Bright Skylark Literary Productions
  • Bright Skylark Literary Productions Sitemap
  • Author Statement
    • Blog: Visionary Vibes >
      • Aberjhani - Author Biography
      • Bright Skylark News Notes
      • Blog: Cultural Arts Reviews and Remembrances
      • Blog: Sonic Delight Music Reviews >
        • Summer-Song Rhapsody for Michael Jackson: Editorial with Poem
      • Shifting Points of View and the Massacre in Charleston, South Carolina (USA) >
        • Author-Poet Aberjhani in the News
      • 7 Ways to Help Replace Legislated Fear with Informed Compassion
    • Greeting Flannery O'Connor at the Back Door of My Mind >
      • Tribute to Savannah Author Robert T.S. Mickles Sr.
    • Dreams of the Immortal City Savannah >
      • Podcast Prospects 504
      • More Books by Aberjhani >
        • Readers & Reviewers on the Writings of Aberjhani
        • Checking in at Goodreads
        • Editing Credits
        • ELEMENTAL: The Power of Illuminated Love (Art and Poetry Gift Book)
        • The River of Winged Dreams
        • The Wisdom of W.E.B. Du Bois
        • Songs from the Black Skylark zPed Music Player: A Novel by Aberjhani
        • I Made My Boy Out of Poetry
        • Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry
        • Buy Books by Aberjhani on Amazon
        • 10th Anniversary of Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance
  • AI Literary Chat Salon
  • Carousel of Sustainable Compassion
  • Working Scribe Carousel Number 2
    • Awards & Honors
    • My LinkedIn Portfolio Sampler
    • Pop Icon Michael Jackson in Life & Legend
    • Creative Thinkers International
  • Art and Poster Store
    • Blog: Silk-Featherbrush Art and Style
    • Postered Poetics
    • Your Introduction to Original Silk-Featherbrush Art & Style
  • Choose a Cultural Arts Heritage Project to Support
  • Working Scribe Image Carousel 2
  • About Bright Skylark Literary Productions
    • Bright Skylark Values and Motto
  • Famous Quotes of Note
    • Pinterest Page of Quotations
  • Charter for a More Compassionate World
  • As a Poet Thinketh: Poetry by Aberjhani
    • The Bridge of Silver Wings
    • Rainbow-Song for the Angel of Tao by Aberjhani
    • Ode to the Good Black Boots that Served My Soul So Well (poem by Aberjhani)
    • Angel of Remembrance: Candles for September 11, 2001
    • Rainbow-Song for the Angel of Tao: Verse 1
  • Articles and Essays
    • Abbreviated Minds in the News for Wreaking Havoc Worldwide editorial by Aberjhani
    • Iconic Authors Toni Morrison's and Harper Lee's New Works Likely to Influence Dialogues on Race
    • Red Summer: Text and Meaning in Claude McKay’s poem ‘If We Must Die’” part 1 of special 4-part series by Aberjhani
    • A Writer's Journey to Selma, Alabama
    • Justice Remains Elusive in Case of Newly-freed Louis C. Taylor (Part 1 of 2)
    • Sensualized Transcendence: Editorial and Poem on the Art of Jaanika Talts (Part 1)
    • Realms of Emerging Light (Sensualized Transcendence Editorial and Poem on the Art of Jaanika Talts Part 2)
    • Notes on the 150th Anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation
    • Why Race Mattered in Barack Obama's Re-Election: Editorial and Poem
    • Posted Perspectives on America's 2012 Presidential Election
    • 47 Percenters and Guerrilla Decontextualization: Dreamers and Nightmares
    • Considering Michael Clarke Duncan: Big Black Man Within A Nonsociopoliticohistorical Context (Editorial with Poem)
  • Video Pen & Ink
  • Links and Connections
    • Aberjhani's Guerrilla Decontextualization
  • Contact the Author
  • Working Scribe Image Carousel 2
  • Working Scribe Image Carousel 2
  • Bright Skylark LP Storefront

Literary & Cultural arts Persuasions: 
Reviews & Remembrances by Aberjhani

Exploring the stylistic texts, images, and provocative meanings
of contemporary & classic cultural arts.

