Voices of Our Foremothers

In the reading "Voices of Our Foremothers," Sunny-Marie Birney, uses the technique of breaking the chapter up into parts.  There were four parts within the chapter. Part 1 was labeled, "Laying the Foreground." In this setion Birney talks about her her feeling as though she was a motherless child because she was adopted at the age of two by two people of Euro-American descent and also because she had no recollection of her African American mother. This situation left Birney with a feeling that she was missing a piece of herself. The section goes on to tell how three of her female, African American college profesors made a lasting impression on her life by filling that void she felt had been missing. Part 2 is titled, "The Art of Service," and it explains how educators should approach teaching as a service and view their profession as a sacred calling. Part 3 is called "Carry the Torch." This section names African American female educators that Birney felt paved the way for her and helped to inspire her to enter the field of education. Part 4 is entitled, "Instilling the Vision and Passing the Torch," and it concludes the chapter by Birney talking about her preoent business and her purpose for opening her educational consulting business. She also talks about her decision for home schooling her daughter and the difference between her daughter's home schooled edution as opposed to the education she would obtain while at a public school.

In the Part 1, Birney states," My professors modeled not just exemplary teaching, but also a commitment that uplifted and helped transform myself and, in turn, the African-American community. The fact that they were Black women teaching literature, psychology, and contemporary issues from a Black woman's prespective touched me." When first coming to Spelman College, I had the same reaction because throughout elementary, middle, and high school this was not a normal thing. Throughout my entire educational career I have been accustomed to having White teachers who only gave me the facts from a white prospective. So, when coming to Spelman, like Birney, I admired the fact that the majority of my professors were Black and allowing me to view the same history that I learned in elementary, middle, and high school, but now teaching it to me from a black perspective. 

 Later on in the chapter, Birney explains that educators should view teaching as servants and approach their profession as a sacred calling. I agree with this viewpoint. She explains that an educator should teach in a way "that the students can verbally express themselves and become intrinsically empowered, resulting in a cocreative, reciprocal partnership between student and teacher." I took this as meaning that a teacher should teach so that the information will be useful to the students and also that through their teaching methods, the teachers are able to create an atmosphere that the students fell comfotable to communicate with them in.

Your Perspective

Lillie Smith reflects on her childhood in the cotton field in her acknowledgement of experiences that have shaped her life. Smith nostalgically reflects on the beauty she found in the hard work she had to do as a child. She looks back and realizes what it has taken to shape the way she views the world around her. I find it interesting how she comments on how black women look at education differently, often question the creditials of another black teacher. She also talks about how the black woman is marginailzed compared to the white woman, and how it effects self identity, whereas she found hers without the struggle of outside influence in the south. I found it to be true, we often as black women question the ability of another black person to educate them.

The author discusses the way she researched what influenced people's "knowing" and she mentions how she first hated working in the field, but now that she is older she attributes it to her working qualities now, effecting her perspectives of knowledge. In the cotton field is where she found the beginnings of herself and the initiation of the type of person that she would become. Her humble beginnings have given a deeper apprecition of  her past experiences and perspectives.

Lessons from Down Under

Lessons from Down Under by Bessie House-Soremekun gives readers a taste of childhood in the South right in the middle of the civil rights turmoil. She tells of the restraints put on slaves and how they obtained their own education by depending on literacy and their own traditions. The nonexistence of formal education in the black community led to history being passed down through oral methods rather than writings. The reading discussed different ways African Americans expressed themselves, through storytelling, songs, and even a more rebellious method: protesting and boycotting.  

My Life as a Welfare Brat

In the reading, "My Life as a Welfare Brat," Larstella Irby begins with her experience debating with two women on the Oprah Winfrey Show about welfare. The two women, Linda and DellaMarie, believed that they were entitled to the government assistance that they were getting, but Irby on the other hand felt that government assistance should be viewed as a last resort rather than an alternative lifestyle. She then confessed to them that she also used to be on welfare and explained that the welfare system discourages job finding and brings about a "take-what-you-can-get" attitude.

