Why the caged bird sang: Braxton on NPR
Cummings Professor of English and the Humanities Joanne M. Braxton will appear Wed., March 18 on NPR’s Diane Rehm Show, participating in a discussion on Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. 2009 is the 40th anniversary of the publication of what many consider to be Angelou’s most famous work.
“[I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings] establishes the authority and presence of African American women in the genre of autobiography,” Braxton says.
Braxton has spent a significant portion of her career paying homage to Angelou’s work and is one of the country’s primary scholars of the autobiographer and poet’s writings. She is the author of Black Women Writing Autobiography: A Tradition Within a Tradition (Temple University Press, 1989) and editor of (and author of the introduction) Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings: A Casebook (Oxford University Press, 1998).
The Diane Rehm show airs live from 10 a.m. to noon on NPR affiliates across the country, Braxton will appear in the 11 a.m. to noon hour. Listen live online here.
