tag:theconversation.com,2011:/ca/topics/racial-injustice-36219/articlesRacial injustice – The Conversation2024-02-11T13:51:40Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2207382024-02-11T13:51:40Z2024-02-11T13:51:40ZBlack Londoners of Canada: Digital mapping reveals Ontario’s Black history and challenges myths<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/573874/original/file-20240206-20-tawyco.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=285%2C457%2C1015%2C514&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Reproduction of a landscape drawing of London, Ont. (Canada West) in 1855. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Map & Data Centre/Western Libraries at Western University) </span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Aurelia Jones was a prominent member of the Black community in mid-19th century London, Ontario, Canada, and the spouse of Abel Bedford Jones, a Black entrepreneur and religious and political leader. </p>
<p>After A.B.’s death, Aurelia moved to Halifax, Nova Scotia. The archival traces of her life tell the story of a migration from one Black community with British and American affiliations to another with strong Caribbean influences.</p>
<p>As research associates on the <a href="https://news.westernu.ca/2023/02/formerly-enslaved-black-londoners-digital-archive">Black Londoners Project</a> at Western University, we are finding historical clues about people like Aurelia Jones and exploring the Black history of London, Ont., by using a digital mapping approach. This methodology helps to understand the movements of individual people and how these movements, in turn, reveal connections within communities and to other places. </p>
<p>Black migration to and from Canada is an ongoing process dating back to the <a href="https://ugapress.org/book/9780820329406/the-hanging-of-angelique/">17th century</a>. The migrations of Black individuals often reflect the geographic and cultural connections of Black communities across borders and further into the <a href="https://boydellandbrewer.com/9781580464536/the-african-diaspora/">African diaspora</a>. </p>
<h2>Black geographies, Canadian myths</h2>
<p>Scholars such as <a href="https://btlbooks.com/book/black-geographies-and-the-politics-of-place">Katherine McKittrick</a>, <a href="https://www.queensu.ca/gnds/people/katherine-mckittrick">professor and Canada research chair in Black Studies</a>, have highlighted how understanding Black history means being attentive to how <a href="https://guides.lib.berkeley.edu/blackgeographies/gettingstarted">geography, culture and race intersect</a> in the formation of Black communities.</p>
<p>Such considerations challenge persistent myths of Canada’s past. For example, Black Canadian historian <a href="https://www.barringtonwalker.com/">Barrington Walker</a> has argued there is a <a href="https://www.osgoodesociety.ca/book/the-african-canadian-legal-odyssey-historical-essays/">“deep psychic and emotional attachment to the idea of Canada as a refuge and a haven from U.S. slavery and racial injustice.</a>” </p>
<p>The promise of freedom on British soil <a>creates a moral binary between the United States and Canada</a> that obscures <a href="https://theconversation.com/ancestry-ad-gets-it-wrong-canada-was-never-slave-free-116051">the history of slavery in Canada</a>.</p>
<p>Further, the idea that African American refugees uniformly would become loyal British subjects misrepresents the enduring connections between Black Canadians and other parts of the <a href="https://libguides.northwestern.edu/AfricanDiaspora">African diaspora</a>. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/meet-the-black-snowshoers-who-walked-1-000-kilometres-across-canada-in-1813-126977">Meet the Black snowshoers who walked 1,000 kilometres across Canada in 1813</a>
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<p>Shifting the focus from nationalist discourse to migrations among Black communities helps us better understand everyday Black life. </p>
<h2>Digital Black history projects</h2>
<p>The Black Londoners Project approaches Black history geographically by supplementing the narratives of 16 Black refugees from slavery and racial oppression in the U.S. with archival evidence (among others, personal narratives, census information and newspaper articles) of their lives in London, Ont. </p>
<p>The project aims to form a map of Black spaces in London, and to trace the connection diverse African diasporas have to the city. Digital tools then visualize how Black communities shaped each other and Canadian society at large. </p>
<p>Users of our online site will be able to read biographical entries with digitized archival materials and to browse digital maps of Black historical sites in London. The website will also connect with other digital Black Canadian History projects: </p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://www.blackpeopleshistory.ca/">A Black People’s History of Canada</a> aims to address and rectify the absences of Black Canadian history in school curricula. The project is headed by <a href="https://afuacooper.com/">Afua Cooper</a>, professor in the department of sociology and social anthropology at Dalhousie University; </li>
