Black Arts Movement Star Carolyn M. Rodgers Dead at 69
The Black Arts Movement and the African-American community both lost one of each group's biggest boosters recently. Carolyn M. Rodgers, a poet, activist and co-founder of one of the most important and largest black-owned publishing companies, died April 2nd, after battling cancer.
Rodgers authored nine books, including "How I got Ovah," and often delved in to issues facing black women.
"Carolyn Rodgers was one of the finest poets to come out of the Black Arts Movement," Haki Madhubuti, a professor, publisher of Third World Press and poet told the Chicago Tribune.
The movement provided a fresh new voice for the African-American community and included artists, such as Amiri Baraka. Rodgers became a voice for black women, writing about relationships, identity and the strong spirit of black women.
"Her work always positions black women, in particular, as strong and not as victims but as survivors," Quraysh Ali Lansana, director of the Gwendolyn Brooks Center for Black Literature and Creative Writing at Chicago State University, where he is also an associate professor in English, told the Tribune.
A Chicago native, Rodgers studied with the Pulitzer Prize-winning Brooks and founded the Organization of Black American Culture. In addition to her poetry, she wrote short stories and criticism.
"She was a militant voice, but also more introspective, especially as it related to the role of the black woman," Useni Eugene Perkins, a friend who teaches playwriting at Chicago State University, told the Tribune.
Rodgers, along with Madhubuti and several others founded Third World Press, an important outlet for African Americans and other repressed voices during a crucial period.
In the poem "Breakthrough," Rodgers penned these lines:
"How do I put my self on paper/The way I want to be or am and be/ Not like any one else in this/Black world but me."
What strikes me about Rodgers is the way she used artistic expression to struggle with the issues of her day. And she tackled these issues during a period when race relations, the role of the female in American society and the ideals of American society in general, were all in full upheaval.
It is a model for young people to follow today. I often think that some young people turn to destructive activities and behaviors, because they have feelings bottled inside that they do not know how to express.
Rodgers struggled with the changing roles of women and black women using a creative outlet. Along the way, she spoke to millions of women struggling with the same issues and opened up doors for future artists.
Check out some more of Rodgers' work here.
via bvblackspin.com