Amiri Baraka: The Power to Speak and Act Louder

Poetry is designed for a person to express, reflect, and advocate in order to lead a piece towards open interpretation. A piece can have an intended idea or message however, the audience can perceive it in any way they’d like. Some pieces can be viewed as political, leaving an open discussion for typically difficult topics such as racism, protest movements, laws, etc. What can make poetry political is when a piece proposes a challenge to the audience to think of the injustices of society, the oppression of a culture and be able to connect with the poet to recognize the struggles of the victims and their need for advocacy. Amiri Baraka, also known as Leroi Jones, was a founding member of the Black Arts Movement who addressed racial politics that were difficult to speak of but not new to the ongoing issues of society. Baraka challenged black artists to expose themselves and be honest about the harsh reality they experienced in their society, guide them to not conform to the white identity and innovate a new form of art, language or literature to change the way black artists are perceived as and how it paved the way for black culture today.      

Poets have an unrestricted prose that gives the ability to speak on whatever they’d like, however they’d like. In the book, Amiri Baraka: The Politics and Art of a Black Intellectual, Jerry Watts writes, “Jones’s essay functioned as a call to arms to black playwrights, writers, and scholars of all varieties. Jones implores them to stop hiding behind elusive symbolisms and complicated metaphors, for modernist Western aesthetics have no place in the black American struggle for freedom” (174). Referring to Jones’s essay to The Revolutionary Theatre, Watts discusses how important it was for Jones to speak on racial conflict with a strong approach and bring awareness to a corrupted society. He indicates Amiri Baraka, at this time known as Leroi Jones, the intended goal for his essay to The Revolutionary Theatre was written to intensify racial differences and divisiveness so people weren’t able to turn a blind eye to real world issues. Jones wanted to motivate black artists to explore their individual artistic elements and not conform to the style of poetry that was taking place then. Watts challenges Jones’s idea of reforming the theatre’s views and writes, “Written during a moment of personal transition as Jones withdrew from the Village to Harlem, this “revolutionary” manifesto is entangled in contradictions” (Watts, 172). Watts discusses how Jones’s reference to black people being the victims are not the subject but are the objects of history. This would relate to Jones’s use for the word “victim” in his essay to mean “oppressed” to give a “victim-status orientation” rather than a protest orientation. He also writes how Jones can appear disoriented about his target audience since he wrote to The Revolutionary Theatre as Leroi Jones, before his transition to Amiri Baraka and fully immersed himself in black nationalism. 

Baraka prioritized his work to include sound, rhythm, voice, performance, etc to strengthen the power of his message and create a new form of discourse. In the article titled, Amiri Baraka: A Lifetime of Saying the Unsayable, Naila Keleta-Mae writes “Baraka’s commitment to this artistic philosophy of being “close to the ground” in ways that allowed him to say the unsayable is no more evident than in his brazen performance in 2002 of the most controversial poem of the last decade of his life- “Somebody Blew Up America” (7). Keleta-Mae discusses the determination Baraka had to get people to connect with his most talked about poem, regardless of the backlash he would receive. He had an objective to be different and have the audience view racial differences from a distinct lens. Keleta-Mae describes Baraka’s artistic philosophy by him having no fear of taking the stage confidently, rearranging mics so that his voice can be heard in different ranges, utilizing music when performing and made no precise contact with the audience when reciting his most infamous poem. She indicated that Baraka was able to win the attention of his audience solely by his use of sounds, rhythms, words, tempos, and volumes of his forceful, deep tone of his voice. Using these devices as a part of his artistry alleviated the strength and power of the piece to publicly say the unsayable. She writes that Jones’s artistic approach to using these elements including his line breaks, end-stops, and spacing in his performance transitioned his words into a new style. Because of this, Keleta-Mae mentioned she didn’t feel pressured as if she had to agree with his views or adopt them but rather challenge herself as an independent thinker and how she can individually become “closer to the ground.”  

Baraka’s previous work initiated his full dedication to black nationalism that helped create several projects dedicated to black artists to encourage new forms of poetry, drama, art, and literature from coast to coast to embrace black studies and African-American culture. In the article, Amiri Baraka and the Music of Life, Komozi Woodard writes, “Baraka rose from the ashes of the Newark Rebellion like the Phoenix, transforming himself to not only the Malcom X of literature, but also the leader of a series of Black Power organizations that changed the complexion of national African American politics for nearly a decade” (10). Woodard speaks on the successes of Baraka after being arrested and being put in prison and how it motivated him to make an even bigger impact on black culture. His accomplishments include The Black Arts Renaissance, a committee for a Unified Newark, launched the Congress of Afrikan People with a variety of branches and organized the African Liberation Support Committee. Baraka was the peak of schools and universities to teach black culture studies and “transformed common sense about the hopelessness of black politics” (Woodard, 10). Despite his controversial work, Woodard addresses Baraka’s poetry as being able to spark the need for advocacy, the need for a louder voice, the need for educating black consciousness and cultural regeneration and his pursuit for black artists to find their identity, purpose and direction.  In our course textbook, Poetry in Theory: An Anthology 1900-2000, the text states, “The Black Artist must draw out of his soul the correct image of the world. He must use this image to band his brothers and sisters together in common understanding of the nature of the world (and the nature of America) and the nature of the human soul” (Cook, 389). Baraka expressed the need for unity in the black culture throughout the hardships the culture has and will continue to face. He writes to guide these artists to stay true to their identity in order to discuss the realities of the culture, not just what America thinks they know about it. The urge to speak authentically and wholeheartedly utilizing different elements in their art would enhance the power of the message and transform the nation’s perception of black culture.

The impact of Baraka’s poetry had the nation thinking of his select choice of words, the imagery he designed and the sound he generated to shift the nation’s perspective on black culture and poetry as a genre. As discussed by Ahad Mehrvand, Baraka filled a gap in contemporary poetry. In Mehrvand’s article, A Postcolonial Reading of Amiri Baraka’s 21st Century Political Poem on America, he writes “Educational practices and institutions in a country usually follow mainstream sources of political knowledge about an incident. However, it is the task of the political poet to educate the society to see differently and to come to the truth of a political incident” (8). Mehrvand explains how Baraka’s poem, Somebody Blew up America, constructed the world to understand how pivotal and eye-opening Baraka’s message was. He references how this piece got people to view society through a different set of eyes and created a new outlook for the black culture through his work. Baraka was the political poet that stepped up to represent and advocate for his culture. Through his setbacks and transitioning to a new identity, Mehrvand discusses Baraka's design of another version of literary expression to conquer conventional representations of knowledge and truth. His dominant discourse about the country’s values led to the open discussions of racism, imperialism, capitalism, and colonialism.

Political poetry can relate to protesting, exposing our legal system of unfairness and allow writers to express social concern that can potentially lead to activism. What can make poetry political is when the piece can lead an open discussion for social concerns, be explicit and authentic with racial and cultural experiences and be able to effectively use the power of their words to reach their target audience from a higher perspective. A political piece can be the core of where most political questions can be developed from. As a founding member of the Black Arts Movement, Amiri Baraka influenced black artists today to step out of their comfort zones and explore a new realm of art. He encouraged artists to develop a new form of literature, language, performance and music by implementing sounds in their work and design vivid imagery to encourage black artists nationwide to connect to the culture that is home to them. Baraka designed an honest, raw platform for future generations of black artists to challenge and expose themselves in their work. His intellectual and cultural contributions reinforced black America and America in general to have a fresh set of eyes.