Main Page

American Dream Meets Black Reality in Johnson's 'From “N Word” to Mr. Mayor'

5/6/2019

0 Comments

 
Picture
To fully appreciate reading former Savannah mayor Otis S. Johnson's From 'N Word' to Mr. Mayor, Experiencing the American Dream, you might want to note some important clues he shares at the book's beginning. The first is his identification of himself as a "scholar activist." Take that for exactly what it sounds like: he has long been devoted to the cultivation of knowledge within himself and others, as well as to the reversal of heinous social and political injustices.
​
A second shared hint is his struggle over whether to spell out the word "nigger" in this book's title or employ the more politically-accepted abbreviation. Following his publisher's suggestion, he chose the latter but felt the original more "symbolic of my struggle as a black male in American society." With that in mind, the book in general, he states, "documents my struggle to achieve the American Dream while having to confront the vicissitudes of being black in a racist society" (p. 11) 


​A Timeline of Powerful History

PictureFrom 'N Word' to Mr. Mayor, Experiencing the American Dream autobiography by Dr. Otis S. Johnson.
The above words may sound, to some, like little more than sensationalistic jargon employed to grab attention. It would be more accurate to describe them as precise when considering Johnson was born in 1942 and, from the beginning until the present era, his experience of the American dream has unfolded along a timeline of powerful history-shaping events on personal, national, and international levels.

For its precisely-balanced combination of social history and personal memoir, Johnson's book under any title is one of the most valuable written in recent years by an African-American man, and one of the most important for any time by a native of Savannah, Georgia. Being the former dean of Savannah State University's College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences, and current Scholar in Residence and Professor Emeritus that he is, Dr. Johnson's text often reflects the language of his intellectual leanings. That allows him to place his life and his times within an analytical context similar to important works by some of his scholarly heroes, like Harlem Renaissance strategist W.E.B. Du Bois and political scientist Hanes Walton Jr. 
​
Yet, at the same time, he is a very down-to-earth writer who engages readers with stories of his family's Gullah culture heritage, what it meant to lose his father at an early age, learning about racism for the first time, falling in love and getting his heart broken, discovering the world as a young sailor, and confronting the challenges of leadership within a demographically-evolving community. 


​Anti-racism Activism

The city of Savannah and the state of Georgia as Johnson experienced them while growing into maturity during the 1960s were much like America at that time as a whole.  African Americans with many White Americans alongside them were calling for an end to Jim Crow apartheid and battling against the system by staging public sit-ins, conducting protest marches, and targeting racial barriers ripe for breaking.
​
Of his position in this history, Johnson writes, "My life has been full of being in places where I shocked non-blacks with my presence" (p. 88). One such place was on the campus of Armstrong State College (now Atlantic University) where in 1963 he famously became the first African American to enroll in the school. Another was the campus of the University of Georgia, Athens, where he was the first Black from Savannah to attend that institution. At UGA, he walked out of one class after a white professor discussing the U.S. Supreme Court's landmark Brown vs. Board of Education decision proclaimed the only reason African-Americans wanted to integrate schools in Georgia was to marry white women. 
Art Prints

​Most of the kind of anti-racism activism Johnson chronicles is to be expected given the time-frame. In his chronicling, however, he provides important snapshots of black leaders in Savannah, like Wesley Wallace "W.W." Law and Hosea Williams, in political action. But his reportage goes beyond the dynamics of blackness clashing with whiteness.
​
Through his account of how segregation laws prevented Whites from attending the historically black Savannah State College, founded some 45 years prior to the establishment of Armstrong (as a junior college) in 1935, he demonstrates how racism has caused grievous injury on both sides of the color line. It has also been extremely absurd when considering that in order for him to become the first African-American to integrate Armstrong in 1963 for sake of racial progress in the name of democracy, he had to switch from Savannah State's senior college program curriculum to Armstrong's junior college curriculum.  

