1994 Conference Program
Conference
Features
Program of Events
About the Conference
About the Organizer
Biographies
Dedication
The time
cracks into furious flower. Lifts its face
all unashamed. And sways in
wicked grace.
These magnificent lines from
Gwendolyn Brooks' poem "The Second Sermon on the Warplan" provides the leitmotif for the conference,
"Furious Flower: A Revolution in African American Poetry."
This conference is dedicated to Gwendolyn Brooks because of her
prophetic, poetic voice that is urgent, unashamed, graceful,
redeeming, and radical, a voice that tells us even amid the
loneliness and the fears of contemporary life that we must live and
conduct our blooming "in the noise and whip of the
whirlwind."
James Madison University
Honors Program
Office of the Director
Dear Friends:
It is my great pleasure to welcome you to the Furious Flower Conference at James Madison University and to join with you in celebrating the furious flowering of black poetry that has taken place over the last 40 years. The distinguished poets who have joined us for this conference have not only reflected American society in their poetry, but they have also transformed it by the power and urgency of their collective voice. More than 30 major poets and critics have come together to read their poems, talk about new approaches to understanding poetry, begin the serious business of writing a literary history of this significant poetic outpouring, and make the necessary connections with the cultural and folk tradition that ever informs and enriches African American poetry.
For all of us, I hope that this conference will be a time of creative growth, new perceptions, new directions, and valuable assessments. I also hope that it will be a time when old friendships will be rekindled and new ones forged.
My sincere thanks go to Gwendolyn Brooks who inspired this conference, the outstanding poets and critics who have made this gathering historic, the Furious Flower Planning Committee that ably coordinated the conference activities, Dr. Ronald Carrier, Dr. Bethany Oberst, and the entire JMU community for their unswerving faith in this endeavor, the donors who supported this vision with their generosity, and to all those who encouraged me as I labored with this project.
I am looking forward to a marvelous conference because you are here. Thank you for coming.
Sincerely,
Joanne V. Gabbin
Conference Organizer
James Madison University
Office of the President
Dear Friend:
Welcome to the campus of James Madison University and to "Furious Flower: A Revolution in African American Poetry."
The conference in which you are participating represents a significant milestone in the history of this nation and of this University. Never before have so many of the important literary voices that have created the environment for social, economic and political change in the second half of this century been brought together in such a meaningful and dramatic way.
The significance of this conference will be measured through the emotional and intellectual exchanges of its participants; through the power of the poets' and critics' presence and interaction; through the new levels of understanding that are reached through the presentations, interpretations and dialogue; and through the full realization that the revolution in African-American poetry, begun in the 1960s, has indeed produced a "furious flower" that continues to flourish, all the while moving and influencing American literary history and culture.
Enjoy your stay at James Madison University. I look forward to seeing you and sharing with you the excitement felt by all of us participating in this important conference.
Sincerely,
Ronald E. Carrier
President
Commonwealth of Virginia
Office of the Governor
A MESSAGE FROM THE GOVERNOR
On behalf of the Commonwealth of Virginia, it is an honor and a privilege for me to extend my warmest welcome to you, the organizers and participants of "Furious Flower: A Revolution in African American Poetry." I am confident that James Madison University will provide you with an excellent setting for what I know will be a successful conference.
This conference will greatly increase public understanding of the works of contemporary African-American poets by analyzing their literary achievements. I know that the conference will provide its participants with valuable insight into the cultural origins, critical theories, and literary interpretations of African-American poetry.
"Furious Flower: A Revolution in
African American Poetry" will allow all of the conference's
participants the opportunity to increase their knowledge of this
rich cultural heritage. I am pleased to welcome all of you to
James Madison University for what I know will be an educational and
rewarding conference.
George Allen
Governor
THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON
July 5, 1994
Greetings to everyone gathered at James Madison University to honor the life and works of Gwendolyn Brooks -- artist, poet, and renowned literary figure.
Conveying the past, present, and perhaps future of African-American poetry, the title "Furious Flower: A Revolution in African-American Poetry" reflects both the struggle and great triumph of African-American literature. The demand for equality and equal opportunity has given rise to a body of work filled with beauty and vitality, immeasurably enriching our nation and the entire international community.
As we work to foster the creative talents of America's finest authors, this conference offers an important opportunity to explore and to marvel anew at the artistry and vibrant imagery that characterize so much of African-American literature.
I join you in honoring Ms. Brooks, and I applaud the involvement of the teachers, scholars, students of African-American poetry, and the many other remarkable poets participating in this conference. I look forward to enjoying your inspirational work for many more years to come.
Hillary joins me in sending best wishes to all for a wonderful conference.
Bill Clinton
BOOK EXHIBITS Taylor Hall - Lounge
Representatives from leading publishers are exhibiting and selling their books on African American poetry and criticism during the conference. They will be available to answer questions about current and upcoming publications. The JMU Bookstore has set up a special exhibit featuring the books of poets and critics participating in the conference. More than fifty titles are available in this exhibit. In addition, the Know Bookstore of North Carolina has an exhibit featuring a broad range of titles in the field of African American literature and culture to complement the more specialized sales of the JMU Bookstore. Come in and browse.
VENDORS Warren Hall - Campus Center
Vendors
from all over the region are on hand to sell their fabrics,
clothing, jewelry, perfumes, art, and artifacts. The exhibits are
on display outside Warren Hall on the patio, weather permitting.
ART EXHIBIT Sawhill Gallery - Duke Hall
Sawhill Gallery opens its "Masks of Africa"
exhibit on the first day of the conference with a gala reception
for conference participants. The exhibit displays a stunning
collection of African masks representing cultural groups from
several African countries. Long appreciated by the western
world as art objects, masks equally serve the needs of traditional
African culture. In this collection of masks, donated to the
JMU Foundation by Mr. Robert Zigler of
Washington, D.C., the striking patterns, bold colors, and tactile
materials speak to the beautiful inseparability of art and culture.
Gallery Hours M-F 10:30 to 4:30; S-S
1:30 to 4:30
"GROWING" EXHIBIT Carrier Library - Main Lobby
Inspired
by the conference theme, this exhibit combines mounted photographs
of conference participants, taken "on location" with biographical
information and poetry. Six-foot batik banners hand painted
by Johlene Hess dramatically announce
the exhibit. The photographs, taken by C.B. Claiborne, are
added to the exhibit as soon as they are developed, thus the idea
of a "growing" exhibit. Come by and see our exhibit
grow.
SIGNATURE PORTFOLIO Taylor Hall - Lounge
In
conjunction with the Furious Flower Conference the Virginia
Foundation for the Humanities and Public Policy and James Madison
University have commissioned a limited
edition of a souvenir signature portfolio. This distinctive
portfolio contains specially selected poems by twenty three of the
participants in the conference. Each poem has been printed by
letter press on fine quality paper and placed in an embossed
folder. This exquisite portfolio was designed and produced by
Calvin Otto of Charlottesville, Virginia. The signature
portfolio can be purchased at the Book Exhibit.
Don't miss this collector's item.
