the craft. what it means to be a Black or POC writer.
“I don’t have a craft. I have a love of the people who traveled the ocean to become a new people. I don’t have a craft. I have the embrace and trust of my ancestors. And the language we created.” Nikki Giovanni, Black Writers on Craft, Practice, and Skill, How We Do It
Have you ever thought about what it means to be a Black or POC writer? To you. Personally. Within your practice? I know I have thought about it often. Questioned even if there’s such a thing as being “too Black” in my work. Wondering exactly what it means when someone doesn’t identify with the character when I’m uncertain that’s ever been a prerequisite for my own reading. I’ve thought about the need at times to write to process the discrimination and hatred of being from a marginalized group, attempting to make sense of multiple chain of events over the last few years.
I think many of us come to this identity of being Black or POC and writers in many different ways. Some of us do not want to be defined by our race or ethnicity in our writing at all. Others of us lean into it with literary fairy godmother Toni Morrison at the helm. I think it’s a personal choice. But I’m grounded in the idea that as Black people in this country, it is revolutionary to be a writer. They tried to shut slaves out of reading and writing, a punishable offense. Every single time I pick up a pen, there is a connection to an ancestor who was denied.
Some of us pick up the mantle of those in our families who may never be able to tell their stories. We want the world to know that they mattered too. Recently, I was thinking of grief and how important it is at times to simply be able to tell someone that this other person existed. I find those moments in my storytelling, when I get to keep people like my grandmother Irene or Agnes alive. Loved ones like my Uncle Charlie or my Aunt Tiny. Their stories mattered, and it almost feels like a responsibility as the family scribe, to find the opportunities to tell them even if in the small details of a larger story.
In a different vein, I want to tell stories that aren’t always riddled in trauma. It’s simultaneously important to me to depict Black joy and mundanity. To showcase love, and softness, and vulnerability in my stories. To share a laugh between the characters and my readers. I enjoy that in the art I consume as well. Those moments where you get to take a breath and celebrate the amplitude of Blackness.
I have a personal affinity for writing Black stories. I think it shapes how I show up in the literary world. I think it’s a flag that says, we belong here too. I want to incorporate the language and the culture, for people to understand that the whole diaspora is rich. It’s important to me to show that Black literature is elegant, thoughtful and worthy, even when it’s being shared in its raw form. Whether it’s urban or the utmost literary work, everyone deserves a voice.
Being a Black woman absolutely shapes how I see the world. I don’t think there is a world where I can separate myself from that. So much of my life has been finding more ways to integrate it. Cutting down on the spaces in which I have to tone it down or curb or squeeze it into corners.
So whether you are Black or POC, I ask you, how does that show up for you if at all in your practice? Could be helpful to spend some time with that notion.
“When you’re anxious or filled with self-doubt, remember: the collective spirit of our people is with you. You are walking a path that all writers have walked. This path is, at times, both crooked and demanding, but always infinitely rewarding.” Jewel Parker Rhodes, Fiction Lessons for Black Authors.
Taking an exercise from the aforementioned book for the week, and you can apply regardless of ethnicity or race.
Talk to an aunt, grandparent, a second cousin about your family’s heritage. Ask to see pictures, mementos, genealogy charts, family Bibles which have significance. What stories are attached to these objects? What do these stories reveal about the [spirit] in your family? What makes these stories dramatic or intriguing?
Write the family tale you found; write the story just as your family tells it.
After writing it, look at the gaps within the story. Where are the spaces where you can totally fill in or imagine parts of what happened?
Revise the family story, filling in the gaps you’ve imagined.
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