Navigating Major Changes

Early in From 'N Word' to Mr. Mayor (2016, Donning Company Publishers) Johnson discusses three types of black leadership attributed to sociologist Daniel C. Thompson (author of Sociology of the Black Experience) and with which many readers of African-American literature are familiar: "...the Uncle Tom...racial diplomat...and race advocate" (p. 48). He places himself closer to the third category but more as a "human rights advocate" who believes the following: "'We are all God's children,' but I live in an institutional and structural racist society. 'Self-preservation is the first law of nature'" (p. 49).
​
By the time Dr. Johnson took office in 2004 as the sixty-fourth mayor of Savannah, and its second consecutive black mayor (after the late Floyd Adams), the city was well on its way to navigating major changes in its multicultural and economic make-up. His determination to meet that challenge at every level resulted in 2006 in a major heart attack experienced while attending the National Conference of Black Mayors in Memphis, Tennessee. Consequently, he writes, "How I approached the job of being mayor during the period before and the period after my heart attack were two very different periods" (p. 291).
As it pertained to his labors as mayor, Johnson's professed sense of racial "self-preservation" took a back seat to his role as a servant leader committed to advocating "for improving conditions that impact people of all races and classes" (p. 261). In the wake of the Great Recession that would create chaos in American cities during his second term, he worked with city council members to help Savannah avoid the kind of disastrous lay-offs and cancellation of services which occurred in cities like Atlanta and Camden. As he points out:

"In 2011, we were still in the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression. We had to find a way to continue providing all of the services to citizens with about $8 million less than we had in 2010...while the 2011 budget was extremely difficult, it was balanced with minimal impact to our citizens and without an increase in property taxes. That was due to strong leadership, clear priorities, and tough resolve by this council, which chose not to spend wildly when times were good" (p. 325).

Candidates lining up for the 2020 presidential race in America could take a few helpful lessons from this former mayor's playbook. One might be committing to running a campaign based on proven abilities and a strategic comprehensive vision rather than one based on negative personal attacks. In fact, though he won his first election to mayor before former U.S. President Barack H. Obama won his first election to the White House, their campaign styles bore striking similarities. (The president and mayor met when Mr. Obama visited Savannah in 2010.)   

Conclusion

At times, From 'N Word' to Mr. Mayor reads a bit too much like a college paper, or lecture, as Johnson parenthetically informs readers where he will continue the thread of a particular subject or on which page he has already discussed it. This is easy enough to overlook, and even smile about, when remembering these pages are coming to us from a master scholar at whose literary feet we are fortunate indeed to sit and learn as much as possible. 
​
Aberjhani
Author of Dreams of the Immortal City Savannah
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Archives

    November 2023
    June 2023
    February 2023
    December 2022
    June 2022
    February 2022
    November 2021
    September 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    December 2019
    November 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    March 2019
    January 2019
    October 2017
    July 2017
    August 2012

