Interview with Yawah Awala, parent and Carpetbag community supporter

By Nayo Watkins

Nayo Watkins: What does Yawah mean?

Yawah Awala: Yawah means one "who is loved by God" or "woman of God." It is West African, my brother-in-law gave me the name. He said I remind his so much of his aunt—her name was Yawah. He gave me the name in the ’70s. I’ve had it for awhile, about 24 or 25 years.

NW: I think I’ve had Nayo for about that long. I got it in the ’60s, ’round ’64. It means seeker of truth.

YA: I like that

NW: Yeah. It’s good to have a name that has some meaning.

YA: Oh, definitely. People wanted to call me Yawah and I thought, "Oh, what a compliment," but you know, each of us were made of God’s own action. She — sometimes I say God and She and people tend to say, "Aww," but I say I think her name is She. My God has to be She. And then men call her He.

NW: How long have you lived in Knoxville?

YA: Let’s see, my family moved here in ’65 from our farm in Alabama ’cause my uncle died. We had 80-some acres of farmland, so when he died we were granted 65. I would say I lived here from ’65 to ’75, then I moved away and went to New York. Stayed awhile. Came back. Moved away. Came back. I’m always moving away — so I can say maybe 30 years or so I’ve lived in Knoxville.

NW: You have a pretty good sense of this community then.

YA: Yes, yes, but people still tell me I’m an outsider, and it’s okay. Knoxville is a very different place. I always saw it as a place you would want to be if you were wealthy and you want to retire. This would be a good place if you didn’t want to do anything. It would be a place if you didn’t have much ambition. For younger people, for instance, it’s here but it’s limited. It’s for a very few.

NW: The opportunities?

YA: Yeah, and once those vacancies are filled, then everybody else is just standing looking in — unless you create something from your inner self, such as what Carpetbag has done. It wasn’t a job given down from any corporate place, it was something that was developed, I figure, from Linda, from the inside, even though she was an "outsider" of Knoxville, though she’s been here quite awhile. We’ve been for about the same amount of years.

NW: So, if you can, think back to the first time you became aware of Carpetbag.

YA: That was such a long time ago. I can’t remember how many years, but I remember seeing the advertisement in the paper that Carpetbag Theatre was looking for people to start. I want to say this was in the ’60’s — it was such a long time ago.

NW: This was when the theater was just starting.

YA: Yes. The very beginning. I remember classmates of mine going to do an interview for that, do auditions for Carpetbag. And I remember one friend in particular, Maxine Thompson — she’s Dr. Maxine Thompson now at the University of Tennessee — she was like one of the first members originally from Knoxville, that I can remember. It was exciting then to see their play "Dark Cowgirls," and this other play I thought was so good.

NW: "Red Summer"?

YA: Yes. Okay. I remember when I first saw the whole play, I was just so intrigued about it. I feel like, "Ohh, I want to do that," but I was shy, you know, and every time they would have an audition I would think, "I’m gonna go, I’m gonna go." But I never showed up. I was always very intrigued how they could stand up there and recite their parts, and as my Grandmother used to say, remember by heart. I was like, "Man, Knoxville really needs to support Carpetbag a bit more than they do." Because they were very community involved, they were always doing something that involved, especially, the young people. You know, they were always like, "Come out, bring the children — be involved in this." Sometimes people would interact. In my opinion, Knoxville should support Carpetbag more than they do because when they go out of town they get a huge audience — you know, a huge, huge audience.

NW: What do you think Carpetbag means to Knoxville? Why is it important to Knoxville?

YA: What I think it does is keep the live theater open, the live entertainment. Say, for instance, when we couldn’t go to the picture shows, as they said back then, we always had, away back in the day, our entertainment, our oral speakers who would tell us our stories and do it in such a way that we could be intrigued, sitting by the fire listening to somebody talk about the stories of old. To me Carpetbag keeps that alive with their live productions. Even though the African-American community is not a "theater kinda type" town — and I don’t know why as of yet, but I think that if people would give it a chance, or were involved with it, they would really get a good kick, a good feeling of it.

