness where she encounters ordeals— strange like in dreams, actual like in life. It is a journey of mid-passage like the one that Mistress Rebekka of the novel takes and like the one that Florens’ mother takes. Florens’ journey morphs her from a sixteen year-old belly full of de sire, fright, and rebellion; from a sickening feeling of aban donment by her mother; from an orphaned Negrita, from a disparaged stereotype called, in today’s language teenager to a miracle called hers4fi “Florens. In full .Free,” as defined, spoken, and written by herself. Children, like Florens, who grow up hearing tales, like Lina of the novel tells her, often do not know what the tales are called. They may know that the kind beginning “once upon a time” is called by grown-ups a fairy tale, but they, like Florens, usually do not know the variants called wisdom tale or folktale or the tale of identity called a wonder tale. Some signs “need more time to understand” and need someone to help decipher them, as Lina helps Florens. Deci phering—a reading and decoding of signs_is another key note of the fiction authored by our honoree. When Chloe Anthony Wofford to become Morrison arrived at Howard University, she had heard variants of the kind of tale Lina tells Florens. If she had forgotten some tales she had heard or read, she had, nevertheless, stored them, as Sorrow of the novel had stored them deep in unconscious ness, as we all have. At Howard she met a professor who loved stories, collected stories, toLd stories, and wrote about ..

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THE PEDAGOGY OF READING: TONI MORRISON’S A MERCY fl3

Dr. Eleanor W. Trylor, chair of the Department of English, opened the keynote panel at the Heart’s Day Confrrence on February 13, 2009. This panel greets “The Return of the Daugh ter,” the theme of this con ference, by welcoming our honoree and this magnificent audience. We convene, cer tainly, to congratulate the morning panels for brilliant examples of scholarship on the fiction of Toni Morrison and on the kind of teaching that advances the reading of a narrative project that has, arguably, redirected our literary imaginary and re-charged the world of story. For readers growing up after 1970, Pecola of The Blu est Eye is as vivid a reference sign as is “Goldilocks and the Three Bears,” and if one has revealed the other as an imperial story, then that is a byproduct. For the same readers, Sethe of Beloved is as vivid as Scarlet of Gone with the Wind, and the Tar Baby has become a beautiful woman called Jadine. Seven sentences into the newest Morrison novel, called A Mercy, a voice asks, “Can you read?” (1). But before that question is uttered, we, the hearer/reader, have already asked the crucial questions to be asked of anything: Who? What? Where? How? When? So we read/hear on to dis cover who is speaking and to whom. This is one of the most important discoveries to make of any novel written by our honoree. Voice and address is one keynote that distinguishes fiction written after 1970, at least by African-American nov elists. In A Mercy, the voice opening the narrative is the voice of a sixteen year-old girl called Florens, speaking! writing not to the world, not to you and me (except as im plied), but to whom she hungers for: she says, “My head is light with the confusion of two things, hunger for you and scare if I am lost” (6). She is speaking to the man she loves. This is all we know about her before we know her name, full of curi except that she calls her telling “a confession osities familiar only in dreams” (4). We know also that read ing, for her, means reading signs like whether the groundhog sees his shadow or, as she says, when “a pea hen refuses to brood.” She and we understand that “other signs need more time to understand” (4). Rapidly, we learn that Florens’ sixteen year-old self can’t wait to be grown; she is what grown-ups call fast—a