</ul>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZBDvF9DCq9c?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Afua Cooper speaks about ‘A Black People’s History of Canada.’</span></figcaption>
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<ul>
<li><p><a href="https://www.blackpress.huronresearch.ca/">The Black Press in 19th-century Canada and Beyond</a> explores the history of journalism as intellectual activism in Black Canadian and international history. It is led by <a href="https://ccie.educ.ubc.ca/boulou-ebanda-de-bberi/">Boulou Ebanda de B'béri</a>, research director and professor in the department of communication at University of Ottawa, and <a href="https://huronatwestern.ca/profiles/faculty/nina-reid-maroney-phd/">Nina Reid-Maroney</a>, history professor at Huron University College; </p></li>
<li><p><a href="https://mobaprojects.ca/">Mapping Ontario’s Black Archives</a> presents a map of museums and archives that house records of Black-centred histories and is led by <a href="https://www.drcherylthompson.com/">Cheryl Thompson</a>, associate professor of performance studies and director for the Laboratory for Black Creativity at Toronto Metropolitan University.</p></li>
</ul>
<h2>Black oral history, digital mapping</h2>
<p>Digital mapping of Black migrations allows us to centre Black historical presence in public memory and examine Black oral narratives outside of their abolitionist framing. The teacher and white abolitionist, Benjamin Drew, published narratives of Black refugees in Ontario in his 1856 anti-slavery report, <a href="https://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/drew/drew.html"><em>The Refugee; or, A North-Side View of Slavery</em></a>. A primary narrative of A.B. Jones comes from Drew’s report. </p>
<p>A.B. Jones told Drew about his desires for liberty in Canada, stating: “I wished then to emigrate to some place where I could be really a FREE MAN … therefore, I came here, and am only sorry to say that I did not come years before I did.” The passing of the <a href="https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/fugitive-slave-act-of-1850#:%7E:text=The%20Fugitive%20Slave%20Act%20of,in%20the%20South%20once%20captured.">Fugitive Slave Act in 1850</a> in the U.S. led to much Black migration across the border. </p>
<p>However, the attitude of many Black Canadians toward the potential of equality in Canada <a href="https://www.mqup.ca/black-american-missionary-in-canada--a-products-9780228014478.php">would change after the 1850s</a> as, for example, <a href="https://theconversation.com/black-history-how-racism-in-ontario-schools-today-is-connected-to-a-history-of-segregation-147633">access to education became increasingly segregated</a>.</p>
<p>Many would move <a href="https://utorontopress.com/9781487529178/unsettling-the-great-white-north/">within Canada, to the U.S. and other places</a> in search of support from and community with the African diaspora.</p>
<h2>Aurelia Jones</h2>
<p>Through A. B. Jones’s account, we learned of his spouse, Aurelia Jones (née Bonsor), in the marriage register of Upper Canada/Canada West. Following A. B.’s death around 1860, there are few records of Aurelia living in London. </p>
<p>Aurelia’s case shows how peripheral Black women are in the archive. In the words of African American Studies professor Ula Taylor, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1353/JOWH.2008.0010">“the clues to their experiences are limited, heavily tainted, or virtually nonexistent</a>.” A public record of Aurelia exists because of her husband: after she inherited his property, she appears as “Mrs. A.B. Jones” in tax records. </p>
<p>However, Aurelia reappears in <a href="https://www.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.8_01136_2/212">Hutchinson’s Nova Scotia Directory of 1867</a> and in the <a href="https://www.bac-lac.gc.ca/eng/census/1881/Pages/item.aspx?itemid=617606">1881 Canada census for Nova Scotia</a>, living in Halifax. There, Aurelia lived on Creighton Street with a Black couple from Antigua and Jamaica. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Drawing showing a waterfront with boats and what appears to be log-constructed cabins." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=291&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=291&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=291&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=365&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=365&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/574244/original/file-20240207-26-ojnwih.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=365&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">View of the city of Halifax, N.S., 1860, from Harper’s Weekly, Aug. 11, 1860.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015006963360">(HathiTrust)</a></span>
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<p>Nova Scotia’s Black communities emerged from layers of migration; for example, <a href="https://broadviewpress.com/product/black-slavery-in-the-maritimes/#tab-description">Black Loyalists</a> arrived during the American Revolutionary War (1775-83), and African Caribbean peoples came looking for work in the 19th and 20th centuries. Creighton Street was a centre of Black Haligonian life well into the 20th century.</p>
