More Than Craft and Criteria: The Necessity of Ars Spirituality in (Black Women’s) Poetic Inquiry and Research Poetry

Abstract

The author introduces ars spirituality as a reflexive practice in poetic inquiry. She examines Faulkner’s ars poetica and ars criteria and contends their focus on the craft, aesthetics, and evaluation of research poetry do not account for the ways in which spirituality influences Black women’s research poetry and poetic inquiry. The author argues Black women’s poetry—whether crafted from/for personal experiences, historical research, or transcripts—is born of the spirit and conceptualizes ars spirituality using the works of Audre Lorde and Cynthia Dillard. Three guiding principles of ars spirituality are discussed and an ars spirituality example is provided.

Keywords

poetic inquiry research poetry Audre Lorde Cynthia Dillard

In “Concern With Craft: Using Ars Poetica as Criteria for Reading Research Poetry,” Faulkner (2007) wrote, “I am tired of reading and listening to lousy poetry that masquerades as research and vice versa” (p. 220). The “lousy poetry” Faulkner referenced is research poetry or poetry written by researchers who use the participants’ words to narrate experiences and reveal epiphanies in poetic style. Research poetry is considered a category of poetic inquiry, an arts-based research (ABR) form that “synthesize(s) experiences in a direct and affective way” (Prendergast, 2009, p. xxii). Research poetry is but one name for poetry included under the ABR and poetic inquiry umbrella. Prendergast (2009) listed 40 terms used to describe poetic inquiry. She highlighted Tedlock’s (1983) “narrative poetry” as the earliest term and included Prendergast’s (2007) “hybrid poem,” Davis’s (2007) “autoethnographic verse,” and Faulkner’s (2007) “research poem,” to name a few. Faulkner (2007) also listed several terms, including “poetic transcription” (Glesne, 1997; Madison, 1991; Richardson, 2002), “autoethnographic poetry” (Furman, 2003), “narratives of the self” (Denzin, 1997), and others. Faulkner argued with the many labels, styles, and uses of poetry in qualitative and ABR and poetic inquiry, a critical issue is the evaluation of research poetry. She maintained there must be some way to determine “what constitutes good (research) poetry?” (p. 220) and highlighted Afflicted Girls: Poems (Cooley, 2004) as an exemplar of good research poetry for the author’s attention to craft, aesthetics, and detailed research. Cooley’s “poems are good because aesthetic considerations dominate, yet they simultaneously present and interpret some solid historical research” (p. 221). Thus, Faulkner noted that good research poetry should be aesthetically pleasing and grounded in rigorous (historical) research.

Although not explicitly written, it is likely that Faulkner’s (2007) question about good research poetry prompted the exploration of other questions: What are the standards of quality? How are the standards of quality determined? How does the research community determine whether research poetry has met a standard of quality? To answer these questions, Faulkner (2007, 2016) presented ars poetica and introduced ars criteria as evaluative measures of research poetry. Ars poetica (the art of poetry) focuses attention on the craft and aesthetics of research poetry. Ars criteria (the art of criteria) emphasizes the rigor and vigor in the identification and application of evaluative criteria in qualitative research poetry and poetic inquiry. The pairing of Faulkner’s work on ars poetica and ars criteria emphasizes the importance of prioritizing craft and aesthetics within flexible boundaries as a boxing-in of poetry and poetic inquiry would hinder the development of the craft. However, should there be no boundaries, the result could be more “lousy poetry that masquerades as research and vice versa” (Faulkner, 2007, p. 220). Therefore, while Faulkner is careful to describe the limitations of “evaluating” poetry, she also reiterates that researchers who incorporate research poetry and/or engage in poetic inquiry should study the craft, be aware of the traditions, understand the techniques, and be reflexive in how they understand poetry. Addressing these areas will encourage researcher poets to be more attentive the art and craft of poetry—the ars poetica and ars criteria.

While Faulkner (2007) applied ars poetica to research poetry, her use of the concept is an application, not an introduction. In literature, ars poetica describes a genre of poetry (or prose) dating back to the first century BC. Roman poet Quintus Horatius Flaccus, known as Horace (15 BC), penned the “Epistle to the Pisos” as practical advice to young and aspiring poets. In the epistle, he highlighted the principles of poetry as a craft and advised poets to be sincere, be attentive to their audiences, read widely, and seek and accept critical feedback. The epistle later was described as Ars Poetica by Marcus Fabius Quintilianus or Quintilian and has since been known by that name. Alexander Pope’s (1711) “An Essay on Criticism” often is cited as an exemplar of Horatian-style ars poetica. Both Horace and Pope used similar forms (i.e., hexameter verse and heroic couplets) and conversational tones in their practical discussions of guidelines for poets and critics. However, since its inception, ars poetica has evolved from Horace’s treatise also to include a type of poem or prose whereby a “poet describes his or her reasons for practicing their art” (Teicher, 2018, p. 24). Other examples of ars poetica are Archibald MacLeish’s “Ars Poetica” (1926) and Brand’s (2017) “An Ars Poetica from the Blue Clerk.”

In applying ars poetica to research poetry, Faulkner (2007) explained that ars poetica examines elements of “artistic concentration, embodied experience, discovery and/or surprise, conditionality, narrative truth, and transformation” (p. 230). Using these elements, Faulkner developed six specific criteria—artistic concentration, embodied experience, discovery and/or surprise, conditionality, narrative truth, and transformation—to be applied when determining the quality of research poetry.

Artistic Concentration focuses on history, craft, and literary details (e.g., rhyme, titles, figurative language) used in the poetry.

Embodied Experience focuses on the extent to which the reader connects emotionally with the poetry.

Discovery and/or Surprise focuses on whether the reader gains knowledge or a new perspective about a topic or human condition presented in the poetry.

Conditionality is the point of view used to present the story (through poetry).

Narrative Truth is the degree to which the facts presented in the poetry are true, “regardless of whether the events, feelings, emotions, and images ‘actually’ occurred” (p. 230).

Transformation focuses on whether or not the poetry encourages new perspectives, insight, and social change.