    Categories

    All
    1950s
    1960s
    2022 Russia Ukraine War
    20th Century Authors
    21st Century Artists
    21st Century Authors
    21st Century Poets
    Aberjhani
    Aberjhani Observance Of National Poetry Month
    Aberjhani On Aurie Cole
    Aberjhani On Brad Gooch
    Aberjhani On Chinese Famine
    Aberjhani On Dick Gregory
    Aberjhani On Duncan McNaughton
    Aberjhani On Eugene Talmadge
    Aberjhani On Flannery O'Connor
    Aberjhani On Immigration
    Aberjhani On Jean-Paul Sartre
    Aberjhani On Mao Zedong
    Aberjhani On Mark Morneweg
    Aberjhani On Maya Angelou
    Aberjhani On Otis S. Johnson
    Aberjhani On Paul Laurence Dunbar
    Aberjhani On PT Armstrong
    Aberjhani On Russia Ukraine Was
    Aberjhani On Savannah Georgia
    Aberjhani On Savannah-Georgia
    Aberjhani On Yang Jisheng
    Adapting Books For Film
    Africa
    African American Authors
    African-American Authors
    African-American Comics
    African American History Month
    African American Men
    African-American Men
    African Americans
    African Americans Abroad
    African Americans In Japan
    African Americans Living Outside America
    African American Writers In Savannah GA
    African Diaspora
    African Engineers
    African Writers
    AI Literary Chat Salon
    Alice Walker
    Amanda Gorman
    American Artists
    American Authors
    American Civil War
    American PEN Video
    Andrew Davidson
    Angel Art
    Angel Lore
    Angel Meme
    Angel Of War And The Year 2022
    Angelology
    Annie Cohen-Solal
    Antiracism
    Archangel Michael
    Art By Aberjhani
    Art By Christia Cummings-Slack
    Artist-Author Aberjhani
    Artist James Russell May
    Artist Marcus Kenney
    Asian Authors
    Audio Podcast
    Aurie Cole
    Author Brad Gooch
    Author Connie Zweig
    Author Franklin D. Lewis
    Author Interview
    Author Mark Morneweg
    Author Poet Aberjhani Official Site
    Author-Poet Aberjhani - Official Site
    Authors
    Authors From Savannah Georgia
    Ava DuVernay
    Benjamin Hollander
    Benjamin Van Clark Neighborhood
    Ben Okri
    Ben Okri Videos
    Best Interviews Of 2023
    Bill Berkson
    Biography
    Biracial Relationships
    Biracial Women
    Black History Month
    Black Men Who Write
    Black Movie Directors
    Black Women Authors
    Blogs By Aberjhani
    Booker Prize For Literature
    Booker Prize Winners
    Book Industry
    Book Publishing
    Book Reviews
    Book Reviews By Aberjhani
    Books
    Books About Rumi
    Books About Savannah-Georgia
    Books About Sufism
    Books And Authors
    Books By Aurie Cole
    Books By Darrell Gartrell
    Books By Flannery O'Connor
    Books By Patricia Ann West
    Books By PT Armstrong
    Books By Robert T.S. Mickles Sr.
    Books By Rotimi Ogunjobi
    Books On Flannery O'Connor
    Brad Gooch
    Brad Gooch Audio Podcast
    Brunswick Georgia
    Canadian Authors
    Canadian Novelists
    Carlos Ruiz Zafon
    Caste The Origins Of Our Discontents
    Celebrity Authors
    Children's Literature
    Chinese Authors
    Chinese History
    Christia Cummings-Slack
    Christina Cummings-Slack
    Christine Cummings
    Classic Authors
    Connie Zweig
    Contemporary African Literature
    Contemporary African Writers
    Contemporary Artists
    Contemporary Authors
    Contemporary Canadian Authors
    Contemporary Literature
    Contemporary Southern Literature
    Cormac Mccarthy
    Cornel West
    Creative Nonfiction
    Creative Thinkers
    Cultural Demographics
    Cultural Heritage
    David Gordon Green
    Dick Gregory Videos
    Digital Publishing
    Director Regina King
    Director Steve McQueen
    Doctorate In Literature
    Dreams Of The Immortal City Savannah Book By Aberjhani
    Duncan McNaughton
    Ebooks
    Education
    El Portal Press
    English As A Second Language
    English Learning Students
    Essay On 21 Years Of Wisdom
    Essays By Aberjhani
    Essays On Ben Okri
    Essays On Duncan McNaughton
    Essays On Flannery O'Connor
    Essays On Immigration
    Eugene Talmadge
    Eugene Talmadge Memorial Bridge
    Evolving Cultures
    Existential Creativity
    Existentialism
    Fall Of The Rebel Angels
    Famous Women Artists
    Fiction
    Filming Movies In Savannah-Georgia
    Flannery O'Connor
    French Authors
    French Literature
    Genre Bending Literature
    Genre-bending Literature
