Good Morning POU!
This week we will feature history lessons, past and present, focusing on African Americans in the Appalachian region of the United States.
Long thought of as an area consisting of backwoods mountain folks of European ancestry, there is a deep cultural history that has long been ignored but now is gaining recognition for its contributions in both arts and education. So let’s begin with the term “Affrilachian”.
What are Affrilachians you ask?
Affrilachians are African Americans who are native to and/or reside in the Appalachia region of the United States.
For decades, the voices of African Americans within Appalachia went unacknowledged. Perceptions of the region’s diversity were limited by stereotypes that portrayed Appalachians as mountain dwellers who were primarily white.
In response to a long history of exclusion, African American and Appalachian poet Frank X Walker created the term Affrilachian in 1991 to name African Americans who considered themselves part of Appalachia but who were not accounted for in traditional, albeit stereotypical, understandings of the region. Since then, Walker has published five books of poetry; served as editor of the first journal of Affrilachian Art & Culture (Pluck!); founded the group called Affrilachian Poets; helped create the first video documentary of Affrilachia, Coal Black Voices in 2001; and inspired such advancements as a Journal of Appalachian Studies special issue on race in 2004.
Walker was born Frank Walker, Jr., in the small town of Danville, Kentucky, the second of eleven children. At Danville High School, he played football on the school team, was a member of several clubs, and was twice elected class president.
He was recruited to attend the University of Kentucky in engineering, but changed his major to English. Walker is a charter member of the Mu Theta chapter of Phi Beta Sigma fraternity at the University of Kentucky. He now holds life membership within the organization. It was during his college years that he adopted the middle initial “X”, which was given to him by friends.
A founding member of the Affrilachian Poets, he is the founding editor (2007) and publisher of PLUCK!, the new Journal of Affrilachian Art & Culture. In January 2010, he returned to the University of Kentucky to accept a position as professor in the English Department.In 2013, he was appointed Poet Laureate of Kentucky, the first African-American to hold that position.
Kentucke, “where some of the Bluegrass is black.”