The African-American Experience
New Books that Take an Innovative Approach to History
Joy Fleishhacker, Curriculum Connections -- School Library Journal, 1/6/2009
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Commemorate Black History Month with several new titles that blend historical detail and perspective with an artist's creativity and perception to effectively—and often poignantly—describe events and experiences. Traversing the realms of music, the fine arts, poetry, and storytelling, these new titles touch upon the arts in either their subject matter or their narrative style.
Painting and Remembering with Fabric (Gr 1-5)
Stitchin’ and Pullin’ (Random, 2008) introduces the artisans of Gee’s Bend, Alabama, an isolated rural community known for its spectacular quilts. Patricia C. McKissack’s free-verse poems are narrated by Baby Girl, a child who plays “beneath the quilting frame,” listening and learning as her relatives laugh, sing, and share stories while piecing “together colorful scraps/of familiar cloth/into something/more lovely/than anything they had been before.” When she is old enough to join the circle, Baby Girl chooses fabrics, colors, and stitches that commemorate these tales, fashioning family memories, local history, and her own perspective into an eye-catching—and telling—work of art.
Brightly illustrated with Cozbi A. Cabrera’s rich-toned paintings, this exquisite book stitches together many themes that can be explored in the classroom, including community traditions, family history, pride in creative expression, and passing a craft down through generations.
The Poet Speaks (Gr 1-6)
Two evocative picture book renditions of Langston Hughes’s work provide wonderful opportunities for sharing and interpreting the poems in the classroom. My People (S & S, 2009), Hughes’s spare yet lyrical 33-word paean, has been exuberantly illustrated by Charles R. Smith Jr. with elegantly composed sepia-toned photographs of black Americans (Gr 1-6). E. B. Lewis’s fluid, color-drenched watercolors interpret the verses of The Negro Speaks of Rivers (Hyperion, 2009) with stunning images of individuals through the ages (Gr 3-6).
Sharing Hope through Storytelling (Gr 1-5)
An inspiring folktale relates how “five new Africans” purchased off a slave boat and brought to a Georgia plantation in 1842 gathered on a hillside, magically high-stepped into the air, and soared Way Up and Over Everything (Houghton, 2008) to escape a life of bondage. This “flying story,” first told by Alice McGill’s “great-grandmama’s mama” and passed down through the generations, brims with both intimacy and immediacy. The down-to-earth language and vivid descriptions, beautifully illustrated with Jude Daly’s delicate folk-art paintings, convey the realities of “hard work by the whip” as well the spirit-lifting wonderment of “Africans [who] could fly just like birds.”
A Blues-Infused Look at History (Gr 3-6)
In Boycott Blues: How Rosa Parks Inspired a Nation (HarperCollins, 2008), a guitar-strumming, “dog-tired hound” recounts the 1955 bus boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, singing out a true story that “walks. And walks. And walks./To the blues.” Andrea Davis Pinkney’s text hums with homespun language, musical rhythms, and expressive emotion. Incorporating dazzling colors and swirling lines into dramatic images, Brian Pinkney’s magnificent artwork supports each nuance of the text. An absolutely captivating read-aloud, this book imaginatively and cogently conveys the essence of the Civil Rights Movement.
A Poetic Tribute to a Steadfast Leader (Gr 4 Up)
Ntozake Shange’s lyrical language and Kadir Neslon’s epic-scale paintings introduce the young Coretta Scott (HarperCollins, 2009) and the Civil Rights Movement. The book is filled with affecting verbal and visual images. The poem details how “Coretta and her siblings/walked all/of five miles to/the nearest colored school/in the darkness/with dew dampening/their feet.” A bigger-than-life painting pairs together the profiles of Coretta and Martin Luther King Jr., their eyes closed in prayer. Another image offers a bird's-eye view of the enormous crowd that gathered at the March on Washington “listening to the words/that would inspire a nation.” This riveting read-aloud makes a powerful preamble to Civil Rights studies.
Artfully Revealing an Artist’s Life (Gr 6 Up)
Elizabeth Spires’s I Heard God Talking to Me (Farrar, February, 2009) blends free verse, photography, and sculpture into a mesmerizing portrait of a unique artist. The illiterate son of freed slaves, William Edmondson (1874-1951) was 57 when a voice directed him to begin stonecutting (“I knowed it was God telling me what to do”). Working out of his yard in Nashville, Tennessee, he scavenged scraps of limestone and carved them into tombstones and stylized figures—whimsical animals, mythical personages, and assorted individuals (both
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"Miss Louisa." Philadelphia Museum of Art. |
Spires gives voice to Edmondson’s stone creations in a series of vividly imagined poems, each paired with a photo. Utilizing a delightful variety of tones and narrative styles, the carvings muse about their origins, their perceptions of the world, and the artist who released their hidden-in-stone souls. Several poems sculpted from Edmondson’s own words are paired with riveting archival photographs of the stonecutter, melding verbal and visual images to eloquently convey his earnest inspirations, rock-solid faith, and quiet wisdom. In addition to introducing Edmondson’s life, work, and place in history, this handsome book can launch discussions about artists' inspirations and the creative process. Nurture art appreciation and creative writing by having students pen their own pieces from the perspective of a work of art.
Exploring the Civil Rights Movement through Music (Gr 7 Up)
Adroitly weaving together historical and cultural threads, Mary C. Turck reveals the importance of music in Freedom Song: Young Voices and the Struggle for Civil Rights (Chicago Review, 2008). The cogent text introduces the realities of a segregated nation, the individuals determined to bring change, and watershed events while also examining African-American music through the changing times, from its roots in Africa, to singing in the churches, to the evolution of jazz. Turck clearly illustrates how songs conveyed human rights aspirations, helped people identify with the ideals, and bridged the gap between disparate groups. Illustrated with eye-catching black-and-white photos, the text emphasizes the actions of ordinary individuals, many of them youngsters, demonstrating to today’s students that they have the ability to make a difference. Play the accompanying CD, which features the Chicago Children’s Choir performing the highlighted works, so that your students can experience the music’s power to soothe, inspire, and unify. This compelling combination of written word and spirited song provides a fresh perspective on the Civil Rights Movement.
A Life in Poems (Gr 8 Up)
Carole Boston Weatherford’s fictional verse memoir, Becoming Billie Holiday (Boyds Mills, 2008), is told through moving first-person poems that describe the singer’s troubled life from childhood to the triumphant moment when she debuted her signature song, “Strange Fruit,” at age 25. Borrowing titles from Holiday’s recordings, the accessible narrative poems are filled with jazzy rhythms, raw language, and luminous verbal images. Weatherford doesn’t shy away from the hard truths of her subject’s life (touching upon rape, prostitution, violence, and discrimination) and poignantly delineates the woman’s heart-wrenching yearning for love. However, the poems also convey the high notes, eloquently expressing the Holiday’s unique talent, resiliency, and the sense of self-worth she found in performing. Floyd Cooper’s sepia-toned artwork creates an appropriately nostalgic atmosphere.
Harmonizing biography with artistry, this book can be explored along with Holiday’s recordings, making for an effective multi-sensory experience that will speak (or sing) to teenagers. Visit the “Becoming Billie Holiday” Web site (www.becomingbillieholiday.com) for a “Reading and Discussion Guide,” tips for planning a book club event, photos and trivia about Holiday, and links to other resources.
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