NW: Have you worked with Carpetbag at all, in any way?

YA: Yes, I have. I’ve catered several of their things, done volunteer work, my daughter is involved with their youth ensemble TRY [Theatre Renaissance for Youth]. She’s been doing that for the last three years. She loves it, she knows that she wants to be Miss Actress now. And so Carpetbag allowed her to explore the drama part of her, everybody always calls her Drama Queen. She gets to explore that and puts it out on stage and it’s been very, very good for her. Some of the situations she plays on stage kinda fits in with her life sometimes, so she gets to express that and get it out and get it over with. So I like that part of it. I’ve also done some volunteering, just working with them in general in the last years or so — food, passing out flyers, whatever I can do to help.

NW: Are any of your other children involved?

YA: Yes! My other daughter is 22. She worked the summer program with Linda Hill. Linda Hill had a program where they worked out at the zoo, her and my niece, matter of fact. And so, each day they would entertain the children out at the zoo. It was very, very good, and we had a video, as a matter of fact. It was interesting, ’cause the little kids would gather around and they sat up on the tree and they had this guy that played the guitar and sing songs and be the animals. The children who were visiting the zoo would actually stop and see them performing and get a kick out of watching the girls. They had these costumes that looked like little animals. And it was such a great program, and it was such a great gift.

NW: What effect do you think the community has on the theater? In other words, does Carpetbag draw upon the community to figure out what to do?

YA: As far as I can see they do. They always have an advertisement out advertising hiring through the church, and, you know, church has always been a media for getting information out if you want to know what’s going on in the community and what opportunities that could be before you. That’s how I heard about it was through the church, someone was talking about it at church that they were having some try-outs, someone was asking me to try out, so that’s what I did.

NW: What effect do you think Carpetbag has on the community? Does it really have any?

YA: From a personal stand-point I would say yes, because it provides employment for the summer. This is very, very great, because a lot of the youth summer programs have been cut out because of administration — people not having money. And Carpetbag provides employment all summer, as well as the opportunity to act and express yourself through your music and your acting, so it is an employer for children through the summer.

NW: The kind of shows that Carpetbag does, that have a message to them — where they’re trying to give a message about history or something — does that have an impact on community?

YA: Yes. It does. Especially with the teens, with the program TRY. It deals with alcohol, drugs, depression and just regular teen problems where girls and boys both are trying to fit in with what they think the in-crowd is. And what it tries to do is deter the teens from going into that kind of direction by putting on the productions and trying to show this is what can happen if you go this-a-way. And also, a lot of the reality tragedies in our inner-city community, they reenact that on stage. So, it has a very good impact as far as saying, "I have a positive message for you young people. Look at this. Take a look at it and see that you do have a choice. Let’s act about it, let’s dance about it, but let’s not actually participate in it. We can pretend like we are doing drugs, we can pretend like we are drinking, but don’t actually do it, because there is a downside to that." Like the production last night, the alcoholic mother and then there was an alcoholic child — that is a reality, you know, in a lot of families, and so we have to be so kind and careful with our children.

NW: Do you think it makes a difference, does it work, is anybody listening, is it reaching where it needs to reach?

YA: It’s reaching my daughter a lot. And I would say there are at least 100 or so more children that has participated in the program, Well, really more than that. I guess it’s that old thing that if you’ve got a thousand listening and one actually catch on to that message, then you succeeded. I would say they are very successful as far as teenagers are concerned. And not all teenagers think that it’s cool, but I think there are a lot of children that were brought up by parents like me, kinda like hippie, vegetarian kinda person that’s odd — I don’t consider myself odd, but that’s a rarity in our community here in Knoxville, you being black and a vegetarian. Oh, my God — and you’ve got an African name, so that’s three strikes against you right there. It gives those children outlets, it gives those children a sense of belonging. It gives children with nappy hair a sense of belonging. It gives children that want to wear their hair natural or any other kind of way or wear it green, yellow, purple or blue, it gives them a sense of belonging. Because it is theater, and it is quite somewhat being yourself if you want to be. Because acting is really like bringing that other personality of you out, which sometimes we have to close it up, so, it is great.