HOSPITALITY AND MESSAGE CENTER Taylor Hall - Lounge
To leave messages for conference participants or to receive messages, visit the Hospitality and Message Center. Phone calls for conference participants will be received at (703) 568-6953 and (703) 568-6310. The center will also have information on Harrisonburg's restaurants, fitness centers, and tourist attractions.
VIDEO DOCUMENTARY
Throughout
the conference, members of the staff of WVPT will document the
activities of the conference by videotaping the sessions and
informal gatherings on campus. The video tapes will be edited
for distribution to universities and colleges and will be used to
produce a video documentary aimed at national public broadcast.
8:00 a.m.
- 6:00 p.m. Registration and Book
Exhibit
Taylor Hall Lounge
8:00 a.m. - 8:30 a.m. Continental
Breakfast
Taylor Hall Lounge
8:30 a.m. - 9:15
a.m. Open
Session
Grafton-Stovall Theatre
Welcome
Ronald E. Carrier, President
James Madison University
Occasion
Joanne V. Gabbin, Conference Organizer
James Madison University
9:30 a.m.
- 11:30 a.m. Critics'
Roundtable
Grafton-Stovall Theatre
African American Poetry and the Vernacular Matrix
African American poetry, perhaps more so than fiction and drama,
has lent and continues to lend itself to the thematic and
formalistic expression of its matrixing
in African American culture, in the vernacular (folk and popular)
culture in particular. This roundtable will investigate the
nature and extent of this matrixing. It will consider the relationship
of the folk to the popular vernacular mode, whether "continuity" or
"disjuncture" best describes that relationship and how the
difference between the two is imprinted upon the literature.
It will also consider the nature and validity of rural/urban,
southern/northern distinctions as they apply to cultural expressive
manifestations such as the blues, and the degree to which these
distinctions spill over into the poetry as a literary
production. (Alvin Aubert)
Chair: Alvin Aubert
Elizabeth Alexander
Sterling Plumpp
Eleanor Traylor
Sherley Anne Williams
11:45 p.m. - 12:45 p.m. Luncheon Phillips Hall
1:00 p.M. - 1:20
p.m.
Keynote
Speech
Grafton-Stovall Theatre
Michael S. Harper
Introduction by Thomas Sayers Ellis
1:30 p.m. - 2:45
p.m.
Poetry
Reading
Grafton-Stoval Threatre
Elizabeth Alexander
Gerald Barrax
Toi Derricotte
E. Ethelbert Miller
Introduction by John R. Keene
CONCURRENT SESSIONS
3:00 p.m. - 4:30
p.m.
Taylor Hall Room 305
Rapping the Rhythms: The Blues of Aubert, Dove, Hughes and Tolson
Chair: Carl Phillips, Washington University
Lenard D. Moore,
Carolina African American Writers' Collective
"In the Landscape and the Music: Insight into Alvin Aubert's Poetry"
Darrel Stover, Johns Hopkins University
"Rita Dove: Boundaries and the Blues"
Mariann Russell, Sacred
Heart University
"Hughes and Tolson: Blues
People"
3:00 p.m. - 4:30
p.m.
Taylor Hall Room 306
The Seers Who Sat In: Poetic Aesthetics in the
1960's
Chair: Hazel Arnett Erwin, Shaw University
B.J. Bolden, University of Illinois, Urbana
"BAM! The Second Black Aesthetic: Haki R. Madhubuti and
the Black Arts Movement of the 1960's"
Reginald S. Young, Louisiana State University
"Understanding the 'New Black Poetry' and Its Bearing on the
Literacy of a Generation in Waiting"
Julius Thompson, Southern Illinois University at
Carbondale
"Researching and Writing the Literary History of Broadside Press,
Detroit, Michigan, 1960 - 1994: Methods, Techniques and
Observations"
3:00 p.m.
- 4:30
p.m.
Taylor Hall Room 302
Feminine, Fertile and Frank
Chair: Mary Helen Washington, University of Maryland, College Park
Gerri Bates, Howard University
"Silent Screams of the Lifegiver:
Abortion and the Maternal Body in the Poetry of the African
American Woman"
Ikenna Dieke, Hampton University
"Alice Walker and her Earthling Psyche"
Kelly M. Mason
"Madness and Magic in the Poetry of Gwendolyn Brooks"
3:00 p.m.
- 4:30
p.m.
Taylor Hall Room 402
Clarion Calls in the Americans
Chair: Deborah McDowell, University of Virginia
Eugenia Collier, Morgan State University
"Message to the Generations: The Mythic Hero in Sterling
Brown's Poetry"
Mark A. Sanders, Emory University
"The Ballad, The Hero and the Ride: A
Reading of Sterling A. Brown's The Last Ride of Wild
Bill"
Margaret Bernice Smith Bristow, Hampton University
"Rootlessness and Rootedness: An Analysis of the Rhetoric of Social
Revolution Seen in Selected Works of Derek Alton Walcott"
3:00 p.m.
- 4:30
p.m.
Taylor Hall Room 404
Textures and Techniques
Chair: Opal Moore, Radford University
Chezia Thompson Cager, Maryland Institute, College of Art
"Jean Toomer & Ntozake Shange's Choreopoems: A Vision through the Vertical
Technique"
Nehassaiu de Gannes, Providence, Rhode Island
"Their Strategic Deployment of Language: Dionne Brand, Marlene
Noubese Philip, Lillian Allen - Essential Thinker of Technology"
Carmen R. Gillespie, Virginia Commonwealth
University
"'Talking About a Revolution': The Poetics of African American
Popular Music"
3:00 p.m.
- 4:30
p.m.
Taylor Hall Room 400
If
Harriet Tubman Had a Muse
Chair: Sandra Govan, University of North Carolina, Charlotte
Margaret Ann Reid, Morgan State University
"Johari Amini: The Essence of a Black Woman Poet"
F. Elaine DeLancey,
Drexel University
"Sonia Sanchez: 'Flute of Black Lovers, Organs of Black Sorrow and
Trumpet of Black Warriors"
Regina Jennings, Franklin and Marshall University
"The Influence of Malcom X on the
Poetry of Haki Madhubuti and Sonia Sanchez: Issues of Re(re)naming and Inversion"
3:00 p.m.
- 4:30
p.m.
Warren Hall Piedmont Room
Connections and Constructs
Chair: John R. Keene, University of Virginia
Jon Woodson, Howard University
"Notes Toward a Theory of Voyage: The
Construction of Space-Time and Consciousness in the Modernist Long
Poem"
Niama Leslie JoAnn Williams, Temple Univeristy
"A Nzuri
Reading of Alice Walker's Poetry"
Eric A. Weil, Shaw University
"Personal and Public: Three First-Person Voices in African American
Poetry"
3:00 p.m.
- 4:30
p.m.
Taylor Hall
Room 309
Evidences of Things Remembered
Chair: Lonnel E. Johnson, Otterbein College
Gwendoline Lewis Roget,
Mellon University
"'One Moment Please,' Historicizing racial Affronts/ Samuel Allen:
Chronicler of the African American Experience"
Maryemma Graham,
Northeastern University
"Vision and Memory in the Poetry of Margaret Walker"
Elizabeth J. Swanson, Miami Univeristy
"The Richness of Poorness: Language and Deep Structure in Gwendolyn
Brooks' The lovers of the
Poor"
4:45 p.m. - 6:00
p.m.