<h2>Migrations, diasporic connections</h2>
<p>As researchers, we explore circumstances behind Aurelia’s migration to Halifax. </p>
<p>What potential factors led her to leave London? How did she meet her Halifax roommates? Had she established a social network with Black peoples from inside and outside Canada? These questions have remained unanswered because of her erasure and the lack of historical documentation on the lives of Black Canadian women from the 19th century. </p>
<p>Tracing out these intersections of Black communities leads us to visualize history in a way that acknowledges, in the words of <a href="https://arts-sciences.buffalo.edu/africana-and-american-studies/faculty/faculty-directory/walcott-rinaldo.html">Africana and American studies professor</a> Rinaldo Walcott, how Black people <a href="https://www.indigo.ca/en-ca/black-like-who-20th-anniversary-edition/9781554832071.html">“redraw and rechart the places/spaces that they occupy</a>.” </p>
<p>The Black documentary filmmaker Dawn Porter <a href="https://www.rd.com/article/why-black-history-month-shouldnt-be-a-single-month/">recently called for the need to expand public awareness of Black history beyond the shortest month of the year</a>. We recognize the irony in writing this piece during Black History Month. </p>
<p>For Black communities as well as activists and scholars, remembering Black history happens every day of the year. Visualizing Black geography asks us to think of more permanent, transnational ways of commemorating Black history and honouring lives like that of Aurelia Jones.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220738/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Elizabeth Hinds-Hueglin works for Dr. Miranda Green-Barteet and Dr. Alyssa MacLean's Black Londoners Project at Western University. The Black Londoners Project receives funding from Western's Strategic Priorities Fund. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Mitterauer works for Dr. Miranda Green-Barteet and Dr. Alyssa MacLean's Black Londoners Project at Western University. The Black Londoners Project receives funding from Western's Strategic Priorities Fund.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Patrick Kinghan works for Dr. Miranda Green-Barteet and Dr. Alyssa MacLean's Black Londoners Project at Western University. The Black Londoners Project receives funding from Western's Strategic Priorities Fund.</span></em></p>The Black Londoners Project approaches Black history geographically by supplementing narratives of 16 Black individuals with archival evidence about their lives.Elizabeth Hinds-Hueglin, Research Associate in English and Writing Studies, Western UniversityDavid Mitterauer, PhD Candidate, English, and Research Assistant, Western UniversityPatrick Kinghan, PhD Candidate, Faculty of Education and Research Assistant, Western UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1721222022-04-05T12:28:49Z2022-04-05T12:28:49ZPeople are more likely to react to a Black person’s story of injustice – even if it happened to someone who is white<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/443837/original/file-20220201-13-9g6jya.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=49%2C58%2C2946%2C1931&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Black people are seen as more credible speaking on issues of racial injustice. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/saint-louis-university-student-jonathan-pulphus-speaks-to-news-photo/457212058?adppopup=true">Scott Olson/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/research-brief-83231">Research Brief</a> is a short take about interesting academic work.</em></p>
<h2>The big idea</h2>
<p>People appear more willing to boycott a retailer in response to a video message about a consumer’s experience of injustice while shopping when the narrator is Black, even when the source of the actual information is from a white person, according to research I conducted with several colleagues that’s currently under peer review.</p>
<p>We wanted to observe whether and how the race of the person telling a story of racial injustice affects the reaction of their audience. So we conducted three studies that manipulated details about the race of the storyteller and victim to isolate the role the storyteller’s race plays. </p>
<p>In the first study, we recruited 370 white male participants using a crowdsourced academic research panel. We asked them to watch a video in which a professional male actor portraying a consumer describes shopping in a store with his family and being unfairly suspected of shoplifting.</p>
<p>Half the participants heard the story from a white man, the rest from a Black person – who was seen as more credible on the issue in an earlier test. </p>
<p>But after finishing the story, the man reveals that the actual source of the tale was his friend Jay, who was reluctant to speak out. A picture of him is displayed on the screen. At random, some participants see a Black man, others see a white man. Others weren’t given this information, as a control condition. </p>