—

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girl wanting desperately to be grown, loving high-heel shoes. We know that in the place where she grew up, women are called senhoras, and she calls her mother a minha mar, but her confession, which she calls her “telling,” is also called an autosome readers who know may also call it a biography, and slave narrative, but they would be wrong. Yet such knowl echie is to be gained from “other signs which need more time to understand” or explain. The answers to the questions who and whom have been partially answered by page 2 of the narrative, but they will increase, grow in detail as we read further or as our knowledge base increases. As determined by this panel’s Howard University presenters, this is the method— incremental expansion of the knowledge base—that the Mor rison novel encourages. This, in the language of A Mercy, is “the magic in learning”—another keynote of the Morrison novel. Florens’ “confession” is, among other fascinations, a revelation of a journey which teaches her “never again Ltol unfold my limbs to rise up and bare teeth” (1). This she tells us in the first sentence of her utterance. This journey pro ceeds through a wilderness where she encounters ordeals— strange like in dreams, actual like in life. It is a journey of mid-passage like the one that Mistress Rebekka of the novel takes and like the one that Florens’ mother takes. Florens’ journey morphs her from a sixteen year-old belly full of de sire, fright, and rebellion; from a sickening feeling of aban donment by her mother; from an orphaned Negrita, from a disparaged stereotype called, in today’s language teenager to a Free,” as defined, miracle called hers4fi “Florens. In full spoken, and written by herself. Children, like Florens, who grow up hearing tales, like Lina of the novel tells her, often do not know what the tales are called. They may know that the kind beginning “once upon a time” is called by grown-ups a fairy tale, but they, like Florens, usually do not know the variants called wisdom tale or folktale or the tale of identity called a wonder tale. Some signs “need more time to understand” and need someone to help decipher them, as Lina helps Florens. Deci phering—a reading and decoding of signs—is another key note of the fiction authored by our honoree. When Chloe Anthony Wofford to become Morrison arrived at Howard University, she had heard variants of the kind of tale Lina tells Florens. If she had forgotten some tales she had heard or read, she had, nevertheless, stored them, as Sorrow of the novel had stored them deep in unconscious ness, as we all have. At Howard she met a professor who loved stories, collected stories, told stories, and wrote about . . .

STERLING NOTES

PAGE 28 stories. This professor Sterling Brown, who taught for forty years here in the Department of English, whose method of reading and telling and deciphering story inspired a genera tion of writers, is the ancestral presence infusing this event called Heart’s Day. It is for him and his work that the De partment of English at Howard seeks endowment of a distin guished Chair. Of his teaching Brown’s students, in this case histo rian Michael R. Winston, recalls his “catholicity of interest,” his “store of hard-won insights”: “Brown read in the natural sciences, the social sciences, German literature, French lit erature, and the novel” (Gabbin 56). His direct relation to Toni Morrison is a matter of scholarly observation, as the late historian John W. Blasingame, Howard University graduate and Chair of African American Studies at Yale re has University. “Indeed, marked: Brown, [Jean] Toomer, and Zora Neale Hurston comprise three cardinal points on a triangle of influence out of which emerged, among others, Ralph Effison, Toni Mor rison, Alice Walker, and Leon Forrest” (Gabbin 57). As suggestive as other observations that link Sterling Brown and Toni Morri son, namely that in the 1930s he inaugurated in poetry a new Black poetic diction and that in the 1 970s she in fiction a new poesis, both by way of folk speech and mythology—still there remains a huge parallel. Both writers reveal a common inter est in the question Florens raises as she begins her story, “Can you read?” Both suggest, as Florens does, that reading means de-coding signs and that some signs “need.. .time to under stand.” Both also agree, as Florens demonstrates, that telling (orature) and writing (ecriture) are co-terminus and that only necessity prompts preference of either one. Florens writes “him” when she cannot talk to “him,” hoping that he can or will “read.” But there are things that Florens cannot know. She cannot know that at the approximate time that she is taking her journey through a wilderness becoming America, a girl like her is also growing up motherless, is learning to read and write, reads everything, writes poems which, in a way, tell her story. Her name is Phillis, and one of her poems uses the same words that Florens’ mother does. The poem begins: “Twas [a] Mercy” (Wheatley, line 1). But Florens can’t know any of this because the wonder of it all had not happened