Poetry Reading
Grafton-Stovall Theatre
Sam Allen
Haki Madhubuti
Pinkie Gordon Lane
Naomi Long Madgett
Introduction by Carl Phillips
6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m. Dinner On Own
6:30 p.m. - 7:30
p.m.
Duke Hall
Masks of AfricaExhibit
Opening and Reception
8:00 p.m.
- 10:00
p.m.
Poetry Reading
Wilson Hall
Amiri Baraka
Mari Evans
Michael S. Harper
Sonia Sanchez
Introduction by Askia Toure
Friday, September 30
8:00 a.m.
- 6:00
p.m.
Registration
&
Taylor Hall Lounge
Book Exhibit
8:30 a.m. - 9:15 a.m. Signature Party Taylor Hall Lounge
9:30 a.m. - 11:30
a.m.
Critics'
Roundtable
Grafton-stovall
Theatre
Critical Theories and Approaches in African American Poetry
The
work of literary theory and of theorizing in other areas of the
human sciences is to specify what conditions obtain among those who
create, those who make use of creations, and the languages (or
signs) that enable creators and consumers to negotiate in a world
of social constructions. In short, theory is obligated to
explain relations between people and artifacts in the contexts of
history and culture. In that sense, theory is necessary for
rigorous examination of African American poetry. How might
theory advance the study and appreciation of African American
poetry? Within the frame of this question, scholars on the
panel will be asked to address what kind of critical or cultural
theory seems most appropriate for understanding poetry, how such
theories influence interpretive methods and approaches, and how
must theorists themselves grapple with their own historicity in
light of African American poetry's evolution from orature to literature to newer genres that mix
orality and literacy. The aim of
the panel is to clarify some problems of theory and poetry as they
affect various audiences. (Jerry W. Ward, Jr.)
Chair:
Jerry W. Ward, Jr.
Joyce Anne
Joyce
Aldon Nielsen
Arnold Rampersad
Lorenzo
Thomas
11:45 a.m. - 12:45 p.m. Luncheon Phillips Hall
1:00 p.m. - 2:45
p.m.
Keynote
Speeches
Wilson Hall
Rita Dove
Gwendolyn Brooks
Introduction by Joanne V. Gabbin and Dolores Kendrick
3:00 p.m. - 5:00
p.m.
Poetry Reading
Wilson Hall
Dolores Kendrick
Nikki Giovanni
Sterling Plumpp
Eugene Redmond
Introduction by Gloria Wade Gayles
7:00 p.m. - 9:30
p.m.
Tribute
Banquet
Phillips Hall
Presentations by
Eugenia Collier
Maryemma Graham
Haki Madhubuti
Deborah McDowell
Opal Moore
Eugene Redmond
Jerry W. Ward, Jr.
Music by "The Spoken Word"
Saturday, October 1
8:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m. Book Exhibit Taylor Hall Lounge
8:00 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. Registration Taylor Hall Lounge
8:30 a.m. - 9:15 a.m. Signature Party Taylor Hall Lounge
9:30 a.m. - 11:30
a.m.
Critics'
Roundtable
Grafton-Stovall Theatre
Writing a Literary History of African American Poetry
As the drum stands at the crossroads of traditional African and African American culture, so the poets stand at the center of the drum providing the cadence, connections and continuity that define their literary history. Panelists on this roundtable will speak on periodicity and identify significant literary movements from the Harlem Renaissance through the Black Arts Movement to hip-hop. In an attempt to provide a valid historical framework for the poetry, panelists will discuss major literary milestones and important poets emerging during the twentieth century. (Eugene Redmond)
Chair: Eugene Redmond
Jabari Asim
Raymond Patterson
Clyde Taylor
11:30 a.m. - 2:00 p.m. Lunch On Own
2:00 p.m. - 4:00
p.m.
Poetry
Reading
Grafton-Stovall Theatre
Jacqueline
Brice-Finch, James Madison University
Jeannette Drake, Richmond, Virginia
Roy L. Hill, Saint Augustine's College
Sybil Kein, The University of
Michigan-Flint
Adam David Miller, Berkeley, California
Brenda Marie Osbey, New Orleans,
Louisiana
Kalamu ya
Salaam, New Orleans, Louisiana
Gloria Wade Gayles, Spelman College
Introduction by Eugene Redmond
4:15 p.m.
- 5:00
p.m.
Grafton-Stovall Theatre
"The Dark Room Collective: A Fisted Reading"
Vera
Beatty
Thomas Sayers Ellis
Major Jackson
Sharan Strange
Natasha Tretheway
Kevin Young
Introduction by Daryl Cumber Dance
5:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m. Dinner On Own
8:00 p.m. - 10:00 p.m. Conference Finale Wilson Hall
Bernice
Johnson Reagon
Sonia Sanchez
Val Gray Ward
JMU Contemporary Gospel Singers
Introduction by Joanne V. Gabbin
The conference, "Furious Flower: A Revolution in African American Poetry" will examine the significance and scope of African American poetry written since 1960 through the discussion of its folk and cultural origins, interpretive approaches, critical theories and literary movements. The last 40 years have witnessed a "furious flowering" of black poetry in this country. The African American poets writing during this period have challenged the status quo and raised their voices in the struggle against racism, sexism, political and economic exploitation, violence and injustice. They have created lyrical beauty, while experimenting with language and form. They have explored and exposed private and public concerns with a relentless insistence upon the truth. Sometimes quietly and sometimes stridently, they have transformed society and reflected that transformation in their poems.
Though their contribution to social change is well known, scholarship on their poetry and the literary milieu that it represents is difficult to find. This conference will make a significant contribution to this scholarship and to increasing public understanding of the impact of African American poetry in this country and abroad. More than 30 major poets and critics have come together to read their poems, talk about new approaches to African American poetry, begin the serious business of writing a literary history of the poetic outpouring over the last four decades, and make the necessary connections with the cultural and folk traditions that ever inform and enrich black poetry.
Out of this conference will come a video documentary that will trace the major trends in African American poetry since 1960, a series of videotaped interviews between poets and critics which will be used as educational guides by college and high school teachers, and a collection of scholarly articles which will stimulate initial exploration of the field. In all, this conference has the opportunity to advance significantly the understanding of appreciation of one of the most dynamic areas of American literature.
Joanne V. Gabbin
Joanne V. Gabbin
Joanne V. Gabbin is a professor of
English at James Madison University where she directs the university's Honors Program. She
is author of Sterling A. Brown: Building the Black Aesthetic
Tradition which was recently published in a new edition by the
University Press of Virginia (1994). Gabbin has published
essays in Wild Women in the Whirlwind, edited by Joanne M.
Braxton and Andree Nicola McLaughlin
and Southern Women Writers: The New
Generation, edited by Tonette Bond
Inge. Her articles have also
appeared in The Dictionary of Literary Biolgraphy, The Zora Neale Hurston Forum, the Langston Hughes
Journal, Callaloo, and Black Books
Bulletin. A dedicated teacher and scholar, she has received
numerous awards for excellence in teaching and scholarship.
