I will give you a quick pop quiz. We will bee easy as done discussing it but we will be taking it. You will also have the pop quiz for tbone and weasel. Lets start with August Wilson. August wilson was born frederick april 27, 1945. His mothers name was daisy wilson. She was a cleaning lady. Fredericks name was august kittle. Race is always one of the things we are discussing as we look at these plays. His father, Frederick August baker, hes a german is white or european. His mother is a black woman named daisy. She is a cleaning lady. We are talking about a mixed relationship. His mixed identity is a part of what he is working on when he is writing. How he is negotiating africanamerican existence is a part of who and what he is as he is working. It is part of the mission he is undertaking. He is the fourth of the six children. District in the hill of pittsburgh, pennsylvania. Toot of what wilson is going talk about deals with the great migration. I mentioned that in this class before. The great migration is what happened after reconstruction in the south. The social status of black people moved from slavery to freed to the reconstruction era to sharecropping. I dont new name get is accurate for me to say slavery but that is essentially what it becomes. It is just a system where the black people used be the slaves on the plantation, they are in a position where they are renting what used to be the slave cabins. They are renting clothes. They are renting the tools to go work for the same forms on which they were enslaved. They are never able to actually pay for the rental fees for the things they are using. That is one of the motivating factors that caused a number of blacks to move northward at the turn of the century and pursue a better life in the north. I want you to think for a couple minutes about what that does or what that means for black families in the south. More often than not it was the north orould gor the eldest son. The purpose was to make money they could send home. That is always the goal. You will find a number of people in pittsburgh, new york, chicago who have come north looking to make a fortune so they can either make enough money so their family can come to the north or so they can send money home so their people could have a way of living. Understand that one of the things wilson is talking about, one of the things that informs it is the great migration. Pittsburgh, because these rural areas are now dealing with , thereux of black people that getl tensions built afterwards. Neighborhoodsite in which black presences hadnt been before. Port hadnt been a growing black populations that need things to live. Food, shelter. In south caret pittsburgh then it is in South Carolina or georgia. They are like how do we live . How do we feed ourselves . These become the primary concerns. Understand that all of those things are what are informing census when we finally get to it. At the age of 15 he dropped out of high school and joined the 2 four three years. I cant give you the real percentages, i would be making stuff up and lying to you. I believe there is a higher percentage of black people in our current military then other races. What are some of the motivating factors for joining the military . What does it give you . Dont a lot of Army Recruiters go to poor black neighborhoods to recruit and push the education opportunity and using that . They wouldnt do it with rich white kids. The point was she believes recruiting agencies go to poor black neighborhoods and recruit black people in greater numbers than they do in rich white neighborhoods. That is a fact of today. May have been a fact in the 1960s. It is a good job. It provides money. It provides income, steady income. Ou are risking your life that is part of this. Institutionshe that take black men away from their families. Outside of prison and what will become the insane incarceration rate based around things that happened in the 80s we have to look at the systems that moved black men away from their families. The Armed Services were one of them. It was not in a cruel way. They were offered this opportunity. They said here is an opportunity for you to get three meals a day, place to sleep, training, education. You can send a check home to your family. That is one of the opportunities for employment and advancement. Wilson would have been about 18 years old. Hes in the army for three years. After he leaves the army in the toe 1960s, he comes back the pittsburgh area and joins a group of artists who form the center avenue poets. The blackter cofound horizon theater. A black nationalist Theater Company in pittsburgh, pennsylvania. He stays in pittsburgh until 1974 or 1975. He moves westward. Spends a couple years in chicago. To minnesota. 78 hes going to concentrate on playwriting in minnesota. He joins a theater and the artistic director is lou bellamy. It is a blackowned, black oriented, black centered Theater Company in minnesota. Town inhe name of the minnesota flying out of my head . Is trying to say fargo, minnesota. Minneapolis, that would be the name of the giant town that i cannot think of. The theater in minneapolis, minnesota. He is working with lou bellamy. August wilson gets to a point in his life where what he is writing about is the lives of black people. I want you guys to think for a couple of minutes about why that has happened. Why is it significant and in what way is it significant that he is writing about the lives of black people . We talked in this class about the shift between white artists writing black voices. What does it mean . What does their voice sound like . Is it authentic . What is the characters purpose . Black characters were appearing in white movies. I will jump just a bit to talk about the Popular Culture that is influencing the way August Wilson is thinking about plays and writing and the presentation of black people. I want to talk for a second thet Popular Culture of 1980s. In the 1980s, what are the things informing im