    Global Community
    Grandmothers
    Great Sufi Poets
    Greeting Flannery O'Connor At The Back Door Of Mind Book By Aberjhani
    Gullah Geechee Culture
    Gustave Flaubert
    Halloween's End
    Hector France
    Historical Fiction
    Historical Poetry
    History
    History Of Civil Rights Movement
    History Of Famines
    History Of Literature
    History Of Racism
    Human Cannibalism
    Iconic Authors
    Immigrant Experience
    Immigration Policies
    Influential Authors
    International Authors
    International Poets
    Interracial Relationships
    Interview
    Isabel Wilkerson
    Jalal Al-Din Mohammad Balkhi
    Jalal Al Din Mohammad Rumi
    Jalal Al-Din Mohammad Rumi
    James Joyce
    Jean Genet
    Jean-Paul Sartre
    Jelaluddin Rumi
    Jim Crow Racism
    Lady Gaga
    Latino Ficiton
    Leadership Philosophy
    Leadership Theory
    Life And Legacy Of Dick Gregory
    Life And Legacy Of Flannery O'Connor
    Lillian Gregory
    Literary Biographies
    Literary Community
    Literary Criticism
    Literary Essays
    Literary Friendships
    Literary History
    Literary Honors
    Literary Influencers
    Literary Influences
    Literary Legacies Of The South
    Literary Prizes
    Literary Traditions
    Literary Translations
    Literature Of Immigration
    Luca Giordano
    Memoir
    Memoir By Darrell Gartrell
    Michal Majernik
    Movie Sets
    Mythology
    National Poetry Month
    Naturalism Fiction
    New Orleans
    Nicanor Parra
    Nigerian Authors
    Nigerian Literature
    Nigger By Dick Gregory
    Nobel Laureates
    Nonfiction
    Novels
    Official Site For Author Poet Aberjhani
    Official Site For Author-Poet Aberjhani
    Official Website Of Author Poet Aberjhani
    Official Website Of Author-Poet Aberjhani
    Oklahoma City
    Oprah Winfrey
    Patricia Ann West
    PEN America
    PEN International
    Philosophy
    Podcast On Literature
    Poems About Savannah-Georgia
    Poems By Patricia Ann West
    Poetry
    Poetry By Aurie Cole
    Poetry By Duncan McNaughton
    Poets Against War
    Poets From
    Poets From Afghanistan
    Poets From Boston
    Poets From Savannah Georgia
    Poets From Savannah-Georgia
    Poets On War
    Political Activism
    Political Biographies
    Political Strategies
    Political Theories
    Postered Poetics Art By Aberjhani
    Predatory Gentrification
    Preventing Erasures Of History
    Prose And Poetry
    Prose Poem
    Public Intellectuals
    Public School System
    Publishers
    Publishing
    Publishing Options
    Putin Attacks Ukraine
    Q&A With Author
    QOTD Quote Of The Day
    Quentin Tarantino
    Quotations
    Quotes By Dick Gregory
    Quotes By Flannery O'Connor
    Quotes By Mark Morneweg
    Race In America
    Race In Japan
    Racism In Georgia
    Racism In Savannah
    Racism In The United States
    Reiki Master
    Richard Wright
    Rotimi Ogunjobi
    Rumi Day
    Rumi's Birthday
    Russian Invasion Of Ukraine
    Russia Ukraine Conflict 2022
    Russia Ukraine Video
    Russia Ukraine War
    Salman Rushdie
    Sandfly In Savannah Georgia
    San Francisco Poets
    Savannah College Of Art And Design Graduates
    Savannah Georgia
    Savannah-Georgia
    Savannah River
    Savannah State University
    SCAD Graduates
    Shams Of Tabriz
    Singer Sade
    Social Activism
    Social Realism
    Somewhere In The Stream By Duncan McNaughton
    South Carolina
    Southern Legacies
    Spike Lee
    Spiritual Counseling
    Spirituality
    Starvation
    Still Water Words
    Sufi Literature
    Talks Between My Pen And Muse
    Teachable Take-Aways
    Text And Meaning Series By Aberjhani
    The American Poet Who Went Home Again
    The Angel's Game
    The Famished Road
    The Gargoyle By Andrew Davidson
    The River Of Winged Dreams
    The Word "Nigger"
    Toni Morrison
    Transgression Fiction
    Transgression Literature
    Transgressive Literature
    Tribute To Dick Gregory
    Ukraine Russia Crisis 2022
    Video
    Video Podcast
    Video Poem
    Videos About Rumi
    Videos On Literature
    Wakanda Forever
    War And Peace
    William Anderson
    Wisdom21
    Women Artists
    Women Authors
    Women Poets
    Women's Voices
    World Community
    World History
    World Poetry Day
    Writers And Writing
    Xenophobia
    Yang Jisheng
    Year 2022 In Review
    Yoko Ono
    YouTube Videos