then. “Some signs need time to understand.” Only a reader can know this. Another thing that Florens cannot know is that her “telling” which she inscribes for the man she loves to read is a wonder tale, but centuries will pass before a scholar names it so. Florens’ tale “begins with some harm or villainy done to someone” (Florens’ perception that her mother has aban doned her) “or with a desire to have something” (Florens’ desire to find her lover; Mistress Rebecca’s desire that Florens find the blacksmith), “and develops through the hero’s [Florens] departure from home and encounter with [a] donor [Daughter Jane] who provides [her] with a magic agent that helps [her] find the object of the search. Further along, the tale includes combat with an adversary.. a return and a pursuit” (Propp 102). Florens’ tale encounters the tales of everyone im portant to her becoming or her identity, so the structuring of her identity is the structuring of the novel where Florens is both reader and writer, careful observer, active participant, passionate and compassionate, grate ftil and giving, fearful and brave, profligate (ready to give her whole self, feeling she is empty without “him,” not knowing, like Sethe of the narrator’s Beloved, that “[she is hen best thing,” 273); then fiercely Florens becomes herself: “Full,” Florens. Florens cannot know that over the years her tale will back-watered, racialized, genderized, class trivialized, be conscienced, anonymized, stereotyped, politicized almost beyond recognition. She cannot know that there will be a university built in her honor; that it will be bigger than Mas ter Jacob of the novel ever would be able to imagine; that in it there would be a professor who would expose the stereo types, saying that “[t]he Negro has met with as great injustice in American literature as he has in American life” (Brown, “Negro Character”). Florens could not know her biographernarrator would change the word Negro to Africanist and show, further how. She could not know how generations of their stu dents at the University and far beyond would learn to read the signs; would scrape and peel all the caked dirt and painted-over surfaces and make shiny clean the floor where she wrote her story. In doing this, they would be passing on Florens’ story as legacy—their lineage, and they would be calling the story the birth of American literature. .

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BOOK REVIEW: TONI MORRISON’S A MERCY Renowned author Toni Morrison has offered another heartfelt novel to all of her fans, adding another profound resource to the literary world. A Mercy, set in the late 1600’s, captures the thoughts, friendships, portrayals, and acts of mercy of characters from various backgrounds—African, Dutch, Barbadian, Portuguese, oceangoing. For these characters, it narrates their journeys and reveals the inter sections of their lives in the new world. A Mercy alternates storytelling voices among characters and a narrator. The main character, Florence, an adolescent full of innocence and youth, opens up the story, bringing the reader into her words of unrelenting but now lifeless love—words that never reach her former lover. She tells her story, starting with the beginning and the manner in which she came to the land of her master, Jacob Vaark, and continuing through her journey, during which she is smitten by love, into to her melancholy present. Jacob Vaark is a Dutch trader and an orphan who luckily receives land in the New World by inheriting it from an uncle he has never seen. He is a man who is modest and who is kind to all three of his slaves as well as other black men who enter the story. He secures a wife from Portugal, Rebekka, not because of her physical features but because he believes she will play her role. Their union cannot be a better one, for they work well together and provide one another with good or U’1f .u companionship. uir ‘w:: ritr Vaark’s farm serves as the setting of the story, and together, Vaark, Re bekka, Florence, and two other slaves—Lina, a young woman who takes Florence under her wing as a daughter, and Sorrow, a withdrawn girl who lacks a past other than a life at sea—come together on this isolated farm and live contently as though they are a family. At one point, their lives are ideal. However, their isolation soon becomes a curse. After Rebekka’s cliii dren die, Vaark begins to build elaborate houses like the one he detested when he first arrived in the New World. Their lives worsen after smallpox plagues the residents of the community. A Mercy delves deeply into the lives and the thoughts of each of the primary characters, showing their feelings and beliefs and the way they change because of the hardship they face in life. In the end, they realize that without blood ties, there is nothing to keep them bound together. Morrison braces readers with a tragedy that unfolds in the New World—one thought to be full of promises for both Africans and Anglo-Saxons. Her moving novel tells of characters who all show mercy but never receive it.

