The Dangers of Whitewashing Black History | David Ikard | TEDxNashville

Video Statistics and Information

Video

Captions Word Cloud

Captions

[Music] I am the proud father of two beautiful children Elijah 15 and Octavia 12 when Elijah was in the fourth grade he came to me came home from school bubbling over with excitement about what he had learned that day about african-american history now I'm an african-american and cultural studies professor and so as you can imagine african-american culture is kind of serious around my home so I was very proud that my son was excited about what he had learned that day in school so I said well what would you learn he said I learned about Rosa Parks okay what did you learn about Rosa Parks he said I learned that Rosa Parks was this trail old black woman in the 1950s in Montgomery Alabama and she sat down on this bus and she had tired feet and when the bus driver told her to give up her seat to a white patron she refused because she had tired feet and had been a long day and she was tired of oppression and she didn't give a proceed and she marched with Martin Luther King and she believed in non-violence and I guess he must have looked at my face and saw that I was a little less than impressed by his history lesson and so he stopped it he's like dad what's wrong what what did I get wrong I said son you didn't get anything wrong but I think your teacher got a whole lot of things wrong what do you mean I said Rosa Parks was not tired she was not old and she certainly didn't have tired feet he said what I suggest Rosa Parks was only 42 years old yeah you're shocked right never heard that Rosa Park was only 42 years old she had only worked six hours that day and she was a seamstress and her feet were just fine the only thing that she was tired of where she was tired of inequality she was tired of oppression and my son said well why would my teacher you know tell me this thing you know this is this is confusing for me because he's easily loved his teacher and she was a she was a good teacher a youngish you know twenty-something white women really really smart pushed him so I liked her as well but he was confused why would she tell me this he said he said dad tell me more tell me more tell me more about Rosa Parks and I said son I'll do you I'll do you one better he was like what I said I'm gonna buy her autobiography and I'm gonna let you read it yourself so as you can imagine Alijah wasn't too excited about this new lengthy homework assignment that his dad had just given him but he took it in stride and he came back after he had read it and he was excited about what he had learned he said daddy said not only was Rosa Parks not into initially into non-violence she said but Rosa Parks grandfather who basically raised her and was light enough to pass his white used to walk around town with his gun in his holster and people knew that if you mess with mr. parks his children or grandchildren he would put a cap in your proverbial bottom right he was not someone to mess with and he said I also learned that Rosa Parks married a man in Raymond who was a lot like her grandfather right he would organize he or he was he was a civil rights activist he would organize events and sometimes the events would be at Rosa Parks his home and one time Rosa Parks remarked that there were so many guns on the table because they were prepared for somebody to come busting into the door but they were prepared for whatever was going to go down the Rosa Parks said there were so many guns on the table that I forgot to even offer him coffee or food right this is who Rosa Parks was and in fact Rosa Parks when she was sitting on that bus that day waiting for those police officer arrived and not knowing what was going to happen to her she was not thinking about Martin Luther King who she barely knew she was not thinking about non-violence or Gandhi she was thinking about her grandfather a gun-toting take no mess gunned father the grandfather that's who Rosa Parks was thinking about and my son was mesmerized by Rosa Parks and I was proud of him to see this excitement but then I still had a problem because I still had to go to a school and address the issue with his teacher because I didn't want her to continue to teach the kids obviously false history so I'm an izing over this primarily because I understand as an african-american man that whenever you talk to whites about racism or anything that's racially sensitive there's usually going to be a challenge this is what sociologist white sociologist Robyn D'Angelo calls white fragility she argues that in fact because whites have so little experience being challenged about their white privilege that whenever even the most my new challenge is brought before them they usually cry get angry or run and I have experienced them all and so when I was contemplating confronting his teacher I wasn't wasn't happy about it but I was like this is a necessary evil of being a black parent trying to raise self actualize black children so I called Elijah to me and I said Elijah I'm gonna tell your teacher you know I'm gonna set up an appointment your teacher and try and correct this and maybe your principal what do you think and Elijah said that I have a better idea and I said really what's your idea he said we have a public speaking assignment and why don't I use that public speaking assignment to talk about debunking the myths of Rosa Parks and I was like well well that is a good idea so Elijah goes to school he does his presentation he comes back home and I can see something positive happened I said well what happened son he said well later on in that day the teacher pulled me aside and she apologized to me for giving that misinformation and then something else miraculous happened the next day she actually taught a new lesson on Rosa Parks filling in the gaps that she had left and correcting the mistakes that she made and I was so so proud of my son but then I thought about it and I got angry and I got real angry why why would I get angry because my nine-year-old son had to educate his teacher about his history had you educate his teacher about his own humanity he's nine years old he should be thinking about basketball or soccer or write the latest movie he should not be thinking about having to take the responsibility of educating his teacher his his his students write about himself about his history that was the burden that I carry it was a bearing that my parents cared and generations before them caring and now I was seeing my son take on that burden too you see that's why Rosa Parks wrote her autobiography because during her lifetime if you can imagine you do this you you do this amazing thing you're alive and you're talking about this your civil rights activism and a story emerges in which somebody is telling the world that you were old and you had Tiger's feet and you just were an accidental activist not that you had been an activist by then for 20 years not that the boycott had been planned for months not that you were not even the first or the second or even the third woman to be arrested for doing that right you become an accidental activist even in our own lifetime so she wrote that autobiography to correct the record because what she wanted to remind people of was that this is what it was like in the 1950s trying to be black in America and fight for your rights during the year a little over a year that the boycott lasted there were