Intro to African American Literature

On April 12th at 4:30-5:30 pm I attended Dr. Robin Wall Kimmer’s presentation on her work. Her lecture was based around “The Good Harvest. “This event took place in the Corey Union Function Room where many faculty members and students attended. Personally, I did not read her book; Braiding Sweetgrass but after attending this presentation it is a book that I want to read. Dr. Kimmer was an amazing speaker, everything flowed very nicely, and it amazed me how much she spoke from the heart. It seemed as if she didn’t even need the slides she prepared. Even when answering questions, there was nothing that Dr. Kimmer could not answer. She had a very detailed answer to every question that was asked. I feel her presentation told me a lot about her personality, I feel as if I really got to know her as a person. It was easy to see how caring, appreciative, and passionate Dr. Kimmer is. Her lecture opened my eyes to new ideas I have never been exposed to. I found the event to be very engaging and beneficial as I learned a lot from this.

One aspect of Dr. Kimmer’s presentation that I really enjoyed was the connections she made. She provided the audience with a lot of information on herself, allowing us to get to know her better.  She is a SUNY Distinguished Teaching Professor of Environmental Biology at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse. She is a MacArthur fellow, an author, and a member of the Citizen Potawatomi Nation. She lives in Syracuse, although her home reservation is in Oklahoma. One story that I really appreciated showed Dr. Kimmers determination.  When she was graduating high school, she couldn’t decide between wanting to study science or to become a poet. Her guidance counselor told her she couldn’t do both and she decided to study plants. In her higher education, she was one of the only women and the only native person on campus. She did what she could to fit in. On her first day, she had an interview with her advisor where she told the advisor that she wanted to study the beauty of nature and plants. She wanted to answer questions like why the world is so beautiful and how do we keep it like that? Her counselor told her that’s not science and if that was her interest, she should go art school. It was obstacles like these that got her to where she is today. She clearly has developed a deep passion and genuine care for our earth. She is knowledgeable and strives to maintain the natural beauty of our planet. She speaks up for what she believes, encouraging others to help her take action to preserve the beauty of the earth. I found this to be very inspirational, as sometimes people doubt others, it shows how Dr. Kimmer did not let people stop her and followed her passion. Another part, of her lecture that stood out to me is the idea she called “two eyed seeing.” I found this to be a very eye-opening topic. This idea is to look through multiple lenses and view things from different perspectives. This idea will allow for a much better understanding and a better way of solving problems. She continued on to tell the audience, that ecologists have turned to the knowledge of traditional people for a deeper understanding and seeing of the natural world. In a time where climate change and global warning awareness is so advertised, I think it is important to look to the people who appreciate the world and know how to properly care for it.  She included the statistical detail that 80% of the world’s remaining biodiversity is safeguarded by indigenous places only 10% have protection. She says that we are not to go back in history but to go forward to a planet to live on in the future. These words stuck out to me because it is never too late to make a change and start caring. Her presentation showed me how we can help enhance and preserve the natural beauty of the earth we live on.  She finished off her lecture by saying that “an educated person knows their gifts and how to give them to the world.” As someone aspiring to be a teacher, these are words that will stick with me forever. This was a very powerful message and she clearly knows how to spread her gift with the world.

Overall, I enjoyed Dr. Kimmer’s lecture, her message was very powerful and moving. She really gave me insight to a perspective I had never thought about before. I learned a lot from what she had to say, and it left me, and I am sure the rest of the audience feeling very inspired. Although I had been worried that I would feel lost during this presentation since I did not read Braiding Sweetgrass, I gained a lot of valuable information from this event.

 I attended “The Sherlock Holmes You Never Knew: Black American Adaptations, Then and Now.” This event took place on Thursday, February 29th from 6 to 7 pm in the Old Main Colloquium. The presentation was delivered by Dr. Ann McClellan who is the Chief Academic Officer and a provost at SUNY Cortland. Many people attended the presentation including students, professors, and even President Bitterbaum! Her presentation focuses on Sherlock Holmes who audiences recognize as the founding father of all great (white) fictional detections. The presentation focused on the adaptations of Sherlock Holmes that people fail to acknowledge. Since 1903 there have been Black American Sherlock Holmes characters and her presentation covered the history of the Black Sherlock Holmes adaptations across genres.

