African American Studies Commons^™

Losing Count: A Re-Collection, By Numbers, Kim D. Hester Williams

The Goose

Poetry by Kim D. Hester Williams

Mic Check : Finding Hip Hop's Place In The Literary Milieu, Victorio Reyes

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The study of Hip Hop poetics has been slowly gaining momentum as an area for scholarly inquiry. Accordingly, Mic Check rests on one critical assumption: Hip Hop is the most significant American form of poetry ever invented. To back up this claim, this project investigates Hip Hop lyricism from five critical angles: tradition, form, tone, medium, and practice. I argue that music’s foundational position in African American literature clarifies Hip Hop’s experiments with language, which operate within and extend an ongoing, centuries-old tradition of linguistic, rhythmic, and poetic experimentation. Comprehension of the longstanding literary/oral territory from which Hip Hop is …

Properly Unhinged: A Collection Of Poems, Madison Everett

Honors Projects

This is a collection of poems that explores the identities I possess and am a part of. These identities include being half black and half white, clinically diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and Generalize Anxiety Disorder, pansexual or bisexual or something altogether different (depending on the day), and cis gendered womanhood. I also explore what a poem is and what a poem is not, and how there is very little difference between the two. In a lot of ways, this is an exploration into myself and what it means to be within the world. What does it mean to …

Hearing/S: Will In The Carceral Archive, Kayla Morse

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This long-form poetry project follows the human will — in this case the “criminal,” or captive will — as it is manhandled through an archive of reverends, wardens and superintendents narrating the future of prison reform. Drawing primarily from National Prison Association Conference archives between the years 1874 and 1895, these documents saturate the work with a will resistant but compelled towards subjugation by the state — as it appears within the text across forced labor economies, eugenic prison science that dictates starvation, classification, and isolation as the rule, the dehumanization of banal bureaucratic processes, the visceral and spectacular violence …

A Matter Of Life And Def: Poetic Knowledge And The Organic Intellectuals In Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry, Anthony Blacksher

CGU Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation unpacks the poetry, performances, and the production of Def Poetry Jam to explore how a performative art embodied and confronted racial discourses, including stereotypes and also, addressed the racism, patriotism, and imperialist discourses that circulated after 9/11. Def Poetry Jam contributes to the intellectual capacity of spoken word and performance poetry, and poets as intellectuals, where poets produce and disseminate knowledge, ideas, and data, in the form of narratives, that contribute to critical consciousness. The effectiveness of the series lay in the consistent blurring of entertainment, knowledge, anti-capitalism, and capitalism. This research demonstrates how Def Poetry Jam provided …

The Journey Of An Emotional Black Boy, Alonzo Elias

Philosophy Summer Fellows

The title of my project is "Emotional Nigga" a.k.a. "Emotional Black Boy" because people would be comfortable if I called it so. The audience for this project may want to think of it this way. The title I chose is meant to express the struggles I faced in my journey to self-awareness. I decided to share my story through fifteen topics, which have brought me a better understanding of myself and will hopefully help the audience as well. These topics are Self-Love, Prelude: Intimacy and Attachment Theory, Relationships, Sex, Beauty, Sexuality, Love, Self-Love, Spirituality, Religion, Astrology, Psychology, Self-Care, and Life. …

The Fluid Pastoral: African American Spiritual Waterways In The Urban Landscapes Of Harlem Renaissance Poetry, Maren E. Loveland

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

In 1921 Langston Hughes penned, “My soul has grown deep like the rivers” in his poem “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” (Hughes 1254). Weaving the profound pain of the African American experience with the symbolism of the primordial river, Hughes recognized the inherent power of water as a means of spiritual communication and religious significance. Departing from the traditional interpretation of the American pastoral as typified by white poets such as Robert Frost and Walt Whitman, the African American poets emerging from the Harlem Renaissance established a more nuanced pastoral landscape embedded within urban cultures, utilizing water in particular as …

The Strains Of Confessional Poetry: The Burdens, Blunders, And Blights Of Self-Disclosure, Lara Rossana Rodriguez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

When a provocative style of autobiographical verse had emerged in postwar America, literary critics christened the new genre “confessional poetry.” Confessional poets of the 1960s and ’70s are often characterized by scholars of contemporary poetry as a cohort of writers who, unlike previous generations before them, dared to explore in their work the personal and inherited traumas of mental illness, family suicides, failed marriages, and crushing addictions. As a result, the body of work these writers produced is often experienced as a collection of stylized, literary self-portraits. What can these self-portraits reveal to us about the connection between confessional poetry …

