OU students and faculty reflect on their experiences with race.
Editor’s note: This article contains language that may be offensive to some readers. This article was originally published on Wednesday, February 5, 2014.
When Winsome Chunnu-Brayda walked into a bathroom at Hocking College in 2000 and saw a sign reading, “N----rs go home, the American dream is to see all black people going back to Africa with their sacks on their backs,” she was shocked.
Coming from Jamaica, where the n-word was not used as a derogatory term, Chunnu-Brayda said the blatant racism was new.
“We (students from the Caribbean) understood the historical significance of the term and knew what it meant as a derogatory word,” she said. “Of course we took the situation seriously and reported it to officials, but that was my first experience with seeing something like that.”
Fourteen years later, Chunnu-Brayda, the associate director of Ohio University’s Multicultural Center, hasn’t experienced overt racism since. Now, she studies the ramifications of racism and inequality and how it affects different generations.
Though February is Black History Month, when we celebrate the achievements of black Americans, it’s also a time to reflect on what still needs to be done, because the fight for equality is not yet over, Chunnu-Brayda said.
Historical context
The United States emerged from slavery in 1863 only to implement Jim Crow laws, which marked a time of violence and segregation between whites and African-Americans.
It is generally agreed that the Civil Rights Movement in the U.S. began during the 1940s, and it is also commonly thought that the movement ended after the passage of three major Civil Rights laws during the 1960s: The Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Fair Housing Act of 1968, said Patricia Gunn, associate professor of law in the Department of African-American Studies.
“While the passage of these laws helped to improve the lives of African Americans, there have been countless instances in recent years when those laws have not been followed,” she said. “Thus, to the extent that any American is denied the civil rights to which she or he is entitled, the Civil Rights Movement is decidedly not over.”
Some people might say that the country has come so far, but it is still far behind from what the Civil Rights Movement stood for, said Francine Childs, professor emerita in the department of African-American studies. She also marched on Washington with Martin Luther King Jr.
“Until we can do what MLK said and judge people by the content of their character instead of the color of their skin, we’re going back in history,” she said.
For some, there is a belief in a post-racial society; a society in which there is equal access to everyone irrespective of race, class or gender, Chunnu-Brayda said.
“I think the post-racial society idea came after the election of President (Barack) Obama, to say now that we have a black president we have overcome all of those barriers, and we are now living in a society where race doesn’t matter anymore,” she said. “But I think that term is being used by people who are trying to dismiss the major inequities in our society.”
The prison industrial complex with the disproportionate number of black and Hispanic males in prison and laws such as stop-and-frisk are among the inequalities that still exist, Chunnu-Brayda said.
A contemporary world
The fight for civil rights and social justice is an ongoing battle, agreed Kellee Perez, a senior studying sociology-criminology.
“I think that our country still has a great deal of work to be done on two issues we’ve struggled with since our country’s inception: racial and gender equality,” she said. “We have only just begun our fight on more contemporary issues like equality for members of the LGBTQ community.”
Each generation has new challenges to overcome, and it’s a misguided belief to think that people are all free, said Akil Houston, assistant professor of cultural and media studies in the Department of African-American Studies.
“This masks the vast inequality that is present in contemporary times,” he said.
The problems that still exist are shown differently than in the ’60s — instead of overt racism, there are subtle signs that one gets from people and from policy, Chunnu-Brayda said.
The current fight doesn’t have an official name, but it’s a fight for basic human rights, Houston said.
“Generally the only time civil rights is discussed, it is in a historical context of what happened and the empty celebrations of Dr. King each January,” he said.
“To have a real conversation about human rights would be considered a divisive political battle, so more often than not, there are not many serious critical conversations that don’t digress into the blame game.”
Problems from the past
Unfortunately, racism is still something people have to experience in their daily lives, Perez said.
“My own personal experience is what makes me ridiculously cognizant of issues on racial injustice,” she said.
While working at Panera Bread, a gentleman jokingly used racial slurs and tried to blame his ignorance on history, Perez said.
“He claimed that he could not tell I was an African-American when I almost blew a gasket,” she added. “He said he was sorry about what he said, but that I had to understand that these things were acceptable when he was growing up.”
And then there are some people who are taking steps backwards and trying to reverse progress that was made, Childs said.
“It makes me want to cry sometimes,” she said. “We thought that when we marched and people spit in our faces, we were marching so that our children and grandchildren wouldn’t have to go through this, but it seems like we have to pick it up and start over.”
When people argue that progress has been made because there is a black president, they forget that he also deals with racism and ignorance, Childs added.
“How can we say that we have overcome when the president, because he is a black man, is treated in a manner, in a way in which no other president has been treated?” she asked. “How can we say we have arrived at equality or that justice is prevailing?”
Looking to the future
Despite the setbacks, Chunnu-Brayda said steps are being taken in the right direction.
“The America of today is different from the one you’ve inherited, and the America 20 years from now will be different from the one you grew up in,” she said. “The people who are most prepared to meet that, will be the most successful. (The U.S.) will only remain great if those who are inheriting it are ready to meet the challenges head on in a positive and constructive way.”
Diversifying the curriculum and spreading the message of equality through schools will also help move the country forward, Chunnu-Brayda said.
“Society is a reflection of school, and school is a reflection of society,” she said.
“So, once we have this message being transferred through generations, we’ll eventually get there, but we still have a long way to go.”
Childs said to maintain the rights that were fought for, people have to keep marching — because there is no way she’s going back.
“We sacrificed, we protested,” she said. “I’m not going back; no, I will not go back.”
@thisisjelli