over four Church bombings Martin Luther King's house was bombed twice other civil rights leaders houses were bombed in Birmingham Rosa Parks husband slept at night with a shotgun because they would get constant death threats in fact Rosa Parks mother lived with them and sometimes she would stay on the phone for hours so that somebody'd so that nobody would call in with death threats because it was constant and persistent in fact there was so much tension there was so much pressure there was so much terrorism that Rosa Parks and her husband they lost their jobs and they became unemployable and eventually had to leave and move out of the south this is a civil rights reality that Rosa Parks wanted to make sure that people understood so you say well well David what does that have to do with me I'm a well-meaning person I didn't know in slaves you know I'm not trying to whitewash history I'm a good guy I'm a good person let me tell you what it has to do with you and I'll tell it to you by telling you a story about a professor of mine white professor when I was in graduate school who was brilliant brilliant individual we'll call him Fred and Fred was writing this history of the civil rights movement but he was writing specifically about a moment that happened to him in North Carolina when this white man shot this black man in cold blood in a wide-open space and was never convicted and so it was this great book and he called together a couple of his professor friends and he called me to have to read a draft of it before final submission and I was flattered that he called me I was only a graduate student then and I was kind of feeling you know feeling myself a little bit okay yeah I'm sitting around amongst intellectuals and I read the draft of the book and there's a moment in the book that struck me as being deeply problematic and so I said Fred as we were sitting around talking about this draft I said Fred I've got a real problem with this moment that you talk about you're made in your book and he said I could see Fred get a little you know a little tight as we say and he said what do you mean that was that's a great story I I that was a big you know it happened just like I said I said can I give you another scenario now what's the story it was 1968 Martin Luther King had just been assassinated his maid domestic we'll call her Maybelle was in the kitchen little Fred is 8 years old little Fred comes into the kitchen and Maybelle who he's all he's only seen as smiling and helpful and happy is bent over the sink and she's crying and she's sobbing inconsolably and little Fred comes over to her and says Maybelle what is wrong and maybe I'll turns and she says they killed him they killed our leader they killed Martin Luther King he's dead they are monsters and little Fred says it'll be okay Maybelle it'll be okay it'll be okay and she looked at him she's no it's not gonna be okay did you did you not hear what I just said they killed Martin Luther King and Fred son of a preacher it looks up at Maybelle and he says but Maybelle didn't Jesus died on the cross for our sins wasn't that a good outcome maybe this will be a good outcome maybe the death of Martin Luther King will lead to a good outcome and as Fred tells the story he says that maybe I'll put her hand over her mouth she reached down and she gave little Fred hug and didn't she reached into the ice box and took out a couple Pepsi's it gave him some Pepsi's and sent him on his way to play with the siblings and he said this was proof that even in the most harrowing times of race struggle that two people could come together across racial lines and find human commonality along the lines of love and affection and I said Fred that is some BS Fred was he said Fred was like what but I don't understand David I I'm really odd that that's that's the story I said friend let me ask you a question I said you were in North Carolina 1968 if maybe I would have went to her community you were eight years old what do you think the eight year old african-american children were calling her do you think they were calling her by her first name no they called her miss Maybelle or they called her miss Johnson or they called her Auntie Johnson they would have never dare call her by her first name because that would have been the height of disrespect and yet you were calling her by her first name every single day that she worked and you never thought about it I said let me ask you another question was Maybelle mary did she have children but what church did she go to what was her favorite dessert tread could not answer any of those questions I said Fred this story is not about Maybelle the story's about you I said this story made you feel good but this story is not about Maybelle the reality is what probably happened was Maybelle was crying which was not something she customarily did so she was letting her guard down and you came into the kitchen and you caught her at a weak moment where she was letting her guard down and see because you thought of yourself it's just like one of her children you didn't recognize that you were in fact the child of her employer and she found herself yelling at you and then she caught herself realizing that if I'm yelling at him and he goes back and he tells his dad or he tells mom I could lose my job and so she tempered herself and she ended up even though she needed consoling she ended up consoling you and sending you on your way perhaps so she could finish mourning in peace and Fred was stunned and he realized that he had actually misread that moment and see this is what they did to Rosa Parks because there's a lot easier to digest an old grandmother with tired feet who doesn't stand up because she wants to fight for any quality but because her feet and her bat are tired and she's worked all day she grandmother's old grandmothers are not scary but young radical black women who don't take any stuff from anybody are very scary who stand up to power and are willing to die for that those are not the kind of people that make us comfortable so you say what do you want me to do David I don't know what to do well what I would say to you is there was a time in which if you were Jewish you were not white if you were Italian you were not white if you were Irish you were not white in this country it took a while before the Irish the Jews and the Italians became white right there was a time in which you were other when you were the people on the outside Toni Morrison said if in order for you to be taller I have to be on my knees you have a serious problem she says white America has a serious serious problem to be honest I don't know if race relations will improve in America but I know that if they will improve we have to take these challenges on head-on the future of my children depend on it the future of my children's children depends on it and whether you know it or not the future of your children and your children's children depends on it too thank you [Applause]

Info

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 579,193

Rating: 4.7734246 out of 5

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Social Science, Big problems, Culture, Discrimination, History, Human Rights, Inequality, Politics, Progress, Race, Social Change, Social Interaction, Social Justice, Society, Sociology

Id: bb04xj7LS34

Channel Id: undefined

Length: 18min 27sec (1107 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 13 2018

Reddit Comments