    RSS Feed

  • Bright Skylark Literary Productions Sitemap
  • Author Statement
    • Blog: Visionary Vibes >
      • Aberjhani - Author Biography
      • Bright Skylark News Notes
      • Blog: Cultural Arts Reviews and Remembrances
      • Blog: Sonic Delight Music Reviews >
        • Summer-Song Rhapsody for Michael Jackson: Editorial with Poem
      • Shifting Points of View and the Massacre in Charleston, South Carolina (USA) >
        • Author-Poet Aberjhani in the News
      • 7 Ways to Help Replace Legislated Fear with Informed Compassion
    • Greeting Flannery O'Connor at the Back Door of My Mind >
      • Tribute to Savannah Author Robert T.S. Mickles Sr.
    • Dreams of the Immortal City Savannah >
      • Podcast Prospects 504
      • More Books by Aberjhani >
        • Readers & Reviewers on the Writings of Aberjhani
        • Checking in at Goodreads
        • Editing Credits
        • ELEMENTAL: The Power of Illuminated Love (Art and Poetry Gift Book)
        • The River of Winged Dreams
        • The Wisdom of W.E.B. Du Bois
        • Songs from the Black Skylark zPed Music Player: A Novel by Aberjhani
        • I Made My Boy Out of Poetry
        • Journey through the Power of the Rainbow: Quotations from a Life Made Out of Poetry
        • Buy Books by Aberjhani on Amazon
        • 10th Anniversary of Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance
  • AI Literary Chat Salon
  • Carousel of Sustainable Compassion
  • Working Scribe Carousel Number 2
    • Awards & Honors
    • My LinkedIn Portfolio Sampler
    • Pop Icon Michael Jackson in Life & Legend
    • Creative Thinkers International
  • Art and Poster Store
    • Blog: Silk-Featherbrush Art and Style
    • Postered Poetics
    • Your Introduction to Original Silk-Featherbrush Art & Style
  • Choose a Cultural Arts Heritage Project to Support
  • Working Scribe Image Carousel 2
  • About Bright Skylark Literary Productions
    • Bright Skylark Values and Motto
  • Famous Quotes of Note
    • Pinterest Page of Quotations
  • Charter for a More Compassionate World
  • As a Poet Thinketh: Poetry by Aberjhani
    • The Bridge of Silver Wings
    • Rainbow-Song for the Angel of Tao by Aberjhani
    • Ode to the Good Black Boots that Served My Soul So Well (poem by Aberjhani)
    • Angel of Remembrance: Candles for September 11, 2001
    • Rainbow-Song for the Angel of Tao: Verse 1
  • Articles and Essays
    • Abbreviated Minds in the News for Wreaking Havoc Worldwide editorial by Aberjhani
    • Iconic Authors Toni Morrison's and Harper Lee's New Works Likely to Influence Dialogues on Race
    • Red Summer: Text and Meaning in Claude McKay’s poem ‘If We Must Die’” part 1 of special 4-part series by Aberjhani
    • A Writer's Journey to Selma, Alabama
    • Justice Remains Elusive in Case of Newly-freed Louis C. Taylor (Part 1 of 2)
    • Sensualized Transcendence: Editorial and Poem on the Art of Jaanika Talts (Part 1)
    • Realms of Emerging Light (Sensualized Transcendence Editorial and Poem on the Art of Jaanika Talts Part 2)
    • Notes on the 150th Anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation
    • Why Race Mattered in Barack Obama's Re-Election: Editorial and Poem
    • Posted Perspectives on America's 2012 Presidential Election
    • 47 Percenters and Guerrilla Decontextualization: Dreamers and Nightmares
    • Considering Michael Clarke Duncan: Big Black Man Within A Nonsociopoliticohistorical Context (Editorial with Poem)
  • Video Pen & Ink
  • Links and Connections
    • Aberjhani's Guerrilla Decontextualization
  • Contact the Author
  • Working Scribe Image Carousel 2
  • Working Scribe Image Carousel 2
  • Bright Skylark LP Storefront