The Ways of White Folk still finds itself in print, in
homes, and in the classrooms; its themes continue
to resonate with an American culture still in a state
of recognition and healing.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Anonymous. “ ‘White Folks’ Ways: Relations of Races
Interpreted by Negro Poet Hughes. Pasadena Star-
News, 23 June 1934, p. 6.” In Langston Hughes: The
Contemporary Reviews, edited by Tish Dace, 189.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
Bliss, H. Bond. “Bitter Stories of Negro Race. Miami
Herald, 15 July 1934, p. 16.” In Langston Hughes:
The Contemporary Reviews, edited by Tish Dace,
220–221. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1997.
Gannet, Lewis. “Books and Things. New York Herald
Tribune Books, 27 June 1934, p. 15.” In Langston
Hughes: The Contemporary Reviews, edited by
Tish Dace, 189–190. Cambridge: Cambridge Uni-
versity Press, 1997.
Hughes, Langston. The Ways of White Folks. New
York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1969.
Joyce, Joyce Ann. “Race, Culture, and Gender in
Langston Hughes’s The Ways of White Folks.” In
Langston Hughes: The Man, His Art, and His Con-
tinuing Influence, edited by C. James Trotman,
99–107. New York: Garland Publishing, 1995.
Nifong, David Michael. “Narrative Technique and
Theory in The Ways of White Folks.” Black America
Culture Forum. 15, no. 3 (Autumn 1981): 93–96.
Roberson, Mason. “Hughes Talks on Tragedy of Race.
Spokesman, 7 June 1934, p. 6.” In Langston Hughes:
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Schuyler, George. “Views and Reviews Pittsburg Cou-
rier, 30 June 1934, p. 10.” In Langston Hughes: The
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Tracy, Steven C. A Historical Guide to Langston
Hughes. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.
Michael PerryWeaver, Afaa Michael (Michael S.
Weaver) (1951– )
A poet, playwright, fiction writer, and freelance
journalist, Weaver spent 15 years working in the
factories of Baltimore, Maryland, his birthplace,
where he was educated in the local public schools.
Although he began his college education at the
University of Maryland in College Park at age 16,
he attended for only two years before going to work
in the factory. After leaving the factory, Weaver at-
tended Regents College, where he earned a B.A.
degree before attending Brown University on a
University Fellowship. While at Brown, he worked
with MICHAEL HARPER and earned an M.F.A. in
creative writing.
Weaver published his first collection of poems,
Water Song (1985), while he was working in the
factory. He published two other collections of
poems: My Father’s Geography (1992) and Timber
and Prayer: The Indian Poems (1995), under the
name Michael S. Weaver. His most recent collec-
tions (appearing after the name change) include
Talisman (1998), The Lights of God (1999), and
Multitudes: Poems Selected and New (2000). A
faculty member of Cave Canem, Weaver, who ac-
knowledges being influenced by Pablo Neruda, is
a traditionalist in many ways, but he has also been
influenced by black popular culture, particularly
gangsta rap and progressive hip-hop music. He
employs a diverse array of cultural references from
African, Asian, and European history in his work.
The title poem from My Father’s Geography illus-
trates this:I was parading the Côte d’Azur,
hopping the short trains from Nice to
Cannes,
At a phone looking to Africa over the Medi-
terranean,
I called my father, and, missing me, he said,
“You almost home boy. Go on cross the sea.”The positive father-son relationship Weaver cele-
brates in this poem is echoed in “Afternoon Train.”
Upon seeing hip-hoppers clad in baggy pants536 Weaver, Afaa Michael