Unearthing Hidden Literacy: Seven Lessons I Learned in a Cotton Field

By: Lillie Gayle Smith
I strongly relate to Lillie Smith’s testimony on how she valued literacy outside of the classroom. Growing up, my parents taught me to be very appreciative. Both of my parents were born in Arkansas and suffered from living in the racist south. My parents relate to Smith because they picked cotton for their families. My mother often describes the horrors of being as young as 5 picking cotton. She described the intense summer heat and how picking the cotton would hurt her hands. She also has a strong fear of snakes which relates to her experiences of picking cotton on her family’s farm. In one instance, she describes how my grandfather had to kill this enormous snake right in front of her. This truly traumatized her. My father picked cotton at a very young age, which he often relates to his strong work ethic. I related my parent’s experiences to Smith’s essay. She notes that picking cotton was something that she never discussed when she says “[it] was something I wanted to forget, not extrapolate lessons from (37).” Initially, she felt that those particular memories were painful and she didn’t learn anything from the experiences. Later, she realizes that picking cotton benefitted her. She notes, “Unearthing memories of picking cotton and extrapolating lessons from the experience constitute two highlights of my graduate studies because the journey of discovery has led me to a deeper appreciation and understanding of past experiences and present perspectives (46).” She believes that although picking cotton represented a negative time in her life, she gained a sense of strength. This strength led her to understand the value of being a strong, Black woman. A majority of her essay discusses this class that she took entitled, “Black Women’s Literacy.”In this class, she felt comfortable in expanding her knowledge of the empowerment of Black Women’s literacy. She noted that in order to heighten Black women and their literacy, they must feel a sense of comfort and respect from their professors or teachers. Smith felt that her professor, “respected and validated knowledge acquired beyond the walls of the academy (38).” Because she felt respected from her professor, she enjoyed the class and learned more knowledge about uplifting Black women.
As her essay progresses, she relates literacy to her experiences picking cotton. She notes that these experiences led her to possess a good education. Smith says, “..because slave women were exploited, they developed greater independence and self-reliance than their nonslave counterparts (41).”She relates picking cotton to exploitation, thus she reveals her personal strengths. Smith talks about the values that she learned from her childhood. The money that she earned picking cotton was used to buy school supplies and clothing. She discussed how she would save this money and put it in a bank. She learned to appreciate the value of hard work and dedication. My parents’ experiences parallel to Smith. Because they learned to appreciate working hard, I also value hard work and dedication. I have a very strong work ethic and I am very appreciative. I believe that literacy can be strongly related to experiences that are not connected to education.

-Lauren Tripplett

When Does Superwoman Get Her Paycheck?

Reel Women: Black Women and Literacy in Feature Films
Joanne Kilgour Dowdy
_________________________
When will Hollywood release a movie that praises a successful black woman’s journey?

Why are black women depicted as illiterate in each of these movies? Is this the image we have in all films?

Will we ever recover from the crippling stereotype that we need to latch on to others to receive insufficient gratification?

Joanne Kilgour Dowdy does a phenomenal job at outlining the Black Woman’s image in the film industry from 1985-2001. She uses her own literacy and opinions of the film industry to instill techniques of critical analysis into her graduate students in their “Black Women and Literacy” course. She encourages her students to employ critical observation instead of slipping into the norm of naïve consumption. I enjoyed her. She opens her students’ eyes to the ways symbols shape the world’s view of all black women.

Even though all nine movies were centered around the rise of black women, they all shared the issue of illiteracy that plagues our society. In “WIT” Dowdy showed the struggle that black women face in the science and medical fields. Sue was a nurse that had to admit her “stupidity” when a patient said a word that she was not familiar with. “Sophorific” (very sleepy) was the word that the patient mentioned when asking about the side effects of her medication. The incident may have seemed small in the scene but this was a moment that set the black woman back two steps. Will black women ever be viewed as intelligent enough to practice medicine? As an aspiring physician I am striving everyday to put another crack in the imaginary glass ceiling that hovers over the heads of black women. We are intelligent enough! We can be nurses, but we need to strive to be doctors! I take this negative scene as a call to action. I do not agree with the nurse calling herself stupid because medicine is a field based on research. If I am ever put into a situation where the patient needs information that I cannot recall, I would gladly research it.