Dr. McClellan began with a brief introduction of herself, she told the audience that her presentation is a part of a larger project she has been working on for several years. It wasn’t until 2014 on a research trip in London that she read a self-published pamphlet created by an American. The pamphlet had an entire history and connection of African American culture and Sherlock Holmes, it opened up stories, characters, narratives, and representations that she had never heard of or seen in her prior research. Before this presentation, I honestly didn’t know much about the character Sherlock Holmes, but Dr. McClellan told us that according to the Guinness World Records, Sherlock Holmes is the most portrayed fictional character of all time. One thing that stands out about Sherlock Holmes is that he is known as a white man from England. Even his fan group is primarily white. She showed us a photo from the annual dinner in NYC of the Bakers Streets Irregulars, a worldwide fan society of Sherlock Holmes. The dinner is invite only and everyone in the photo is white and a male. We looked at a photo from 1986 and 2020; the only difference is that there is now one woman and one man of color. Other than that,  his fan base is predominantly white males and over the years, as the world has advanced not much has changed within the fan base. I found this to be very surprising and it also made me curious if this fan base also studies these different adaptations.

Dr. McClellan then defined the word adaptation which was very helpful as her presentation is focused on these different adaptations. She defines adaptation as another person’s take on a story or character, a different genre, a different period, or a completely new story. This simple definition she included, made it much easier to understand and connect to her presentation. She then began to discuss the first African American adaptation of Sherlock Holmes which took place in 1903. This was the first Broadway musical with an all-black cast which is not widely recognized due to racism. The play is titled “Dahomey” and it stars Bert Williams as the main character who plays Shylock Homestead. Although he was African American, he used burnt cork to make his skin look darker and outlined his lips in white makeup to exaggerate his characteristics. He felt that if white people could make money by doing blackface, he should be able to do the same. Dr. McClellan then began to discuss different genres like silent films and music which was centered around Sherlock Holmes. Something that stuck out to me was her explanation of whitewashing and colorblind casting. She spoke about how this still occurs in today’s society. Whitewashing is when characters who are created to be of a certain race, ethnicity, or culture are converted to be white in films, plays, etc. Colorblind casting states that race doesn’t matter and will instead be ignored. It was argued that colorblind casting makes racial identity invisible, but audience critics argued that the first thing people notice is racial and ethnic identities. They believed it influenced how viewers see and react to characters and their relationships with others. I connected this aspect of her presentation to our class discussions on color blindness.  Lastly, as Dr. McClellan concluded her presentation, she provided a great wrap-up and lasting impact. She stated how there have been several Sherlock Holmes adaptations, including stories of Sherlock Holmes being a woman, transgender, an alien, and an MLB player. All of these different things have nothing to do with the original story, yet audiences still struggle to imagine the character as a different race or ethnicity. She told the audience how this shows us the importance of fans of color and creating, collecting, and archiving diverse representations of iconic figures.

Overall, I enjoyed this event and took a lot of information away from it. It is clear to see how passionate Dr. McClellan is about her research.  Through her presentation, I learned about adaptations I did not know existed. This event sparked my curiosity and left me wondering about racism and biases that still occur in today’s society.  Her presentation was engaging and presented in an organized manner.

On February 6^th from 2-3pm, I attended Dr. Willnide Lindor’s talk “Making Shakespeare Sexy Again: Pedagogical Approaches to Race and Empire,” in Old Main.  I was extremely interested in attending this event because I take a class with Dr. Lindor and she’s been one of my favorite professors here at SUNY Cortland because of her passion for her subject, and her active engagement with her students.

While sitting in at this event, many subjects were brought to my attention that I really hadn’t thought of before.  Dr. Lindor discussed the difficulty around making Shakespeare something enjoyable or interesting for her students of color.  Dr. Lindor explained that typically she’s noticed that her African American students are unable to make a connection with Shakespeare because of background ethnic differences.  She further stated that “black students are not the intended reader of Shakespeare” and that, “Shakespeare is the embodiment of whiteness.”  I found this very interesting.  As someone who plans on entering the field of adolescent education, I’m very conscious of the fact that I will more than likely teach Shakespeare in my future classroom.  I think of the stigma around Shakespeare; that it’s confusing and most students aren’t interested in it because of the language.  However, although obvious, I had never before thought of Shakespeare’s intended audience: it had never really been said out loud.  As Dr. Lindor discusses, it’s no mystery why she found that her African American students had difficulty forming a connection with texts written by Shakespeare.

After providing us with some background information, Dr. Lindor then dove into her strategies for teaching Shakespeare.  She explained that by understanding how students are introduced to Shakespeare that teachers are better able to understand the background that multicultural students bring to the college classroom.  She says that incorporating a race conscious pedagogy allows students to thrive in their education within the realm of Shakespeare.  Dr. Lindor then introduced us to her “Experience Retrieval Exercises.”  ERE’s, as she calls them, are activities where students share information about previous knowledge about a topic regardless of the education level.  Dr. Lindor then asked us to participate in an ERE that she uses in her classes.  In this ERE, we wrote down what we knew about Shakespeare on an index card in groups. Then, after a timer went off, Dr. Lindor collected our index cards, placed them in a bowl, shuffled them around, and picked out cards in a random order and read them aloud to the group.  She explained that often times when she executed this activity in her Shakespeare classes, she found that students typically had a few negative associations and memories of Shakespeare but also some positive ones.  Dr. Lindor said that as a class, hearing all of this different information from memory recall lays new touchstones for their future encounters with Shakespeare.