Among them are the College Language Association Creative
Scholarship Award for her book Sterling A. Brown (1986), the JMU
Faculty Women's Caucus and Women's Resouce Network Award for Scholarship (1988), and
the Outstanding Faculty Award, Virginia State Council of Higher
Education (1993). She is also the founder and organizer of
the Wintergreen Women Writers' Collective, which meets every year
in Wintergreen, Virginia.
Furious Flower Presenters
Elizabeth Alexander ï Sam Allen ï Jabari Asim ï Alvin Aubert ï Amiri Baraka ï Gerald Barrax ï Gerri Bates ï Vera Beatty ï B.J. Bolden ï Joanne Braxton ï Jacqueline Brice-Finch ï Margaret Bernice Smith Bristow ï Gwendolyn Brooks ï Chezia Thompson Cager ï Eugenia Collier ï Daryl Cumber Dance ï F. Elaine DeLancey ï Toi Derricote ï Ikenna Dieke ï Rita Dove ï Jeannette Drake ï Thomas Sayers Ellis ï Hazel Arnett Ervin ï Mari Evans ï Joanne V. Gabbin ï Nehassaiu de Gabbin ï Nehassaiu de Gannes ï QuoVadis Gex-Breaux ï Carmen R. Gillespie ï Nikki Giovanni ï Sandra Govan ï Maryemma Graham ï Michael S. Harper ï Roy L. Hill ï Major Jackson ï Regina Jennings ï Lonnell E. Johnson ï Joyce Ann Joyce ï John R. Keene ï Sybil Kein ï Dolores Kendrick ï Pinkie Gordon Lane ï Naomi Long Madgett ï Haki Madhubuti ï Kelly M. Mason ï Deborah McDowell ï Adam David Miller ï E. Ethelbert Miller ï Lenard D. Moore ï Opal Moore ï Aldon Nielsen ï Brenda Marie Osbey ï Raymond Patterson ï Carl Phillips ï Sterling Plumpp ï Arnold Rampersad ï Bernice Johnson Reagon ï Eugene Redmond ï Margaret Ann Reid ï Gwendoline Lewis Roget ï Mariann Russell ï Kalamu ya Salaam ï Sonia Sanchez ï Mark A. Sanders ï Darrel Stover ï Sharan Strange ï Elizabeth Swanson ï Clyde Taylor ï Lorenzo Thomas ï Julius Thompson ï Askia Toure ï Eleanor Traylor ï Natasha Tretheway ï Gloria Wade Gayles ï Jerry W. Ward, Jr. ï Val Gray Ward ï Mary Helen Washington ï Eric A. Weil ï Niama Leslie JoAnn Williams ï Sherley Ann Williams ï Jon Woodson ï Kevin Young ï Reginald S. Young
Elizabeth Alexander
Elizabeth Alexander was educated
at Yale University and Boston University, where she studied with
Derek Walcott.
Having previously
taught at the University of Pennsylvania, she currently teaches at
the University of Chicago. Her first collection of poems,
The Venus Hottentot, published
in 1990, reveals poems that often explore the interior lives of
historical black figures, exposing emotions and experiences that
strikingly illuminate public concerns. Her poetry and fiction
have appeared in such publications as The Southern Review,
American Poetry Review, Prairie Schooner, Callaloo, Black American Literature Forum, and
The American
Voice. She also reviews contemporary literature for
The Village Voice. A 1992 recipient of the NEA
artist grant, she has been anthologized in InThe Tradition:
An Anthology of Young Black Writers edited by Kevin
Powell and Ras Baraka and Every Shut Eye Ain't Asleep, edited by Michael S. Harper and
Anthony Walton. Her latest book is Body of Life
(1996).
Samuel W. Allen
Samuel W. Allen's poetry has been
published in four collections: ElfebeinZahne; Ivory Tusks and Other Poems;
Paul Vesey's Ledger and Every Round.
His poems have also appeared in more than 200 anthologies.
Known for merging African and African American culture in his
poetry, he roots his poetry in the heritage of black people with
the oral tradition, African survivals and the Southern black church
as his major influences. Allen is also a prominent figure in
Africa and African American criticism as a reviewer, translator,
editor and lecturer. His translations of Jean-Paul Sartre's
OrpheeNoir and
Leopold Senghor's Anthologiede la Nouvelle Poesie Negre made
these important works available to non-French-speaking
readers. Working as an attorney until 1968, he accepted the
position as Avalon Professor of Humanities at Tuskegee Institute in
Alabama and has since devoted himself to teaching and
writing. Allen taught at Wesleyan University, 1970-71, and at Boston College from 1971 until he
retired in 1981. He has also served as writer-in-residence at
Tuskegee and at Rutgers University. Allen has lectured
extensively on black affairs both literary and political at major
national and international conferences, and he has read his poetry
at institutions throughout the United States and abroad.
Jabari Asim
Jabari Asim is book
editor for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and the only
African American to hold such a position at
a major metropolitan
daily. He is an assistant editor of Drumvoices Revue, a journal
published by Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville. He is
founding editor of EYEBALL, a new literary arts journal
that was recently awarded a Gregory Kolovakos Seed Grant. His poetry has appeared
in Black American Literature Forum, Obsidian II, Painted Bride
Quarterly, Catalyst and Shooting Star Review, among
others. His plays include "Caribbean Beat," produced by Muny Student Theatre Project; "Peace, Dog,"
produced by The New Theatre; "Believe I'll Testify," produced by
Gettys Productions; and "New Blood
Symphony" and "Didn't It Rain," both staged by Pamoja Theatre Workshop. His fiction and
poetry are both included in In
The Tradition: An Anthology of Young
Black Writing. In 1995, he became the arts writer for the new
Post-Dispatch entertainment magazine Get Out, and
his reviews have appeared in various publications, including
The Hungry Mind Review and Salon magazine. He is
currently the assistant book editor at the Washington
Post.
Alvin Aubert
Alvin Aubert is an award-winning poet and a playwright,
editor and literary critic. In 1993 he retired from
Wayne 
State University where as
professor of English he taught creative writing and African
American literature and served two years as interim chair of the
Department of Africana Studies. In 1975 he founded and edited
the journal Obsidian, now Obsidian II, aimed at
publishing works in English by and about writers of African descent
worldwide. This outstanding journal continues to debut the
works of many African scholars and creative writers. Engaged
in teaching since 1960, he taught at Southern University in Baton
Rouge, his alma mater; the University of Illinois; the University
of Oregon and the State University of New York's Fredonia
campus. He received the A.M. degree in English from the
University of Michigan, which he attended as a Woodrow Wilson
Fellow, and studied at the University of Illinois. He was a
Bread Loaf Scholar in poetry (1968) and received two creative
writing fellowship grants from the National Endowment for the Arts
for his poetry (1973, 1981). He also received an Editors
Fellowship Grant (1979) from the Coordinating Council of Literary
Magazines for small press editing and publishing, and the 1988
Callaloo Award for his contribution to
African American cultural expression. His poems, articles and
reviews have appeared in numerous literary magazines and
anthologies. South Louisiana: New and Selected
Poems, which includes new poems along with poems from two
previous collections Against the Blues (1972) and
Feeling Through (1975), was published in 1985.
