Talk:Aunt Jemima

Made me think of a Toni Cade Bambara short story I read back in uni:

Course we did have a set-to about the costume. The designer saw my point — her talents were being squandered copying the pancake box. Playwright saw my my point too, why distort a perfectly fine character just cause the director has mammy fantasies. An African patchwork apron was the only concession I'd make. Got to be firm about shit like that, cause if you ain't some bronze Barbie doll type or the big fro murder-mouth militant sister, you Aunt Jemima. Not this lady. No way. Got to fight hard and all the time with scripts and the people. Cause they'll trap you in a fiction. Breath drained, heart stopped, vibrancy fixed, under arrest. Whole being entrapped, all possibility impaled, locked in some stereotype. And how look trying to call from the box and be heard much less be understood long enough to get out and mean something useful and for real?

Leverage (talk) 14:51, 27 September 2015 (UTC)

Hmm, sounds like a beautiful show, I wish I could have seen it. That reminds me of my favorite poem by Lucille Clifton...

when the birds begin to walk
when the crows in their silk tuxedos
stand in the road and watch
as oncoming traffic swerves to avoid
the valley of dead things
when the geese reject the sky
and sit on the apron of highway 95
one wing pointing north the other south

and what does it mean this morning
when a man runs wild eyed from his car
shirtless and shoeless his palms spread wide
into the jungle of traffic into a world gone awry
the birds beginning to walk
the man almost naked almost cawing
almost lifting straining to fly

~Lucille Clifton

I know why the caged bird sings... just like a one-winged dove. Word to your Mammy. Any other thoughts on the rewrite? ~Formerly Annoying Crap 19:01, 27 September 2015