War will stop when we no longer praise it, or give it any attention at all. Peace will come wherever it is sincerely invited.

We have elders who [are] misguided and wallowing around in troughs of money with the wrong sort. They're not really good elders for the youth to emulate. The youth rightly don't like them.

I think that indigenous women's wisdom is crucial. So much of the care of the Earth has come from the mothers. I think it's imperative we turn to their wisdom in how to take care of the planet.

Howard Zinn helped us desegregate Atlanta. That was moving because he took a lot of abuse for that. He and Staughton Lynd, a fellow professor who was also from the North, stood with us. They were certainly behind us. In fact, they often stood in front of us. This had a huge impact on me. But one of the reasons I was very careful about speaking about the relationship I had with him and Staughton was because, in a racist society, if you acknowledge a deep love for and a deep debt owed to white teachers, they tend to discredit your own parents and your own community.

We are a people. A people do not throw their geniuses away. If they do, it is our duty as witnesses for the future to collect them again for the sake of our children. If necessary, bone by bone.

I'm pore, I'm black, I may be ugly and can't cook, a voice say to everything listening. But I'm here.

Resist the temptation to think what afflicts you is peculiar to you. Have faith that what is in your consciousness can be communicated to the consciousness of all. And is, in many cases, already there.