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—Sophia Adem

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BOOK REVIEW: TONI MORRISON’S A MERCY Renowned author Toni Morrison has offered another heartfelt novel to all of her fans, adding another profound resource to the literary world. A Mercy, set in the late 1600’s, captures the thoughts, friendships, portrayals, and acts of mercy of characters from various backgrounds—African, Dutch, Barbadian, Portuguese, oceangoing. For these characters, it narrates their journeys and reveals the intersections of their lives in the new world. A Mercy alternates storytelling voices among characters and a narrator. The marn character, Florence, an adolescent full of innocence and youth, opens up the story, bringing the reader into her words of unrelenting but now lifeless love—words that never reach her former lover. She tells her story, starting with the beginning and the manner in which she came to the land of her master, Jacob Vaark, and continuing through her journey, during which she is smitten by love, into to her melancholy present. Jacob Vaark is a Dutch trader and an orphan who luckily receives land in the New World by inheriting it from an uncle he has never seen. He is a man who is modest and who is kind to all three of his slaves as well as other black men who enter the story. He secures a wife from Portugal, Rebekka, not because of her physical features but because he believes she will play her role. Their union cannot be a better one, for they work well together and provide one another with good I •Hi• . companionship. Vaark’s farm serves as the setting of the story, and together, Vaark, Re bekka, Florence, and two other slaves—Lina, a young woman who takes Florence under her wing as a daughter, and Sorrow, a withdrawn girl who lacks a past other than a life at sea—come together on this isolated farm and live contently as though they are a family. At one point, their lives are ideal. However, their isolation soon becomes a curse. After Rebekka’s chil dren die, Vaark begins to build elaborate houses like the one he detested when he first anived in the New World. Their lives worsen after smallpox plagues the residents of the community. A Mercy delves deeply into the lives and the thoughts of each of the primary characters, showing their feelings and beliefs and the way they change because of the hardship they face in life. In the end, they realize that without blood ties, there is nothing to keep them bound together. Morrison braces readers with a tragedy that unfolds in the New World—one thought to be full of promises for both Africans and Anglo-Saxons. Her moving novel tells of characters who all show mercy but never receive it. -

‘J’() J:J J

—Sophia Adem

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THE SABES PUZZLE AMERICAN AUTHORS, TITLES AND PASSAGES: PAST AND PRESENT letters into each square, which Based on the “Double Delight” published by PennyPress, this puzzle is solved by placing will read in the same order both across and down unless otherwise specified. To assist you, authors’ significant initials (except for the answer name) are placed in parentheses for author identification clues. two

To win a $20 prize, complete American Authors Titles and Passages: Past and Present correctly. Fill out the required infor mation below, and submit this page to the Department of English (24-8 Locke Hall) on or before the last day of classes, April 2 3rd. Names of those who have submitted correctly answered puzzles with be entered, and a raffle drawing will determine the winner of the SABES Puzzle Contest.

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ACROSS 8. Author of “A White Heron” and A Country Doctor (SO). 9. According to Ralph Waldo Emerson, “By the rude bridge that the flood, / Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled, / Here once the embattled farmers stood, / And fired the shot heard round the world.” ii. Chosen or picked; judicious, resthctive in choice, discriminating. 13. According to architect Frank Lloyd Wright, who wrote more than 20 books, “An architect’s at the drafting board, and a wrecking bar at the site.” most useful tools are an 15. Made, created, or invented. 17. The author of Death Comesfor the Archbishop (Was

Willa).

Name:_________________________________ Major and Minor:_______________________

19. Gwendolyn Brooks is the author of works such as Annie Allen and Maud

Email:_______________________________ Phone:_______________________________

21. This went with peace for Tolstoy (2 words).

Address:

22. A qualifying, specifying, or modifying word.

Name of the Common Text Project selection by 34- Down:

23. According to William Thomas “Billy” Strayhorn, who worked with Duke Ellington and wrote pieces such as “Take the A Train,” “Ever up and Likewise, according to Elizabeth Harrison, “Those who are lifting the world up ward and are those who encourage more than criticize.” 25. According to novelist Rick Moody, “My contention is that that [simpler] style is just as stylized as an style.” 27. Former name of the author of Dutchman and Black Magic

U) and others.

29. Known as The Voice of Traditional Jazz and Ragtime, this monthly publication was issued Mississippi without interruption for 35 years until the passing of its founder (2 words).

DOWN 1. Author of “We Wear the Mask” and Lyrics f a Lowiy Lfe (PL). 2. Came forth, emerged, was discharged, emitted; was published.

ACROSS 1. Author of The Souls of Black Folk (WEB).

3. According to Albert Einstein, “The true value of a human being can be found in degrees to which he [or she] has liberation from the self.” 5. Walt Whitman’s were grass in the collection that included “Song of Myself.”

