Anyone who has followed my blog and knows me in person, you know I'm full of thoughts and have good intentions of posting but often get backlogged and don't write anything for weeks or months at a time. I started grad school three months ago and had so many things I wanted to write about this transition but never made time to sit down and do it. I have a handful of people I owe snail mail letters to, over 30 unchecked voicemails, and on and on. But two minutes ago I heard a song for the first time that caused my eyes to swell with tears. The song is called Breathe by India Arie.
"Sometimes you just can't believe the things your eyes see
So much injustice in this life
If it's happenin' right on your TV screen
So you drop to your knees and you're prayin'
'Cause you can hear him sayin' he can't breathe
And it's all so overwhelming
Because you know there's nothing you can do to help him
Continue to breathe
Continue to breathe
In times like these
That's what your heart is for
Continue to breathe"
My time at grad school has been amazing in so many ways. I love my classmates and am enjoying Massachusetts. I'm dreading winter but it comes with the territory. I started my classes on a high note and was getting A's pretty much across the board. But then I started to pay a little more attention to the content of our classes, the themes of guest lecturers and panelists brought to the university, and the caliber of conversational comments that were coming from both my professors and my classmates. The result is that I feel sad...like really sad. I am disappointed/discouraged by the conversations we are having on campus and in our classes. Sad because what is being presented as "new" information or important facts to consider are basic things that paint my reality every day.
In statistics, we ran a linear regression on factors that affect salary. The result, no surprise, was that being a female and person of color has a negative impact on your salary while the opposite has a positive impact on your salary. In economics, we read a case on Seattle raising their minimum wage to $15/hr but then discussed all the negative reasons behind increasing minimum wage and realized that many employers would just be inclined to lay off and over work their staff if that type of increase was mandatory. In social entrepreneurship, we selected which of three entrepreneurs we would fund with $1million in impact investing. After making our decision we learned that people of color are not funded at ridiculously disproportionate rates like it's not even a competition (~1% get funded). I could go on and tell you example from my other classes but I think you are catching my point. When this information gets brought up and dumped out every day with no dialogue about solutions and tools to address the issue it lingers like a festering wound for me. My classmates who are personally unaffected by these stereotypes are free to live their lives; they can opt in or opt out of making this their fight. But I can't. My gender, my race, my cultural heritage...those are unchangeable and unfortunately for me they consistently put me at a numerically proven disadvantage time and time again.
So my social justice education is just pouring salt in what began as a small-ish size wound to turn it into a painful infection. I started to shut down in class and stop participating. I was so annoyed that I couldn't and didn't want to engage in the useless conversations of stating the obvious. But a few encouraging words from different sources and the perfect timing of this song have swept me up.
"Continue to breathe
In honor of your brother
That's what your heart is for"
If you aren't sure what the song is referencing, maybe you will remember the words "I can't breathe...I can't breathe..." That is what Eric Garner screamed as he was strangled to death on the sidewalk by NYPD. Do you know how terrible it is to hear a grown man scream. Eric Garner, Phillando Castille, Michael Brown, and Trayvon Martin (I wrote about Trayvon five years ago)...
"Fight for your life
In the face of a society
That doesn't value your life
For the men in your life
For the boys in your life
For your brothers, for your fathers
For the ones that came before us
For the future, for the future"
So when I return to class next week, I will reclaim my voice and I will reclaim my narrative. I will challenge my classmates, my professors, and myself to do better. To name the problem is a good place to start but we will never create a remedy if all we do is diagnose.
"Continue to breathe
In times like these
Nothing matters more
Continue to breathe
Continue to breathe
In honor of your brother
That's what your heart is for"
The best is yet to come,
~Adwoa
"Sometimes you just can't believe the things your eyes see
So much injustice in this life
If it's happenin' right on your TV screen
So you drop to your knees and you're prayin'
'Cause you can hear him sayin' he can't breathe
And it's all so overwhelming
Because you know there's nothing you can do to help him
Continue to breathe
Continue to breathe
In times like these
That's what your heart is for
Continue to breathe"
My time at grad school has been amazing in so many ways. I love my classmates and am enjoying Massachusetts. I'm dreading winter but it comes with the territory. I started my classes on a high note and was getting A's pretty much across the board. But then I started to pay a little more attention to the content of our classes, the themes of guest lecturers and panelists brought to the university, and the caliber of conversational comments that were coming from both my professors and my classmates. The result is that I feel sad...like really sad. I am disappointed/discouraged by the conversations we are having on campus and in our classes. Sad because what is being presented as "new" information or important facts to consider are basic things that paint my reality every day.
In statistics, we ran a linear regression on factors that affect salary. The result, no surprise, was that being a female and person of color has a negative impact on your salary while the opposite has a positive impact on your salary. In economics, we read a case on Seattle raising their minimum wage to $15/hr but then discussed all the negative reasons behind increasing minimum wage and realized that many employers would just be inclined to lay off and over work their staff if that type of increase was mandatory. In social entrepreneurship, we selected which of three entrepreneurs we would fund with $1million in impact investing. After making our decision we learned that people of color are not funded at ridiculously disproportionate rates like it's not even a competition (~1% get funded). I could go on and tell you example from my other classes but I think you are catching my point. When this information gets brought up and dumped out every day with no dialogue about solutions and tools to address the issue it lingers like a festering wound for me. My classmates who are personally unaffected by these stereotypes are free to live their lives; they can opt in or opt out of making this their fight. But I can't. My gender, my race, my cultural heritage...those are unchangeable and unfortunately for me they consistently put me at a numerically proven disadvantage time and time again.
So my social justice education is just pouring salt in what began as a small-ish size wound to turn it into a painful infection. I started to shut down in class and stop participating. I was so annoyed that I couldn't and didn't want to engage in the useless conversations of stating the obvious. But a few encouraging words from different sources and the perfect timing of this song have swept me up.
"Continue to breathe
In honor of your brother
That's what your heart is for"
If you aren't sure what the song is referencing, maybe you will remember the words "I can't breathe...I can't breathe..." That is what Eric Garner screamed as he was strangled to death on the sidewalk by NYPD. Do you know how terrible it is to hear a grown man scream. Eric Garner, Phillando Castille, Michael Brown, and Trayvon Martin (I wrote about Trayvon five years ago)...
"Fight for your life
In the face of a society
That doesn't value your life
For the men in your life
For the boys in your life
For your brothers, for your fathers
For the ones that came before us
For the future, for the future"
So when I return to class next week, I will reclaim my voice and I will reclaim my narrative. I will challenge my classmates, my professors, and myself to do better. To name the problem is a good place to start but we will never create a remedy if all we do is diagnose.
"Continue to breathe
In times like these
Nothing matters more
Continue to breathe
Continue to breathe
In honor of your brother
That's what your heart is for"
The best is yet to come,
~Adwoa
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