If Winter Come: Collected Poems, 1967-1992 was published
in 1994. His latest book is Harlem Wrestler: And Other Poems (1995). He is currently
professor emeritus at Wayne State University.
Amiri Baraka
Amiri
Baraka, poet, activist, and playwright,
is one of the most exciting and prolific auhors in America. Considered an 
architect of the Black Arts
Movement, he has published 12 books of poetry including Preface
To A Twenty Volume Suicide Note, The
Dead Lecturer, It's Nation Time, Spirit Reach, and Reggae
or Not, a novel, five books of essays, 24 plays, and four
anthologies. Baraka, born LeRoi Jones, was educated at Rutgers
University and Howard University. Since 1962 he has combined
his artistic and literary activities with teaching and has taught
poetry and drama at The New School for Social Research, Columbia
University, University of Buffalo, Yale University and George
Washington University. He was the professor of African
Studies at the State University of New York at Stony Brook.
Amiri Baraka has also been a prime and dynamic force in
the Black Arts Repertory Theater School in Harlem and Spirit House
in Newark. From 1968 until 1975, he was one of the founders
and chairmen of the Congress of African People, a nationalistic
Pan-Africna organization, and one of
the chief organizers of the National Black Political Convention in
1972. He also edited Cricket, a magazine of
African-American music, and directed and publication of new
literature through Jihad Press and Peoples War Publications.
He is currently editor of The Black Nation. His most
recent work includes appearing in Warren Beatty's political satire
Bulworth as a prophetic
homeless man and writing the liner notes for the Ravi Coltrane's (son of John Coltrane) first album
Moving Pictures.
Gerald Barrax
Gerald Barrax, a poet of exceptional perception and
stunning poetic technique, has been writing poetry since
the 
1960s. His early poems
appeared in a volume entitled Another Kind of Rain (1970)
and stylistically link him to the young black poets who
experimented with new typographical techniques, a poetic diction
laced with street talk, and metaphors of political urgency.
Since then he has published three other volumes: An Audience of
One: Poems (1980), The Death of Animals and Lesser
Gods (1984), and Leaning Against the Sun (1992). Barrax was born in Attalla, Ala., and grew up in
Pittsburgh. After serving in the U.S. Air Force, he attended
Duquesne University where he earned his B.A. degree in
English. He continued his studies at the University of
Pittsburgh and the University of North Carolina. Barrax, a widely recognized poetry critic and
editor, won the 1983 Callaloo Creative
Writing Award for Non-Fiction Prose and edited the poetry section
of Callaloo from
1984-1986. In 1985 he assumed editorship of Obsidian
II at North Carolina State University, where he is a professor
of English. His latest work From a Person Sitting in Darkness:
New and Selected Poems is scheduled for release in 1998.
Joanne M. Braxton
Joanne M. Braxton is a poet,
lecturer, keynote speaker and workshop leader. She challenges
her reading and 
listening audiences by
expressing the essence of the black experience through her sense of
humor, vast knowledge and her strong convictions about the
importance of African American culture in America. Her tone
is almost always private and reflective as she makes extensive use
of symbolism. Braxton earned her bachelor's degree in
literature and writing from Sarah Lawrence College in 1972 and
he doctorate in American Studies from
Yale in 1984. She is currently the Cummings Professor of
American Studies and English at the College of William and Mary,
where she has taught for more than 13 years. She has received
several awards for college teaching, including the Outstanding
Virginia Faculty Award in 1992. She also authoredThe Collected Poetry of Paul
Laurence Dunbar (1993). Her other books include
Sometimes I Think of Maryland (1977), Black Women
Writing Autobiography: A Tradition Within a Tradition (1989),
and Wild Women in the Whirlwind: Afra-American Culture and the Contemporary Literary
Renaissance (1990), which she coedited with Andree
Nicola McLaughlin. She also contributed the introduction to Out
of the Depths, Or, The Triumph of the
Cross (African-American Women Writers, 1910-1940). Maya
Angelou's I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings: A Casebook will be released in 1998 as part of
the Casebooks in Contemporary Fiction series.
Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Brooks, to whom the
Furious Flower Conference is dedicated, describes writing poetry as
"delicious 
agony," a process that has
produced some of the most outstanding poetry written in the 20th
century. Her career has garnered a magnificent array of
achievements. In 1950 Brooks won the Pulitzer Prize for
Annie Allen, becoming the first black writer to win this
award. In 1968 she was named Poet Laureate of Illinois,
succeeding the late Carl Sandburg, and holds that post to this
date. Brooks was named Consultant-in-Poetry to the Library of
Congress, 1985-1986, and was the first black woman to be so
honored. She is the recipient of over 70 honorary doctorates,
and in 1980 she was nominated to the Presidential Commission on the
National Agenda for the Eighties.
She has authored more than 20 books including
A Street in Bronzeville, Annie
Allen, The Bean Eaters, In the Mecca, Blacks, Maud Martha (a
novel) and Report From Part One (an autobiography).
In 1988 she was selected for an award by
Essence Magazine-one of seven internationally renowned
Black women to be so honored. The next year the Poetry
Society of America bestowed on her the Frost Medal, its highest
honor; and that same summer she was the focus of an entire issue of
the Colorado Review which was devoted to her in
conjunction iwht a conference
celebrating her life and work. In 1986, Gwendolyn Brooks,
Poetry and the Heroic Voice, a comprehensive biocritical study, was
authored by Dr. D. H. Melhem. In
1990, the long-awaited book by the late Dr. George Kent, A life
of Gwendolyn Brooks was published and is a full-scale
biography of this major poet. She was named the 1994
Jefferson Lecturer by the National Endowment for the Humanities,
and in 1995 President Clinton presented her with the National Medal
of Arts. Her Selected Poems were published in 1995, and
the second half of her autobiography, Report from Part
Two, was released in 1996.
Currently a chair has been named in her honor at
Chicago State University: The Gwendolyn Brooks Distinguished Chair
in Black Culture and Literature, and she serves as
writer-in-residence at that university.
Toi Derricotte
Toi
Derricotte has published three
collections of poetry, The Empress of the Death House
(1978), Natural Birth 
(1983), and
Captivity (1989). She says of her poetry, "truthtelling in my art is a way to separate
my 'self' from what I have been taught to believe about my 'self,'
the degrading stereotypes about black females in our
society." Because of this poetic approach, her poetry emerges
as strong, sensuous, courageous and poignantly personal.
Derricotte is the recipient of two
fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts (1985 and
1990), as well as the recipient of the Lucille Medwick Memorial Award from the Poetry Society
fo American (1985), a Pushcart Prize
(1989) and the Folger Shakespeare
Library Poetry Book Award (1990). Her poems have been
published in a significant number of journals including
American Poetry Review, Callaloo,
IowaReview,
MassachusettsReview, New England
Review and Bread Loaf Quarterly
and Ploughshares. Derricotte is an associate professor of English at
the University of Pittsburgh and has taught in the graduate
creative writing programs at New York University, George Mason
University and Old Dominion University. In 1997, Norton published
her autobiography, written in journal form, The Black
Notebooks.