In another film analyzed, Music from the Heart, I found that the woman depicted was “book literate” but her lack of political influence foiled her attempt to innovate the music curriculum at her school. Principal Bassett worked hard to try to get a famous violin player to teach at her school. Budget constrains did not stop her, she put together several fundraisers help pay for her goal. Her story was very popular in the media, but unfortunately the Caucasian violin player was acknowledged as the hero. This was another tragic example of the way Black women are used and ignored in society. I felt as if she deserved acknowledgement for her efforts, but she got the short end of the stick.

When will we finally receive our due praise?

What is Hollywood’s roll in the continued degradation of our image?

How would the world change if Black women were depicted as the brilliant movers and shakers that they truly are?

-Danielle Winfrey

"She was workin like foreal..."

‘She was workin like foreal’: critical literacy and discourse practices of African American females in the age of hip hop written by Elaine Richardson focuses on a study based on racial, gender, and other social identities and expereinces encountered by four African American females. In correlation with these experiences, the author primarily calls attention to the portrayals of black folk via pop culture and mass media. One of the sentiments two interviewees expressed particularly caught my attention. The first girl stated that a lot of lyics in songs feautured in the hip hop community are degrading to women. In reference to tip drill, she stated that the artist was essentially saying that he and all of his friends were “down” for “running a train” on this particular girl. The second interviewee responds: “But that’s not degrading if the girls is wit it. It’s some girls who wit dat. I don’t think its degrading. It’s girls who is like that and they down for the git down, just how the boys is” (Richardson 799). I feel as though this remark attempts to justify the behavior on both parties’ parts. I dont agree with these sentiments because I feel as though who is to say that these girl are “down wit it?” Who is to say that these girls are not taking part in the action because they have to? And so what if the girls are “down wit it?” Does that make it right? I feel as though the male who takes part in this is in no way, shape, or form uplifting her. On the contrary, I feel as though he is not only degrading her, but he is disrespecting her. I have heard people say before, that these men in videos are not only disrespecting that particular featured girl in the video, but he is disrespecting the black race in general. This sentiment, however, I do not agree with. I believe that one singular artist cannot be responsible for acting as a personal representative for his entire race in that artists are their own people and their own individuals. In essence, I do not believe that it is fair to blaim the negative portrayal of black folk on these hip hop artists.

The Strength of the Black Woman

In the essay, Going Against the Grain, there is a strong emphasis on the empowerment of the Black woman. Black women have improved as a result of the negative images and stereotypes that we were faced with during slavery. Last semester, I read Angela Davis’s essay entitled, “Reflections on the Black Woman’s Role in the Community of Slaves.” Davis’s ideas were cited in Going Against the Grain. These ideas reinforced the images of Black women as it relates to our history and future. Davis discussed our roles as slaves and emphasized the value of being a Black woman. In the slave community, she notes that the Black woman had a strong influence over her family and the slave master’s family. Although she represented strength and power, she was often exploited and degraded. Davis discussed that female slaves had both male and female roles. Black women were “females” when they were being raped or forced to have more children, and they had "male" mentality when they endured intense struggles. In Davis’s essay, she also notes that because female slaves had “male roles” as the leader of their family, they were not treated as real women like their Caucasian counterparts. As a result, we were dehumanized and the image of the Black woman was tarred.
In effect, Black women were very valuable in slave society, but their value was overlooked. They represented strength, power and intelligence. These attributes were commonly ignored by slave masters and people of power. I strongly believe that these images ultimately helped us become empowered; starting in slavery. During slavery, Black women had a strong desire to become literate, but did not have this opportunity. Going Against the Grain truly emphasized the importance of literacy in the Black community and notes how it started during slavery. Over time, Black women became more aware of education and the importance of being intelligent. We fought the negative images associated with being Black and female. Davis suggested, “they were indeed beaten down, but they were not broken, and they actually managed to accumulate strengths and to re-create themselves under the lash, such that they emerged from slavery more whole than anyone could have expected (4).” Through these dark images, Black women learned to persevere and battle through racism during slavery and today. We continue to improve ourselves through literacy and education.

