CLASHING HARMONIES & UNIVERSAL PARTICULARS: A WORKSHOP REPORT ON THE 3rd NATIONAL BLACK WRITERS CONFERENCE Medgar Evers College, Brooklyn NY, March 22-24, 1991 Medgar Evers COLLEGE Edited and with an Introduction by Eugene B. Redmond ✓ Forward by Elizabeth Nunez-Harrell, Director NBWC Coll. Published in Conjunction with the 591 1991 Midwest Black Writers and Thinkers Symposium . N4 C53 1991 ©SIUE|siue.edu/digialcollections CLASHING HARMONIES & UNIVERSAL PARTICULARS: A WORKSHOP REPORT ON THE 3rd NATIONAL BLACK WRITERS CONFERENCE Medgar Evers College. Brooklyn NY. March 22-24, 1991 Edited and with an Introduction by Eugene B. Redmond Foreword by Elizabeth Nunez-Harrell, Director NBWC Reports by Jabari Asim Georgene Bess Lynn Casmier-Paz Ira Jones Darlene Roy Evon Udoh SIUE Editorial Staff: Associate Editor, Layout and Production: Alexandra Babione Assistant Editor, Copy Control and Input: William Dorman Student Editorial Assistants: Douglas Rudder and Christina Veasley SYMPOSIUM SPONSORS Eugene B. Redmond Writers Club The English Department of SIUE East St. Louis School District 189 Delta Sigma Theta, Inc (ESL Alumnae Chapter) East St. Louis State Community College The National Endowment for the Humanities Black Student Program Committee of the Student Program Board of SIUE Black Student Association of SIUE Published October 1991 in the Drumvoices Revue Supplement Series by the English Department of Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville and printed by the Humanities Steno Pool. Copyright c 1991 by Drumvoices Revue, SIUE, Box 1431, Edwardsville, IL 62026-1431. EBR Writers Club, P.O. Box 6165, East St. Louis, IL 62203 3 ISBN 1-880748-00-2. I ©SIUE|siue.edu/digialcollections CoH 511 .M 4 CS3 ©SIUE|siue.edu/digialcollections TABLE OF CONTENTS Schedule of Events ......................................................................................................... 3 Forew ord........................................................................................................................... 5 Struggling with the W ordforce.................................................................................... 6 Keynote Addresses Summarized ................................................................................. g ALICE WALKER: Living By The Word ............................................................. 8 ISHMAEL REED: Fightin ’ With the Word.......................................................... 9 PANEL I: The Black Writer in a Pluralistic S ociety............................................................ 11 PANEL II: Literature as a Source for Finding the Moral Center in a Changing World 14 PANEL III: The Use of Black Historical Fact in Literature ................................................ 17 PANEL IV: The Use of Folklore and the Creation of Myth in Black Literature............ 19 PANEL V: New Directions for Black Writers in the 21st Century.................................... 23 PANEL VI: The Black Writer: Publishing, Distribution, Marketing ................................. 25 CONFERENCE WRAP UP PANEL: A Summary of Summaries...................................................................... 27 Notes on Contributors .................................................................................. 29 Photo Essay........................................................................................... 32 ©SIUE|siue.edu/digialcollections ©SIUE|siue.edu/digialcollections MIDWEST WRITERS AND THINKERS SYMPOSIUM October 31 through November 3, 1991 "The Role of Black Culture and Literature in the Lifting of the Cities" Schedule of Events Thursday. October 31. 1991 Location: Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville Panel: "Clashing Harmonies and Universal Particulars’' 10:30 a.m.-12:15 p.m. Moderator: Eugene B. Redmond Panelists: Jabari Asim, Georgene Bess, Ira Jones, Darlene Roy, Lynn Casmier-Paz, Evon Udoh Reception: Hosted by the Black Student Association 12:20-12:55 p.m. Speeches: Pinkie Gordon Lane, Poet Laureate of Louisiana (Andrea Wren, opening reader) 1 :00-2:00 p.m. Elizabeth Nunez-Harrell, Director NBWC (Jabari Asim, opening reader) 2:10-3:00 p.m. Reception: Hosted by the Black Student Association 3:00-4:00 p.m. Writers Round Table — Invitation only 7:00 p.m. Friday. November l, 1991 In-Service Workshops: East St. Louis School District 189 (Closed to public) Readings, talks, and/or workshops High Schools: Amiri Baraka, Elizabeth Nunez-Harrell, and Pinkie Gordon Lane Junior High Schools: Lincoln McGraw-Beauchamp and Georgene Bess Reception: East St. Louis City Hall Rotunda 7:00-10:00 p.m. Authors’ Party, Tribute to Miles Davis and Official Welcome from symposium co­ sponsors. Featuring guest writers and the Lincoln Senior High School Jazz Combo. Saturday. November 2. 