These criteria support Faulkner’s (2007) contention that it is important for researcher poets or those engaged in poetic inquiry to be as knowledgeable of the techniques and aesthetics of poetry as they are of research methodology and writing.

Faulkner (2016) extended her discussion on the quality and rigor of poetic inquiry and research poetry in “The Art of Criteria: Ars Criteria as Demonstration of Vigor in Poetic Inquiry.” She encouraged continued dialogue about flexible, rigorous, vigorous, evaluative criteria and presented six found poems to explore qualitative criteria and represent the intersection of poetry and social science. Faulkner used a Diastic poem generator and a methodic approach to create each found poem using a chapter in her book, Poetry as Method (Faulkner, 2009), and a seed phrase aimed at identifying qualitative criteria. Each of the poems provides an answer to the question, “What is qualitative criteria?” (Faulkner, 2016, p. 664). As I read the poems, I was drawn to several phrases—qualitative consciousness, semantic poetica, exploration imagination, poetry statements, poetica imagination, and craft art. These phrases seemingly support Faulkner’s (2016) suggestion that the ars criteria poems presented prioritized craft, aesthetics, and language flexibility. Using both ars poetica and ars criteria as guiding frameworks, I interpret that “good” research poetry is written to emote, to inform, and to transform; and “good” researcher poets pay careful attention to craft, aesthetics, and language as they compose research poems that reflect engaged and rigorous research.

As I engaged with Faulkner’s (2007, 2016) contentions on the evaluative criteria for poetic inquiry and research poetry at the intersection of art and science, I considered the ways that poetry, for me, has been substantially more than craft and more than aesthetics. Since I was a child, writing and reading poetry have been paramount to expressing and processing emotions, understanding experiences, telling stories, and doing healing work. While other forms of writing also have served some of these purposes, I speak, listen, and hear most genuinely through poetry. In fact, poetry has always “felt right” as a natural method of communication and expression. Faulkner (2016) hinted at this phenomenon when she mentioned the poet’s “intuition” and used Thiel’s (2001) statement that “writing cannot be taught” (as cited in Faulkner, 2007, p. 223). I interpret this intuition, right feeling, or innate connection to writing as a channeling of spirituality. I understand being drawn to writing poetry as a form of “spiritual musing” that facilitates the way I embrace memory, community, nature, and interconnectedness (West, 2011) as I explore and make sense of the world, in general, and my experiences as a BlackQueerWoman in/of the South, specifically.

Spirituality was not discussed in Faulkner’s (2007, 2016) ars poetica or ars criteria. While Faulkner did note that ars poetica and ars criteria encourage researcher poets to examine their relationship to poetry in terms of craft (aesthetics) and criteria (process) and to identify their favorite poets and understand their connection to the poets’ work, there is minimal focus on the spirituality or potentially innate feeling associated with writing poetry. Even among the six criteria that undergird ars poetica, only one—embodied experience—addresses feeling. Yet, embodied experience explained by Faulkner (2007) is external to the poet and recognizes whether the poem makes audiences “feel with, rather than about a poem” (p. 230). Because there was no discussion of researcher poets “feeling with” the poems they write or utilizing poetic inquiry because writing poetry “feels right,” I wondered how to explore and articulate a natural or spiritual commitment to poetry that was not explained by either ars poetica or ars criteria. To begin this exploration, I asked two main questions:

What does it mean for poetry to “feel right” in communication, expression, and research?

How does spirituality undergird poetry as a feeling and connection beyond art and science?

There are a considerable number of scholars and writers whose work could be used to address these questions; however, I found the most salient answers to these questions in the writings of Audre Lorde (2007) and Cynthia Dillard (2006, 2012) as their scholarship, experiences, and writing for and about Black women resonated. Specifically, I situate writing (poetry) and poetic inquiry within Lorde’s (2007) contention that “poetry is not a luxury” and Dillard’s (2006) suggestion that we must access our “spiritual imagination” (p. ix) and (re)member all we learned to forget as we engage in teaching, research, and cultural work. Both the work of Lorde and Dillard have been instrumental in shaping the ways I view writing, poetry, and the work of (re)membering and honoring the role of spirituality.

In this article, I present ars spirituality as a reflexive imperative in poetic inquiry and use the work of Audre Lorde (2007) and Cynthia Dillard (2006, 2012) to outline the three central understandings of ars spirituality: writing is a critical necessity; (re)membering or accessing racial/cultural memory is imperative; and spirituality is a conscious relationship. In the sections that follow, I begin with a general discussion of writing as spiritual practice and brief introductions to Lorde and Dillard; I expound each of the central understandings and outline how they were derived from Lorde’s and Dillard’s work; and I include three poetic excerpts from my dissertation and note how the excerpts collectively present ars spirituality as they are aligned with each of the central understandings. Finally, I conclude with a call to researcher poets, and more intently poet researchers, to invoke or explore spirituality as they engage in poetic inquiry.

Writing as a Spiritual Practice

Writing, particularly writing poetry, is fundamentally a spiritual practice. Several scholars have explored writing as a spiritual practice, with spirituality representing lifestyle or explorations of self and/or theological beliefs and understandings. In her description of writing as a spiritual practice, Sneider (2013a) explained that writing is “soul work” where the writer’s vulnerability and prayers unlock the subconscious and/or connection to the mystery of God. Sneider (2013b) also maintained that while the soul work of writing is spiritual and aligned with prayers, the deeper work of writing is self-exploration. She wrote,

I don’t mean writing liturgy or prayers or preaching anything to anyone. I mean using the first and most primary human art form—language—to explore my own deepest questions and express my own most important experiences and imaginings. (para. 1)

Cepero (2008) also mentioned the influence of God as she noted the use of journaling as an exploration of self. Specifically, she explained, “One of the wonders of journaling is that it interprets us to ourselves. Here we find our own lives and discover that even the struggles we face are shot through with the gold of God’s presence” (p. 12). Other scholars explained the spirituality of art by highlighting the role of intention and meditation in writing (Allen, 2005) and using feminist theological frameworks to argue that women’s spiritual writing embodies the physical, sacred, experiential, and political (Groover, 2004).

