Through a Black Diasporic Portal

I have always known that Africa is in me.  In middle school, Mrs. Mabel Welch invited me to be a part of the Culture Club, an afterschool club for Black kids to learn about our history.  For a 12-year old biracial girl growing up in a predominantly white town, my participation in that club had a profound effect on me.   In high school, I was a part of Pathfinders, which was an extension of the Culture Club.  In college, I was a part of the Griot Society, which was also an Afro-centric extracurricular club that my homegirl Latasha Levy founded.  While a part of the Griot Society, I co-founded Know Your History, a Saturday School program for Black kids in Charlottesville to learn about the Black history that was missing from their social studies curriculum, as it had been missing from mine.  When I started teaching at Tri-Cities High School, a predominantly Black school in East Point, Georgia, I developed the Know Your History club: an extension of all that I experienced until then.

It was a beautiful gift from the universe, then, when I received an email from my brother Lewy last fall, connecting me to a sister named Bernadette Atuahene.  This is what he wrote:

            Hi sis,

My friend Bernadette is a law professor who is working on a documentary movie about land rights/land redistribution/social justice in South Africa.  Connected to that project, she is working on a curriculum (for high school, I think?) to deal with some of these issues.  She asked me to give it a once over--might you or any of your people have an interested in exploring this with her?  Obviously, this material is just in draft form and not for formal distribution.

Love,

L

When I scrolled down to see what my brother’s friend had written him, this is what I read:

Lew, I have yet another request.  They just keep coming, eh?  You know we founded a nonprofit called Documentaries to Inspire Social Change (DISC) that is producing a film about South Africa called "Sifuna Okwethu: We Want What's Ours" (www.discwebsite.org).  We also have developed a curriculum to go along with the film.  If you have time, we would appreciate it if you could comment on the attached curriculum.  Also, if you have any curriculum specialists in your network that you could connect us with, that would be fantastic.

Let me know if you can help us out!
B

It turns out that specific objectives of the curriculum are that students will learn about the history of colonialism, apartheid, and resistance in South Africa.  The broad objectives are that students will understand common oppression and shared struggle throughout the Diaspora. 

So just like that – really, through Diasporic connections that exemplify the broad goals of the curriculum itself – I got linked into this phat project.  Bernadette welcomed me into the project warmly, and invited me in to pilot the curriculum and revise it accordingly.  As such, I piloted the program this past spring in Atlanta.  Since that time, we have established connections with folks in DC and Chicago, who will teach the curriculum in schools there in the fall also.  Our vision is that all of the teachers and students who participate in the curriculum will connect with one another, so that they can understand how similar issues take shape in different geographic contexts. 

All of this brings me to this current trip to Johannesburg.  As part of a grant I was awarded from the Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning at Kennesaw State University, I am able to travel to the city where the original documentary took place.  While in Jo’burg, I will talk with teachers, principals, professors, and students of education about using the curriculum in schools there.  Again, we hope to link all participants together using the marvels of modern media, such that a young person in Atlanta can hear from a young person in Jo’burg, who just built with a young person in DC, who just spoke with a young person in Chicago.  Because the curriculum includes a social action project, we envision that the youth will share ideas, resources, and perspectives that will help teach these youth about the power of global connections.

Just in the way that the universe (with the aid of some focused, hard-working folks, no doubt) continues to propel this project forward, I believe the universe also set it up to send me off through what seemed to me like a majestic Black Diasporic Portal to the world outside Atlanta: The Maynard Jackson International Airport Terminal.  Um… WHAT?!?!  Have you been there yet?  Even if you do not have an international trip planned any time soon, I recommend you checking that place out.  As Asha drove me up the rounded road towards the terminal, the sight literally took my breath away.  “It’s like Mecca,” I whispered (and I ain’t even Muslim!).  Inside, my amazement was magnified still: everyone with whom I interacted was kind and encouraging and warm and beautiful.  These Black folks were collectively creating a space of human interaction that was even more unique and breathtaking than the architectural masterpiece inside of which we found ourselves. 

I found myself wondering what forces had coalesced to create such a truly beautiful space.  Had Mayor Reed had something to do with this?  Was this Mayor Jackson’s spirit living on?  Were other passengers feeling what I was feeling?  I felt proud of my folks, and I felt proud of my city.  Everybody knows that Atlanta is one of the few (major) Chocolate Cities in the US.  I am thankful that Atlanta chose to construct such an important institution – the international terminal of the US’s (world’s?) busiest airport – with faith in the beauty of the Black Diaspora.