<p>Participants were then told that the speaker in the message is organizing a boycott and asked how willing they’d be to support it.</p>
<p>We found that people were most likely to support taking strong punitive actions against the retailer if the initial source of the information was Black, even when he reveals the incident happened to his white friend. But if the storyteller was white, there was significantly less support for a boycott – though that changed if the incident happened to a Black friend.</p>
<p>To better understand what is going on here, we conducted a second study, this time with 301 white men. The setup was the same except we didn’t use a control and asked more follow-ups. In particular, we asked participants to rank how morally outraged they were about the story – a process that <a href="https://www.doi.org/10.1007/s10551-014-2487-y">has been explored in the literature</a> on consumer ethics and morality.</p>
<p>We confirmed our earlier results and also found that the Black source causes more moral outrage - a negative moral emotional reaction to unethical behavior. In other words, the Black storyteller was more effective at causing perceptions of injustice, which subsequently reduced their likelihood of altering their initial judgment in response to new information.</p>
<p>A third study, involving 300 white men and women, replicated the study but revealed the true source of the story of racial injustice at the beginning of the video. The impact was that participants were less likely to support punitive action if they learned at the outset that the actual source was white, even if the storyteller was Black. </p>
<h2>Why it matters</h2>
<p>More and more research on the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797617714579">persistence of misinformation</a> shows that people often do not update their beliefs formed in response to a message in light of new information. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1529100612451018">This past research</a> focuses on the enduring influence of message content. </p>
<p>Our research suggests that source-related judgments can exert similar enduring influence. For policymakers and others trying to share information with the public, this shows the importance of who they choose as the source of the message – such as a well-known <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/masonbissada/2022/01/27/evangeline-lilly-is-the-latest-celebrity-to-rail-against-covid-vaccines-or-mandates/?sh=2a7687056363">celebrity to combat vaccine misinformation</a>. For the rest of us, it helps to recognize this bias and pay attention to the source of a message – whether it’s in a television ad or in a tweet – and consider the message separate from the source.</p>
<h2>What’s next</h2>
<p>We would like to test how revealing source demographic information at the end of a message exerts influence in other contexts, such as sexual harassment. We also plan to move beyond intention measures to examine influence on participants’ actual behavior.</p>
<p>[<em>Over 140,000 readers rely on The Conversation’s newsletters to understand the world.</em> <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?source=inline-140ksignup">Sign up today</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/172122/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Anne Hamby does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>People may be more willing to boycott a retailer over an act of injustice that takes place at the store if the source of the story was Black – even if the incident happened to a white person.Anne Hamby, Assistant Professor of Marketing, Boise State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1695192021-10-21T14:38:01Z2021-10-21T14:38:01ZWhat if Tom Brady took a knee instead of Colin Kaepernick?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/426736/original/file-20211015-25-fon2ty.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=26%2C10%2C3444%2C2305&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady celebrates after defeating the Kansas City Chiefs in the NFL Super Bowl 55 football game in February, 2021. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Ashley Landis)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The 2021-22 NFL season is underway and Colin Kaepernick is still out of a job. It’s been more than five years <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2020/06/01/colin-kaepernick-kneeling-history/">since he took a knee during the national anthem</a> and in so doing further exposed issues of systemic racism in the NFL. </p>
<p>I’ve been researching and writing about sport and media for several years and I frequently use Kaepernick’s case in my classes. To illuminate the gendered and racialized nature of that case and of the NFL, I ask a hypothetical question: what if Tom Brady took a knee?</p>
<p>Kaepernick’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/15/sports/nfl-colin-kaepernick-protests-timeline.html">story is now quite familiar</a>. In 2016 he began kneeling during the national anthem to protest police brutality and racial injustice in the United States. In what sports reporter Dave Zirin calls “<a href="https://www.pbs.org/wnet/amanpour-and-company/video/the-kaepernick-effect-how-taking-a-knee-began-a-movement-u6r/">the Kaepernick Effect</a>,” this gesture spurred a movement across different sports.</p>