Ultimately, I learned a lot from Dr. Lindor’s talk.  I think all adolescent teachers who teach Shakespeare definitely need to consider making it more inclusive.  I think students learn best when they are able to relate to something, even in the smallest way, and for those who can’t I think Dr. Lindor’s strategies are an excellent way to help students become engaged in the work.

I attended a Zoom session on February 8th from 6 to 7pm, which was hosted and conducted by Dr. Marcus Croom and guided by Dr. Dianne Wellington. Dr. Marcus Croom is an assistant instructor of literacy, culture and language at the University of Illinois in Chicago and a critical race researcher. He has written a number of books addressing 21st century enduring issues throughout school systems and classrooms. During his event, Dr. Croom discussed the various ways that racial inequalities are displayed in classrooms as well as the potential effects that the lack of racial knowledge and awareness can have on academic thinking, student identification, effectiveness of teachers, and literacy methods of instruction. This event was extremely eye opening. A number of interesting ideas and topics were touched upon that I have never been presented with before, putting a significant amount of new and existing ideas into new perspectives. 

One of the most interesting ideas Dr. Croom touched upon during his event was his study on race in literacy. He highlights findings from studies he and other colleagues have done within different classrooms to document teachers’ understanding of race and how they can often, intentionally and unintentionally, discriminate against students of color, or minority groups. According to these research studies, a variety of forms of racism and discrimination are frequently observed in classroom settings, such as prejudices in instructional strategies, a curriculum lacking in diversity and representation, discriminatory disciplinary measures, and the reinforcement of racial stereotypes. The utilization of emojis in the classroom was one startling example given by Dr. Croom during his presentation. Emojis are widely used forms of communication that frequently do not fairly represent a range of diverse groups. Not only teachers, but everyday people often use primarily white characters, which makes people of other races and groups feel excluded and less significant.  In response, Dr. Croom stressed throughout this lecture that in order to establish more inclusive and equitable learning environments for all children, educators must critically evaluate and oppose these discriminatory processes. Croom advocates for the development of racial literacies as a main solution to combat racism in classrooms. Teachers can improve their knowledge of race, racism, and anti-racist beliefs by encouraging diverse racial literacy. They can then include these viewpoints into lesson plans. Creating inclusive classroom environments where all students feel valued, included, and respected are a few examples of teaching strategies. Other examples include addressing specific biases and prejudices, incorporating varied perspectives into curriculum, and developing culturally responsive teaching solutions. Through continuous reflection and the elimination of racial prejudices, educators can work to undermine systematic racist policies and procedures in the classroom and advance social justice and inclusivity for all children. 

I found Dr. Marcus Croom’s presentation to be really insightful. This incident highlighted the critical role that educators play in creating inclusive environments while also casting a great deal of light on the extent of racial and minority disparities in educational settings. His observations about how racial biases appear in classrooms, even in seemingly innocent ways like emojis, emphasized how critical it is to confront these problems head-on. Teachers may help create more equitable learning environments where all students feel valued and empowered to thrive by aggressively confronting discriminatory practices and encouraging racial literacy. The essential reminder provided by Dr. Croom’s call to action is the continued effort required to combat systematic racism and advance social justice in education.

On Friday, April 12^th, I attended Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer’s keynote speech in the Corey Union Function Room titled “Braiding Sweetgrass: What does the Earth Ask of Us?”  Dr. Kimmerer’s speech was completely fantastic and moving, and I’m so glad I decided to bring my laptop and was able to take notes on some of concepts she shared.  Something that really stuck out to me was her overall (Native) approach/perspective on our relationship with the Earth.  Dr. Kimmerer discussed her transition to college where she was asked why she wanted to be a botanist by one of her professors, and her response was untraditional; she wanted to study the beauty of plants.  She described in detail her relationship to plants and the Earth; that she was raised to understand that plants were her brothers and sisters.  She proceeded to make the claim that “It is not the land which is broken, but our relationship to the land.”  This perspective is very new to me, but it’s something that makes perfect sense.  She claimed that in order to move forward and save the planet we need to fix our relationship with the land, our Earth, and a way of doing that is by accepting and taking on Native thought processes.