The points that Irby brought out to the two women on the Oprah Winfrey Show about welfare and any other type of government assistance are probably the views of all tax-paying citizens. Not saying that all recipients of government assistance take advantage of the system, but for a lot of people that is usually the situation. Like the two women, Linda and DellaMarie, many women feel a sense of entitlement, as if they automatically deserve welfare. During her  as a welfare brat, Irby tells about how she would sell her MediCal stickers for extra money. This is one of the main ways people manipulate the system and make it harder for the people who really need government assistance to receive it. This scheme also helps to prove the notion that the welfare system discourages finding jobs because it it easier to sell their benefits to others.

During the show with Oprah, Irby states that it not just the women that use the system. She says that men leave their families because they know that government will pick up the slack where they left off. I believe that if a man is willing to leave his family, he really does not care whether or not they are taken care of. I dont believe that men walk out their families with the mentality of, "They will be okay because the government is going to provide for them."

As her life as a welfare brat dwindled to an end, Irby identifies Pastor Fred Price as the most influential person in her life. His sermons really motivated her change in lifestyle. In one particular sermon about welfare, Price told the congregation, "The government is not your source, God is your source." I think if people had an inspirational and motivational person in their lives, they would want better for themselves. When you are surrounded with people that are in the same situation as you, doing the same things that you are doing, its hard to see life any other way, but when you find someone who is doing something productive, it pushes you to want to change and do the same.

Single-Parent Women and Welfare

In "Black and on Welfare," Sandra Golden tells her experiences with raising a child and needing government assisatance in America. Golden speaks about the judgement and humaliation she suffered based upon the stereotypes of black women and welfare. Sandra Golden, and educated woman, found herself categorized with some people who were"unskilled, unmotivated, uneducated, or undereducated, and responsible for bringing fatherless children into the world" -the stereotypical welfare dependent American (28). Being an educated black female woman, Golden became frustrated with the treatment of people under government assistance. She noted the judgemental attitudes of the workers, the inconsiderate manners of the Welfare's office procedures towards "help", and the assumptions that everyone seeking assistance was the same. Sandra Golden talks about how it is critical to actively HELP those in welfare situations, she says that there should be better steps taken for each individual. Steps to find that persons talents, ablilities, background and intircately place them into society, instead of giving them whats convienently available.

This relates to literacy because  Golden says women in welfare systems and thier literacies are often not recognized. This is important because Sandra Golden also argues that literacy expounds past literature, but there is also home, family, and community literacy as well. As a single parent you already know how to use your family and community as resources to help you and  your family get by. This is a form of understanding how your community works or learning how to be a parent by yourself all contribute to the know-how of that individual. Golden uses these facts to foundate her recommendation that within the welfare system there should be a place for people who are not literate to learn. She says that the ways in which these  people have become communally and family literate are evidences that these people are capable of learning and applying.

Overall, Sandra Golden calls for a reform for the Welfare system, where the welfare system does not just bypass the cases, but investigates how they can better the family, whether that require education or the implementation of  education already recieved. Sandra Golden highlights an important flaw in our government. In order to help people we need not judge them upon arrival. This discourages people to do better because they think everyone is jugemental and degrading and that ulitmately scares them from trying to progess. It is a cycle. It is our job to take these people and help them where they want help in order to truely nurture those struggling in our society. It makes me wonder of how many instances may have occured where an individual wanted my help but felt uncomfortable? I wonder what the outcome of thier situation was? How often does this happen in America daily? How can we change it?

Literacy of Exclusion

In Mandi Chikombero's "Dysfunctional Literacies of Exclusion: An Exploration of the Burdens of Literacy in Tsitsi Dangarembga's Nervous Conditions" she discusses "some of the ways in which the book makes significant contributions to the understanding of Black women's literacy" (148). She tells readers that literacy is a hard thing to define, she tells us to be "black, female, and literate means different things in different context" (148).

Black women have been taught to keep silent. Our struggles have been hidden and kept a secret. Black female authors such as Toni Morrison and Maya Angelou have helped exploit these stories to the public. Two types of literacy are addressed in this chapter, traditional literacy and colonial literacy.

“Traditional literacy refers to all aspects of sociocultural literacies” (151). Oral traditions such as: myths, legends, folktales, songs, and dance are all important parts of traditional literacy. In traditional literacy, women are at the center of reproduction and agricultural production.

Colonial literacy is the act of learning and educating one’s self. It breaks away from traditional literacy and old traditions.

Traditional literacy is how African Americans educated themselves before colonial literacies. Before African Americans were accepted into a learning institute, they learned from their ancestor’s stories and tales.

