Maya Angelou: Abolish n-Word

By T. Kevin WalkerSpecial to the NNPA from The Chronicle WINSTON SALEM, N.C. (NNPA) – Her way with words has garnered her fame and prestige around the globe. But Maya Angelou says that there are some words that not even she, or anyone else, can make sound graceful and dignified. The renowned poet and longtime city resident told more than 1,000 Winston-Salem State University freshmen recently that the ”n-word” is toxic, regardless of how it is used or who uses it. ”It is poison,” she said, her words resonating through a packed K.R. Williams Auditorium. For the second straight year, Angelou was the keynote speaker for WSSU’s New Student Convocation. She walked onto the stage to a standing ovation and began her remarks singing a song in several different languages. The song foreshadowed her later statements on the importance of words and language. Angelou, known for such books as ”I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” and ”Phenomenal Woman” and other poems has long expressed her disdain for the ”n-word” and its popularity in hip-hop. ”It was created to denigrate an entire people,” she said. ”Don’t use the word. I beg you.” Angelou went even further, telling the students to make themselves scarce around people who use the ”n-word” or other racial slurs. ”I will not stay in a room where racial pejoratives are used,” she said. There are words that Angelou encouraged the students to use and memorize, mainly those of noted poets Paul Lawrence Dunbar, James Weldon Johnson and Countee Cullen. She threw in bits of her poetry and works of others during her remarks and encouraged the students to visit the library the next day to become acquainted with great Black poets and writers. Through their words, Angelou said, the students will see that the Black experience is vast and far-reaching. ”You need to know that somebody was there before you,” she said. Angelou is most often linked with Wake Forest University, where she holds the lifetime appointment of Reynolds professor of American Studies. Despite the fact she has been employed at Wake for more than two decades, Angelou says she loves WSSU and Wake Forest equally. ”This is my school. Wake Forest is my school,” she said during a news conference before her convocation remarks. WSSU has claimed Angelou as well. In 1998, the school, in collaboration with the poet, started the Maya Angelou Institute for Improvement of Child and Family Education. Angelou brought famous friends Quincy Jones and Ashford & Simpson to the school for a fund-raiser for the institute. Young people hold a special place in Angelou’s heart. It is the reason, she said, that she enjoys speaking at schools and student convocations. She told the freshmen that not enough adults tell young people how talented and special they are, so Angelou reminded them of that several times. Looking over the sea of students – who, upon school orders, dressed in their Sunday best for the convocation -Angelou said she saw the person who could one day develop a cure for AIDS and the man or woman who could one day devise a way to rid the world of racism. ”She may be in the third row. He may be in the sixth row,” she said. ”Why shouldn’t I think he or she is here at Winston-Salem State University. I believe in you.”