American means white, and Africanist people struggle to make the term applicable to themselves with ethnicity and hyphen after hyphen after hyphen.

I know what every colored woman in this country is doing... Dying. Just like me. But the difference is they dying like a stump. Me, I’m going down like one of those redwoods. I sure did live in this world.

If happiness is anticipation with certainty, we were happy.

What I'm doing ain't about hating White people. It's about loving us.

Who's Got Game? The Ant or the Grasshopper? The Lion or the Mouse? Poppy or the Snake?

Today is always here,' said Sethe. 'Tomorrow, never.

Not knowing it was hard; knowing it was harder