Women and Literacy in Alice Walker's The Color Purple

This reading starts off talking about how women of the Diaspora have been using the oral culture for generations. "Before Black women were allowed to publish, they kept their stories alive through the act of storytelling" (137). Black women writers recorded their histories through their stories. The reading goes on to talk about how literature from writers such as Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison, Gloria Naylor, and Alice Walker mirrors the realities of being both Black and female. 

The reading also states that there are five basic types of feminism: liberal feminism, radical feminism, prostructural feminism, social feminism, and black feminism. Liberal feminists focus on the rights of individual women and work to transform traditional beliefs about femininity and masculinity and emphasize women's rights to create their own identity. Radical feminists argue that the roots of women's oppression lie in the biological differences between men and women. Prostructural feminists examine the ways language patterns produce notions of gender. Social feminists believe that race, social class, and gender oppression are interrelated consequences of a patriarchal, capitalist system. Black feminism, or womanism, defines African-American women's struggles as issues of race, social class, and gender and work to give voice to the experiences of Black women. (138)

In the middle of the reading, five major epistemological categories from which women view reality and themselves and draw conclusions about truth, knowledge, and authority were drawn from a case study of 135 women. The passage went on to show how Celie, from The Color Purple, transitioned through all five categories to find self-worth and joy. 

In the beginning of The Color Purple, Celie begins in the category of the silent woman. Silence is a position in which women experience themselves as voiceless and mindless (138). It represents a denial of self and a strong dependence on external authority. Women of silent knowledge do not view themselves as learners. After Celie progresses through the stage of being silent, she begins to rely on what people say and think. She looks for others to validate her self-worth. The women who rely on received knowledge quiet their own voices to listen to what others have to say. These women are confident in their ability to gather knowledge from others. Celie then becomes a subjective woman. Shug pushes Celie into a place loving herself. When Celie realizes her potential, she no longer looks to others for affirmation because she has recognized the authority with herself. Celie then moves into the scheme of reason. These types of women try to take charge of their lives in a planned manner. During this stage, Celie began questioning God on why her life had been filled with so much turmoil even though she had always been a good person. In the last stage, women desire to improve the quality of life not only for themselves, but also for others. In this scheme, Celie ultimately learns to survive alone and finally possesses the secret of joy. Alice Walker asserts that knowing one's place within a larger schema enables women to maximize their power, uncover their hidden talents, and discover the God inside. That, perhaps, is the greatest level of literacy---knowing that self is an essential part of all (145). 

Literate Black Women Peer Counselors

The essay, “Transformation College Literacy of Literate Black Women Peer Counselors,” started off with Robin Wisniewski’s definition of a literate black woman. “[Being a literate Black woman means] that I can speak and what I have to say will be hear because I know what I am talking about (69). She then goes on to tell readers of the importance of knowledge and education. Wisniewski planned to successfully create a peer counseling program for students with disabilities, from low-income families, and who were the first from their families to attend college. Her methods were not of the traditional note-taking method.

Robin realized she wanted to do this transformation when she herself began feeling change. “My transformative journey began with the awareness of my own expectation for change in myself” (71). She tells readers that her college literacy arose from knowledge and learning new things. She thought of it as freedom, as “liberation” (71).

She starts her story with two young Black women, Lauryn who came from an all black school, and Vania who came from an all white school. Both Lauryn and Vania thought of the program as less of a program, more of a family environment. As the students were being taught, they were also doing the teaching. In this program everyone learned from everyone. Robin tells us that those two women taught her the best method of liberating black women, and that is knowledge through family orientation. These women made the program more family-like and each student was based off of their personality, not their major or grade point average. Each student was tutored without being judged. Robin Wisniewski just wanted to educate young people. “Knowledge is power, so if you’re literate you can make your own way. It is freedom.”

Going Against the Grain 3

The last ten pages of this reading feature how opportunities for African Americans to gain literacy were available to both pre-Civil War era and post-Civil War era. African Americans helped themselves to literacy in provocative and creative ways, but after the Civil War they were energized to take supreme advantage of what had previously had been denied them. This energy was cycled in three ways: the Sabbath school movement; the missionary school movement; and the common or public school movement (153).