Leader of antislavery forces in Massachusetts and learned political leader who worked closely with Lincoln, this person was depicted (unfavorably) in DW Griffith’s Birth of a Nation (C as in Charles).

3. According to Hershel Parker, biographer of Herman Melville, “Working as I did from the archives, I have had few occa sions to quote.. . books on Melville. .. . [F]rom an article by Robert Sandberg I quote summary of a document; and from Clare Spark I quote some transcriptions of 192 Os documents” (2 words). 4-. To force or drive into something; to introduce as an element into some situation or subject. 5. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s was scarlet. 6.

Author of literature for young people that includesJohnny Tremain and America’s Paul Revere (F as in Forbes); author of Paul Bunyan and Walt Whitman’s Prose (S as in Shephard).

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______________,one

_______________.“

________: __________________ _____________ _________ ______________

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ACROSS 8. Author of “A White Heron” and A Country Doctor (SO). the flood, / Their 9. According to Ralph Waldo Emerson, “By the rude bridge that flag to April’s breeze unfurled, / Here once the embattled farmers stood, / And fired the shot heard round the world.” 11. Chosen or picked; judicious, resthctive in choice, discriminating. 13. According to architect Frank Lloyd Wright, who wrote more than 20 books, “An architect’s at the drafting board, and a wrecking bar at the site.” most useful tools are an 15. Made, created, or invented. 17. The author of Death Comesfor the Archbishop (Was in Willa). 19. Gwendolyn Brooks is the author of works such as Annie Allen and Maud 21. This went with peace for Tolstoy (2 words). 22. A qualifying, specifying, or modifying word.

23. According to William Thomas “Billy” Strayhorn, who worked with Duke Ellington and wrote pieces such as “Take the A Likewise, according to Elizabeth Harrison, “Those who are lifting the world up Train,” “Ever up and are those who encourage more than criticize.” ward and 25. According to novelist Rick Moody, “My contention is that that [simpler] style is just as stylized as an style.” 27. Former name of the author of Dutchman and Black Magic

U) and others.

The Voice of Traditional Jazz and Mississippi 29. Known as without interruption for 35 years until the passing of its founder (2 words).

Ragtime,

this monthly publication was issued

31. According to Eudora Welty, “The events in our lives happen in a sequence in time, but in their significance to ourselves of revelation. Likewise, according to Jesse Jackson, “America they find their own order the continuous color, one cloth.” is not a blanket woven from one 33. More abrupt, using even fewer words. 35. Author of “Here Lies a Lady,” Philomela” and The New Criticism, as well as founder of the Kenyan Review UC). 36. Author of All God’s Chillun Got Wings and The Emperor Jones (E). DOWN 1. Author of”We Wear the Mask” and Lyrics of a Low4y Life (PL). 2. Came forth, emerged, was discharged, emitted; was published. 3. According to Hershel Parker, biographer of Herman Melville, “Working as I did from the archives, I have had few occa sions to quote. books on Melville.... [F]rom an article by Robert Sandberg I quote summary of a document; and from Clare Spark I quote some transcriptions of 1920s documents” (2 words). .

4. To force or drive into something; to introduce as an element into some situation or subject. 5. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s was scarlet. 6.

Author of literature for young people that includesJohnny Tremain and America’s Paul Revere (F as in Forbes); author of Paul Bunyan and Walt Whitman’s Prose (S as in Shephard).

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________________:

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10. Author of “Désir&’s Baby,” “The Story of an Hour,” and The Awakening (K).