<p>For the NFL, Kaepernick’s gesture created <a href="https://thesportjournal.org/article/how-the-nfl-responded-to-the-colin-kaepernick-protests-in-2016-2017-and-how-the-league-responded-to-athlete-protests-during-the-black-lives-matter-movement-of-2020-a-sport-study-social-phenomenologi/">a public relations nightmare</a>. </p>
<p>Following the death of George Floyd and swell of the Black Lives Matter movement, the NFL was forced to make public displays in support of inclusivity, which included “allowing” players to post social justice messages such as “End Racism” or “Stop Hate” <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/05/sports/nfl-social-justice.html">on their helmets</a>. </p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/i-dont-have-an-ounce-of-racism-in-me-jon-gruden-and-the-nfls-whiteness-problem-169806">'I don't have an ounce of racism in me': Jon Gruden and the NFL's whiteness problem</a>
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<p>Whether or not the Kaepernick Effect has lead to any meaningful change in the NFL is up for debate, though the recent controversy surrounding <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/12/sports/football/nfl-jon-gruden-emails.html">Jon Gruden</a> would suggest not. But for all its apparent nods to inclusivity and ending racism, Kaepernick has yet to be re-signed to an NFL team.</p>
<h2>A vitriolic response to protest</h2>
<p>Kaepernick was clear in his <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/video/sports/football/100000004643947/kaepernick-explains-his-protest.html">communications with media</a> that his protest was about police brutality and racial discrimination — he was simply calling attention to well-documented facts. </p>
<p>Yet the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/sep/22/donald-trump-nfl-national-anthem-protests">response to his kneeling quickly turned ugly</a> with fans, team owners, media personnel and then-President Donald Trump calling him un-American and unpatriotic. Several went so far as to call him a traitor. The disconnect between what Kaepernick meant and how his detractors interpreted his protest is remarkable. </p>
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<img alt="Former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick kneels during the national anthem." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/426746/original/file-20211015-57123-wyokf3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/426746/original/file-20211015-57123-wyokf3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=455&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426746/original/file-20211015-57123-wyokf3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=455&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426746/original/file-20211015-57123-wyokf3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=455&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426746/original/file-20211015-57123-wyokf3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=572&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426746/original/file-20211015-57123-wyokf3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=572&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426746/original/file-20211015-57123-wyokf3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=572&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (7) and outside linebacker Eli Harold (58) kneel during the playing of the national anthem before an NFL football game against the Atlanta Falcons in Atlanta.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/John Bazemore)</span></span>
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<p>The backlash to Kaepernick’s protest is most obviously <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2017/8/6/blackballing-kaepernick-fear-of-the-black-athlete">tied to the fact he is Black</a>. But to understand the peculiar level of vitriol in response to the protest it’s important to understand the NFL and its underlying myths. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.1975.tb00552.x">In a highly influential 1975 essay</a>, communications scholar Michael Real described the sport as “American ideology collectively celebrated.” </p>
<p>He identified football as an aggressive, militaristic, capitalistic enterprise that is both gendered and racialized. He concluded, “if one wanted to create from scratch a sport that reflected the sexual, racial and organizational priorities of American social structure, it is doubtful one could improve on football.” </p>
<p>Not much has changed since 1975.</p>
<p>Borrowing from sociology and anthropology, Real described the NFL as a mythic structure, one that was created from and helped to sustain the dominant social order in the U.S. </p>
<p>Myths function by appearing to be natural or normal. When faced with a challenge to a dominant myth, communities and societies often wilfully ignore concrete evidence in favour of sustaining belief in the existing social order. That’s what happened with Kaepernick.</p>