The Sabbath school movement was church-sponsored and community-run schools that provided basic literary instruction. It was run predominately by African Americans themselves and operated in the evenings and on weekends. The african American community itself was largely responsible for laying the fertile foundation for universal literacy in African American communities. The second effort toward literacy was the missionary school movement. During the Civil War, various northern community and church organizations intensified their "home" mission activities...These efforts became a primary mechanism for the advocacy of freedom, justice, and empowerment (153). The third effort, the common/public school movement, emerged in the early 1870s. Southern leaders rose to regain their authority by supporting the education of African Americans through the establishing of public schools. These southern leaders were aided by many industrial philanthropists, who sought to maintain the status qui and push industrial models of education and to discourage liberal arts education (155).

This section of the reading went on to tell how African Americans began starting schools of their own such as Spelman College and Morehouse College. Schools such as these came to because African American parents with the resources to take advantage of other options typically did not favor public schools. They did not want to subject their children to the abuse of white southerners or to a southern-designed system of "Black" education, which they knew to be inferior. They preferred private schools that were still being run by philanthropic support, with a significant percentage of that support coming from the freed men and women themselves (155). Such efforts were repeated across as a network of private schools was established that would ultimately form the core of what today is the collective of historically African American private colleges and universities. This network of public and private institutions continues today, at the beginning of the 21st century, having forged a remarkable historical record for education of African American people (156).

"You Ain't Black If You Ain't Seen It!"

This particular reading highlights the importance of black films and literacy. It demonstrates how black feature films portray black women and the role literacy plays in such. It uses "Passion Fish", "Eve's Bayou", "The Josephine Baker", "Losing Isaiah", "The Color Purple", and a few others to demostrate how the black woman is portrayed as either a struggle or a rise from struggle, and in these instances the films seldomly show the black female as a literate being.

 The women who played these roles were provided with lucrative jobs, however, they were subjected to the demeaning message of the producers. It is important to notice these sort of things because just like in other forms of media, movies are factors in influencing youth and how they portray black experiences. These black films imply that black women struggle in day to day life, and the women that play these roles get paid to diminish the view of the black community. I have never noticed the simplicity in slandering the black literacy in these movies until this particular essay. It has raised awareness as to how often and how easily it is for our own people to bring down a collective community. Music, the way black people act on televison, magazines, and movies can all either benefit or be detrimental to the image of black society and our literacies.

Going Against the Grain 2

This portion of Going Against the Grain emphasized the efforts of people all over in the education of black peoples. The author highlights the philanthropic efforts of Reverend Samuel Thomas, Elias Neau, Dr. Thomas Bray, Thaddeus Kosciuszco, Catherine Williams Ferguson, Ann Marie Becroft, and many more. The writer also traces efforts such as Port Royal Commission and different exerpts from the Emancipation Proclamation and President Abraham Lincoln which helped the black community gain literacy. Even when the slaves were under the bondage of  being "contraband", there were still notable efforts of the black slaves succesfully beginning to learn to read and write.

 

 I think it is important to highlight the amount of work that was put into the acquisition of black education, and to note the pride the black community had in seeking and attaining (what we see as) simple knowledge such as reading and writing. When we go back into the historical context of how we as a people struggled to gain the legal right to learn, it shows how ungrateful today's generations can be about free education. As i was reading my exerpt and noticing all of the trials and tribulations people of all different backgrounds and beliefs went through for the education of African-Americans it kind of irritated me to know that I know people who do not go to school because of laziness and lack of concern. It emphasizes the difference in how my generation thinks differently from past generations. It ultimately reminded me of the lack of "work ethic" my father always talks about. Seeing how past leaders literally fought and struggled for many years to even be able to look at a book and then seeing how my generation gets annoyed when we have to touch a book demonstrates the shift in morals between old and new.

Going Against the Grain

The relationship between African American women and the black community is embraced throughout the first few pages of “Going against the Grain.” Women were the backboned in their families and households. Black women became a crucial part of the community despite the struggle of being recognized they have faced. As African Americans were fighting for equal rights for all races, African American women were fighting for equal rights for all genders. Exploitation for America arose when Thomas Jefferson contradicts his “all men are equal” statement by saying blacks should have rights, but not any that are equal to whites. But the real issue was that "all men are equal" left out women, despite everything women have done for their community.  

