{"id":98,"date":"2024-02-23T14:40:15","date_gmt":"2024-02-23T19:40:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/?page_id=98"},"modified":"2024-06-14T12:25:54","modified_gmt":"2024-06-14T17:25:54","slug":"black-arts-activism-baltimore","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/black-arts-activism-baltimore\/","title":{"rendered":"Black Arts Activism & Baltimore"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Maryland, and Baltimore in particular, has a rich history of small presses and Black poet-activists, some of whom are represented here. Chicory<\/em> drew inspiration from the Black Arts Movement in promoting the work of Baltimore\u2019s African American poets and artists. The November 1969 issue<\/a> proclaimed that part of Chicory<\/em>\u2019s purpose was to “reflect the music of language in the inner city,\u201d thereby giving voice to people not often represented in more traditional publications. Sam Cornish and Melvin E. Brown were perhaps the most famous Chicory <\/em>editors. Cornish served as the first from 1966-1970 and he was later Boston\u2019s first Poet Laureate, while Brown was Chicory<\/em>\u2019s longest-serving editor (1971-1980).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Left: Sam Cornish, People Beneath the Window<\/em>. Sacco Publishers, 1965. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Right: Melvin E. Brown, In the First Place, Poems<\/em>. [1st ed.]. Liberation House Press, 1974.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Cornish and Brown both published their first poetry collections with independent political print shops in Baltimore: Cornish\u2019s People Beneath the Window <\/em>was released by Sacco Publishers, an imprint of Baltimore\u2019s Communist New Era Bookstore, and Brown\u2019s In the First Place<\/em> was published by Liberation House Press, which was created by Baltimore civil rights activist Walter Hall Lively.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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E. Sharon Gomillion, Forty Acres and a Mule<\/em>. Illustrated by Casey Czarnik, Diana Press, 1973.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Also featured here is E. Sharon Gomillion\u2019s poetry chapbook Forty Acres and a Mule<\/em>, which addressed the “experience of being [B]lack and a woman in today’s world.” This book was one of the first publications by Diana Press, a radical feminist\/lesbian print shop established in Baltimore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Lucille Clifton, \u201cAll of Us Are All of Us.\u201d Broadside Series, No. 81. Broadside Press, 1974.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Lucille Clifton was the Poet Laureate of Maryland from 1979-1985, and lived and worked in Baltimore from the late 1960s through mid-1980s. Her poem \u201cAll of Us Are All of Us\u201d was published by the famed Broadside Press during this time, and lists the names of Black people, characters, and sites of resistance in an incantation of solidarity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Maryland, and Baltimore in particular, has a rich history of small presses and Black poet-activists, some of whom are represented here. Chicory drew inspiration from the Black Arts Movement in promoting the work of Baltimore\u2019s African American poets and artists. The November 1969 issue proclaimed that part of Chicory\u2019s purpose was to “reflect the music […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-exhibition.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-98","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/98"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/98\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":175,"href":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/98\/revisions\/175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhibitions.lib.udel.edu\/poetry-as-activism-in-conversation-with-chicory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}