Books by Dorothy
Rice
Pennies to Dollars
/ The Seventeenth Child
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Mystic Mam-A-Jama—a Poem
By Dorothy Marie Rice eventually i will write a poem
which will be spoken from everyone's lips
as easily as licking a cherry-flavored lollipop
eventually i will write a poem that rumbles
like a freight train across a busy intersection at noon
my poem will bundle the weary soul
like a squirrel's nest in the bough of a maple tree
my humble musing will be ambitious like a
creek meandering
into the james river, soaking sediment in the chesapeake bay
surging into the atlantic ocean and
vibrating in the creamy smooth chambers of a conch shell
birds and beasts, and critters that creep
will synchronize their timepieces for the great presentation of
my poem
but until . . .
my poem will be
the mystic mam-a-jama
metaphor that beckons wayward lovers home
and makes prodigal children prepare feasts
for their own parents . . .
Ó 2005 Dorothy Marie Rice /
January 14, 2005 |
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Dorothy Marie Rice is a literature and
history resource teacher at the Arts and Humanities Center in
Richmond, Virginia. She presents her original poetry in
local venues. She was a winner of the first Furious Flower
Poetry Prize in 1995. She has co-authored two books:
Pennies to Dollars with her cousin Muriel Miller Branch, and
The Seventeenth Child with her mother Lucille Mabel Walthall Payne.
Both books are currently out of print. In addition to
creating poems, she makes paper jewelry and papier-mâché
bowls.
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Weep Not, Child
By
Ngugi wa Thiong'o
This is
a powerful, moving story that details the
effects of the infamous Mau Mau war, the
African nationalist revolt against colonial
oppression in Kenya, on the lives of
ordinary men and women, and on one family in
particular. Two brothers, Njoroge and Kamau,
stand on a rubbish heap and look into their
futures. Njoroge is excited; his family has
decided that he will attend school, while
Kamau will train to be a carpenter. Together
they will serve their country—the
teacher and the craftsman. But this is Kenya
and the times are against them. In the
forests, the Mau Mau is waging war against
the white government, and the two brothers
and their family need to decide where their
loyalties lie. For the practical Kamau the
choice is simple, but for Njoroge the
scholar, the dream of progress through
learning is a hard one to give up.—Penguin
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Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in
America
By Melissa V.
Harris-Perry
According to the
author, this society has historically exerted
considerable pressure on black females to fit into one
of a handful of stereotypes, primarily, the Mammy, the
Matriarch or the Jezebel. The selfless
Mammy’s behavior is marked by a slavish devotion to
white folks’ domestic concerns, often at the expense of
those of her own family’s needs. By contrast, the
relatively-hedonistic Jezebel is a sexually-insatiable
temptress. And the Matriarch is generally thought of as
an emasculating figure who denigrates black men, ala the
characters Sapphire and Aunt Esther on the television
shows Amos and Andy and Sanford and Son, respectively.
Professor Perry
points out how the propagation of these harmful myths
have served the mainstream culture well. For instance,
the Mammy suggests that it is almost second nature for
black females to feel a maternal instinct towards
Caucasian babies.
As for the source
of the Jezebel, black women had no control over their
own bodies during slavery given that they were being
auctioned off and bred to maximize profits. Nonetheless,
it was in the interest of plantation owners to propagate
the lie that sisters were sluts inclined to mate
indiscriminately.
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The White Masters of the
World
From
The World and Africa, 1965
By W. E. B. Du Bois
W. E. B. Du Bois’
Arraignment and Indictment of White Civilization
(Fletcher)
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