1991 Registration: State Community College, East St. Louis 8:30-9:30 a.m. Sessions held in Room 2085 Continental Breakfast (Cafeteria) Opening session: Board Room 2085 9:30-9:45 a.m. Morning Keynote Address: Amiri Baraka, Poet/Play right 9:45-10:30 a.m. 3 ©SIUE|siue.edu/digialcollections Panel I "Clashing Harmonies and Universal Particulars": A Workshop Report on the 3rd National Black Writers Conference 10:30 a.m.-12:00 p.m. Moderator: Elizabeth Nunez-Harrell Panelists: Jabari Asim, Georgene Bess, Ira Jones, Darlene Roy, Lynn Casmier-Paz, Evon Udoh Lunch: (Cafeteria) On-your-own 12:00-1:00 p.m. Afternoon session: Board Room 2085 Keynote Address: Terry McMillan, novelist 1:00-1:30 p.m. Panel II "Black Writers and Thinkers: Their Roles in Lifting the Cities" 1:45-3:30 p.m. Moderator: Lena Weathers Panelists: Michele Lowery, L. T. McGraw-Beauchamp, Kwaku O. Kushindana, Alice Windom Break: (Cafeteria) 3:30-4:00 p.m. Panel III "Who’s Rapping to Whom?: From Ancient African (Kemet) Scrolls to Contemporary Compact Discs (Interdependence of Oral and Written Black Literature through the Ages)" Moderator: Jabari Asim 4:00-5:30 p.m. Panelists: Sherman Fowler, Margie Hollins, K. Curtis Lyle, Redina Medley Dinner: On-your-own 5:30-7:00 p.m. Open Mike Reading: For Local and Visiting Writers 7:00-9:00 p.m. Ira B. Jones and Andrea Wren, presiding Sunday. November 3. 1991 Location: State College Room 2085, East St. Louis Breakfast: (Cafeteria) Continental 9:00-10:00 a.m. Conference Wrap-up Panel 10:00-12:00 a.m. Darlene Roy, Moderator Panelists: Jabari Asim, Lena Weathers, Eugene Redmond Official Closing 12:00-12:15 p.m. Symposium Co-Directors: Eugene B. Redmond and Darlene Roy 4 ©SIUE|siue.edu/digialcollections FOREWORD The National Black Writers Conference Committee welcomes this publication on the proceedings of NBWC‘91 by a group of visionary writers and lovers of writing in East St. Louis, Illinois. Among the most cherished goals of the Committee was the hope that the Conference would not end in Brooklyn after two days, but that the ideas generated by this meeting of the country’s best writers, literary scholars, insightful readers and lovers of good literature would transcend time and place and inspire more and better literature by African Amricans; more and more discerning readers of Black Literature. This publication is evidence of the fulfillment of that hope. Congratulations East St. Louis. Thank You. Elizabeth Nunez-Harrell, Ph.D., Director National Black Writers Conference 1991 5 ©SIUE|siue.edu/digialcollections STRUGGLING WITH THE WORDFORCE ith the publication of Gashing Harmonies and Universal Particulars, we simultaneously welcome you to the 1991 Midwest Black Writers and Thinkers Symposium and share with you our attempts to render the most seminal and searching features of the Third National Black Writers Conference, held March W 22-24 at Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn, New York. The diligent journeywriters herein form a kindred convergence of East St. Louis (Illinois), St. Louis (Missouri) and Statesboro (Georgia). With this slim volume, they complete one more skirmish in their personal and collective struggles with WORDFORCE. By name, they are Jabari Asim, Georgene Bess, Lynn Casmier-Paz, Ira Jones, Darlene Roy and Evon Udoh. But we also call them free-lance writer, educator, mother, editor, father, social worker, poet, cultural architect or any combination of these. Serious, serious: Tuesday-go-to-meeting/People-developers--even as they toil in the pithy mind-mines of self-development. It was through diverse means that this little gathering of essays was planned, plotted and minted: a one-on-one rap at a bookstore, some spontaneous hallway chatter, long-distance cajoling and coaching. Primarily, however, it was conceived in the warm 1991 winter minds of workshoppers who gather twice-monthly at State Community College in East St. Louis for meetings of the Eugene B. Redmond Writers Club. Indeed, the very title of this booklet has all the ear-eye marks of a workshop-born concept. It evolved rather serio-humorously, and coincidentally, from the healthy verbal sparing and jousting that we are fond of. In response to a perennial charge (by mainstream literati) that African-American literature is not "universal," Darlene Roy, the perceptive president of the Writers Club, observed that Black authors write "Universal Particulars." Around the same time, I coined the phrase "Clashing Harmonies" to suggest the robust reach of - ologies and -isms represented by NWBC panelists, and, indeed, by African and Black Diasporan Writing generally. Hence the oxymoronic title: Gashing Harmonies and Universal Particulars. So the journeywriters went forth. Armed with pens, pencils, tape recorders, background reading, cameras, anticipation