Angelou, Maya: 1928 - 2014
May Angelou on Black Americans
- "I doubt if I, or any Black from the diaspora, could really return to Africa. We wore skeletons of old despair like necklaces, heralding our arrival (in Africa), and we were branded with cynicism. In America we danced, laughed, procreated; we became lawyers, judges, legislators, teachers, doctors, and preachers, but as always , under our glorious costumes we carried the badge of a barbarous history sewn to our dark skin. It had often been said that Black people were childish, but in America we had matured without ever experiencing the true abandon of adolescence. Those actions which appeared to be childish most often were exhibitions of bravado, not unlike humming a jazz tune while walking into a gathering of the Ku Klux Klan.
From Maya Angelou: "All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes", New York (Vintage Books), 1991, p 76