talking about the 1980s because August Wilson will ultimately talk about we will talk about the census. Lets talk about the way he was looking at the world. Of 1986, whatng are the popular images influencing what he is seeing . E. T. , returnclude of the jedi, raiders of the lost ark, Beverly Hills cop, pretty in pink, some kind of wonderful. Most of these movies came out before you all were born. Are you at all familiar with these series of movies . Have you heard of them before . If you think about things like the breakfast club, pretty in pink, i think his name is john hughes. John hughes is making a whole genre. We talk about what ideology means. The unspoken and sometimes less clear structures that influence the way people think about america. The way women should behave, the way men should behave. What it means to be straight, gay, a whole lot of things. No one says it outright. It is unspoken underlying structures that inform the way we think about race and identity , class, and gender. Like prettymovies in pink and some kind of wonderful, there is the movie with john cusack holding up the boombox. I cant remember what it is. As thee all of these biggest movies coming out in the 80s. The primary concern is technically the beginnings of rom com. Women, white men falling in love, those are what a lot of those stories are about. Overcoming rejection, obstacles, most of our movies in the 80s are dealing with white folks falling in love. Think for a couple seconds about how we, people of color, appear in those films. We are more often than not marginal. We are someone else in that story. Finally make it to August Wilson, the things motivating August Wilson are his desire to move black people from the margins to the center. Us . What is true about what matters to us . What is happening in our lives . , whate are on the margins not part ofay is the main story. Whereomes this caricature we are saying the funny lines. Prior to this we have George Jefferson who began as a marginal character. Then we have good times. Black people showing up in comedy. Black peoples lives in Popular Culture for a long time was something you laughed at. Not left with, laughed at. We were the joke, we were the comedy. Think about eddie murphy. I dont know if any of you looked at or read his early comedy, think about think about what that is rooted on. It is a different experience than black people appearing in largely white structures. I want you guys to consider how that works. ,n television, you have roseann married with children, vcrs become a thing. Time, musicoint in Television Began with music. Ineo killed the radio star 1986. I was a high school student. Very first song that ever played on mtv was a video killed the radio star. I cant tell you who did that song but i know that was the song. Michael jacksons thriller. Think about Michael Jackson in the 1980s. This is how black people are represented in art. Peoplemes a thought that are doing on purpose. People are really considering lack artists, playwrights, im not saying they are embracing the black identity, they are becoming critical. They are analyzing it in a way that is a response to the films of the 1970s. Rightsonse to the Civil Movement of the 1960s. Athave to look at things each other. We again look at emmett tills mother who realize the value of performance by keeping his casket open. That was an act of performance. She was like this wont happen behind closed doors anymore. Think about private voice versus public voice. What does it mean when we are forced to keep something in private as opposed to when we make it public. Developments in technology between the 1950s and 1980s. The advancements we make in telephone, in recording technologies. They can about the advancements we have made in film and television itself. Sense,y that should make there are videos. If somebody needs you in the Grocery Store parking lot and they start acting funny, whats the first thing that happens . Is the first thing that happens if you are in a public space and you think things will go bad . That is not a rhetorical question. Somebody pulls out a phone and starts recording. We have all of these instances right now of things that used to happen without any evidence. Now there is evidence. Evidence not only from local street cameras but every individual. Everybody in this room has their own own. A way of documenting their existence and that these crazy things happen to us. That is what africanamerican existence becomes for a while. We say to the public, you are treating us in this way. Often times we will go it cannot be that bad. You are exaggerating. Now we get to the point where our phone comes out and we are not exaggerating, this is what is happening. What happens subsequently is this weird justification. I have to understand the context. That was taken out of context. Maybe it wasnt. When we get back to August Wilson in the 1980s, the things informing his artistic vision and his life as a writer include all of those popculture references. He is seeing a large what is informing his television and movies, that is a white peoples world. Who is writing about us . When they write about us, what are they saying . That is what is driving him as a playwright. Briefly, a lotly of this is stuff that i was alive for. There is a different relationship to this. As i was putting it up here, you guys will look at a lot of the stuff im about to say as stuff that existed only in a history book. Here in high school from on. Everything i am talking about are things i have a memory of having happen. Mount saint helens explodes, i cannot begin to tell you what the images of the ash pouring all over those people look like. It was on my television for days. Images of people covered in ash. It is what informed us. 10, president jimmy carter signed legislation establishing the boston africanamerican National Historic site. It is the Oldest Black Church in america. That was on the news. January 20, 1981, the inauguration of ronald reagan. This matters. Profet an economics ssor. Reaganomics is something you can look up and see how it affected the world. Well talk about this later, it talks about the tax cut. Thatnt from a 70 tax rate get dropped to 37 or 35 . Over the course of five years, 750ose as a country, billion dollars. On this bill that was signed by ronald reagan. 