LITR 5731: Seminar in American Multicultural Literature

Poetry Presentation, fall 2007

13 September 2007

Poetry:  Amiri Baraka’s “Somebody Blew Up America”

Poetry Reader & Discussion Leader:  Jennifer Rieck

Newspaper Headlines:

• “NJ Governor Demands State Poet Quit Over Poem Critical of Israel”

• “New Jersey Poet Laureate Amiri Baraka Will Not Apologize, Will Not Resign”

• “ Senate Panel Moves to Abolish State Poet Laureate Position”

“I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others, rather than to be false, and to incur my own abhorrence.” --- Frederick Douglass

“You're not to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality.” --- Malcolm X

“Ideology…distorts…reality.” --- Karl Marx

Objective 5:  To study the influence of minority writers and speakers on literature, literacy, and language.

• A:  To discover the power of poetry and fiction to help “others” hear the minority voice and vicariously share the minority experience.
• B:  To assess the status of minority writers in the “canon” of what is read and taught in schools (plus the criteria determining such status). 

Analysis:  Baraka indicts America’s socio-political and military response to the “foreign” terrorist acts of 9/11, while at the same time pointing out our country’s own litany of unpunished domestic and international terrorism, past and present.  He represents the minority voice of all those who have suffered under the oppression and terrorism of America’s unjust tyranny and imperialism that functions to maintain domestic and global domination and power.

My accidental deletion of poem’s epigraph follows:  All thinking people oppose terrorism both domestic and international…But one should not be used to cover the other.

Discussion Questions: 

• Does Baraka’s accusatory tone and bitterness keep “others” from hearing his message, or is it received? Can this poem be used to affect change as Linda Brent had hoped her Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl would do?  
   
• Compare and contrast this poem’s political and social commentary with that of Douglass’s commentary in his Narrative.
   
• Should Baraka’s body of work be included in the “canon” of Literature?  What aspects or properties would lead to inclusion, and what would cause his exclusion? (journalistic reviews, awards, academia)