Women were used as producers, only being treated with respect if they were needed. These women found a way to prevail against all odds. “Each movement toward literacy was a signal that these women were going very much against the grain of prevailing cultural beliefs, practices, and expectations” (114).  

Reading how women were treated inspired me to be everything that they expected me not to be. I think here at Spelman, or at any all female college, we learn how to be respectable and dignified intellects with a mind of our own while maintaining our “pretty girl rock.” J 

Black Women/Black Literature

Reading "Black Women/Black Literature" was very uplifting as a black literate woman, but it also had its low points throughout the conversation. It felt good to find out that there are other ethnicities in the world that place value in the black language and culture. This reading was a interview between Christina McVay, a white teacher of Pan-African Literature among many other black literacy classes, and Joanne Kilgour Dowdy. The interview mainly centered around how McVay became interested in black literature, how her classes have an effect on her students as well as herself, and how black women and black literature have influence her life both personally and academically. 

After being asked how she came to be involved with black women and literacy in the Pan-African Department, McVay answered by stating "...one of the communities that has the greatest oral dexterity is the Black community. I believe that comes from that long oral tradition from Africa right through slavery and Jim Crow in this country" (89). Reading this statement the first, I regarded it as a complement to black people, but when I reread it, I only saw it as a one-sided comment only complementing the African Americans that endured slavery and the racism of Jim Crow laws. It seemed as though McVay thought that the dexterity of the black community was only passed down from the older generation, and the younger generation only used the language that they learned from their parents or someone from earlier generations. But the reality is that black language is not only comprised of the oral traditions of the older generation, and would not get the attention for its diversity if it were not for contributions made by both the old and new generations. 

When asked how black women and black culture have influenced her life, McVay explained that she appreciates black literature because of the knowledge and morals and values that black women are able to provide throughout their stories. She went on to talk about how black literature helped to shape her belief system, and that it helped her more than going to Sunday school or church. Although I do believe that black literature includes knowledge and morals and values, I had trouble understanding how McVay believed that reading a book written by a black woman could or would equip her with the knowledge and values needed to make it through life. My take on black literature it that most black writers get their philosophies from the Bible or some type of spiritual teaching or experience anyways, so to put black literature above the Bible or any type of spiritual teaching does not make sense. 

The Black Woman's Strength

 Literacy and education go hand in hand. What is important is that these two concepts are often deprived from black women, leaving them to struggle in society. Black women are generalized and categorized as the stereotypical inferior counterparts of society. Even in the historical perspective women of color faced difficulties in education, besides the long period where they were not taught how to read or write, when they had the legal right to society shut them off. Education was seen as a privalege and not needed for a woman because her ultimate goal was to give birth and raise children, those women who persued education were abnormalities for society. This mentality of inferiority in education has silently progressed into today's society. In this century, "25% of the world's population is illiterate. Women comprise 60% of this group, and Black women comprise 44% of all illiterate women," meaning that the majority of the illiterate population is comprised of black women (19). This fact emphasizes the severity of needing to educate our black women. All in all it is crucial that we uplift the stereotypical black women and not only educate her, but provide her with the resources to recieve a quality education. "Perhaps the black womanis tired, perhaps sha has given up, or perhaps neither is true. Hundreds of years after being brought to the United States, the Black women seems to be worse off than ever. There are glimmers of hope that she will overcome, but they are simply glimmers." The hope comes from the fact that "she continues to survive, and she survives the best she can given her circumstance. She continues to struggle because she believes in the promises for social equity" (23).

-How do you think it is that after all of this time it is still a struggle for the Black woman to educate herself?


-Do you believe that it is a societal hinderance or a mental one?


-Do you see illiteracy as a problem now like the essay emphasizes it to be?

To Protect and Serve

When I first began reading "To Protect and Serve" by Elaine Richardson I was only thinking of it as a assignment I needed to read for class, but by the time I finished the first page I was really interested and it became a reading that I wanted to read. The first page began telling about how black women and women in general are put into stereotypical categories by society because of past slavery experiences and the things that women are driven to do in order to "invent themselves against the distorted images of "money hungry heartless bitch," "Jezebel," and good ole "Mammy" among others many of which were created during slavery" (2).
                                                                                                
The first paragraph made me think about the double standard concept from ADW. The double standard is he train of thought that many people in today's society follow consisting of the belief  that a man can be ambitious or goal oriented of determined to make a better life for himself and his family, but if a woman has the same mindset she is "going against the grain" and is somehow trying to fill a man's shoes as if to say that a man is the only person that is supposed to embody those type of qualities. But at the same time, if a woman doesn't hold any of those qualities, and she only wants to be a housewife and her only job is staying at home and taking care of the house and the kids, she is then categorized as lazy or a "goldigger," or someone who doesn't want much out of life. This double standard poses as a lose-lose situation for women no matter what route they choose to take.