Discussions of writing as a spiritual practice speak to the association between a nonhuman being—the mystery of God—and one’s sense of self (Allen, 2005; Cepero, 2008; Sneider, 2013a). However, writing as a spiritual practice is not limited to these facets. In invoking spirituality in/of poetry, it is not my intention to characterize spirituality as synonymous with religion, although there might be some overlap. Instead, I use the definition of spirituality proposed by Ryan (2005), who, in her exploration of spirituality as epistemology in literature and film, wrote, “. . . spirituality refers to consciousness, ethos, lifestyle, and discourse . . . as a primary attribute of self, and that defines and determines health and well-being” (p. 23). In arguing for ars spirituality as critical reflection in ABR and poetic inquiry, I view writing (and reading) poetry as a spiritual experience—no matter whether the poetry is “traditional,” song lyrics, or the words of research participants. These contentions suggest that the feeling of poetry (and other types of emotive writing) cannot be taught. The mechanics and method of poetry can be taught and represented by ars poetica and ars criteria. However, there is a profound level of poetry whereby the “stories and poems come in search of you” (Thiel, 2001, as cited in Faulkner, 2007, p. 223). This level is the spirituality—or the feeling right—of poetry, a level that exists beyond the boundaries of art and science. Therefore, if writing is a spiritual practice, viewing poetic inquiry solely within artistic and scientific boundaries does little to underscore the influence of poetic necessity, (re)membering, and spirituality in crafting research poetry. The work of Lorde (2007) and Dillard (2006, 2012) emphasize these aspects and promote writing as a spiritual practice.

Audre Lorde

Lorde (2007) explained that for members of marginalized communities, poetry is more than art and science. It is a necessity. In her 1977 essay, “Poetry is Not a Luxury,” Lorde (2007) argued that for Black women poetry is an innately spiritual gift that substantiates our dreams and provides a language to prompt ideas and implement action. Poetry is a “revelatory distillation of experience” (p. 37) that is deeply connected to our ancestral communities. Lorde (2007) further maintained that although women have been taught to see poetry as distorted by European and non-African modes of living that are wrought with “sterile word play” (p. 37), the necessity of poetry is in embracing our feelings and accessing our hidden sources of power.

The importance of the feelings associated with poetry or understanding poetry as “feeling right” contributes to writing as a spiritual practice. In an interview with Adrienne Rich, Lorde (2007) repeatedly discussed the relationship between poetry and feeling. Lorde (2007) maintained that she always thought in poems and noted that poems were the best method for her to “communicate deep feeling” (p. 87). She explained,

When you asked how I began writing, I told you how poetry functioned specifically for me from the time I was very young. When someone said to me, “How do you feel?” or “What do you think?” or asked another direct question, I would recite a poem, and somewhere in that poem would be the feeling, the vital piece of information. It might be a line. It might be an image. The poem was my response. (Lorde, 2007, p. 82)

This quote and other similarly worded statements from Lorde (2007) revealed that poetry was always a significant part of her life. Poetry was not a craft that she learned; it was a spirit that guided her experiences and her pen.

Cynthia Dillard

Dillard (2002, 2008a, 2008b, 2016a, 2016b) also argued for a move beyond art and science, particularly in the ways we understand and implement education, teaching, and research. Dr. Cynthia Dillard is an openly spiritual African ascendant educator who was enstooled as Nkosua Ohemaa Nana Mansa II at the village of Mpeasem in Ghana, West Africa in 2001. She has kept a journal since she was a sophomore in high school, has made yearly trips to Ghana since 1995, and has worked with the Mpeasem community to open a school. She also has and continues to teach and conduct research in the United States and abroad. As such, her work examines multicultural education, spirituality in teaching and learning, epistemology and research, African ascendant women (endarkened) feminist studies. She writes as a spiritual practice, includes poetry and journal entries in her scholarly publications, and is clear about the impact and influence of writing. Dillard (2008b) explained, “Personal and journal writing has been so central a part of my life for the past two decades that I have come to believe that I really write to live” (p. 85, emphasis in the original). Dillard (as cited in Montgomery, 2016) further commented on the responsibility and impact of writing:

I think about that responsibility of writing. And writing for whom? Who is the audience? Does this matter in its ability to heal? In terms of my scholarly writing, there is a certain kind of healing and joy and affirmation in the process as I put down things that I think are, as Edwidge Dandicat talks about, dangerous texts. Texts that allow others to think dangerously because I’ve written them dangerously. . . . I also think that the journal would be so much more useful than any scholarship I’ve ever done in terms of really sussing out what a life of practice in meditative writing, a life of working through. A life of thoughtful articulation of anger and rage and passion and love. They could be instructive. There is some writing that is helpful in moving one forward but often that is writing that others never see. (pp. 494-495)

That Dillard (as cited in Montgomery, 2016) asks these questions about the responsibility and impact of writing while facilitating her human experience as a spiritual being supports the argument for ars spirituality as she demonstrated that writing is not an act navigated only by mechanics and method. Writing, when done with an awareness of the role of the spirit and as a spiritual practice, is healing work, (re)membering work. Furthermore, because healing and (re)membering are critical in navigating the human experience, writing enacted by ars spirituality also is freedom work.

***

Taken together, Lorde (2007) and Dillard (2006, 2012) address the gaps that I felt as I considered ars poetica and ars criteria as evaluative frameworks. I understand poetry as an emotion that has always guided my writing—and subsequently, my life—even when I have tried to stray from it. I never have not been a poet—in my thinking, speaking, and writing. Poetry always has been a timeless, limitless force deeply embedded in my consciousness. Poetry is spiritual, and because I always have experienced poetry as a spiritual act, I argue that research poets must explore ars spirituality—the art of the spirit or the art of spirituality—as they conduct poetic inquiry and write research poetry. However, in conceptualizing ars spirituality, I reject the notion of spirituality as an evaluative criterion. Faulkner (2007, 2016) maintained that the caveat of ars poetica and ars criteria is that providing criteria by which to evaluate alternative forms of research writing might be viewed as limiting and reiterative of power structures. I agree. I do not present ars spirituality as criterion by which to evaluate research poetry as I take considerable issue with evaluation rooted mostly in attention to mechanistic and methodic practices. I pose ars spirituality not as an evaluative measure but as a reflexive practice. Faulkner (2007) wrote that ars poetica was “more than reflexivity” (p. 221). It is my contention that ars poetica (and ars criteria) are secondary to the reflexivity as exemplified in ars spirituality in ABR and poetic inquiry. Furthermore, I argue that exploring ars spirituality and understanding how or whether one feels connected to poetry matters in creating research poetry that moves beyond sterile word play masquerading as “good poetry.”

