We Know The Road To

We Cannot Assume That People By Virtue Of The Fact That They Are Black Are Going To Associate Themselves With Progressive Political Struggles. We Need To Divest Ourselves The Kinds Of Strategies That Assume That Black Unity Black Political Unity Is Possible.

We Have Inherited A Fear Of Memories Of Slavery. It Is As If To Remember And Acknowledge Slavery Would Amount To Our Being Consumed By It. As A Matter Of Fact, In The Popular Black Imagination, It Is Easier For Us To Construct Ourselves As Children Of Africa, As The Sons And Daughters Of Kings And Queens, And Thereby Ignore The Middle Passage And Centuries Of Enforced Servitude In The Americas. Although Some Of Us Might Indeed Be The Descendants Of African Royalty, Most Of Us Are Probably Descendants Of Their Subjects, The Daughters And Sons Of African Peasants Or Workers.

Progressive Art Can Assist People To Learn What's At Work In The Society In Which They Live.

I Think That Has To Do With My Awareness That In A Sense We All Have A Certain Measure Of Responsibility To Those Who Have Made It Possible For Us To Take Advantage Of The Opportunities. The Door Is Opened Only So Far. If Some Of Us Can Squeeze Through The Crack Of That Door, Then We Owe It To Those Who Have Made Those Demands That The Door Be Opened To Use The Knowledge Or The Skills That We Acquire Not Only For Ourselves But In The Service Of The Community As Well. This Is Something That I Guess I Decided A Long Time Ago.

As A Black Woman, My Politics And Political Affiliation Are Bound Up With And Flow From Participation In My People's Struggle For Liberation, And With The Fight Of Oppressed People All Over The World Against American Imperialism.