Rita Dove
Rita Dove, Poet Laureate of the
United States from 1993-5, is one of the most gifted poets of the
last half century. Her poems 
show an expansive and
eclectic intelligence and impressive lyrical and linguistic
gifts. Dove was born and raised in Akron, Ohio, and was
educated at Miami University and the University of Iowa. She
is the author of a novel, Through the Ivory Gate, and a
collection of stories, Fifth Sunday (1985), as well as a
book of essays, The Poet's World (1995). Best known
for her poetry, she is the author of six books of poetry: The
Yellow House on the Corner (1980); Museum (1983);
Thomas and Beulah, which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in
1987; Grace Notes (1989), Selected Poems, (1993),
and her most recent work, Mother Love: Poems was pubished in 1996. Her other honors
include fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and
the Guggenheim Foundation. In 1996, she received the Heinz Award in
the Arts and Humanities and the Charles Frankel Prize. In that
year, her play The Darker Face of the Earth was first
produced at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival. Currently
Commonwealth Professor of English at the University of Virginia,
she lives in Charlottesville.
Mari Evans
Mari Evans, educator, writer, and
musician, resides in Indianapolis. Formerly Distinguished
Writer and Assistant 
Professor, African American
and Resource Center, Cornell University, she has taught at Indiana
University, St. Louis, the State University of New York at Albany,
the University of Miami at Coral Gables and at Spelman College, Atlanta, over the past 20
years. She is the author of numerous articles, four
children's books, several performed theater pieces, two musicals
and four volumes of poetry, including I Am A Black Woman, Nightstar, and A dark and Splendid
Mass, published in 1992. She also edited the highly
acclaimed Black Women Writers (1950-1980): A Critical
Evaluation. Her work has been widely anthologized in
collections and textbooks, and her poems have appeared in several
languages including German, Swedish, French and Dutch. In
1998, she published Singing Black: Alternative Nursery Rhymes
for Children. Her poetry is a superb distillation of the black
idiom, capturing tones from the exquisitely humorous to the
hauntingly poignant. It also reveals a skillful grasp of
craft that shows to advantage the elegance and dignity that pervade
her lines.
Nikki Giovanni
Nikki Giovanni is one of
America's most widely read and controversial poets. The
visionary, truth-telling qualities that 
have come to be associated
with poetry of the sixties and early seventies are yet alive in her
writings. Giovanni entered the literary world at the height
of the Black Arts Movement and quickly achieved not simply fame but
stardom. Truth Is On Its
Way, a recording of her poems recited to gospel music, was one
of the best-selling albums in the country in 1971. All but
one of her books are still in print with
several having sold more than 100,000 copies. Named woman of
the year by three magazines, including Ebony, and
recipient of a host of honorary doctorates and awards, Nikki
Giovanni has read from her work and lectured at colleges around the
country. Her books include Black Feeling; Black
Talk/Black Judgement; My House;
Ego-Tripping and Other Poems for Young People; The Women and the
Men; Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day; Those Who Ride the Night Winds;
Sacred Cows...and Other Edibles, Racism 101, and Love
Poems, her most recent work. Giovanni is a professor of
English at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
Michael S. Harper
Michael S. Harper, the poet
laureate of Rhode Island, is one of the country's most prolific
writers. Author of eight
books of poetry, he began
his distinguished career with Dear John, Dear Coltrane
(1977). His other books include History Is Your Own
Heartbeat (1971),won the Black Academy of Arts and Letters
Award for poetry,NightmareBegins Responsibility
(1975), Images of Kin: New and Selected Poems (1977),
Images of Kin, New and Selected Poems which won the 1978
Melville Cane Award from the Poetry Society of America, and
Healing Songs for the Inner Ear: Poems (1984).
Harper has also made a significant contribution as the editor of
Chant of Saints: A Gathering of
Afro-American Literature of Art and Scholarship, which he
edited with Robert B. Stepto, and
Every Shut Eye Ain't Asleep: An
Anthology of Poetry by African Americans Since 1945, edited
with Anthony Walton. Nominated twice for the National Book
Award, he has been honored by the National Institute of Arts and
Letters, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Guggenheim
Foundation, and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and
Sciences in 1995. He won the 1996 George Kent Poetry Award for
Honorable Amendments, and in 1997 he was awarded the
Claiborne Pell Award for Excellence in Arts. He is University
Professor of English at Brown University, where he directs the
writing program.
Joyce Ann Joyce
Joyce Ann Joyce, Professor of English and Associate Director of the Gwendolyn Brooks Center for Black Literature and Creative Writing at Chicago State University, is the author of Richard Wright's Art of Tragedy (1986), Warriors, Conjurers and Priests: Defining African-centered Literary Criticism, and coeditor, along with Arthur P. Davis, of The New Cavalcade: African American Writing from 1760 to the Present, 2 volumes. Her latest book is Ijala: Sonia Sanchez and the African American Tradition (1996). Her articles have appeared in such journals as New Literary History, The MississippiQuarterly, The IndiaJournal of American Studies and the Journal of Black Studies.
Dolores Kendrick
Poet, playwright and educator,
Dolores Kendrick has been published in the
BeloitPoetry Journal, the
Indiana 
Review, Open Places
and several other anthologies. Author of Through the
Ceiling (1975) and Now is the Thing to Praise (1984),
she has received great acclaim for The Women of Plums
(1989). This book won the Ansfield-Wolf Award in 1990, it was listed as the
New York Public Library Best Book for Teenagers in 1991 and it was
the inspiration for an original production by Karamu Theatre in
Cleveland. The poem "Peggy in Killing" from The Women of
Plums has been adapted for an opera which will open in New
York in the spring of 1995. Kendrick has also recorded her
poetry as a part of the Contemporary Poets' Series by the Library
of Congress and has read at The Folger
Shakespeare Library, the Library of Congress and the Gertrude Whittall Series. She has received a
Fulbright to Ireland and a National Endowment for the Arts Award
(1989). She is the Bira I. Heinz
Professor Emerita at Phillips Exeter
Academy and a National Association of Independent Schools People of
Color Award recipient (1992).
Pinkie Gordon Lane
For Pinkie Gordon Lane, the title
of "first" has spanned her professional career. She was the
first black woman to 
receive a doctorate from
Louisiana State University in 1956 and the first black poet
laureate of Louisiana, an honor she held from 1989-92.
Described as "a poet of lyric space," Lane and her work have
garnered awards and praise, and she has been inducted into the
Louisiana Black History Hall of Fame and has been cited for her
work as an educator, poet and humanist by the Black Caucus of the
National Council of Teachers of English. Representative of
one of the quieter strains of poetry over the past two decades, the
English professor emerita of Southern
University in Baton Rouge has found a wide audience for her volumes
of poems, Wind Thoughts (1972), The Mystic Female
(1978), which was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in 1979, I
Never Scream: New and Selected Poems (1985), and Girl at
the Window (1991). Some of her poems first appeared in
such periodicals as Callaloo, Journal of Black Poetry, Ms.