I further argue that for women of color, Black women specifically, ars spirituality is a crucial component to writing and other forms of artistic expression. It is not my contention women of other racial and ethnic identities do not apply or embrace spirituality in their work. However, in a comparative examination of 19th and 20th century texts written by African American and Anglo-American women, Bryant (1992) found the articulation of spirituality differed between the two groups. Specifically, she noted,

While Anglo-American women’s writings of spirituality, for example, proceed according to narrowly-focused, solipsistic traditions of self-reliant individualism, African American women’s traditions self-consciously manifest a sense of larger purpose, with the commitment to an individual and cultural wholeness necessitating investments not solely in (w)holistic subjectivity but equally in cultural, communal, survival. African American women writers seem to recognize, in fact, a certain urgency behind such (w)holistic reconnecting within a fuller range of experiential and cultural traditions that may take shape when individuals fully interact within cultural communities—an urgency that Anglo-American women’s writings lack. (Bryant, 1992, pp. 7-8)

Bryant’s (1992) does not suggest that Anglo-American woman’s writing is void of spirituality, but she does note her analysis revealed differences in Anglo-American and African American women’s commitment to culture, community, and survival. As a Black woman writer, attention to these three concepts are a spiritual endeavor.

Also, because I write as a Black woman poet, or a “. . . Poet Who Happens to be Black and a Black Poet Who Happens to be Woman” (Lorde, 1991), I examine spirituality through the identities that have shaped and continue to shape the topics about which I write and the ways I write about such topics. It also is clear that the works of Audre Lorde and Cynthia Dillard focus on the experiences of African ascendant¹ women. Furthermore, Lorde, Dillard, and a host of other Black women scholars—bell hooks, Alice Walker, Nikki Giovanni, Maya Angelou, Toni Cade Bambara, Ntozake Shange, to name a few—are influential to me as a Black woman teacher, researcher, and writer, and while the work of Lorde (2007) and Dillard (2006, 2012) are the main sources I use to initiate discussions of ars spirituality as a reflexive practice in ABR and poetic inquiry, the vast body of work by a community of Black women scholars serves as the foundation.

Ars Spirituality: Writing, Memory, and Spirit

As I read the work of Audre Lorde (2007) and Cynthia Dillard (2006, 2012) and explored ways to articulate ars spirituality, there were three main sentiments that resonated:

Writing is a critical necessity, particularly for those who have been forced to be or have chosen to be silent about their pain, oppression, and marginalization;

Accessing racial/cultural memory and engaging in the process of (re)membering are radical acts that facilitate much-needed awakening and healing; and

Spirituality is a conscious relationship with the mind, body, and spirit, for both the individual and community.

I outline these areas as the tenets of ars spirituality in ABR and poetic inquiry, and, in the following paragraphs, connect the work of Lorde (2007) and Dillard (2006, 2012), and link both to the necessity of writing, the importance of (re)membering, and the consciousness of spirituality.

Writing is a Critical Necessity

Lorde (2007) and Dillard (2006, 2012) maintained that writing is a necessity as it prompts Black women to reflect and examine our lives, which influences how and for whom we live. Lorde (2007) maintained poetry is a specific necessity because poems are sources of power woven into Black women’s ancestral lineage. She explained that the “Black mother within each of us” (p. 38) is a poet. It is through her, the Black mother poet, that Black women embrace what “feels right” and enact their freedom. Furthermore, writing (and reading) poetry helps Black women access and gain knowledge, shape dreams, and implement action. As such, poetry is a necessity, not a luxury.

For women, then, poetry is not a luxury. It is a vital necessity of our existence. It forms the quality of light within which we predicate our hopes and dreams toward survival and change, first made into language, then into idea, then into more tangible action. Poetry is the way we help give name to the nameless so it can be thought. (Lorde, 2007, p. 37)

Lorde (2007) reiterated the importance of feeling and presented poetry as a language of revolutionary action and freedom. If poetry is considered in this way—as a feeling deeply embedded into one’s ancient history and as a revolutionary act—both in the language used and action prompted, in its spiritual sense, writing poetry is an obligatory practice for those wanting to heal, be well, and connect to their communities.

Both Lorde (2007) and Dillard (2006, 2012) considered writing as a fundamental life practice and used and promoted poetry and other forms of exploratory writing to explore, heal, revolutionize, and act. One example of using writing in the aforementioned ways was provided by Dillard (2006) in her use of three life notes to center Black women participants in narrative research. The life notes are written in various rhetorical styles and focus on the women’s experiences with teaching, researching, and leading. Dillard (2006) utilized the life notes and other information (i.e., research data, African, African American, and feminist literature) to articulate six assumptions of an endarkened feminist epistemology. Using literature and narrative data, particularly narrative data that are rhetorically diverse and exploratory in nature, to outline an epistemological framework that, when enacted, increases awareness of power relations, provides guidance regarding “the “validity” of the work of African American women” (p. 18), and challenges unitary ways of knowing, doing, and being in a field where Black women were never meant to survive (or thrive) demonstrates why writing is a necessity. Black women write to live.