REMEMORY: DR. ALINDA SUMERS

12. According to Robert Frost, “Happiness makes up in height what it lacks in 14. According to Abraham Lincoln, “The people know their rights, and they are never siow to them, when they are invaded.”

and maintain

15. A Puritan minister in New England and author of Wonders of the Invisible World and The Negro Christianized (M). 16. Author of The Zoo Story, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wo!f? and The Death ofBessie Smith (A); author of “Upon a Spider Catch ing a Fly” and “A Fig for Thee Oh! Death” (T); or with an s, author of Sinners in the Hands ofan Angry God U). 17. According to British political leader and writer Benjamin Disraeli, this “is the brightest gem of criticism.” 18. Nonsense anagram of etrade. 19. Faulkner’s faun was this. 20. Author of The Complete Tales of Uncle Remus UC). 24. Author of the Appeal, in Four Articles... (D); author of In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens and The Temple ofMy Familiar (A). 26. Another piece by the author of The American Scholar and Self-Reliance, who is quoted in 9 Across. 28. Author of “Mourning Poem for the Queen of Sunday” and “Middle Passage” (H); author of “The Mending Wall” and “Out, Out—” (F). 29. Author of The Bishop’s Wifr, The Enchanted Voyage, and The Puppet Master (R)—answer in mixed doubles.

to be made “where’er you will, / In a iowiy plain, or a 30. In Frances Harper’s poem, the persona asks for” men are slaves” (2 words). in where not land But a humblest.. the earth’s among lofty hill; I. “

31. Author of Common Sense (P); author of Notes on the State Across (B). 32. John Massey’s American

f Virginia U); Harper’s Weekly political cartoonist (N), and 37

At a memorial service held in the Carnegie Building on Wednesday, September 17, 2008, the Department of English mourned the loss of Profes sor Alinda Jane Sumers (1943-2008), who specialized in British Renaissance anti 17thCentury literatures, as well as Shakespearean Drama and Studies in the 1 9th Century. A graduate of the University of Northern Iowa and George Washington University, Dr. Sumers joined the Department of English in Au gust of 1984.

During her 24 years at Howard, Dr. Sumers taught dergraduate and graduate courses in Chaucer, Milton and Shakespeare and was the recipient of the Folger Library Institute Seminar Scholarship Award and several How ard University Faculty Research Awards. At the time of her death, she was working on two manuscripts: one on Milton, “Envisioning the Devil’s Party: The Illus trated Fourth (1688) Edition of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, A Scholarly Facsimile Edition”; and one on Shakespeare, “Shakespeare and Renaissance Mythos.” I

Professor Sumers is survived by her husband, Larry Ingraham; her two children, Kathryn and Ivan; her other family members; and a host of lov ing friends, colleagues and students. At the memorial service, the Department acknowledged the work and generosity of Dr. Summers: “BE it, therefore, resolved that your contributions to the Department of English, to the College of Arts and Sci ences, to Howard University, and to humanistic knowledge are universally heralded.”

Tony Sansone, The First Male Physique Idol.

33. Author of “From the Dark Tower” and “Yet Do I Marvel” (C); author of”Thanatopsis” and “To a Waterfowl” (WB). 34. Author of The Autobiography ofMissJane Pitman whose work is the topic of the inaugural Common Text Project in the College of Arts and Sciences this term (G); author of A Farewell to Arms and The Old Man and the Sea who was also known as Papa (H).

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REMEMORY: DR. ALINDA SUMERS At a memorial service held in the Carnegie Building on Wednesday, September 17, 2008, the Department of English mourned the loss of Profes sor Alinda Jane Sumers (1943-2008), who specialized in British Renaissance and 17thCentury literatures, as well as Shakespearean Drama and Studies in the 19a Century. A graduate of the University of Northern Iowa and George Washington University, Dr. Sumers joined the Department of English in Au gust of 1984. During her 24- years at Howard, Dr. Sumers taught tin dergraduate and graduate courses in Chaucer, Milton and Shakespeare and was the recipient of the Folger Library Institute Seminar Scholarship Award and several How ard University Faculty Research Awards. At the time of her death, she was working on two manuscripts: vils Party: The Illus one on Milton, “Envisioning the trated Fourth (1688) Edition of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, A Scholarly Facsimile Edition”; and one on Shakespeare, “Shakespeare and Renaissance Mythos.” I

Professor Sinners is survived by her husband, Larry lngraham; her Kathryn and Ivan; her other family members; and a host of lov children, two ing friends, colleagues and students. At the memorial service, the Department acknowledged the work and generosity of Dr. Summers: “BE it, therefore, resolved that your conthbutions to the Department of English, to the College of Arts and Sci ences, to Howard University, and to humanistic knowledge are universally heralded.”