<h2>Challenging the myth of American exceptionalism</h2>
<p>Kaepernick’s protest called attention to <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2011/10/11/the-myth-of-american-exceptionalism/">the myth of American exceptionalism</a> in a space that is built upon and demands allegiance to that myth. </p>
<p>His protest called attention to police brutality and racial injustice but also challenged the myth that the U.S. is a free and fair country where anyone can succeed through hard work and determination. In refusing to “shut up and play,” he called attention to the deep-seated racial tension that is baked into the DNA of the NFL and the U.S.</p>
<p>In response to this challenge, fans, players, owners and others had to either acknowledge the structural problems of their game and nation or find another avenue to keep the myth intact. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A mural to honour George Floyd and former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick are plastered on a building." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/426754/original/file-20211015-16-eleo7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/426754/original/file-20211015-16-eleo7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426754/original/file-20211015-16-eleo7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426754/original/file-20211015-16-eleo7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=388&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426754/original/file-20211015-16-eleo7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426754/original/file-20211015-16-eleo7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/426754/original/file-20211015-16-eleo7q.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=488&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A pedestrian passes murals to honour George Floyd and former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/David Zalubowski)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What if Tom Brady took a knee?</h2>
<p>What if it was Brady and not Kaepernick that began the movement in 2016? The absurdity of the question is also what makes it so revealing. </p>
<p>It would be impossible for Tom Brady to take a knee — it would run counter to every other facet of his public persona. Where Kaepernick — as someone who is Black — was described as a traitor disrespecting his flag and country, Brady is quintessentially all-American: white, male, heterosexual, fit, attractive, married to a supermodel, family-man, tremendously wealthy, law-abiding, apolitical (or at least uncritical), multiple championship winner and future Hall-of-Famer. In short, he is a winner. </p>
<p>Brady taking a knee is counter to both the man and the league. Nonetheless, had he done so, he would have been received much more favourably — it would have been relatively easy for football’s mythic structure to absorb Brady taking a knee and remain intact. </p>
<p>The impact of the protest on the myth would have been outweighed by the magnitude of Brady’s American-ness. It would have been too costly (literally and figuratively) to purge Brady from the league as has been done with Kaepernick. And to do so would have acknowledged the racial and gendered hierarchy in America’s social structure — the exact forces central to Brady’s and the NFL’s success.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/169519/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jonathan Finn does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Brady taking a knee is counter to both the man and the league. Nonetheless, had he done so, he would have been received much more favourably.Jonathan Finn, Professor of Communication Studies, Wilfrid Laurier UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1458942020-09-24T12:20:44Z2020-09-24T12:20:44ZMicroaggressions aren’t just innocent blunders – research links them with racial bias<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359571/original/file-20200923-18-17p6oh1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=630%2C0%2C4682%2C3741&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">They're not just honest or ignorant mistakes, and they can poison an otherwise pleasant interaction.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/friends-eating-at-table-during-bbq-with-family-royalty-free-image/1014547242">Hinterhaus Productions/DigitalVision via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A white man shares publicly that a group of Black Harvard graduates “<a href="https://medium.com/@pooja.salhotra27/no-racist-comment-deserves-tolerance-e8a416c681eb">look like gang members to me</a>” and claims he would have said the same of white people dressed similarly. A white physician <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/11/health/microaggression-medicine-doctors.html">mistakes a Black physician for a janitor</a> and says it was an honest mistake. A white woman asks to touch a Black classmate’s hair, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLQzz75yE5A">is scolded for doing so</a> and sulks, “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OItfXaBoCb4">I was just curious</a>.”</p>
