Author gives perspective on Black history

Reading from various works, Ntozake Shange, the lively and entertaining African-American writer, spoke to a large audience at the Annenberg School for Communications yesterday afternoon. Shange began the presentation by blaring Latino music and dancing for her audience as she walked to the front of the lecture hall. She explained why she was visiting the University. "I'm here to make you think," she said."Thinking shouldn't make you happy." The first work she read was a poem she wrote in 1977 about the poverty she found in Haiti after visiting Port-au-Prince. "There are half-naked children sleeping under your feet," she read. "Our children have so little will, they don't even steal." She continued by reading from her new novel Liliane, written to make African Americans aware of their ties to black people throughout the Western Hemisphere. She said black Americans are isolated from black people in the West Indies and Central and South America. "In Miami, you should hear [black Americans] talk of the Haitians as foreigners," she said. "Listen to them call them foreigners." The excerpts she read from Liliane described communication between black people and how it has its own special uniqueness which reflects their historical experience. She said that French, Spanish and English were the languages of the slave masters. Black people have their own forms of communication, she added. "There is no word for us when we are simply alive," she said as she referred to slavery. "[There are] no words but what we say to each other and that nobody can interpret." After reading from Liliane, she asked members of the audience to choose which work she would read next. One student asked Shange to read from a poem on male-female relationships. "Having been referred to as money in the bank more than once, I can assure you it's not comforting," Shange read. "A gift is a ransom for your body, my dear." The explicit piece also touched on subjects such as oral sex and the AIDS virus. The lively, opinionated writer joked with the audience throughout the program -- especially when discussing her critics. She said the poet Cannish Calhoun called her to criticize her writing. "Cannish Calhoun called to tell me [that] my writing was disturbing," she told the audience. Her answer to Calhoun was, "Well Cannish, things happen," she said. Farah Griffin, an assistant English professor, said Shange has an entertaining personality. "She's always performative in a wonderful way," Griffin said. "You have to see her work performed." College sophomore Luke Weinstock said he admired and respected Shange. "She speaks of the human condition. She has a voice," he said. "She's always questioning. She's still radical."