We are not afraid.

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Ralph Ellison

Ralph Waldo Ellison was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma on March 1, 1914.

1914 - 1994

Ralph Ellison's single published novel, Invisible Man (1952), is recognized as one of the finest achievements in modern American fiction as well as one of the most complete statements of the African American experience.




Library of Congress Bio
http://www.read.gov/fiction/ellison.html



Born in 1914 in Oklahoma City, the grandson of slaves, Ralph Waldo Ellison and his younger brother were raised by their mother, whose husband died when Ralph was 3 years old. His mother supported her young family by working as a nursemaid, a janitor and a domestic.

From an early age Ellison loved music and expected to be a musician and a composer. He played his first instrument - a cornet - at age 8. By 19, he had enrolled at Tuskegee Institute as a music major, playing the trumpet. Although drawn to jazz and jazz musicians, Ellison studied classical music and the symphonic form because he was looking forward to a career as a composer and performer of classical music.

In the summer of 1936, Ellison went to New York City to earn expenses for his senior year at Tuskegee. It was a fateful decision: He never returned to his studies at Tuskegee and never became a professional musician. While in New York, Ellison met the writer Richard Wright. When they first became acquainted, Ellison had every intention of returning to Tuskegee. But the Great Depression prevented him from earning the needed funds.

Eventually he got a job doing research and writing for the New York Federal Writers Program, an offshoot of the Works Progress Administration. He also began writing essays and short stories for the “New Masses,” “The Negro Quarterly,” “The New Republic,” “Saturday Review” and other publications.

With the outbreak of World War II, Ellison joined the U.S. Merchant Marine as a cook, saw action in the North Atlantic and began to think of writing a major novel. However, not until after the war did he begin writing what was to become Invisible Man.

From the time Invisible Man first appeared in 1952, it was a popular and critical success. On the best-seller list for 16 weeks, in 1953 the novel won the National Book Award. And more than 40 years later, Nobel Prize winner Saul Bellow declared, “This book holds its own among the best novels of the century.”

Invisible Man established Ellison as a serious and important literary figure, and he spent the next two years (1955-57) in Rome as a Fellow of the American Academy. He returned to the United States to teach at a variety of colleges and universities including Bard College, the University of Chicago, Rutgers, Yale and New York University, among others.

He always maintained his wide range of interests - from music, both classical and jazz, to sports, theater and photography - and in 1964 he published “Shadow and Act,” a collection of essays on these and other subjects. Ellison has described the volume as an attempt "to relate myself to American life through literature.“Going to the Territory,” a subsequent collection of essays, lectures and criticism, appeared in 1986. For many years, Ellison worked on a second, long piece of fiction, which he never completed; it finally appeared after his death in 1994, as Juneteenth.

After a short-lived first marriage, Ellison married Fanny McConnell in 1946. A devoted couple, they lived together in an apartment on Riverside Drive in New York City until Ellison died in April 1994. There were no children. Fanny McConnell Ellison died in 2005 at the age of 93.

Ralph Ellison first spoke at the Library of Congress in 1964 when he delivered the Gertrude Clark Whittall Lecture; from 1966 to 1972, he served as the Library's Honorary Consultant in American Letters.

For many years, Ellison worked on a second, long piece of fiction, which he never completed; it finally appeared after his death in 1994 as Juneteenth.

A Selected Bibliography of the Work of Ralph Ellison

Invisible Man (1952)
The Collected Essays of Ralph Ellison (1995)
Flying Home and Other Stories (1997)
Juneteenth (1999)

Invisible Man

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Ralph Ellison Introduction

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Invisible Metaphors

 

Toni Morrison

In a March 1990 Bill Moyers interview with Toni Morrison - for the television series, A World of Ideas - Morrison explored the concept: "Master Narrative."







Moyers: I don’t think I’ve ever met a more pathetic character in modern literature than Pecola Breedlove in The Bluest Eye.

Morrison: She has surrendered completely to the so-called “Master Narrative,” the whole notion of what is ugliness, what is worthlessness. She got it from her family; she got it from school; she got it from the movies; she got it from everywhere.

Moyers: The Master Narrative . . . what is . . . that’s life.

Morrison: No. It’s white male life. The Master Narrative is whatever ideological script that is being imposed by the people in authority on everybody else: The Master Fiction . . . history. It has a certain point of view. So when those little girls see that the most prized gift they can receive at Christmas time is this little white doll, that’s the Master Narrative speaking: this is beautiful, this is lovely, and you’re not it, so what are you going to do about it? So if you surrender to that, as Pecola did (the little girl, the “I” of the story, is a bridge: [she] is resistant, feisty, doesn’t trust any adults) . . . [Pecola] is so completely needful; she has so little and needs so much . . . she becomes the perfect victim–the total pathetic one. And for her, there’s no way back into the community or society. For her, an abused child, she can only escape into fantasy, into madness . . . which is part of what . . . the mind is always creative . . . it can think that up.