The article went on to talk about how "African American females' struggle included devising ways to protect and advance themselves and their families--to assert their humanity--against stereotypes and controlling images" (5). Richardson spoke on how African American females' are seen as nurturers and protectors of life in the social cultural construction of African American literacy. Although I do consider women to be nurturers, I disagree with the belief that they are also supposed to be protectors of life. I believe that it is the man's responsibility to be the protector. The article explains that "slavery hindered the Black man's ability to control his role" (4). I think that this explanation also explains why women are now viewed as the protectors. They feel like it is now their responsibility to take on the role of the woman and the man because men have lost a sense of the roles and duties that they are responsible for in life.

To Be Black, Female and Literate

To be literate in today's society is one thing, to be black, female and literate is another. In today's world literacy is crucial in everyday living. "To Be Black, Female, and Literate" by Leonie C. R. Smith takes readers on a journey throughout a young black girl's childhood and her relationship with education. She tells readers, "my education, whatever shape it took, would be a life long process and would become a tool with which I could do the necessary activist work in my community. (183)


Reading Smith's story opened my eyes to see how literacy affected me as a black woman. Smith tells us about her education throughtout middle school. She tells us about the limits women have in choosing a career. They were limited to being nurses, secretaries, or teachers. The author tells us how education and literacy was important to her and her parents, she also tells us how she was forced out of her regular homeroom into another class who was of lower caliber.


She goes on in telling how her move from Antigua to New York was mindblowing. "I had to learn what it meant to be Black in the United States." Although she was of color, she tells readers how Black American children made fun of the way she spoke and the dark pigment of her skin. Smith felt extreme isolation. The isolation and ridicule helped her gain focus on what was important, her education.


Her adulthood consisted of a number of black organizations that helped her through the racism she faced on a day to day basis. A number of us take literacy and education for granted. A large percentage of Black teens today are highschool drop outs. If we help each other see that education is in fact liberation, we can go on to achieve our goals one after the other, just as Leonie C. R. Smith did. "With my daughter at my side, I remain focused on the task at hand -- getting my PhD." (199)

Black Stories

The craft of stortytelling is an art which can be traced back to the earliest humans. Telling stories can inspire change or unity, it can provide a sense of humor or severity, tell tales of struggle or triumph or protest, or simply provide entertainment. All stories have a purpose, whether that is to inspire or entertain. "Storytelling" by Wanda Franklin and Joanne Dowdy analyzes the nature behind telling stories, emphasizing that "the purpose of a story is to describe how people make sense of the events of their lives, experiences, and actions," and stating that "every story that we tell or hear has a purpose and helps keep our lives knitted together" (122). 

 

While reading this passage I became aware of how many instances I have heard or told a story, I noticed the meanings behind the stories I heard and told, and I realized how often we as humans tell stories and how they impact and change opinions, views, and lives. As a child your parents tell you stories, to put you to sleep, to teach you a lesson, to entertain you, and these stories effectively generate a change in most cases.

-Think of the nursery rhyme "The Three Little Pigs", besides a suspensful story, to a child it teaches them to obey. What other nursery rhymes can you think of  and what lessons do they convey?
-Consider how much time you spend a day telling or hearing stories. How much of your life is spent in storytelling?

I also found interest in the way the authors analyzed how most stories past down (black stories in most cases) placed black women. "Women were ususally given supporting roles that included religion and were usually treated with respect" (129). This is interesting because although women were treated with "respect" in the art of storytelling the actual craft itself could be seen as "male dominance" because in Africa only storytellers were men.

                             

The main focus of  "Storytelling" is about the ways tellling stories impacts our lives as people and as black women, it especially focuses on how it is embedded in black people as a part of our culture and how it is used in life. "To acknowledge that stories and storytellers are ways of keeping African culture alive is a step toward better appreciation of the way that Black women are empowered by the form and content of stories" (134).