1981, someone tried to kill ronald reagan. Everybody knew about it. It showed up on the news for days. The first launch from the Space Shuttle in cape canaveral. Cutsry 29, reagans tax cost america 750 billion over the next five years. 1981, Sandra Day Oconnor becomes the first female justice of the supreme court. These are big stories we couldnt not see. Or wereories impacted in the awareness of August Wilson. These are the things he is thinking about. Are thinking about what the themes are in fences, and as we move from the deeply personal to the public, i want you to think about the way the public is becoming aware. S growingc awareness of the world, nation, national identity. 19 82, the senate businga bill eliminating. Busing stops in 1982. Was racism fixed in 1982 . No, i dont think it was. Was initially built as a blacks andgrate whites. It had to do with equality. What do you know of that from history . We talked about this a couple classes ago. Young woman who had to go to school in mississippi and the 5000 National Guard people who went to mississippi so she could go to school. 1954, 1955. All of these things are related to each other. To gopeople being allowed to largely white institutions. We in this room have to think specifically about what this means for us. Looking at the racial demographics of tulane, we have to consider what that means to us. We are a part of this history. September 20, 1984, the cosby show premieres. The first times we have the representation of a married to actor black female lawyer. They have five kids who are all successful and professional. Way are living life in a that is not abject p overty, not a joke, not constant pain. The things that concern the cosby family, we have to consider their primary concerns. Vanessa is looking for a boyfriend. T became layered what black people are was something new because of the cosby show. Raised 70geller Million Dollars for relief in ethiopia. Does this with a giant televised concert. 1986, for the first time martin s holiday is recognized for the first time. 1986, the challenger Space Shuttle explodes killing seven astronauts. It is one of those things i am 50 years all now. I can remember where i was when this happened. I was in high school. This was my senior year of high school. How old were you guys . Whatave a memory of happened to the world on september 11, 2001 . Do you guys are member that . You have images of the towers falling . Things thatveral have happened in our country and in the world that we as people have images fed to us on television. One of those for me was the explosion of the challenger Space Shuttle. Momentsed it launch and later, we watched it explode. We watched seven astronauts disintegrate. We watched it as a nation. 2001, we watched airplanes hit the twin towers in new york. We watched in real time the towers fall on fire. We watched it happen. I find it interesting that you guys were too young to have a memory of where you were. May 25, 19 86, i included this one, hands across america. Referencehould have a as of last week. What is your reference for hands across america . Peeles us. Things that have global impact, that is one of them. This is the world that is in forming August Wilson as he is writing the play fences. One more thing to talk about then we will discuss fences. The pittsburgh cycle is a series of 10 plays that August Wilson undertook to move black identity, concerns, lives, from the margins to the center. He did it on purpose. His goal, it wasnt that he was he may or may not have held animosity for White America. White people are not the central concern of his plays. Identity,s, black black existence. Ofgets moved to the center his plays and playwriting. The pittsburgh cycle begins in it is different. Jitney. Ered with the first play he wrote was called jitney. Second plate he wrote was it was set in 1927 but premiered in 1984. It is an amazing play. It deals with five black and one black female singer. Do you guys know who big mama thorton is . You should look up big mama thorton. If you are hanging out listening, you might want to listen to big mama thorton. And go go back ofrainey is a different type singer. Nina simone is crossing over into mainstream. Rainey, we have a contemporary reference as well. Have you ever seen miss doreen play in the quarter . You need to go at some point in time and listen to miss doreen. She plays clarinet. You will begin to have an understanding of who ma rainey was. She is amazing. We have joe turners come and gone. This premiered in 1984 and was set in 1911. 1957t the census set in but premiered in 1987. Inwill talk about fences, just a second. He also wrote several other plays. Park. Clybourne lets talk about fences. August wilson is influenced ending conversation with more artists than just playwrights. All of these things inform him. He stops concerning himself with white representation. He specifically begins to seek out black representation. One of the artists that he specifically looks to let me show you. I am proudeak it and of that. [laughter] question, does it have to deal with sexuality . Prof. Proctor yes, it does have to deal with sexuality. For a while, one of the other characters in the play is an opportunist. A young woman who is an opportunist. Who has built a relationship with ma. The play intimates that it is of a sexual nature. Yes, dealing with that is part of it. Clip] when i first began to do , i had no idea i would develop such simple processes with my work. These are natural things that i saw. [indiscernible] these are the elements. Prof. Proctor bring the africanamerican experience or bring the universal to the afri