"To Protect and Serve": African American Female Literacies

... No matter how backward and negative the mainstream view and image of Black people, Ifeel compelled to reshape the image and to explore our manypositive angles because I love my own people. Perhaps this is because I have been blessed with spiritual African eyes at a time when most Africans have had their eyes poked out.... So, like most ghetto girls who haven't yet been turned into money-hungry heartless bitches by a godless money centered world, I have a problem: I love hard. Maybe too hard. Or maybe its too hard for a people without structure-structure in the sense of knowing what African womanhood is. What does it mean? What is it supposed to do to you andfor you? -Sister Souljah