(Re)membering or Accessing Racial/Cultural Memory

In addition to understanding writing as a critical healing practice, one who writes as a necessity also must consider the value of memory and (re)membering. Dillard (2012) maintained memory and (re)membering are imperative to connecting to one’s authentic self as colonization and racialization disrupted the cultural histories and experiences of African ascendants and other people of color. Dillard explained that “we have been collectively seduced into forgetting who we are as African ascendant women” and if we are to heal, “we must learn to remember the things that we’ve learned to forget” (p. 1). Lorde (2007) echoed this sentiment and noted that Black women have been taught to view the world through a eurocentric lens but should access our “ancient and hidden” (p. 36) places. It is in these deep places where creativity, power, emotion, and feeling reside:

Within these deep places, each one of us holds an incredible reserve of creativity and power, of unexamined and unrecorded emotion and feeling. The woman’s place of power within each of us is neither white nor surface; it is dark, it is ancient, and it is deep. (Lorde, 2007, pp. 36-37)

Both Lorde’s (2007) “deep places” and Dillard’s (2012) “cultural memories” reflect a connection to or a claiming of one’s homeland, language, and identity, and accessing deep places and cultural memories “influence our ways of knowing (epistemology) and ways of being (culture)” (Dillard, 2012, p. 26).

Dillard’s (2012) praisesong poem, “Part II: A memory in time: Praisesong for the Queen Mother,” is one such example of describing through poetry the experience of accessing deep places and cultural memories. The poem, in which she honored Paule Marshall’s (1983) Praisesong for the Widow and described her experience being enstooled as Nkosua Ohemaa Nana Mansa II, is a praisesong—the traditional poetry of Africa used to celebrate movement, transition, adversarial triumph, bravery and courage (Dillard, 2012; Muleka, 2014). Praisesong poems also are indicators of deep cultural connections often embedded in memory. Dillard (2012) (re)membered both through the enstoolment experience and through writing the praisesong about the experiences. She accessed the deep places of her cultural memory, focused on collective identity, and, in doing so, (re)membered the African woman she had been taught to forget. Accordingly, (re)membering is the infusion of body and consciousness—spirituality. It is an act of resistance that challenges dominant ideologies and the seduction to forget. Merging writing as a necessity with the power of (re)membering is to write—or create—dangerously (Danticat, 2011).

Spirituality Is a Conscious Relationship

Key to the argument for ars spirituality is centering and understanding the influence of the spirit and spirituality in writing. Lorde (2007) discussed the “true spirit” as hidden within, and Dillard (2006) outlined the importance of “spiritual strivings.” Drawing from DuBois’s contention that African ascendants in the United States are in a constant ebb and flow of finding balance between “African and American souls” (p. x), Dillard (2006) suggested employing spirituality is a consciousness raising experience, especially for those who have been denied access to their his/herstories. She also problematized the academy’s push to minimize or separate oneself from embracing spirituality in exchange for intellectualism. Dillard (2006) wrote, “And in my quests for higher education, I came to understand that belief in something that is as invisible and unprovable as ‘the spirit’ could have very dangerous consequences, especially to an academic career” (p. 40). Dillard (2006) understood that spirituality, as experienced, embodied, and expressed by a Black woman, was not valued or accepted in the White, male, Western academy. However, in acknowledging and centering spirituality, Dillard (2006) noted an academic life is transformed by serving humanity and becoming more fully human; healing the mind, body, and spirit through creativity; and pursuing political change, peace, and justice.

A number of authors have explored Black women’s writing and spirituality as influenced by and as a product of African spirituality, cosmos, and religion (e.g., Carter, 2009; Ryan, 2005; Weir-Soley, 2009; West, 2011). A detailed discussion tracing the history of the relationships among Black women’s writing and spirituality is beyond the scope of this article. However, the legacy of Black women’s exploration and honoring of spirituality in their writing existed pre-Middle Passage and is deeply grounded in African cosmology (West, 2011). Phillis Wheatley’s (1773) Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral is often cited as the “birth of a tradition of black writers who would transform an Anglo Christian discourse of black denigration into a language of self-affirmation” in western society (West, 2011, p. 27). West (2011) suggested Wheatley’s life and poetry represented the spiritual struggle many enslaved and freed Africans experienced as they re-imagined the world at the intersection of Anglo Christianity and African spirituality. While some interpret Wheatley’s work as surrendering to “white supremacist discourse,” West (2011) argued Wheatley retained her Africanity, even as she fought to “salvage the self” in an antagonistic, anti-Black western environment (p. 30). Centuries later, Black women writers continue to fight the same fight, in a similar environment.

What can be garnered from the analysis of West (2011) and other scholars is Black women’s spirituality is creative, emotional, innate, and political. It shows up and out in the ways Black women research, create, and write. Black women’s spirituality is always present as a personal identity and is the foundation of political movements as it is the nexus of advocacy and activism. In addition, the spiritual infusion or centeredness in Black women’s writing is a tradition where Black women are recognized as “carriers of the culture” and “purveyors of spiritual tradition” (West, 2011, p. 11). This integrative nature of Black women’s spirituality is a site of resistance against the intersection of raced and gendered oppression. It is the site where Black women write “to expose and explore the point where racism and sexism meet [. . . and] to help understand the full effects of being black and female in a culture that is both racist and sexist” (Cleage, 1993, p. 7). In the academy, the integration is a rejection of the notion that spirituality and intellectualism should not and cannot equally and effectively inform Black women’s research and writing. Writing as a spiritual practice is transformational. As such, the discussion of the spirit and spirituality is essential to conceptualizing ars spirituality in ABR and poetic inquiry.

An Ars Spirituality Reflection

In addition to identifying the tenets of ars spirituality—writing as critical necessity, (re)membering as a radical act, and embracing the consciousness of spirituality—in the work of Lorde (2007) and Dillard (2006, 2012), I also retrospectively identified the ways in which these tenets have been influential in my writing. Specifically, I offer excerpts from my unpublished dissertation, To be African or Not to Be: An Autoethnographic Content Analysis of the Work of Dr. Asa Grant Hilliard, III (Nana Baffour Amankwatia, II) (Cutts, 2009), as an example of ars spirituality in practice. As a doctoral candidate, I initially aimed to conduct a life history exploration of Dr. Asa Hilliard, or Baba Asa, as an African educator, historian, and psychologist. In August 2007, during the data collection phase, I traveled to Egypt with Dr. Hilliard and the Association for the Study of Classical African Civilizations. He became ill while on the trip and made his physical transition on August 13, 2007. Dr. Hilliard’s death shocked our unsuspecting group. We wept, meditated, and honored him in a ceremony at the Valley of the Kings. Approximately a week later, I returned to Atlanta, Georgia, with more questions than answers and little energy to start processing the experience or putting into perspective how the experience would impact my dissertation research and life, in general. All I knew was that I had to write.