An Old Woman Bumped Her On Canal, Nordette N. Adams

University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

This work is a collection of poems revolving around black or African-American identity and the intersection of feminist consciousness with racial struggle. An examination of the unknown or forgotten black woman runs through this work as well as connection to a mother figure. The poems also reflect the influence of place, particularly New Orleans, its history, its culture, and its present evolution post-Hurricane Katrina. The collection's preface includes development of a unique poetics that considers identity theories and models of the subject in light of poetic voice. The poems use caesura heavily, rhyme, and sonic echo. Poets who have influenced …

Poems Shared By Yazmin Monet Watkins At The 2014 Race & Pedagogy Conference, Yazmin Monet Watkins

Race and Pedagogy Journal: Teaching and Learning for Justice

Included are a selection of poems shared by Yazmin Monet Watkins at the 2014 Race & Pedagogy conference. "A Lesson in this Queer African American Woman's History," was the opening poem for Angela Davis' speech and "Love Letter For Puget Sound," was performed at the Youth Speaks, Youth Summit. The other poems were shared at the What Now Is The Word evening performance. Although these poems were shared as a spoken word performance, it is important to share and document them in this journal as art and activism go hand in hand.

Education, Crystal C. Gray

Eddie Mabry Diversity Award

Education is a spoken word poem that explores many aspects of the African American struggle within (self-knowledge). It starts with an African American college student who is disappointed with the lack of courses about her culture. Most curricula in the United States tend to be from a Eurocentric perspective, leaving out a multitude of information about people of color. All groups of people of color have unique experiences, however, African Americans have the most known (or perhaps I should say, unknown) history. The standard explanation of their existence is often limited to the start of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, when …

Stanford University's Paul Laurence Dunbar Conference-Dunbar: The Originator-Part Ii, Joanne Braxton

Joanne Braxton

Stanford University's Paul Laurence Dunbar Conference-Dunbar:The Originator Part I, Joanne Braxton

Joanne Braxton

Finding Your Own Voice: Braxton Interviews Cortez, Joanne Braxton

Joanne Braxton

Tough Eloquence, Yusef Komunyakaa

Trotter Review

I began reading Etheridge Knight's poetry in the early 1970s, and what immediately caught my attention was his ability to balance an eloquence and toughness, exhibiting a complex man behind the words. His technique and content were one—the profane alongside the sacred—accomplished without disturbing the poem's tonal congruity and imagistic exactitude. Here was a streetwise poet who loved and revered language. Gwendolyn Brooks, Sterling Brown, and Langston Hughes seem to have been his mentors, but Knight appeared to have sprung into the literary world almost fully formed. He had so much control and authority; he was authentic from the onset. …

Uncle Monroe, Peggy Trotter Dammond Preacely

Trotter Review

Poem by Peggy Trotter Dammond Preacely, the grandniece of William Monroe Trotter.

"Whatever Happened To Black America?" Or: The Setzuan Invisibility Of Black And Blues, Joanne Braxton

Joanne Braxton

No abstract provided.

Ua98/1 Green & Gold, Vol. Vii, No. 3, Potter College For Young Ladies

WKU Archives Records

Magazine created by and about the students of Potter College. The Green & Gold contains articles, short stories, poetry and news regarding events of the college, students and alumni.

• Toast to Potter
• Redmond, Ethel. A Negro Sermon
• McCurdy, B.O. Never Seem to Be What You Are Not
• Eastland, May. A New “Brer Rabbit & Brer Possum” Story
• The Universal Sovereign
• Postlewaite, Delphia. Pat’s Joke
• Description of the Azores
• Sanders, Norah. Ghosts
• Barr, Corrine. Interpretation of Prometheus Unbound
• Mitchell, Katherine. The Misfortunes of Rastus
• Earth’s Pain
• The Passing of Pleasant Potter College
• Wilford, John. The Passing of Pleasant J. Potter College …

Ua98/1 Green & Gold, Vol. Vii, No. 1, Potter College For Young Ladies

WKU Archives Records

Magazine created by and about the students of Potter College. The Green & Gold contains articles, short stories, poetry and news regarding events of the college, students and alumni.

