When the Rainbow is Enuf...

In our African-American Community class a few weeks ago we discussed the Black Arts Movement and compared it with the Harlem Renaissance. Both movements focused on themes of racial pride, political empowerment through cultural awareness and the celebration of blackness. Nikki Giovanni, Sonia Sanchez, Zora Neale Hurston and Ntozake Shange were just a few of the names mentioned that day in class. Most were unfamiliar with these women's words even if they may have previously heard their names. Keshea L. did some exploring, some digging (archeology of the poetic) and found some more information about Ntozake Shange Ntozake Shange and her ground breaking work, For Colored Girls Who've Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf. This is her take on what she read. Maybe it will inspire you to do some investigating of your own....



I was deeply touched by the play, "Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When The Rainbow Is Enuf" because it deals with several issues that black women face during our lifetime. These issues of love, rape, abandonment and abortion can either make a woman stronger as she journeys through the spirals of life, or tear her down into the nothing that society once characterized us as. The play links men as the reason for these issues that cloud the lives of black women yet reveals the need for codependency on our male counter-part. Ntozake Shange comprised this choreopoem because of what she went through but decided to use her experience as a strengthening tool that made her into the woman she is today. The play shows that we, as black women, may not have any control over what happens in our lives, but have the power of deciding what direction we choose to allow it to take us.

-Keashea L.

Talisa B. discovered the article, "How It Feels to Be Colored Me" by Zora Neale Hurston and wrote the following response. You can find Zora Neale Hurston's article
here.

I really liked this article, I thought that this article was really humorous and it brought up a lot of things that people unconsciously wonder about. Hurston starts her article off with humor, saying, “I am colored but I offer nothing in the way of extenuating circumstances except the fact that I am the only Negro in the United States whose grandfather on the mother’s side was not an Indian chief”. This is hilarious because African Americans are always saying that they’re part Indian, if they have “good hair” they’re part Indian. If they have lighter colored skin, they’re part Indian. Light colored eyes, they’re Indian and it’s just so funny to me because in actuality half of us don’t know what we are or are not. She goes on to say, “Someone is always at my elbow reminding me that I am the granddaughter of slaves. It fails to register depression with me. Slavery is sixty years in the past. The operation was successful and the patient is doing well, thank you”. This too is funny to me because within the African American community when you mess up or you are not doing the best you can there is always someone there telling you how people suffered and fought for you to do this or that. It’s also funny because African Americans also try to use slavery as an excuse when they feel like someone’s holding them back stating, “my people suffered such and such years and …”



Hurston also talks about when she became colored stating, “I remember the very day that I became colored,” this statement seemed funny at first; because how can you remember the day you became colored? People don’t just become colored, they’re born that way, so I thought that maybe she was saying she remembers the day she realized she was colored. This made me think, when do people realize that everyone is not the same? That some people are African American, Hispanic, Italian, Jewish, etc? In today’s society children learn that everyone is different at a young age through books and TV shows like, “Barney” and “Sesame Street” but when Hurston was a child she didn’t have that, so when did she realize she was colored and how did she know that was different from being Hispanic, Italian, Jewish, etc? She also brought up how she doesn’t always “feel” colored stating “I do not always feel colored…I feel most colored when I am thrown against a sharp white background”. I think this is very true, if you think about it when you're around a group of people who aren't judgmental and are looking at you as a person, you know your identity as a man or woman, black or white, etc.; but you’re not really conscious of it you just view yourself as a person. But when you're with people who are constantly picking out you're differences that’s when you notice that your black or white, man or woman, etc.  All in all I thought that this was a really good article, the only thing that I really didn’t understand was the end part when she was talking about the music and the colors.

-Talisa B.

What is your favorite play? poem? artist? What MOVES and INSPIRES you?