 

Toni Morrison

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJ9vd0lLW2g&feature=share&list=PL5hmbrDt2_Texx5uS960uvHjNI9ZF2Ogp

Shirley Temple

Imitation of Life (1934)

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IB Examination Prep Material

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Langston Hughes

 
“We possess within ourselves a great 
reservoir of physical and spiritual strength.”


“There is no lack within the Negro people 
of beauty, strength and power.” 

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• 1902–1967
• Born in Joplin, Missouri - February 1, 1902
• Raised by his grandmother, Mary Langston, in Lawrence, Kansas.
• Poet, novelist, short story writer, playwright, song lyricist, radio writer, translator, author of juvenile books, and lecturer. In early years worked as assistant cook, launderer, busboy, and at other odd jobs; worked as seaman on voyages to Africa and Europe. Lived at various times in Mexico, France, Italy, Spain, and the Soviet Union.

James Langston Hughes was first recognized as an important literary figure during the 1920s, a period known as the "Harlem Renaissance."  His first published poem was – The Negro Speaks of Rivers. During The Great Depression, Hughes became involved in radical politics, eventually joining the American Communist Party. The work of Langston Hughes was influenced and shaped by the joys, struggles and triumphs of poor African American families. In the writer's own words, his poetry is about . . .

"workers, roustabouts, and singers, and job hunters on Lenox Avenue in New York, or Seventh Street in Washington or South State in Chicago – people up today and down tomorrow, working this week and fired the next, beaten and baffled, but determined not to be wholly beaten, buying furniture on the installment plan, filling the house with roomers to help pay the rent, hoping to get a new suit for Easter – and pawning that suit before the Fourth of July."

Harlem

by Langston Hughes   


What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

I, Too, Sing America

by Langston Hughes   


I, too, sing America.

I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.

Tomorrow,
I'll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody'll dare
Say to me,
"Eat in the kitchen,"
Then.

Besides,
They'll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed—

I, too, am America.

I, Too, Sing America

  by Langston Hughes

I, too, sing America.

I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.

Tomorrow,
I'll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody'll dare
Say to me,
"Eat in the kitchen,"
Then.

Besides, 
They'll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed—

I, too, am America.

- See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15615#sthash.F2k1BVuV.dpuf

African American Poets

Harlem

by Langston Hughes   


What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore —
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over —
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

I, Too, Sing America

by Langston Hughes   


I, too, sing America.

I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.

Tomorrow,
I'll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody'll dare
Say to me,
"Eat in the kitchen,"
Then.

Besides,
They'll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed —

I, too, am America.

kitchenette building
by Gwendolyn Brooks

We are things of dry hours and the involuntary plan,
Grayed in, and gray. “Dream” makes a giddy sound, not strong
Like “rent,” “feeding a wife,” “satisfying a man.”

But could a dream send up through onion fumes
Its white and violet, fight with fried potatoes
And yesterday’s garbage ripening in the hall,
Flutter, or sing an aria down these rooms

Even if we were willing to let it in,
Had time to warm it, keep it very clean,
Anticipate a message, let it begin?

We wonder. But not well! not for a minute!
Since Number Five is out of the bathroom now,
We think of lukewarm water, hope to get in it.


Yet Do I Marvel
by Countee Cullen

I doubt not God is good, well-meaning, kind,

And did He stoop to quibble could tell why

The little buried mole continues blind,

Why flesh that mirrors Him must some day die,

Make plain the reason tortured Tantalus

Is baited by the fickle fruit, declare

If merely brute caprice dooms Sisyphus
To struggle up a never-ending stair.

Inscrutable His ways are, and immune

To catechism by a mind too strewn

With petty cares to slightly understand

What awful brain compels His awful hand.

Yet do I marvel at this curious thing:

To make a poet Black, and bid him sing!



We Wear the Mask
by Paul Laurence Dunbar 

We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes —
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.

Why should the world be over-wise,
In counting all our tears and sighs?
Nay, let them only see us, while
        We wear the mask.

We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries
To thee from tortured souls arise.
We sing, but oh the clay is vile
Beneath our feet, and long the mile;
But let the world dream otherwise,
        We wear the mask! 

Hamlet

William Shakespeare's  

The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark

Open PowerPoint

Hamlet - full text online with notes

Comprehensive Hamlet resource guide 

Hamlet wiki

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The Great Gatsby

Link to Gatsby PowerPoint

.

Maya Angelou

Link to Maya Angelou PowerPoint

Dream Assignments 2-3

Jamie
With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together – knowing that we will be free one day.
 
Andre
This will be the day . . .This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:
 
Isaac
‘My country, 'tis of thee
Sweet land of liberty – Of thee, I sing.’
 
Preston
‘Land where my fathers died, Land of the Pilgrim's pride; From every mountainside Let freedom ring.’
 