<p>It’s a pattern that recurs countless times, in myriad interactions and contexts, across American society. A white person says something that is experienced as racially biased, is called on it and reacts defensively.</p>
<p>These comments and other such subtle <a href="https://theconversation.com/many-small-microaggressions-add-up-to-something-big-50694">snubs, insults and offenses</a> are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.62.4.271">known as microaggressions</a>. The concept, <a href="https://www.scribd.com/doc/170642574/Offensive-Mechanisms-Chester-Pierce">introduced in the 1970s</a> by Black psychiatrist Chester Pierce, is now the focus of a fierce debate.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359574/original/file-20200923-14-12rnumx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="young Black woman with her hand up" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359574/original/file-20200923-14-12rnumx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359574/original/file-20200923-14-12rnumx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359574/original/file-20200923-14-12rnumx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359574/original/file-20200923-14-12rnumx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359574/original/file-20200923-14-12rnumx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=537&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359574/original/file-20200923-14-12rnumx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=537&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359574/original/file-20200923-14-12rnumx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=537&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Most research has focused on the harms done to those on the receiving end of microaggressions.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/mom-and-daughter-arguing-royalty-free-image/1032210076">SDI Productions/E+ via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>On one side, Black people and a host of others representing multiple diverse communities stand with a wealth of testimonials, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.62.4.271">lists of different types of microaggressions</a> and compelling scientific evidence documenting <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000172">how these experiences harm</a> recipients.</p>
<p>Some white people are on board, working to understand, change and join as allies. Still, a cacophony of white voices exists in the public discourse, dismissive, defensive and influential. Their main argument: Microaggressions are innocuous and innocent, not associated with racism at all. Many contend that those who complain about microaggressions are <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/09/the-rise-of-victimhood-culture/404794/">manipulating victimhood and being too sensitive</a>.</p>
<h2>Linking bias to microaggressions</h2>
<p>Until recently, the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s12552-013-9107-9">majority of research on microaggressions</a> has focused on asking people targeted by microaggressions about their experiences and perspectives, rather than researching the offenders. This previous research is crucial. But with respect to understanding white defensiveness and underlying racial bias, it’s akin to researching why baseball pitchers keep hitting batters with pitches by only interviewing batters about how it feels to get hit.</p>
<p>My colleagues <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=2AwIThUAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">and I</a> – a team of Black, white (myself included) and other psychological scientists and students – went directly to the “pitchers” to untangle the relationship between these expressions and racial bias. </p>
<p>We asked white college students in 2020 – <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s12552-020-09298-w">one group at a university in the Northwest</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s12552-017-9214-0">another at a campus in the southern Midwest</a> – how likely they are to commit 94 commonly described microaggressions that we identified from <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/0003-066X.62.4.271">research publications</a> and Black students we interviewed. For example, you are meeting a Black woman with braids; how likely are you to ask, “Can I touch your hair?” </p>
<p>We also asked our participants to describe their own racial bias using well-known measures. Then, we asked some participants to come to our laboratory to talk about current events with others. Lab observers rated how many explicitly racially biased statements they made in their interactions.</p>
<p>We found direct support for what recipients of microaggressions have been saying all along: Students who are more likely to say they commit microaggressions are more likely to score higher on measures of racial bias. One’s likelihood of microaggressing also predicts how racist one is judged to be by lab observers, as they watch real interactions unfold. We’re currently analyzing the same kind of data from a national sample of adults, and the results look similar.</p>
