A teaching moment

"Renaissance woman," they call her.

Last night, sitting on a tall chair, Maya Angelou cast a wide grin upon a crowd of 850 students and faculty. The Stamp Student Union's Grand Ballroom was quiet with respect and anticipation, waiting for the icon to speak.

"Que bonitos ojos tienes, debajo de esas dos cejas," she started to sing, throwing in a little shimmy and a sultry smile. "Hava nagila, hava nagila, hava nagila venis'mecha," she continued as the audience clapped and hummed along.

Then she spoke.

"When I get to be a composer I'm going to write about brown and black, yellow and  red ... some tall people, some fat people, some skinny, pretty and plain," she said. "When I get to be a composer, when I might begin to compose."

At 81 years old, Angelou has lived a lifetime, growing from the depths of racial segregation and intolerance to national acclaim and respect. She travels by bus across the nation, giving lectures and imparting words of wisdom. Angleou speaks to her audience, whom she calls her sons and daughters, giving them permission to laugh, learn and be loved.

"I was here about six or seven years ago, but I so enjoyed myself and I made friends here," Angelou said in an interview before the event. "The university has such a history, and the area has such a history that I am caught by what you've been through. The role of Maryland during slavery and the role of the university, especially this campus, it's just been very interesting."

Angelou's lecture also had a warning.

She denounced the practice of making assumptions based on race, gender and culture. Marginalizing individuals based on upbringing and background is a narrow way of thinking, she said, adding that intelligence comes from acceptance, understanding and the courage to ignore stereotypes.

"I'd like young men and women to realize that human beings are more alike than we are unalike," she said. "It's very important. Sometimes because we bring such idiocies with us, we bring such narrow thinking, decisions, whether they are voiced or not, decisions to believe ‘We'll never get along because he thinks differently, because she looks differently and he calls God a different name.' And so because of those marginal differences people come to believe that the primary core of the human being is different, but it's not." 

As the author of more than 30 works of literature and poetry, the winner of three Grammy Awards and the recipient of over 30 honorary degrees, Angelou does not like to brag about herself. Instead, she tells her story — telling the tales of her childhood and of the "composers" who helped guide and inspire her.

Her Uncle Willie was one them.

In the small town of Stamps, Ark., where Angelou grew up, racial intolerance and brutality were commonplace, she said. Oftentimes, young white men rode into town and ransacked the general store owned by her Uncle Willie, who was paralyzed on the right side of his body, as he hid in a barrel of potatoes.

Angelou, who would help hide him, said while society labeled him a degenerate due to his skin color and handicap, she always saw him as an inspiration.

"I think she covered some of the basic stuff that we already knew, even with the racial prejudice and stuff, but it was really good to hear it in a different way," junior economics major Erica Meyer said. "It just makes you think and reminds you of things like I need to be more respectful of others. These are things you hear all the time, but these words are bad and we shouldn't be so easy-going about them and let them slide."

Behind her dark-framed glasses, Angelou's eyes reflected the pride and strength of a woman who has seen the world change. As she read her poem, "A Brave and Startling Truth," her "sons and daughters" listened intently to her closing words:

"We, this people on this wayward, floating body created on this earth, of this earth, have the power to fashion for this earth, a climate where every man and every woman can live freely without sanctimonious piety, without crippling fear. When we come to it we must confess that we are the possible. We are the few, we are the miraculous wonders of this world."

hampton@umdbk.com