NW: What about with adults? With shows like "Red Summer," which brought out some of the ugly part of Knoxville’s history — how do you think that was received generally, and did it matter?

YA: "Red Summer," I remember my husband’s grandfather talking about "Red Summer." Matter of fact, he said he was on Gay Street when that happened. And I thought, "Oh, they are so interesting." And sometimes I think Knoxville needs another Red Summer. I think what it did was taught a lot of people, ’cause I think a lot of people didn’t know that Knoxville actually did have a radical side to it. When you have people coming into the city, they tend to think that we are so passive, ’cause there are certain things that we still allow to go on as African Americans in this community, to allow it to be perpetuated tremendously without raising a voice against it. So "Red Summer" was a wake-up call to say "Hey! We can do something here." Not saying you have to drastically go for it, that you have to take lives, but revolution is like that sometimes — and as we know, revolution means change. Sometimes people kill to stay alive, so it is in a defense to something. "Red Summer" portrayed that and I think it kind of gave a wake-up call to the consciousness of people, that might could have made some people, be them black or white, to say, "Hmmmm. Maybe we do need to speak up a bit."

NW: To the best of what you can remember, how has Carpetbag changed over the years?

YA: From a couple of years ago, it seems that they are doing more in the community, ’cause I think they was traveling for awhile, you know making themselves known. They always had a youth program I think, but this program over the last 3-4 years has been very, very proactive in seeking out young talents, if you would use that word for children at risk — to empower the inner-city children. Very strong.

NW: What do you think they do best?

YA: The theater. They have a way of bringing the integral part of the European community and the African-American community together to the theater. They are one of the groups that can bring all kinds of people from the rural mountains of Kentucky to the rural hills of Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, all of those colored peoples and all those different kind of people together in their workshops where everyone can sit and have a dialogue. So, I think they do that very well. I guess you would call that community … Pot. They can bring together a community pot very well.

NW: When you see a production, is there usually a discussion after the production — sometimes in relationship to the production?

YA: This particular production at Clarence Brown Theatre at the University of Tennessee — it was about five different women with these different personalities. And I think that they did have an audience response after that. And I do know that in a couple of productions that I had the pleasure of providing catering service for them, there were people after at the reception asking lots of questions to the cast and to Linda.

NW: What do you expect will happen in terms of your daughter, how old is your daughter?

YA: She’s 16.

NW: So what do you expect will happen in terms of her relationship with Carpetbag? So that is the first question. The second question is a little different; what would you like to happen?

YA: I guess I would say that she would learn and mature in her acting ability, learn the technical things around her natural ability to project herself and her theatrics. What I would like to happen is that when Carpetbag travels around the world in their productions that the youth program will be traveling with them. And that way I think that it would encourage other youth in the countries and the cities that they travel in to make them just a little more excited about live theater.

NW: Have you ever told them what you think of what they are doing?

YA: Not that I remember.

NW: Do you feel comfortable that if you had a suggestion or you needed to say, "I think this is good or I think this wasn’t so good," do you feel like you have a way to say that?

YA: Yes. Now, I do feel that. There’s a young person, Amira Haught, that works for them. Zakiyyah Modeste also I feel like I could talk to them. Also others, but especially with them. I feel like I could have an opinion — that I could say, "I observed such and such and so, and I observed, maybe if you tried this or that," it would be heard. As a community we have somewhat of an input. Because one of the things I think they are striving for is to strengthen our home base, and you know, as the old people say, "You have to get your house straight before you go somewhere else."

