Please reply to these two students 75/words each:

1-The poet I chose for this weeks discussion board post was Le Roi Jones also known as Amiri Baraka. Jones played a big role in the Black Arts Movement, considered a father of the movement by many. The first thing that made me interested in Jones was that he had two names he was known by. Following the death of Malcolm X, Jones dissociated from his previous life, even ended his marriage. He moved to Harlem and started the Black Arts Repertory Theatre/School. A few years later he became a Muslim and changed his name to Amiri Baraka. It really stood out to me that Malcolm X had such an influence on Baraka’s life, with his death causing him to completely change his life. Along with being a poet, Baraka was also a play write. Another thing that stood out to me was how Baraka adopted a Marxist Leninist philosophy. A poem from Baraka that I read titled The Liar stood out to me the most out of the poems I read. The last few lines said “when they say, “it’s Roi who is dead” I wonder who they will mean”. This made me think that Baraka was having a moment of reflection wondering who people would remember him as or what version of himself died, Amiri Baraka or Le Roi Jones. The Black Arts Movement starting in the 1950s and had its roots in civil rights movement, Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam, and the Black Power movement. One thing that interested me in this movement was that I didn’t know much about this movement and when I looked into it I learned that it was a response to the turbulent socio-political landscape of the time. It gave a different perspective from what was being said by others at the time.

2-I chose to look into the Black Arts movement. The movement was rooted in black empowerment and defining their distinction in perspective and experience from what the white people had been voicing. It went on during the 50’s to the 70’s, but its roots and stories being told have been brewing for generations and I would argue that it never really stopped.

I chose to look into Lucille Clifton, because I wanted to look into a non male poet. After reading Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zola Neale Hurston, a female writer in the black arts movement, I realized that the black female experience is completely its own, totally separate and unique from the white female experience or black male experience.

Lucille Clifton had a very successful career. She was discovered by Langston Hughes, a staple and leader of the Black arts poetry movement, and she was published in an Anthology put together by Hughes called The Poetry of the Negro(1970). The anthology is an incredibly influential book and has poems by black poets dating back to the 1700’s. Cliftons poetry focused on the Black American experience and the dynamics of family life and being a black woman. Her poems are famously short and she is known to be able to say more with less. Along with her poetry she also wrote children’s books that worked to educate black children about themselves and their history. She has been given and been nominated for tons of awards and was the first author to have two books as finalists for the pulitzer prize. She continued to write her entire life and as the world changed so did what she wrote about. Some of her final books discussed 21st century issues such as terrorism and prejudice. She wrote till she died in 2010 and it seems like she will always be remembered as a voice for black women.