Brown Girl Dreaming

Brown Girl Dreaming

by Jacqueline Woodson

Bibliography

Woodson, J. (2014). Brown girl dreaming. Nancy Paulsen Books.

ISBN 9781524737818

Summary

Brown Girl Dreaming is the free-verse memoir of author Jacqueline Woodson. Born, in Ohio in 1963, it details her young years growing up in South Carolina and Brooklyn, NY. Her story is one of duality. She says, "I am born in Ohio, but the stories of South Carolina runs like a river through my veins" (2). Woodson lives in a tension between her northern and southern self. Her north self talks too fast and wears shoes, walking on cement sidewalks instead of feeling the red dirt between her toes. Her southern self eats from the luscious bounty of her South Carolina grandfather's garden, instead of the shriveled produce from the bodega in Brooklyn. Her southern self catches fireflies in the twilight. There is a also a tension between Woodson's middle class father's side and her poor blue-collar Irby side. The Woodson's trace their lineage of teachers, doctors, and lawyers back to Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings (purportedly). Her Irby grandparents are just a generation separated from slavery. Her grandfather works in a factory, and her grandmother does "daywork": going into white houses to clean their houses and raise their children. Most importantly, she is born into a country that is "caught between Black and White" (1). She is born in the middle of the fight against Jim Crow. Her mother and sisters participate in lunch sit-ins in the segregated restaurants. These dualities shape Woodson as a person and as an author.

Analysis

Woodson's memoir reads like a conversation with a good friend. Her free-verse poetry is luminous with figurative language that settles comfortably around the reader, inviting them in, like the true southerner she is, "The southern way of talking without words... when the heat of summer could melt the mouth" (25). While Woodson's style evokes the feeling of a languid southern afternoon, she is clear about the boundaries she learns within her southerness. She may be sweet, polite, and helpful, but, as a Black girl, she must not use slang, because she is under constant scrutiny. Interestingly, since this is ubiquitous in the South, she must also never say "ma'am" to anybody. For her mother, "The word is too painful a memory... [it is reminiscent] of not-so-long-ago- southern subservient days" (68), another example of her duality.

Her coming-of-age story is relatable. She and her sister are forced to wear ribbons while they are in South Carolina. They hate them. They have to handwash and iron them every week, and other children make fun of them. They "anchored them to their childhood" (121). All of us want to be "one of the big kids." When she starts school, Woodson reflects the wonder and magic of starting school with a caring teacher, "There is nothing more beautiful than P.S. 106. No one more kind than Ms. Feilder, who meets me at the door each morning, smiles down, and says, 'Now that Jacqueline is here, the day can finally begin'" (158). I enjoy her occasional internal rhyming amidst her free verse, "The South in my mouth" (183).

Highlighted Poem

Herzel Street on p. 145 is a great example of both Woodson's use of figurative language and her childhood duality. She moves to Herzel Street, a street in Brooklyn, NY where many of her South Carolina relatives lives.

herzel street

And the people from Greenville

brought people from Spartanburg

and Charleston

and all of them talked

like our grandparents talked

and ate what we ate

so they were red dirt and pine trees

they were fireflies in jelly jars

and lemon-chiffon ice cream cones.

They were laughter on hot city nights

hot milk on cold city mornings,

good food and good times

fancy dancing and soul music.

They were family.

The poem is evocative for the city as well as Woodson. This area of Brooklyn is a place where immigrants come together to make their own, unique home, like Woodson herself internalizing her dualities, becoming her own person (without those pesky hair ribbons!).

Use

Students will create a family tree and choose a relative to share stories about their childhood. The student will write a free-verse poem about that story and add it to their tree.