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Black is a country

Posted by ESC on June 12, 2003

In Reply to: Black is a country posted by ESC on June 12, 2003

: : : : : Trying to get together a list of as many sayings about black people as possible, Such as Black don't Crack, Black is Beautiful.... any additions would be appreciated.

: : : : Once you've had black, you don't look back... well, you *did* ask...

: : : It's a Black thang - A reference to any cultural or social practice, behavior, or attitude unique to or stemming from the African American experience.

: : : Blacker than thou - A signifying expression used to refer to an African American who thinks he/she set the standard for Blackness and disses other African Americans for not acting or thinking "Black enough."

: : : The Blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice - An old proverb resurfacing in hip hop. A variation: The Blacker the college, the sweeter the knowledge.

: : : (All of the above from: Black Talk: Words and Phrases from the Hood to the Amen Corner by Geneva Smitherman (Houghton Mifflin Co., New York, N.Y., 1994.)

: : To be young, gifted and black - "Though it be a thrilling and marvellous thing to be merely young and gifted in such times, it is doubly so, doubly dynamic - to be young, gifted and black." Lorrain Hansberry, American dramatist, 1930-65. (From "Oxford Dictionary of Quotations," Fifth Edition, edited by Elizabeth Knowles (Oxford University Press, Oxford and New York, 2001).

: Black is a country - "In America, black IS a country." Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones), born 1934. ("Famous Black Quotations," edited by Janet Cheatham Bell, Warner Books, N.Y., 1995.)

: Black power - Used by Stokely Carmichael in June 1966 during an organized march through Mississippi. (Safire's New Political Dictionary by William Safire (Random House, New York, 1993).

I am Black and I'm proud - "Say It Loud: I'm Black and I'm Proud," song, 1968, James Brown, singer, born 1934. (Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, by John Barlett and Justin Kaplan, general editor (Little, Brown and Co., Boston, 2002.)

Black is beautiful - Slogan, 1960s, anonymous. (Bartlett's.)

  • Black Lewis The Whitey 06/12/03

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