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Notice of Fall 2009 British Author Course (ENGL 20901)—Zadie Smith Dr. R. Victoria Arana will be offering the British Author Course next term and has chosen as its subject Zadie Smith (in the Neo-Millennial Black British Context). All English majors must take one author, and for minors, an author can be used as an English Elective. Zadie Smith’s fiction includes three novels—White Teeth (2000), The Autograph Man (2002), On &auy (2005)—and many short stories published in scattered periodicals. She has also been widely interviewed. Since Smith ciaims that the works of E. M. Forster inspired her, students will read and/or screen the films made of his two most influential nov els: Howard’s End (1910) and Passage to India (1924). Students will be introduced to the new and exciting field of study that embraces the works of current young black British writers. Summer Jobs with Mayor Fenty’s Green Summer Job Corps Mayor Ath-ian Fenty’s Green Summer Job Corps is currently hiring college students and graduates as team leaders, site managers, and program managers. These paid positions last for the duration of the summer and offer valuable experience to students interested in environmental education, youth advocacy, or urban sustainability. The Program will employ 800 youth this summer in a variety of projects centered on sustainabffity, environmental protection and green-collar job experience. They have started interviewing and will accept applications until all positions are filled. The qualifications for each position vary. To apply, 1) visit http: //green.cIc.&ov/summer; 2) click the link to “Now accepting applications for supervisors!” and 3) on that page, you’ll find a full job announcement, complete with descriptions and qualifications. A link to the application can be found at the bottom of that announcement. A resume and two references are required. For more information, send an email to grecn.summerd)dcgov. Intern or Volunteer for International Development and Public Health Project for Haiti International Action is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization located on Capitol Hill. Its mission is to provide clean water to the people of Haiti using efficient, affordable chlorinators and treatment for children suffering from stomach worms in the form of albendazole pills. They need the help of motivated, concerned, passionate student groups like those at Howard to keep their projects running. They invite students to start fundraising campaigns, intern or volunteer at their office, or simply spread the word about International Action’s campaign to provide clean water in Haiti. For more information, contact Tamara Coger at (202) 488-0735 or visit info@hairiwater.org. Teacher Certification Program for Those Willing to Teach in DC Schools The Center for Inspired Teaching is now offering a 15-month teacher certification program that recruits, selects, prepares, and supports highly qualified individuals who wish to serve the children of the District of Columbia. Participants in this pro gram wiJi learn instructional methods that actively engage learners. The Inspired Teacher Certification Program prepares educators in 3 areas: Early Childhood, Elementary, and English Language Arts (middle and high school). The program in cludes summer pre-service coursework and first-hand experience working with students, support in securing a full time paid teaching position in a DC public or public charter school in fall 2009, ongoing coursework and regular visits from a mentor throughout the first year, and cormection to hundreds of passionate educators through Inspired Teaching’s network of teach ers who are serving as change-agents in the DC region. To learn more or apply online, visit them at \vw\v.In9)Irec1tcaching.or. Author Marita Golden to Visit with Howard Students on April 7th at 5pm in Locke Hall 100 The Sterling Allen Brown English Society is hosting a talk by author, educator and literary activist Marita Golden. The event will take place eon Tuesday, April 7th, from 5 to 7:3Opm, in Locke Hall 100 and is entitled “An Open Forum: Author Marita Golden on her Writing Career and Literary Activism.” All students and faculty members are invited to attend to hear the author discuss her work and activism and to answer questions. Anyone interested in Golden’s novels or essays or a career as a writing should make an effort to attend. (See below for information on the author’s upcoming workshops.) A ffier is at tached; please share the information with classes and other students.