-Lauren Tripplett

Let Us Encourage and Uplift

For my blog on Going Against the Grain, I would like to focus on parts of the writing that show how past generations of African American women have become a literary backbone for future generations of Black females as well as the entire race. These past generations of women realized that they would have to strive in literacy in order to thrive in the United States. They recognized that in order for them to survive and be successful in the US, they would have to practice their literary skills. They also recognized that through achieving literacy and proper education they could make a difference in the African American community. “The quest for literacy was a symbolic manifestation of their desire for agency and autonomy…. In this quest they also accepted personal responsibility for securing their own rights and perceived their opportunities to learn to be an obligation to use the benefits of those opportunities for good and righteous work in solving an array of problems, not only for themselves but for the race as a whole(113).” As I read this part from Going Against the Grain I reflected on my literacy narrative and thought of the strong, black, literate females in my life who encouraged me to achieve literacy. My grandmothers, aunts, and my mother all took part in my learning how to read, write and comprehend the English language. As you continue reading Going Against the Grain think of the Black, literate women who have uplifted you and encouraged you to achieve literary skills and talents, and think of how you can pass that same encouragement to future generations of Black females.

Kirah Brace

FIRE!!! Going Against the Grain in FLAMES!

Powerful
Ambitious
Thirsty
Passionate
Diligent

These are all words that perfectly describe the Black Woman in her rawest form. These are simple words that personify her and give way to her strong mind. Powerful, ambitious, and thirsty for knowledge, the Black woman has effectively began to rise and melt the chains of ignorance and illiteracy that have kept her mind in slave quarters long after Emancipation.

As African American Women we have a testimony. We have overcome! We have successfully made it through the flames of racism, sexism and class-bound ideologies. Like grains of sand, scorched by these flames of oppression, we have matured into sharp pieces of glass, able to cut at the very ropes that continuously attempt to lynch our people. We are alive! We are human! We made it! “The quest for literacy was a symbolic manifestation of our desire for agency and autonomy.” Though our quest is not completely fulfilled, we are closer than ever before.

We have truly gone against the grain in our quest for literacy. In the face of opposition our foremothers took strides to ensure that we would be at this very place today- a place of security, knowing and wanting. “They were the storytellers” that lit up little faces on the plantation, issuing dreams and promises of the women that we are today. It is amazing to think that one day-not too long ago- some little girl dreamed of the freedom and power that we have today. Our history of struggling and persevering through the toils of slavery have molded us into ready-minded soldiers with our souls “fired with a holy zeal for freedom’s cause.”

“O, ye daughters of Africa, awake! Awake! Arise! No longer sleep nor slumber, but distinguish yourselves. Show forth to the world that ye are endowed with noble and exalted faculties… And where is the youth who has written upon his manly brow a thirst of knowledge; whose ambitious mind soars above trifles, and longs for the time to come, when he shall redress the wrongs of his father and plead the cause of his brethren?... Their souls would become fired with a holy zeal for freedom’s cause… Able advocates would arise in our defence. Knowledge would begin to flow, and the chains of slavery and ignorance would melt like wax before the flames” -Maria W. Stewart

Danielle Winfrey

Going Against the Grain: The Acquisition and Use of Literacy

African American history particularly that of black women is effectively illustrated in Going against the Grain: The Acquisition and Use of Literacy. As I was reading this text, I recalled the sentiments my peers expressed in regards to the advantages of living the life of a black woman on the first day of class. Royster relates that despite the two hundred years of oppression and dehumanization African American women endured, they came out with a sense of self worth and self reliance. I have read several articles that have equally illustrated the treacherous institution of slavery since I have been at Spelman; however, I thoroughly enjoyed this text. Although, Going against the Grain relays that the black race was raped, beaten and dehumanized, Royster too emphasizes that even in the face of oppression we, as black women, acted “with authority and power as intellectual beings” (114). I feel as though too often in the black community, we are told that we have been wronged and we have the right to be bitter. The acquisition of literacy was by no means an easy road and by titling this chapter “Going Against the Grain”, Royster relays to me that it is imperative that we continue to do so. Despite the fact that we were used and abused throughout the institution of slavery and viewed as inferior to all others long after, our acquired literacy was one of the primary skills in which we formed our distinction. We, as African American women, have beaten all odds--we are no longer on the plantation and we are no longer being held down. As we so diligently went against the grain before, it is imperative that we do not stop now. Here at Spelman, we have been given ample opportunity to utilize our literacy and become even more competent than the women before us therefore it is imperative that we continue to go against the grain as we refuse to succumb to the notion of victimization.

--Taylor Carter