• Editorial
• The Girl in Brown
• Keith, Katherine. The Asheville Conference – YWCA
• Falter, Emma. Report of the Delegate to State Convention of YWCA
• YWCA Notes
• The Old Girls Entertain the New
• New Girls Entertain the Old
• Reception for Miss Sinclair
• Givens, Kathryn. Just Like a Girl
• The Girl Who Laughs
• The Mammoth Cave Trip
• Jordan, Katherine. The Boat Trip
• A Petition
• To Potter College
• Thanksgiving Day
• Ossolian Society
• Hypatian Society
• Sigma …

Ua98/1 Green & Gold, Vol. Vi, No. 3, Potter College For Young Ladies

WKU Archives Records

Magazine created by and about the students of Potter College. The Green & Gold contains articles, short stories, poetry and news regarding events of the college, students and alumni.

• Editorial
• Camak, Gerster. The State at Present
• Burnside, Blanche. Interpretation of Ancient Mariner
• Falter, Elizabeth. A Nebraska Wooing
• Booth, Blanche. When Greek Meets Greek
• Buchanan, Pauline. Why Uncle Josh Unjined
• What I Would Do If I Were Left Upon My Own Resources – Class of 1911 (PC)
• The Snow Image – Class of 1912 (PC)
• Courage
• YWCA Notes
• Mitchell, Katherine. The Great Stone Face
• Commencement Calendar
• Programmes
• Senior Class Day Program …

Ua98/1 Green & Gold, Vol. V. No. 3, Potter College For Young Ladies

WKU Archives Records

Magazine created by and about the students of Potter College. The Green & Gold contains articles, short stories, poetry and news regarding events of the college, students and alumni.

• Pillsbury, Agatha. Art & Life
• Smith, Mary. Mandy’s Wedding
• Stevens, India. Home Sweet Home
• Buchanan, Pauline. The Mammoth Cave Trip
• YWCA Notes
• Ossolian Society
• Hypatian Society
• Delta Pi Kappa
• Mu Phi Psi
• Beta Sigma Omicron
• Serenades
• Irregular Entertainment
• Lost River
• Senior Banquet – Class of 1907 (PC)
• Senior Day
• Flag Rush – From the Junior Point of View
• Jokes
• Mrs. Amy Henschel’s Home-Coming
• Personals
• Exchanges
• Teachers’ Recital
• Thanksgiving Program
• Recital Potter …

Ua98/1 Green & Gold, Vol. V, No. 2, Potter College For Young Ladies

WKU Archives Records

Magazine created by and about the students of Potter College. The Green & Gold contains articles, short stories, poetry and news regarding events of the college, students and alumni.

• McKinney, Luna. The Nineteenth Century Modification of the Epic: The Ring & the Book
• Compensation
• Stevens, India. A Pleasant Prescription
• Gay Motes that People the Sunbeams
• Epler, Clara. A Realized Ideal
• Lewis, Lena. January Nineteenth
• Bryan, Helen. A Year in the Philippines
• Patterson, Maggie. Aunt Hannah’s Experience
• Mu Phi Psi
• Sigma Theta Phi
• Beta Sigma Omicron
• Delta Pi Kappa
• New Year Reception
• Presbyterian Reception
• YWCA Notes
• In Memoriam – Alice Moore …

Ua98/1 Green & Gold, Vol. Iii, No. 2, Potter College For Young Ladies

WKU Archives Records

Magazine created by and about the students of Potter College. The Green & Gold contains articles, short stories, poetry and news regarding events of the college, students and alumni.

• Editorial
• Santo Domingo & the United States
• Kirby, Clara. A Dead Letter
• Willis, Effie. Milton’s Minor Poems
• Baker, Louise. Uncle Reuben’s Baptism
• Myers, Willie. Was Godfrey Cass a Victim of Circumstances?
• Gorin, Rebecca. The Expression of the Emotions in Cats
• Faculty & Students’ Reception
• Mr. Walter Spry’s Recital
• The YWCA Reception
• Reception for Seniors & Sophomores
• YWCA Notes
• Exchange

Ua98/1 Green & Gold, Vol. Ii, No. 3, Potter College For Young Ladies

WKU Archives Records

Magazine created by and about the students of Potter College. The Green & Gold contains articles, short stories, poetry and news regarding events of the college, students and alumni.

• The Degeneracy of the Modern Novel
• A Plea for the New Novel
• The Home Makers
• Faculty of Potter College
• Aunt Charlotte
• Our Next Presidential Campaign
• Memories
• Societies
• Dead Sea Fruit
• Why I Disliked the Last Book I Read
• The Last Book I Read
• Exchange
• Mrs. Smith’s Forget-Me-Not Party
• The Senior Reception – Class of 1904 (PC)
• Alumnae Notes
• College Notes