April
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. So let freedom ring

Kenny
from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring. From the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring, from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania . . .
 
Lillyan
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of  California.
 
Badamasi
But not only that – let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia. Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee. Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.
Jonelle
From every mountainside – let freedom ring. And when this happens, and when we allow freedom to ring

Jaricka
 when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children

Karetha
Black men and White men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics – will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual

‘Free at last,
Free at last,
Thank God Almighty,
We are free at last.'

_______________________


Robert
We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back.
 
Creadel
There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, 'When will you be satisfied?'
 
Josh
We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality.
 
Jekeia
We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities.
 
Run'nita
We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one.
 
?
We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by  signs stating 'For Whites Only.'
 
?
We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote, and a Negro in New York believes he has  nothing for which to vote.
 
Jamiah
No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness  like a mighty stream.
 
?
I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations.
 
?
Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells – and some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality.
 
Vivian
You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.
 
Kieara
Go back to Mississippi . . . go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana –  go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities – knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.
 
Cyndell
Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.
 
Da-Ja
I say to you, today, my friends –  even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow – I still have a  dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
 
April
I have a dream, that one day . . . this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold  these truths to be self evident: that all men are created equal.’
 

Dream Assignments

Anise
In a sense, we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check.
 
Martice
When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.

Ikea
 This note was a promise that all men, yes, Black men as well as White men, would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
 
Ajari
It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned.
 
Krystal
Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check – a check which has come back marked 'insufficient funds.'
 
Shimari
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation.
 
Ronald
So we’ve come to cash this check – a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.
 
Dazia
We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of 'now.'
 
Keyon
This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off, or to take the tranquilizing drug of 'gradualism.‘Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy.

Nalayasia
Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice.
 
Ra
Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.
 
Tyrone
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment.
 
Matthew
This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality.
 
Valeta
Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam, and will now be content, will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.
 
Martinique
There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights.

The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice.

In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds.

Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence.

Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all White people . . .

. . . for many of our White brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny –

. . . and they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.

I Have a Dream

 "I Have a Dream" Speech

Martin Luther King, Jr.

August 28, 1963

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves, who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice.

It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity. But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free.

One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination.

One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity.

One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society, and finds himself an exile in his own land.

So we've come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.



In a sense, we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check.

When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.

This note was a promise that all men, yes, Black men as well as White men, would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned.

Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check – a check which has come back marked 'insufficient funds.'

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation.

So we’ve come to cash this check – a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of 'now.'

This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off, or to take the tranquilizing drug of 'gradualism.‘Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy.

Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice.

Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment.

This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality.

Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam, and will now be content, will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.

There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights.

The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice.

In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds.

Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence.

Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all White people . . .

. . . for many of our White brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny –

. . . and they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.

We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back.

There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, 'When will you be satisfied?'

We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality.

We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities.

We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one.

We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by  signs stating 'For Whites Only.'

We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote, and a Negro in New York believes he has  nothing for which to vote.

No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness  like a mighty stream.

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations.

Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells – and some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality.

You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.

Go back to Mississippi . . . go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana –  go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities – knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.

Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.

I say to you, today, my friends –  even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow – I still have a  dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream, that one day . . . this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold  these truths to be self evident: that all men are created equal.’

I have a dream, that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave  owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream . . . that one day, even the state of Mississippi – a state sweltering with the heat of injustice,  sweltering with the heat of oppression – will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream . . . that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the  color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists – with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification –

. . . one day right there in Alabama, little Black boys and Black girls will be able to join hands with little White  boys and White girls as sisters and brothers.I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low;

The rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight – and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith, we will be able to hew out of  the mountain of despair – a stone of hope.

With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of  brotherhood.

With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together – knowing that we will be free one day.

This will be the day . . .This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with new meaning:

‘My country, 'tis of thee
Sweet land of liberty – Of thee, I sing.’

‘Land where my fathers died, Land of the Pilgrim's pride; From every mountainside Let freedom ring.’

And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. So let freedom ring
 
from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring. From the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring, from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania . . .

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of  California.

But not only that – let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia. Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee. Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.

From every mountainside – let freedom ring. And when this happens, and when we allow freedom to ring  
when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children

Black men and White men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics – will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual

‘Free at last,
Free at last,
Thank God Almighty,
We are free at last.'

Generation Next

The website for Generation Next says the group is "a broad partnership of organizations and leaders from across the Twin Cities" representing schools, government, businesses and community organizations, "all dedicated to educational excellence and narrowing the achievement gap."

The  Generation Next mission statement: "To dramatically accelerate educational achievement of all children from early childhood through early career through an aligned partnership of community stakeholders."

Generation Next

Strive Together

Growth and Justice

Center for School Change

MN Minority Education Leadership
African American Leadership Forum