#BambaraOnTFW #SisterIsAVerbAndANoun Resembling a Revolutionary: My Sister Toni by Malaika Aderso ...Then, I met Toni Cade at our annual Clark College writer’s conference in Atlanta where I enrolled as an undergrad. There she was, afro-ed down and dressed in a black velvet skirt to her knee, sheer black hose, open toe-ed shoes. Her alto speaking voice was charged with authority and levity. As the brothers would say—and as Sonia Sanchez would spell it—she was a badddd ‘people’ in every way. She became my teacher, my sister, and my friend. The first course I took from her was team taught with Dr. Richard Long. What a gift that was to young students to have two generations and genders, two brilliant thinkers and artists sharing what they know and do. Toni taught all over the place—on the campus, in the community—most famously at the Neighborhood Arts Center—and in her home on Simpson Road in Bankhead. Nikky Finney and Shay Youngbloodare among the writers well-known today who also sat at Toni’s feet on Sundays, once a month for more than a half dozen years. We called ourselves the Pamoja Writers Guild, and in addition to coming together around potluck meals to encourage each other in our writing, we produced public readings—e.g., we poets reading and sometimes accompanied by the likes of saxophonist Joe Jennings in gallery space in the West End. Those were the glory days. Toni was a citizen of the world, a champion of human rights. She loved Black people and being Black. She created community, including Pamoja. Toni applied her talents as an organizer and social critic to her work as an artist and mentor of artist. Out-of-town writers, such as ALelia Bundles, and we local folk went to school on Toni in that house on a corner for more than a half dozen years...
Posted on: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 14:00:34 +0000
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