As I read and became more concrete in the ways in which ars spirituality influence writing, I revisited my dissertation and, to my surprise and affirmation, realized that I—without being immersed in reading Lorde (2007) or Dillard (2006, 2012) and not considering ars spirituality—included statements, vignettes, and poetry in the dissertation that aligned directly with the proposed tenets of ars spirituality (i.e., writing as a critical necessity, accessing racial and cultural memories, and spirituality is a conscious relationship). A lengthy discussion of the representations of ars spirituality in the dissertation is beyond the scope of this article. In lieu of a lengthy discussion, I present excerpts representative of each tenet and provide brief explanations of the excerpts.

Excerpts 1a and 1b: Writing as a Critical Necessity

1a. . . . I am constantly using my writing to peel away layers, reveal self, and understand the masks. So Chapter 3 could be summed up with one sentence: “My method is to write” (Richardson, 2000, emphasis added). Yet, I know one sentence is not sufficient coverage for a chapter on methodology. The academy has trained me well. I believe that writing encompasses the essence of this work and pushes me to continue. For me, writing is, in some aspects, a method to the madness. In particular to this study, writing is the method to interpret the sadness and move beyond the hurt to comprehend how this process and Dr. Hilliard’s works have helped me and countless others. (p. 81)

1b. I have been a poet for as long as I can remember. I do not recall the title or specifics of my first poem, but I do remember that in the fourth grade a classmate asked me to help him write a poem to give to a girl he liked. So, I was a poet at nine years old, and poetry has been my release since that time. (p. 108)

These excerpts demonstrate how I enacted writing as a critical necessity as I wrote the dissertation. Excerpt 1a reveals the “life of working through” (Dillard as cited in Montgomery, 2016, p. 495) by using writing to explore my experiences and enact healing. In Excerpt 1b, I indicated I was a poet at age 9 and since that age have used poetry as a “release.” This excerpt is reminiscent of Lorde’s (2007) statement, “poetry functioned . . . for me from the time I was very young” (p. 82). Although not stated in Excerpt 1b, I recall that the classmate who asked me to write a poem did so because he knew I wrote well and could articulate more clearly what he wanted to say. It is possible that both he and I recognized the natural gift and spirit of poetry with which I communicated.

Excerpt 2: Accessing Racial and Cultural Memory

Vignette 4: “I am a T-shirt”

(Adapted from the article by Twinet Parmer, 1994)

In the Window of Africa store, I see a T-shirt

AFRICAN

COLORED

NEGRO

AFRO-AMERICAN

BLACK

AND AFRICAN AMERICAN—

HAVE YOU ARRIVED YET?

My color, my hair, my lips

Clearly define me

Anger, fear, shame, confusion, guilt

SELF-CONFLICT

I know that I am African

Arrived in America

400 years ago

Ancestors

Snatched from West Africa

Panic and fear

Crammed

(into holds of slave ships) Traveled

(across unknown ocean) Emptiness, loneliness

Sense of hopelessness, helplessness

[Bounded by] chains

[Beaten with] whips

LOSS OF IDENTITY

Neither name nor family

To connect me to the African continent

I was and am African

I was identified as “Colored”

[And] inherited a fighting spirit

A faith, a longing to be free

[Still I was only]

Three-fifths of an American

Separate [was not] equal

Being colored branded me

With FEAR

[That I would]

Suffer the fate of Emmet Till

I was and am African

I became “Negro”

In the 1950s and 1960s

Negro was a good name

Equal status with Caucasians?

Spell it . . . with a capital “N”

Negroes were outstanding

Booker T. Washington, educator

George Washing Carver, scientist

Daniel Hale Williams, heart surgeon

Jean Baptist Point DuSable, Chicago settler

[But] Negro was noticeably absent from my textbooks.

Dick and Jane did not play with Negroes.

I was and am African

A proper Negro

Should behave

Be accepted

Be clean

Be mannerly

Be a credit

To the race

Watch my diction

[Be a] “House Nigger”

I was and am African

Being a “proper” Negro did not shield me

[So] I became an “Afro-American”

[This] was short lived

[For I] did not wear [a fro]

Was not a ’60s militant

Nor a civil rights activist

Nor a trouble maker

I did not adequately express my “Blackness”

[But] I was being transformed

Into Black

Proper Negro training taught me that

Black was bad

Blackball

Blackmail

Blacklist

Black Sambo

I was and am African

The color black was

A challenge to fight

Ashamed

Rosa Parks starting trouble

Disappointed by Dr. King, the civil rights activists

[But] I agreed to hear him speak

Soldier Field, Chicago 1966

I was converted!

Right then

[Right] there

I accepted the spirit

“We shall Overcome”

“Lift Every Voice and Sing”

I was and am proud.

I blossomed in my new identity.

Black is beautiful.

So is my big, bushy, nappy, wooly, Afro.

[Yet] I was still a cheerleader

Not a restless, dissatisfied participant

[Until] Dr. King’s assassination truly converted me.

I was and am African

My new label became African American

I straddled two worlds—

The mainstream, the world of color

I am not ashamed of my ethnicity

My militancy transformed to the calmer age of the ’80s and ’90s

Until May 1992—Los Angeles riots

Being African American

Does not release me from the bonds of [culture]

I was and am African

I wear my T-shirt

No longer ashamed, guilty, or confused

I have accepted it

I am this T-shirt

So I wear it proudly

Nothing hides its message

AFRICAN

COLORED

NEGRO

AFRO-AMERICAN

BLACK,

AND AFRICAN AMERICAN

HAVE YOUR ARRIVED?