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ENGLISH DEPARTMENT ANNOUNCEMENTS Group Attendance of the Play Crowns—Update! by Regina Tay The Sterling Allen Brown English Society would like to invite you all to attend the gospel musical Crowns, a lead role in landed lor. This is also a chance for Howard students to support one of their own, Zurin Villaneuva, who has years of age can attend the play. In the 30 or Under Program offered by the theater, students and others who are under 30 to know who’s performances for $13. Others can purchase group discount tickets, which cost $25.00-$39.O0. We need phone number to and name your with email and send please attending, interested as soon as possible. If you are interested in ‘hat queens’ of the by “worn hats the refers to Crowns title The Kelly McCray, SABES President, at kmccravO9(cLvahooom. soulful, With heads. their adorn that lace the South—women whose storied lives are woven into the straw, silk, wool and on Based identity. true one’s spiritual and joyful music, they celebrate family and faith, love and loss, seeking (and finding) selfof thrill the captures the acclaimed book by photographer Michael Cunrnngham and journalist Craig Marberry, Crowns Best Resident Musi including Awards, Hayes Helen four of Winner lives. women’s six expression with an intimate look at first time—but be the for again_—or it See audiences. Washington delighted cal, Crowns is a series of musical portraits that is playing from Crowns soar.” spirit your let will that music the prepared for the ‘hattitudes’ that will make you laugh and on the play, information For more NW). March 27 through April 26, 2009 at the historic Lincoln Theatre (1215 U Street, so that attending in interest your go to http: / /www.arena-stage.org/season/08-09/crowns/. Meanwhile, email to express we can get the $25 discount ticket price. students If You Missed the Fuibright Information Session, Deadline: October 2009: Howard University visited How Office National Fuibright’s from es representativ that (especially juniors and graduate students) should be aware research, to an opportunity have students grant, ard earlier this month to encourage students to apply. With a Fulbright kinds of Ful teach, take courses, or undertake community projects in virtually any country in the world. There are many living airfare; roundtrip bright grants, and the term is usually for 1 academic year. Recipients receive funding for but now is the dations; and, in some cases, a stipend for boohi and tuition expenses. The official deadline is October 2009, if you missed the time to start planning for the Fuibright. Undergraduate and graduate students are encouraged to apply, so once information session, visit the Fulbright website and visit Director of Undergraduate Studies Alla Tovares for support you’ve begun the application. Run 2/17 to Discount MCAT, LSAT, GRE, and GMAT Test Preparation Available on HU Campus, Classes 3/28 in The Howard Center, Room 518: for Howard The schedule for 2009 test preparation on campus that the Center for Preprofessional Education has negotiated 7:3Opm to lOpm, Students is now available. MCAT prep will be held from February 2 April 15 (M/W + Tues Feb 17), ASAP to en register to asked are Students retail). (versus $1,899 by The Princeton Review and costs $749 Howard Special + 3 Sat (3/28, lOpm to 7pm (M!W), 22 April 28— Mar sure timely receipt of MCAT materials. LSAT prep will take place be held will GRE prep off). $450 4/4 & 4/18 from 12:3Opm to 4pm), by The Princeton Review and costs $749 (includes prep GMAT ofl). from Feb 19 April 16 (Thurs), 7pm to 10pm, by The Princeton Review and costs $699 (includes $350 The $500 oil). will take place Feb 17 April 14- (Tues), 7pm to 10pm, by The Princeton Review and costs $749 (includes Registra Preprofessional Center is located in the Howard Center, Room 518 and can be reached at (202) 238-2363. For the /. brarv/preprof oward.edu/li tion Form & Fall Schedule online, go to http://www.h —

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of Delaware Arts & Humanities Summer Institute Opportunity at the University of Delaware: The University and humani arts strong encourages will be sponsoring a summer institute for rising college seniors June 8-July 2, 2009, and to give highly is designed ties students to apply. The University of Delaware’s Arts and Humanities Summer Institute (AHSI) graduate motivated students entering their senior year of an undergraduate degree program an opportunity to learn about the fourprograms in Art Conservation, English, History, and Material Culture at the University of Delaware. Details about AHSI for coordinated will be that trips field and experiences learning week program of coursework, the out-of-classroom student Program), Scholars McNair the e.g., campus, participants (some in conjunction with other summer programs on .art-sci udel .C(lU / stipends, housing arrangements, and the application can be found at the AHSI website: http./ / www jird(a)ude1 .edu; ph aji. Please direct any questions about the program to the director, Dr. Rosalind Johnson (email: r one: 302-831-7019).