On Friday, Jan. 31, students and faculty gathered to discuss how Martin Luther King, Jr.’s message has been diluted, to honor his beliefs in their entirety, and to discuss the inequality facing America today.

The day’s events were titled “Access, Equity, and Inclusion: How Are You Living The Dream?”, and included two blocks of breakout sessions and a closing keynote address. They were organized by a group of students and faculty members who make up the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Planning Committee. Jalen Alexander ’14, a member of the planning committee, stressed that the event was designed to build on other social justice work being done around campus.

“Access, Equity, and Inclusion are all topics that the freshmen were introduced to during their orientation last semester,” Alexander wrote in an email to The Argus. “Therefore there was a common conversation between frosh, their RAs, and students who served as orientation leaders. We wanted to keep that momentum going, and expand the conversation to the rest of the campus.”

The event was sponsored by the Office of Academic Affairs, the Department of African American Studies, the Office of Diversity and Institutional Partnerships, and various other academic departments and

By Sofi Goode

Assistant News Editor

 

On Friday, Jan. 31, students and faculty gathered to discuss how Martin Luther King, Jr.’s message has been diluted, to honor his beliefs in their entirety, and to discuss the inequality facing America today.

The day’s events were titled “Access, Equity, and Inclusion: How Are You Living The Dream?”, and included two blocks of breakout sessions and a closing keynote address. They were organized by a group of students and faculty members who make up the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Planning Committee. Jalen Alexander ’14, a member of the planning committee, stressed that the event was designed to build on other social justice work being done around campus.

“Access, Equity, and Inclusion are all topics that the freshmen were introduced to during their orientation last semester,” Alexander wrote in an email to The Argus. “Therefore there was a common conversation between frosh, their RAs, and students who served as orientation leaders. We wanted to keep that momentum going, and expand the conversation to the rest of the campus.”

The event was sponsored by the Office of Academic Affairs, the Department of African American Studies, the Office of Diversity and Institutional Partnerships, and various other academic departments and University offices. Alexander was excited by the diversity of departments involved.

“It’s important that our journey towards social justice is a collective one,” he wrote. “I don’t believe that we will individually make it to the ‘promised land’ while those around us continue to suffer from inequity and injustice. We cannot isolate our academic pursuits from our pursuits of social justice; I believe that they are, and should be interwoven.”

Seven different discussions were held by various students and faculty over the course of the day on topics ranging from creative identity and alliance to women and minorities in science to students of color in leadership to race and religion.

The keynote event was held in the Memorial Chapel and included a performance of “Amazing Grace” by Associate Director of Career Development and Campus Outreach Persephone Hall and a reflection by Christian Hosam ’15. Hosam addressed the reality of Dr. King’s message and asked the audience to reflect on the depth of their understanding.

“Today, I want us to ask ourselves not if we know Dr. King, but how we know him,” Hosam said. “As we reflect, we should address the fact that many of the stories that are told about Dr. King often sanitize his most radical and progressive messages. Sure, we all know ‘I Have a Dream,’ but how many of us can draw from ‘Beyond Vietnam,’ which was a scathing anti-war speech that called into question the violence and imperialism of the United States government?”

Following Hosam’s speech, President Michael Roth introduced activist and writer Tim Wise to give the keynote address. Wise’s speech focused on the true beliefs of Dr. King and how many fail to take these into account when celebrating a day held in his honor. Wise emphasized the violence of inequalities that are not commonly associated with Dr. King.

“Nonviolence is not an abstraction,” he said. “Not only would [Dr. King] have made sure our children know that, he would have made sure they understand the violence isn’t just about me hitting you and you hitting back, that violence is structural, that it’s institutional, that poverty is violence…. Dr. King would want us to know that, he would want us to know about the violence of that inequality.”

Because Martin Luther King, Jr. Day is often celebrated as a day of community service, Wise stated that people should understand what Dr. King meant by serving the community. Wise stated that although service efforts such as painting houses and learning fire safety are beneficial in and of themselves, they do not represent the specific modes and motives of service for which Dr. King advocated.

“Unless we’re clear about what the service needs to look like and what the cause is for, which we’re asking people to serve, then we’re not understanding his legacy and following his tradition,” Wise said. “We’ve lost that sense of community responsibility so we somehow think that if we just go help people, that’s going to be sufficient…. Dr. King certainly didn’t think that it would be, so who are we celebrating?”

Anthia Diaz ’15 attended the keynote and appreciated the complex discussion of Dr. King’s beliefs.

“It reminded me of Nelson Mandela’s death this year,” Diaz said. “There was a lot of commentating on the fact that people only know one Mandela, or just want to talk about the sanitized Mandela. But he was also indeed very radical, if not more radical than Dr. King. I think it’s funny how everyone wants to sanitize everything for the public eye, when everyone is very complex, and people can be radical, and there’s nothing wrong with that.”

The closing of Wise’s speech strongly reflected this sentiment, as he stressed that Americans should be free to disagree with King, but not to dilute his message.

“We don’t have to agree with him but, by god, we do not get to ignore him even as you claim to be a follower of his,” Wise said. “You either take this man in his entirety or you leave him alone entirely. You don’t get to pick and choose. This man is not a salad bar; he was a philosopher and a moral apostle of justice and a believer in equity.”

Although the celebration focused on a comprehensive view of Dr. King’s teachings, Mahurin acknowledged that no one-day conference could encompass the whole of his philosophy.

“[Dr. King] was an incredibly complex philosopher, theologian, and activist; and his ideas are bigger than any campus could cover in a day (or a week) (or a month),” Mahurin wrote in an email to the Argus. “What’s important, though, is to acknowledge the bigness and complexity of those ideas, as opposed to over-distilling or over-sanitizing them. I wish even more students, faculty, and staff attended the MLK events. Everyone—everyone—has something to learn.”

Overall, the conference aimed to provoke attendees to think about Dr. King’s ideas and apply his principles of service and equity to the problems that society faces today.

“In the year 2014, the United States is burdened with severe inequality, a deeply racist criminal justice system, and…gender inequities,” Hosam said. “We don’t honor Dr. King by ignoring the differences that he fought so hard to have us celebrate. We do honor him by committing ourselves to being leaders and bringing justice.”