Yes, I have.

I was, I am, and have always been African .

(pp. 166-169, emphasis in the original)

The poem presented in Excerpt 2 is a research poem that accesses racial and cultural memory by exploring the ethnic identification process. Specifically, I used Parmer’s (1994) article, “I Am a T-shirt” in which she noted that a t-shirt in the window of African store read: “AFRICAN, COLORED, NEGRO, AFRO-AMERICAN, BLACK, AND AFRICAN AMERICAN—HAVE YOU ARRIVED YET?” (p. 440). The words on the t-shirt prompted self-conflict and led to Parmer’s (1994) reflection on experiences she had related to identifying with each of the racial and ethnic categories used. As I was mentored by Dr. Hilliard and conducted research for my dissertation, I also engaged in a process of racial and ethnic identification African American to Black to African ascendant. Therefore, Parmer’s (1994) discussion of identity resonated.

Excerpt 3: Embracing the Consciousness of Spirituality

Vignette 7: The Ancestors at Meidum

Pyramids at Meidum and Dahsure

As far as my eyes could see

Clear blue skies

Sun beaming down

Heavenly

I felt a surge

Through my body

In my heart

My chest, my eyes

Full

“Are they here?”

The tears fell

And I, embarrassed,

Wiped them quickly

Looking around at others

To see

The same response

They were there

The ancestors were there

And we all felt them

Felt their power

Their presence

Their welcoming

I stopped wiping the tears

Let them flow freely

As others clasped their hands

Together

And reveled in the moment

They were there (pp. 184-185)

I wrote the poem in Excerpt 3 immediately after our group visited the pyramids at Meidum and Dahsure. In the dissertation, I likened the emotion felt during the visit to Nettie’s description of in seeing the African coast as written in Alice Walker’s (1982) The Color Purple—“Something struck in me, in my soul, Celie, like a large bell, and I just vibrated” (p. 143)—and to Nikki Giovanni’s (2003) poem, “Africa, I,” in which she wrote, “we landed in accra and the people/clapped and i almost cried wake up/we’re home” (p. 176). Excerpt 3 communicates a similar spiritual experience as presented by Walker (1982) and Giovanni (2003). Furthermore, the excerpt emphasizes the importance of going back or connecting to home in embracing spiritual consciousness. The pyramids at Meidum and Dahsure were the first stops on our tour and my first step to walking back home (Dillard, 2006), and the resulting poem was a channeling of the Black mother poet (Lorde, 2007).

Conclusion

Faulkner’s (2007, 2016) ars poetica and ars criteria focus on the craft, aesthetics, and evaluation of research poetry do not account for the influence of spirituality as an integral consideration in poetic inquiry, particularly for Black women. Black women’s poetry—whether personal or research-based—is born of the spirit. Ars spirituality is presented as an important reflexive practice in poetic inquiry. It is the overarching impetus under which craft, aesthetics, and evaluation are situated. In ars spirituality, a quality criterion of poetic inquiry is whether the writer is connected spiritually to the poetry. In other words, does writing poems just feel right? Has the writer’s reflexive practices included understanding how she feels poems? In what ways or by what experiences do the poems come to her? Does the writer view writing as a critical necessity, engage in racial/cultural (re)membering, and consciously embrace spirituality? Answering these questions begins to invoke one’s spirit in the poetic inquiry and research poetry process.

It is true that “writing is about discipline, persistence, and attention to craft” (Faulkner, 2007, p. 224), and concerns with craft and criteria are necessary. However, for Black women researcher poets, writing poetry also is about the connection to and understanding of the spiritual self and the role of spirituality in writing poetry. Whether or not one explores spiritual connections to poetry determines the difference between one who is a researcher poet and one who is a poet researcher, with the latter being the one who understands and embraces ars spirituality as a reflexive (and necessary) practice. Poetry is not a luxury for poet researchers. Writing (poetry) is a critical imperative, a healing practice, and a will to live. I am a poet researcher. While I have been educated to research and write in ways that are conducive to navigating the academy (i.e., to separate spirituality from intellectualism). I reject research and writing where my spiritual core is not centered and used to guide. Embracing ars spirituality results in research poetry where attention to craft, criterion, and the creative spirit has been paid.

Supplemental Material

Ars_Spirituality_Revision_Letter – Supplemental material for More Than Craft and Criteria: The Necessity of Ars Spirituality in (Black Women’s) Poetic Inquiry and Research Poetry

Supplemental material, Ars_Spirituality_Revision_Letter for More Than Craft and Criteria: The Necessity of Ars Spirituality in (Black Women’s) Poetic Inquiry and Research Poetry by Qiana M. Cutts in Qualitative Inquiry

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biography

Qiana M. Cutts is a poet and an assistant professor in the Department of Counseling, Educational Psychology and Foundations at Mississippi State University. Her research interests are teacher education and preparation, the lived experiences of Black girls and women, and poetic inquiry. She has authored several journal articles and book chapters and the poetry collection, In Somebody Else’s Blood (2019).

References

Allen

P. B.

(2005). Art is a spiritual path: Engaging the sacred through the practice of art and writing. Boston, MA: Shambhala Publications.

Brand

(2017). An ars poetica from the blue clerk. The Black Scholar, 47, 58-77. doi:10.1080/00064246.2017.1264860

Bryant

S. F.

(1992). Speaking into being: Spirituality and community in African American and Anglo-American women’s writing (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global. (Order No. 9312659)

Carter

T. A.

(2009). Powers divine: Spiritual autobiography and Black women’s writing. Lanham, MD: University Press of America.

Cepero

(2008). Journaling as a spiritual practice: Encountering God through attentive writing. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.

Cleage

(1993). Deals with the devil: And other reasons to riot. New York, NY: Ballantine Books.

Cooley

(2004). Afflicted girls: Poems. Baton Rouge, LA: LSU Press.

Cutts

Q. M.

(2009). To be African or not to be: An autoethnographic content analysis of the works of Dr. Asa Grant Hilliard, III (Nana Baffour Amankwatia, II) (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA. Retrieved from https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/eps_diss/41

Danticat

(2011). Create dangerously: The immigrant artist at work. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

10.