Additionally, I think she made an excellent point to reference higher education’s participation in Native American people’s erasure in higher education.  Personally, I grew up just 20 minutes away from the Seneca Nation territory, however, it is mind boggling to me that even in the state of New York, where we have multiple Native reservations, the education that we, as students receive about Native American culture and history is quite poor.  I strongly agree Dr. Kimmerer’s claim that higher education plays an important role in our understanding of aspects of Native culture and its values.  I think that it can be difficult for people to change their relationship with the Earth because of how most of us were educated or raised to think about Earth and how we use it as opposed to this healthy, balanced, and respectful relationship that Dr. Kimmerer discussed thoroughly in her speech on Friday.  Near the end of her speech, Dr. Kimmerer shared her thoughts on what it means to be educated.  She said that “an educated person knows their gifts and how to give them to the world.”  Again, she shares with us a unique, but quite positive perspective and mindset.  After listening to Dr. Kimmerer, it is very clear that she deeply values education, but contrary to what most people think of as the “correct” form of education, Dr. Kimmerer strongly believes that education comes from everything around you, especially our planet.

Overall, I was very moved by Dr. Kimmerer’s speech.  It really opened my eyes to a perspective I had never been made aware of, but once I heard her speak more about it, this perspective sat very well with me.  I hope I can continue to learn more about Native culture throughout my academic journey because I strongly feel it will well round me not only as a student, but as a person.

In “Citizen: An American Lyric” there are a lot of ideas that are brought up regarding racism. One of them is the idea of evolving anger, how acts in the past build to something greater. Rankine brings up a video by Hennessy Youngman, and in that video he says “the anger built up through experience and the quotidian struggles against dehumanization every brown or black person lives simply because of skin color.”(24) This is powerful because in our everyday lives there are small things that in the moment may not affect us but as time goes on that small thing grows bigger, especially when recurring. For example, in 2004 Serena Williams was participating in the US Open and she was put at a disadvantage and subsequently lost the game. This was because of five bad calls. With that she left calmly and didn’t make a scene during the game. After the game Williams said “I’m very angry and bitter right now. I felt cheated. Shall I go on? I just feel robbed.”(27)A year later technology was added to be able to challenge plays, so whatever the official said was not the final word and avoided these outcomes.  Comparing that to 5 years later in 2009, there was another match where Serena got a bad call and lost her temper. But instead of keeping it inside, she let her anger out. Audre Lorde says “that her response to racism is anger. I have lived with that anger, on that anger, beneath that anger, on top of that anger, ignoring that anger, feeding upon that anger, learning to use that anger before it laid my visions to waste, for most of my life. Once I did it in silence, afraid of the weight of that anger. My fear of that anger taught me nothing. Your fear of that anger will teach you nothing.”(278) This relates to how anger is used, and in this moment what happened to Serena. She had so much pent up anger that was never resolved. She ended up cursing at the umpire and this caught a lot of people’s attention. She ended up getting an $82,500 fine and could not play for two years. During the dispute Williams used the word “again. And this can draw your attention back to the first time and how she kept all her feelings inside. So maybe there was a better way that she could have approached the unfair ruling. But when in the moment it is challenging to keep your composure. This relates to how there is an evolution of anger, a strong emotion that helps humans fight adversary. And through that 5 year period she learned to stop fearing her anger and to embrace it. For that anger is what allows her to fight for injustices in the world.

From pages 40 to 55 there are small stories that are based on racist acts and microaggressions. Towards the end of that section there is a picture that is given, “plastic letter stencils, smudging oil sticks, and graphite” was used for this art by Glenn Ligon. The left side says “I do not always feel colored” and the right side says “I feel most colored when I am thrown against a sharp white background.” Both of these are repeated numerous times as it gets lower it gets darker. For me this relates to the idea of what Serena went through as well as microaggressions. As it happens more and more you get into a darker place mentally. On the surface it seems fine but there still is a lot of hidden emotion that has yet to come out. There could also be a retreat into a more common place. If the white background symbolizes a white place than the darker it gets, that could be going back into a place that is more familiar to you. That relates to the left part of the drawing, where the speaker does not feel colored because his color is no longer a part of his identity. Because everyone is the same there is no space for feeling different. 

Lastly are the examples and the story, every story is different but there is a common theme in all of them. There is an offense happening to someone of color and there isn’t much thought about it, or there is never the recognition that something occurred. There are so many examples of this happening and the strive for wanting better. Rankine finishes the chapter off by saying “just getting along shouldn’t be an ambition.” This is sadly what a lot of people go through and as someone of color, it makes it a lot harder to not fall in this category. 

• Why do people only care about a problem when there is outrage, rather than stopping it when the problem is small? What can we do to stop that?
• What does Glenn Ligon’s stencil drawing say to you? Are there any similarities between the drawing, Serena Williams, and microaggressions?