James Weldon Johnson. The Black Bard

As African American poets have always tried to reflect in their writings the typical concerns of their culture in the context of a larger American civilization, they created part of their poetical compositions by recalling the folkloric values of their ancestors. In fact, they conceptualised poetry as a participatory activity, an active mean of expression by creating an aesthetic tradition shaped with communal values, the primacy of musicality and stylish improvisation.

As a matter of fact, critics such as Sterling Brown, who explored the unlimited possibilities of the folk tradition, found out that black songs and tales may well represent the originality and complexity of the black race and its literature whereas, the nineteenth century white culture was still basing their traditional music on feigned stereotypes and bald sentimentalism.…