Davis

A. M.

(2007). SIP (School Induced Psychosis): Poem for my daughter. Qualitative Inquiry, 13, 919-924.

11.

Denzin

N. K.

(1997). Interpretive ethnography: Ethnographic practices for the 21st century. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

12.

Dillard

C. B.

(2002). Walking ourselves back home: The education of teachers with/in the world. Journal of Teacher Education, 53, 383-392.

13.

Dillard

C. B.

(2006). On spiritual strivings: Transforming an African American woman’s academic life. Albany: State University of New York Press.

14.

Dillard

C. B.

(2008a). Re-membering culture: Bearing witness to the spirit of identity in research. Race Ethnicity and Education, 11, 87-93.

15.

Dillard

C. B.

(2008b). A whole sense of self, a whole sense of the world: The blessings of spirituality in qualitative research and teaching. International Review of Qualitative Research, 1, 81-102.

16.

Dillard

C. B.

(2012). Learning to (re)member the things we’ve learned to forget: Endarkened feminisms, spirituality, and the sacred nature of research and teaching. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

17.

Dillard

C. B.

(2016a). Towards an education that (re)members: Centering identity, race, and spirituality in education. Tikkun, 31, 50-53.

18.

Dillard

C. B.

(2016b). Turning the ships around: A case study of (re)membering as transnational endarkened feminist inquiry and praxis for Black teachers. Educational Studies, 52, 406-423.

19.

Faulkner

(2009). Poetry as method: Reporting research through verse. Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press.

20.

Faulkner

S. L.

(2007). Concern with craft: Using ars poetica as criteria for reading research poetry. Qualitative Inquiry, 13, 218-234.

21.

Faulkner

S. L.

(2016). The art of criteria: Ars criteria as demonstration of vigor in poetic inquiry. Qualitative Inquiry, 2, 662-665.

22.

Furman

(2003). Exploring step-fatherhood through poetry. Journal of Poetry Therapy, 16, 91-96.

23.

Giovanni

(2003). The collected poetry of Nikki Giovanni, 1968-1998. New York, NY: HarperCollins.

24.

Glesne

(1997). That rare feeling: Re-presenting research through poetic transcription. Qualitative Inquiry, 3, 202-222.

25.

Groover

K. K.

(2004). Things of the spirit: Women writers constructing spirituality. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press.

26.

Horace

Q. H. F

. (15 BC). Epistle to the Pisos (ars poetica). Retrieved from https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/69381/ars-poetica

27.

Lorde

(1991). To the poet who happens to be Black and the Black poet who happens to be a woman. Callaloo, 14(1), 39-40. doi:10.2307/2931424

28.

Lorde

(2007). Sister outsider: Essays and speeches. Berkeley, CA: Crossing Press.

29.

MacLeish

(1926). Ars poetica. Retrieved from https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/17168/ars-poetica

30.

Madison

D. S.

(1991). “That was my occupation”: Oral narrative, performance, and black feminist thought. Text and Performance Quarterly, 13, 213-232.

31.

Marshall

(1983). Praisesong for the widow. Toronto, Ontario, Canada: McClelland & Stewart.

32.

Montgomery

(2016). Going back to move us forward: A conversation with Dr. Cynthia Dillard (Nana Mansa II of Mpeasem, Ghana, West Africa). Equity & Excellence in Education, 49, 493-497.

33.

Muleka

(2014). Centering the peripheral: A case for poetry in Africa. Journal of Arts and Humanities, 3(1), 150-160.

34.

Okpalaoka

C. L.

Dillard

C. B.

(2011). Our healing is next to the wound: Endarkened feminisms, spirituality, and wisdom for teaching, learning, and research. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 131, 65-74.

35.

Parmer

(1994). I am a t-shirt. Journal of Counseling & Development, 72, 440-441.

36.

Pope

(1711). An essay on criticism. Retrieved from https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/69379/an-essay-on-criticism

37.

Prendergast

(2007). Thinking narrative (on the Vancouver Iland ferry): A hybrid poem. Qualitative Inquiry, 13, 743-744.

38.

Prendergast

(2009). Introduction: The phenomena of poetry in research. In Prendergast

Leggo

Sameshima

(Eds.), Poetic inquiry: Vibrant voices in the social sciences (pp. xix-xlii). Rotterdam, The Netherlands: Sense Publishers.

39.

Richardson

(2000). Writing: A method of inquiry. In Denzin

N. K.

Lincoln

(Eds.), Collecting and interpreting qualitative materials (2nd ed., pp. 923-948). Los Angeles, CA: Sage.

40.

Richardson

(2002). Poetic representation of interviews. In Gubrium

J. F.

Holstein

J. A.

(Eds.), Handbook of interview research: Context and method (pp. 877-891). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

41.

Ryan

(2005). Spirituality as ideology in Black women’s film and literature. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.

42.

Sneider

(2013a). How the light gets in: Writing as a spiritual practice. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

43.

Sneider

(2013b, June 29). Writing as a spiritual practice [blog post]. HuffPost. Retrieved from https://www.huffingtonpost.com/pat-schneider/writing-as-a-spiritual-practice_b_3180506.html

44.

Tedlock

(1983). The spoken word and the work of interpretation. Philadelphia, PA: University of Philadelphia Press.

45.

Teicher

C. M.

(2018). Ars poetica. American Poetry Review, 47(5), 9-11.

46.

Thiel

(2001). Writing your rhythm: Using nature, culture, form and myth. Ashland, OR: Story Line Press.

47.

Walker

(1982). The color purple. San Diego, CA: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.

48.

Weir-Soley

D. A.

(2009). Eroticism, spirituality, and resistance in Black women’s writings. Gainesville: University Press of Florida.

49.

West

(2011). African spirituality in Black women’s fiction: Threaded visions of memory, community, nature, and being. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.

50.

Wheatley

(1773). Poems on various subjects, religious and moral. London.

Supplementary Material

Please find the following supplemental material available below.

For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.

For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.

0.00 MB

0.03 MB