NW: So if there was something you thought, either something you wanted to suggest to them to do or something they were doing that you thought maybe they could do a little bit better; do you think you would come forth and talk to some of them?

YA: There are so many elements in our community that has wonderful rich histories and stories that I think that they could incorporate that in sometime, and I then maybe they could take on the characters. But at least talk to the elders and even allow, you know, how you have those one-woman shows? Let the elder have that kind of spirit and they could sit and tell you an old story about 1926 or whatever and just mesmerize the crowd. I have been involved more personally in the last three to five years — and just the whole art of story telling, I just like it, the whole art of that. I guess somehow I feel like I’ve got a story, I want to tell it!

NW: When she [Yawah’s granddaughter] gets to be first grade/kindergarten, what outlets are available to her to nurture that creativity?

YA: I am really doing my best to get myself in the position to move back out to my family’s farm by the fall of next year. And I’m going to ask my children to give me their children for at least the summertime, so I can nurture that creativity. There’s no alternative school around except home schooling, except middle school at Vine, because they are a performing-arts school. But the undertone there is that they are trying to take African dance out of the middle school and trying to allow tap and modern to be the prevalent things. But I’ll fight. I’m fighting with the dance instructors. It was said that the European children feel left out, and I don’t understand why, because the class is open. Any student that wants to sign up for African or West African dance can. Now, if they can’t get the rhythm in order to participate in the program, that’s not particularly our problem. That’s their biological given. It’s kinda being a stranglehold.

NW: Are there other forms beside that that they can get?

YA: Oh yeah.

NW: So they don’t have to take it?

YA: Exactly, but they’re putting the pressure on that particular part. For instance, it was the main theme when Vine did that Kwaanza program. West African dance would be the last piece, and it would be the piece where everyone would get so hype and get so excited about it. But the European counterparts seems to — that noise — so, we’re kinda fighting. One of the things I forgot, on Saturdays she would be able to go to dance classes and hit the drums and play around in the dance studios. But not as far as education is concerned. Her little creativity would be squashed. She would probably be considered as a trouble child or a troublemaker, cause my nine-year-old — oh, it will be a great story when we get through this.

NW: Maybe he’ll be another candidate for theater?

YA: Oh, he’d be perfect. Omar — he’s a Drama King. We put them together for about a half-an-hour and say, "Okay, y’all, go at it." They put on a little production at home. My older son, he’s an entertainer. He’s been with Little Richard for like eight years. Travels — so, it’s just like a trickle-down thing. He’s a singer and a dancer. He’s a black-rock band guy. Another riot.

Nayo Watkins is an arts and community consultant who lives in Durham, N.C. She is sole proprietor of Bodacious Consulting and Organizing. Her work has included helping to build collaborations and partnerships between artists and communities that explore the relationship between art, culture, activism and empowerment. She served as coordinator for the Mississippi American Festival Project and for the N.C.-based Alternate ROOTS Community Artist Partnership Project. She was writer/facilitator for "Parables to Policy," an Internet project of Southern Rural Development Initiative and was consultant to the Mississippi Young Person’s Cultural Exchange. Prior to becoming an independent consultant, she served as executive director of the African American Dance Ensemble (Durham), At the Foot of the Mountain Theatre (Minneapolis), and the Mississippi Cultural Arts Coalition (Jackson), and as program assistant for the Afro-American Studies Program of the University of Mississippi. As an artist, Watkins is a poet, essayist, playwright and performer. Her poems and essays have appeared in literary anthologies and journals. As a playwright, she draws upon oral histories and participatory research to create plays rooted in place, people, culture and community. Productions of her commissioned plays have been staged in Port Gibson, Itta Bena and Oxford, Mississippi, and in Durham and Wake Forest, North Carolina. Her work is included in the repertory of actors John O’Neal, Cynthia Watts and Yolanda King.

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