Magazine, Negro American Literature Forum, Nimrod, Obsidian, The Black Scholar and The Southern
Review. Her forthcoming book is titled Elegy for
Etheridge.
Naomi Long Madgett
Writer, editor, teacher and
publisher, Naomi Long Madgett has been
the moving force behind Lotus Press, Inc., the 
leading publisher of
distinguished poetry by African Americans. Responsible for
the publication of 77 titles, she was senior editor of the Lotus
Poetry Series of Michigan State University Press from 1993-1998
while continuing as publisher and editor of Lotus Press in
Detroit. An award-winning poet in her own right, Madgett has published eight collections of poetry
including Pink Ladies in the Afternoon (1972, 1990),
Exits and Entrances (1978), Phantom Nightingale:
Juvenilia (1981), and Octavia and Other Poems (1988)
which was national co-winner of the College Language Association
Creative Achievement Award. She has also won the American Book
Award, the Michigan Artist Award, a George Kent Award, and a Robert
Hayden Runagate Award. Black Scholar Magazine gave
her the Award of Excellence in 1992, and in 1993 the Hilton-Long
Poetry Foundation offered its first annual Naomi Long Madgett Poetry Award for excellence in a manuscript
by an African American poet. This award is now sponsored by Lotus
Press and has had six winners. Madgett's poems have been included in well over 160
anthologies in this country and abroad and have been translated
into several languages.
Haki R. Madhubuti
Haki
R. Madhubuti, born Don L. Lee, moved to
Chicago as a teenager, thus beginning a period of growth,
service 
and commitment that would
have a significant impact on the literary and cultural life of
Chicago. Madhubuti, one of the
most distinctive and searing voices in contemporary poetry, has
divided his time among a variety of activities. Best known as
a poet, he works as an essayist, critic, publisher, social activist
and educator. He is the founder and editor of Third World
Press and Black Books Bulletin and directs the Institute
of Positive Education, an organization that brings nation-building
ideas to the youth of Chicago. A founding member of the
Organization of Black American Culture Writers Workshop (OBAC), he
honed his early poetic style in the circle of other OBAC poets such
as Gwendolyn Brooks, Carolyn Rodgers, Johari Amiri, and Sterlimg Plumpp. His books include Think Black;
Black Pride; Don't Cry, Scream; We Walk the Way of the New
World and Dynamite Voices: Black Poets of the
1960's. His more recent work includes Claiming
Earth: Race, Rage, Rape, Redemption (1995), Heartlove: Wedding and Love Poems
(1998), and editing Million Man March/Day of Absence: A Commemorative Anthology (1996). He is
currently a professor of English and director of the Gwendolyn
Brooks Center at Chicago State University.
E. Ethelbert Miller
E. Ethelbert Miller is the
director of the African American Resource Center at Howard
University, a position he has 
held since 1974. Miller
is the founder and director of the Ascension Poetry Reading Series,
one of the oldest literary series in the Washington area.
Author of Migrant Worker, Season of Hunger/Cry of Rain, Women
Surviving Massacres and Men, and Where are the Love Poems
for Dictators?, he most recently published First
Light: Selected and New Poems and In Search of Color
Everywhere. Miller is a Washington, D.C. treasure.
In 1979, the Mayor of Washington, D.C. proclaimed September 28,
1979 as "E. Ethelbert Miller Day." Awarded the Mayor's Art
Award for Literature (1982), he has received the Public Humanities
Award (1988) and the Columbia Merit Award (1993). Miller has
served on the D.C. Community Humanities Council and as senior
editor for theWashington Review of the Arts. His most
recent work includes editing the acclaimed anthology In Search
of Color Everywhere: A Collection of
African-American Poetry (1996) and authoring Whispers,
Secrets, Promises (1998).
Aldon
L. Nielsen
Aldon L. Nielsen, professor of English at San Jose State University, is the author of Reading Race: White American Poets and the Racial Discourse in the Twentieth Century (1988) and Writing Between the Lines: Race and Intertextuality (1994). Nielsen's two collections of poetry are Evacuation Routes and Heat Strings. Nielsen is producer, director and host of a San Jose State, California radio program, The Incognito Lounge, and publishes a poetry newsletter. Nielsen also served as director of poetry writing workshops at the Martin Luther King Public Library in Washington, D.C. His latest work is C.L.R. James: A Critical Introduction (1997).
Raymond R. Patterson
Raymond R. Patterson is the
author of 26 Ways of Looking at a Black Man and Other
Poems (Award Books) and 
Elemental Blues
(Cross-Cultural Communications), as well as an unpublished
book-length poem on the life of Phillis
Wheatley and an Opera Libretto, David Walker. His
poetry has appeared in The Transatlantic Review, The OhioReview, The West Hill
Review, The Crisis, The BeloitPoetry Journal
and elsewhere. Many of his poems have been anthologized and
can be found in The Poetry of the Negro, New Black Voices,
Soulscript, The Norton Introduction to Literature and A
Geography of Poets, and they have been translated into a
number of languages. In addition, they have been performed
over PBS. In 1985 the Hale Smith composition "Three Patterson
Lyrics" received its world premiere at Alice Tully Hall. For
his poetry, Raymond Patterson has received a National Endowment for
the Arts award and a Creative Artists Public Service
fellowship. He has served on the executive boards of the
Poetry Society of America and PEN American Center and is a trustee
of the Walt Whitman Birthplace Association. He was born in
New York City and educated at Lincoln University, Pennsylvania, and
New York University. He is a professor emeritus of the City
College of the City University of New York, where he taught for
many years in the English Department and directed its annual
Langston Hughes Festival.
Sterling D. Plumpp 
Sterling D. Plumpp describes himself as a poet who writes out
of his experience and sees the blues and black folklore as intimate
family members. Writer, editor and educator, Plumpp has lived most of his life in Chicago.
He has taught at the University of Illinois since 1970 where he is
currently a professor in the departments of African American
Studies and English. Among his works are Black
Rituals, a partly autobiographical publication on black
psychology; Portable Soul and Half Black, Half
Blacker, books of poetry; Somehow We Survive, a 1982
anthology of South African poetry, Blues: The Story Always
Untold (1989) and Johannesburg and Other Poems
(1993).His forthcoming children's books are Harriet Tubman and Paul Robeson.
In 1983 he received the Carl Sandburg Literary Prize for Poetry for
The Mojo Hands Call, I Must Go. His most
recent books are Hornman(1996)
and Ornate with Smoke (1998). His poems have also
appeared in Black Scholar, Black World, Obsidian and
Black Books Bulletin.
