Are African-American writers Americans first and blacks second? Is it time for black writers to, in the words of Henry Louis Gates Jr., "discard the anxieties of a bygone era" and put words to page with the confidence that their work will speak to the population at large? These are some of the questions that were addressed in a lively, and sometimes explosive, fashion at this year's National Black Writers Conference, which drew authors like Walter Mosley, Stanley Crouch, Ishmael Reed, Terry McMillan and Bebe Moore Campbell to Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn, from March 21-24.

The following remarks by Wall Street Journal editorial page writer Hugh Pearson helped spark a spirited debate at a conference panel titled "Assuming the Universality of the Black Experience." Pearson is the author of "The Shadow of the Panther: Huey Newton and the Price of Black Power in America," a book which called into question recent romantic reinterpretations of the Black Panther experience.

The key attribute of any healthy group of people is the element in their culture that tells them they are special in the eyes of the higher creator. However, as people of black African descent define that element which makes us special, our efforts are fraught with contradictions. The racism we face is based on the notion that we are inherently less intelligent than everyone else, that we are a less advanced form of human being. Too often, in our search for authenticity, we inadvertently reinforce that image.

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