Black Girlhood by Nicole Dennis Benn
It has been an interesting time to be editing this issue of Kweli. Now, more than ever, reading has become my sanctuary in this harsh face of fear during the COVID pandemic. Some days when the prospects of this “new normal” seem grim, I would make my way to the window in my study with a cup of tea and some music to read stories that somehow reminded me of what it was like to open a book and see myself on the page for the very first time. Time passed backward, though in reality, it pushed me forward on a sea of purpose—forward into a realm where I was now able to curate stories by black women about black girlhood for a journal for writers of color. When I made the call for submission for stories about black girlhood, I did not expect the vast number of stories I’d receive. All the stories were competitive, but I could choose only six. I was particularly drawn to these pieces for several reasons. In these stories we see our vulnerabilities and complexities as black girls navigating a world that has already made up its mind about us. I looked for authentic, fresh voices that captured our hearts and souls and memories of a moment in time or of the coming of age process.
Sitting in my study in Brooklyn, I experienced the transport that once allowed the little black Jamaican girl that was me to dream, to imagine. Absorbed in the brilliant works, lost in each sentence and metaphor describing a black girl’s joy, sorrow, pain, remorse, or wonderment, I quickly forgot about the crisis outside and my own fears. The pleasure of reading these stories was the right antidote. I read the experiences of six other girls whose lives were changed by something big—from one girl’s journey to Michigan to live with her grandfather after her father dies, to another girl’s devastation when she realizes that puberty has alienated her from her friends, to another girl reckoning with her own privilege and the inequalities she sees in her changing Brooklyn neighborhood, to one girl’s loss of innocence when she finds out her mother’s dark secret.
These were all memorable stories about girls whose lives I inhabited during those hours of reading, becoming them in another time and another place, all while remembering myself at that stage. There is consideration of what it means to be a black girl in a world that not only silences and dehumanizes, but sexualizes our girls. This issue presents an opportunity to commune with each other, to step inside the interior worlds of black girls, to hear our own voices echoed back to us. What a roar.
I hope you will love these works as much as I do. And I hope they will comfort and move you during this time.
With love,
Nicole Dennis-Benn
Brooklyn, NY
April 30, 2020
CONTENT
Fiction
Hey American! by Radhiyah Ayobami
Work by DéLana R.A. Dameron
Secrets in the Mangoes by Vanessa Croft
What the Fireflies Knew by Kai Harris
Boiling Water by Arriel Vinson
Nonfiction
The Granada by Nicole Shawan Junior
This guest edited issue was made possible with funding from the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA).