Arnold Rampersad
Arnold Rampersad, scholar, literary critic, biographer, and MacArthur Fellow, is the author of a two-volume biography of Langston Hughes and an earlier study of the life and works of W.E.B. DuBois. The Life of Langston Hughes has won numerous awards, including the American Book Award in Biography of the Before Columbus Foundation in 1990 and the Clarence Holt Award in 1988. The work was a runner-up for the Pulitzer Prize for biography in 1989; and the first volume I, Too, Sing America, was nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1987. Rampersad is Woodrow Wilson Professor of English and director of American studies at Princeton University. Earlier he taught at the University of Virginia, Stanford, Rutgers and Columbia. In 1991, he edited Richard Wright: Early Works and Richard Wright: Later Works for the Library of America series. He assisted Arthur Ashe in writing his Days of Grace: A Memoir (1994), and his biography of Jackie Robinson was published in 1998.
Bernice Johnson Reagon
Bernice Johnson Reagon is a curator in the Division of Community
life at the Smithsonian Institution, National Museum
of American History, and
Distinguished Professor of History at American University.
She is a specialist in African American oral, performance, and
protest traditions. Her current research includes
documentation of early twentieth century gospel repertoire and
performance traditions and nineteenth century worship
traditions. During the Civil Rights Movement, Reagon was a member of the original SNCC (Student
Non-violent Coordinating Committee) Freedom Singers. She
founded and currently serves as artistic director of Sweet Honey
In The Rock, an internationally
acclaimed African American women a cappella quintet, whose
repertoire specialty is African American song and singing
traditions. Reagon's publications
include: We Who Believe In Freedom: Sweet Honey In The Rock:
Still On The Journey (1993); "We'll Understand It Better
By and By;" Pioneering African American Gospel Composers
(1992); the landmark documentary anthology, Voices of the Civil
Rights Movement: Black American Freedom Songs 1960-1965; and
Compositions One: The Original Compositions and Arrangements of
Bernice Johnson Reagon
(1986). Her recordings as a singer include "River of Life," a
solo multi-track recording (1986) and Sweet Honey In The Rock recordings: "Selections (1976-1988)"
(1997), "Sacred Ground" (1995), "We All. . . Everyone of Us"
(1995), "Still On The Journey" (1993): "In This Land,"
(1992); "Live at Carnegie Hall" (1988); "All for Freedom," (for
children); "Feel Something Drawing Me On;" (1985) and"Good News" (1980). In 1989 she was a
recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship
Award. In 1995, she received the National Medal of the Arts
at the White House when Gwendolyn Brooks also received the same
award. She resides in Washington, D.C.
Eugene Redmond
The first and only official poet
laureate of his native East St. Louis, Ill., since 1976, Redmond
teaches at Southern 
Illinois University
Edwardsville, his alma mater. He has written several books,
including Songs from an Afro/Phone: New Poems and Drumvoices: The
Mission of Afro-American Poetry, A Critical History. He, along with Henry
Dumas and Sherman Fowler, founded Black River Writers Publishing
Company, which has published most of his poetry. His
boundless energy has propelled him into countless creative projects
including his work with Katherine Dunham at Southern Illinois
University's Performing Arts Training Center and his biographical
study of the late poet and fiction writer Henry Dumas.
Redmond has been poet-in-residence at Southern Illinois University,
Oberlin College, California State University, Southern University
in Baton Rouge, and the University of Wisconsin at Madison.
Redmond is the founding editor of Drumvoices Review, a
multicultural literary magazine. He is also a playwright
whose works have been produced by colleges in Illinois, California,
Louisiana and New York. The recipient of the 1993 American
Book Award for his collection of poems The Eye in the
Ceiling, he received the 1993 Pyramid Award from the Pan
African Movement USA for his writing achievements and his lifetime
dedication to multiculturalism. He is presently at work on a
poetic biography of former premiere ballerina Katherine Dunham.
Sonia Sanchez
Sonia Sanchez is one of the most
deeply moving and committed poets to emerge from the Black Arts
Movement in 
the late sixties and
seventies. A poet, activist, playwright, editor and teacher,
Sanchez has significantly influenced African American literature
and culture by the urgency of her sustained and powerful
voice. From 1969 to the present, she has authored eight books
of poems including Homecoming (1969), We a BadddDDD People (1970), A Blues Book
for Blue Black Magical Women (1974), homegirls& handgrenades (1984), and Under a Soprano
Sky (1987), Wounded in the House of a Friend (1995),
Does Your House Have Lions? (1998), and Like the
Singing Coming Off the Drums: Love Poems (1998). A
recipient of numerous awards including a National Endowment for the
Arts Award, 1985 American Book Award for homegirls & handgrenades, the Governor's Award for
Excellence in the Humanities for 1988, and the Peace and Freedom
Award from the Women International League for Peace and Freedom for
1989, she recently received the Pew Fellowship in the Arts for her
outstanding literary achievement. Sanchez has lectured at
over 500 universities and colleges in the United States and has
traveled extensively, reading her poetry in Africa, China, Europe,
Canada, and the Caribbean. She currently holds the Laura
Carnell Chair in English at Temple University.
Clyde R.
Taylor
A member of the faculty at the University of California at Berkeley since 1972, Clyde R. Taylor is a contributor of poems, articles and reviews to Black World, Black Folk, Criticism, Blake Studies, Dasein and Journal de l'Universite de Sherbrooke. He is associate editor of Blackfolks and a contributor to Modern Black Poets: Twentieth Century Views and Vietnamand Black America. Taylor earned his bachelor's and master's degrees from Howard University and his doctorate from Wayne State University. He was the recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship to Study William Blake at the University of Manchester in 1963-64. He received the Richard Wright Award for Literary Criticism from Black World in 1973. The Mask of Art: Breaking the Aesthetic Contract--Film and Literature is scheduled for publication in 1998.
Lorenzo Thomas
Lorenzo Thomas, assistant
professor of English at the University of Houston-Downtown, was a
member of the 
legendary Umbra
workshop in the 1960s. This workshop drew young writers to
the Lower East Side of New York City in search of their artistic
voices. Reflecting on those years in a 1978 Callaloo essay, Thomas observes, "cultural
black nationalism of our moment did not spring forth from
inspiration of the New York Times or the Late News," but
was the result of cultural transmissions from the griots of the folk tradition to these young
writers. Now an internationally acclaimed poet and critic, he
continues to receive inspiration from this source. His
collections of poetry include Chances are Few (1979),
The Bathers (1981) and Sound Science
(1992). He edited Sing the Sun Up: Creative Writing Ideas from African American
Literature (1998). He is a recipient of two Poets Foundation
awards and the Lucille Medwick
Prize.
Eleanor W. Traylor
Eleanor W. Traylor is professor
of English and chair of the department of English at Howard
University. Adjunct 
professor of English at The
Catholic University of America, she is also Project Director of
From Text to Stage to Text: Great Moments in African American
Literature, a multimedia resource for the teaching of African
American literature in secondary schools. Essayist and critic
of African American literature, she has prepared historical and
biographical scripts for the Program in Black American Culture of
the Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution, and
she has developed and directed the Larry Neal Cultural Series in
literature at the African American Historical and Cultural Museum
in Philadelphia. She is the recipient of The Marcus Garvey
Award for community service, the Hazel Joan Bryant Award of the
Midwest Black Theatre Alliance for service in community theater, and the Catholic University
Alumni Achievement Award in literary criticism. Her
publications are numerous and multi-faceted, among them