Learning #blackhistory, Amplifying #blackfutures
It’s February and I am loving #blackfuturesmonth thread on IG. Also thanks to Iheoma U Iruka for sharing some of these resources with me.
A few things that are educating and inspiring me so far:
Martin Luther King Jr autobiography alongside Dr. Tiffany Jana’s Subtle Acts of Exclusion to explore perspectives about the past and present of black history in America to be an ally for black futures. #books #blackauthor #blackeditor
What is Owed by Nikole Hannah-Jones in the NYT Magazine on racial and economic justice #article
Key Quotes from the article:
“To borrow from Ta-Nehisi Coates’s phrasing, racism is the child of economic profiteering, not the father.”
“That 2019 Yale University study, called “The Misperception of Racial Economic Inequality,” found that Americans believe that black households hold $90 in wealth for every $100 held by white households. The actual amount is $10.”
“To summarize, none of the actions we are told black people must take if they want to “lift themselves” out of poverty and gain financial stability — not marrying, not getting educated, not saving more, not owning a home — can mitigate 400 years of racialized plundering. Wealth begets wealth, and white Americans have had centuries of government assistance to accumulate wealth, while the government has for the vast history of this country worked against black Americans doing the same.”
“In 2018, Duke University’s Samuel DuBois Cook Center on Social Equity and the Insight Center for Community Economic Development published a report called “What We Get Wrong About Closing the Racial Wealth Gap”. says - “The cause of the gap must be found in the structural characteristics of the American economy, heavily infused at every point with both an inheritance of racism and the ongoing authority of white supremacy,” the authors of the Duke study write. “There are no actions that black Americans can take unilaterally that will have much of an effect on reducing the wealth gap. For the gap to be closed, America must undergo a vast social transformation produced by the adoption of bold national policies.”
Therefore I am concluding: to be anti-racist is to work towards economic equality from top to bottom through all economic systems to support black families to catch up from architected historical poverty to truly tackle America’s racist past.
The 1619 Project #essays
This project is truly amazing. Quotes from their website:
“1619 is not a year that most Americans know as a notable date in our country’s history. Those who do are at most a tiny fraction of those who can tell you that 1776 is the year of our nation’s birth. What if, however, we were to tell you that the moment that the country’s defining contradictions first came into the world was in late August of 1619? That was when a ship arrived at Point Comfort in the British colony of Virginia, bearing a cargo of 20 to 30 enslaved Africans. Their arrival inaugurated a barbaric system of chattel slavery that would last for the next 250 years. This is sometimes referred to as the country’s original sin, but it is more than that: It is the country’s very origin.”
“The goal of The 1619 Project is to reframe American history by considering what it would mean to regard 1619 as our nation’s birth year. Doing so requires us to place the consequences of slavery and the contributions of black Americans at the very center of the story we tell ourselves about who we are as a country.”
“Through centuries of black resistance and protest, (black Americans) have helped the country live up to its founding ideals. And not only for ourselves — black rights struggles paved the way for every other rights struggle, including women’s and gay rights, immigrant and disability rights.”
“Before the abolishment of the international slave trade, 400,000 enslaved Africans would be sold into America. Those individuals and their descendants transformed the lands to which they’d been brought into some of the most successful colonies in the British Empire. Through backbreaking labor, they cleared the land across the Southeast. They taught the colonists to grow rice. They grew and picked the cotton that at the height of slavery was the nation’s most valuable commodity, accounting for half of all American exports and 66 percent of the world’s supply. They built the plantations of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison, sprawling properties that today attract thousands of visitors from across the globe captivated by the history of the world’s greatest democracy. They laid the foundations of the White House and the Capitol, even placing with their unfree hands the Statue of Freedom atop the Capitol dome.”
The Case for Reparations #article
This article traces how systemic oppression trickled from brutal slavery in the past to implicit and invisible societal inequities today through the story of Clyde Ross and his struggle to own a home.
Key Quote:
“The implications are chilling. As a rule, poor black people do not work their way out of the ghetto—and those who do often face the horror of watching their children and grandchildren tumble back.”
I am also exploring media/art/content about and by black creators to celebrate their beauty, culture, creativity, and brilliance.
A few on my list so far:All by Myself: The Eartha Kitt Story - #documentary
I absolutely loved the portrayal of a badass black woman. Her strength and sensuality is just magnificent!
My favorite scene from the movie is Eartha sitting at a table with all white men, speaking her mind without care! You inspire me, Eartha.
“The Culture Within” episode from one of my favorite podcasts Invisiblia explores how subtle and pervasive implicit biases can be even in well-meaning individuals. #podcast
“A fire like you” by Upile Chisala. #poetry #blackpoets #southafricanpoets #blackwomenpoets
Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am #documentary
Atlanta by Donald Glover #tvseries
Guava Island (because Donald Glover is a creative genius and I crush on him big time!) #movie
Fences: Denzel Washington's directorial debut. Written by August Wilson #movie #blackwriter #blackdirector
Afraid of the dark by Trevor Hall #standupcomedy
If you explored other things, please share in the comments!
Photo by Janine Robinson on Unsplash