Sterling Allen Brown

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Sterling Allen Brown (May 1, 1901-born), a black scholar, folklorist, writer, and educator, as well as the first Poet Laureate of the District of Columbia, was Benjamin Brown.

He mainly researched black culture of the Southern United States and was a full professor at Howard University for the bulk of his career.

He taught at Vassar College, New York University (NYU), Atlanta University, and Yale University.

Early life and education

Brown was born on May 1, 1901 on the campus of Howard University in Washington, D.C., where his father, Sterling N. Brown, a former slave, was a leading scholar and professor at Howard University Divinity School. Grace Adelaide Brown, who had been the valedictorian of her class at Fisk University, taught in Washington, D.C. public schools for more than 50 years. Both his parents grew up in Tennessee and often shared tales with Brown and his sister Mary Edna Brown (a founder of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority) about famous figures such as Frederick Douglass and Booker T. Washington.

Brown's early childhood was spent on a farm on Whiskey Bottom Road in Howard County, Maryland. He was educated at Waterford Oaks Elementary and Dunbar High School, where he graduated as the top student. He was given a scholarship to attend Williams College in Massachusetts. Williams Phi Beta Kappa's 1922 undergraduate student enrolled in Harvard University and received an MA in English a year later. He was hired as an English lecturer at Virginia Theological Seminary and College in Lynchburg, Virginia, in 1923, which he continued for three years. He never pursued a doctorate degree, but several colleges granted him honorary doctorates. During his senior year at Williams, Brown won the Graves Prize for his essay "The Comic Spirit in Shakespeare and Moliere."

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Academic career

Brown began his teaching career at several universities, including Lincoln University and Fisk University, before returning to Howard in 1929. For 40 years, he served as a professor at a university. Brown's poetry embraced the South as its setting and chronicled the lives of enslaved African-Americans. Brown often imitated southern African-American speech, employing "variant spellings and apostrophes to distinguish consonants" in his creative work. He lectured and wrote about African-American literature and folklore. He was a pioneer in the appreciation of this art form. When writing, he had a "active, imaginative mind" and "a natural gift for dialogue, description, and narration."

Brown was known for introducing his students to jazz, which, as well as blues, spirituals, and other forms of black music, became a staple of his poetry. He appeared at the famous From Spirituals to Swing concerts, and his introduction can be found on the recordings of the performances.

Brown taught at Vassar College, New York University, Atlanta University, and Yale University during his Howard University tenure. Toni Morrison, Kwame Ture, (a.k.a.) were two of his notable students. Kwame Nkrumah, Thomas Sowell, Ossie Davis, and Amiri Baraka (a.k.a.) Stokely Carmichael is a stage actress. LeRoi Jones (LeRoi Jones) is a footballer who plays for Leo Varadkar.

Brown resigned from Howard's faculty position in 1969 and moved full-time to poetry.

Literary career

Brown's first book of poetry, Southern Road, was published in 1932. It was a series of poems, many with rural themes, that explored the everyday lives of poor, black, and country folk with humour and dignity. Brown's collection included traces of authentic dialect and structures as well as formal studies. Despite the success of this book, he had trouble finding a publisher for his sequel, No Hiding Place.

His poetic work was influenced by African-American music, including work songs, blues, and jazz. His writing in the United States often dealt with race and class. He was especially interested in a folk-based tradition, which he considered the most authentic. Brown, however, lived the majority of his life in Northeast Washington, D.C.,'s Brookland neighborhood.

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