<p>With some microaggressions, like “Can I touch your hair?,” the influence of racial bias is real but small. When the white woman who asked to touch the Black woman’s hair responds, “I was just curious,” she’s not necessarily lying about her conscious intentions. She likely is unaware of the subtle racial bias that also influences her behavior. One can demonstrate racial bias and curiosity at the same time.</p>
<p>Even small doses of prejudice, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1368430212468170">especially when they are confusing or ambiguous</a>, are documented to be psychologically harmful for recipients. Our research suggests that some microaggressions, such as asking “Where are you from?” or staying silent during a debate about racism, may be understood as small doses of racial bias, contaminating otherwise good intentions.</p>
<p>In our studies, other kinds of microaggressions, including those that explicitly deny racism, are strongly and explicitly related to white participants’ self-reported levels of racial bias. For instance, the more racial bias a participant says they have, the more likely they are to say, “All lives matter, not just Black lives.” These expressions are more than small doses of toxin. Still, even in these cases, racial bias does not explain all of it, leaving ample room for defensiveness and claims that the recipient is being too sensitive.</p>
<p>In our research, participants who agreed with the statement “A lot of minorities are too sensitive these days” showed some of the highest levels of racial bias.</p>
<h2>Addressing microaggressions in context</h2>
<p>Amidst chronic and widespread racial injustices, including <a href="https://www.epi.org/publication/the-color-of-law-a-forgotten-history-of-how-our-government-segregated-america/">segregated neighborhoods</a>, <a href="https://www.kff.org/racial-equity-and-health-policy/issue-brief/disparities-in-health-and-health-care-five-key-questions-and-answers/#:%7E:text=A%20%E2%80%9Chealth%20disparity%E2%80%9D%20refers%20to,care%2C%20and%20quality%20of%20care">disparities in health care outcomes</a>, <a href="https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-statistics-dont-capture-the-full-extent-of-the-systemic-bias-in-policing/">systemic police bias</a> and <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/carlieporterfield/2020/06/25/white-supremacist-terrorism-on-the-rise-and-spreading/#e9040d55a0fb">rising white supremacist violence</a>, a chorus of Black and other voices also have been expressing pain and anger about the stream of subtle microaggressions they endure as part of daily life in the United States.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359577/original/file-20200923-20-19k8mdx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Black woman smiles in conversation with women of other races" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359577/original/file-20200923-20-19k8mdx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/359577/original/file-20200923-20-19k8mdx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359577/original/file-20200923-20-19k8mdx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359577/original/file-20200923-20-19k8mdx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359577/original/file-20200923-20-19k8mdx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359577/original/file-20200923-20-19k8mdx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/359577/original/file-20200923-20-19k8mdx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Those on the receiving end of microaggresions want perpetrators to acknowledge the problem.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/smiling-friends-in-discussion-before-holiday-dinner-royalty-free-image/640951000">Thomas Barwick/DigitalVision via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Consistent with our research, they generally are not insisting that offenders admit to being card-carrying racists. They are asking offenders, despite their conscious intentions, to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBMWkHHAkN8">understand and acknowledge the impacts</a> of their behavior. They are asking for understanding that those offended are <a href="https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/we-were-so-happy-microaggressions-and-where-they-happen/e/52110912">not imagining things or just being too sensitive</a>. Mostly, they are asking offenders to improve their awareness, stop engaging in behaviors that create and perpetuate race-based harm themselves and join in fighting against the rest of it.</p>
<p>As a clinical psychologist, I know that, even in the best of circumstances, true self-awareness and behavior change are hard work.</p>
<p>U.S. society provides far from the best of circumstances. At the nation’s birth, people found a way to celebrate democracy, freedom and equality while owning slaves and destroying Indigenous populations, and then found ways to <a href="https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674008199">erase many of these horrors from the nation’s collective memory</a>. Yet, as <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/1747259-the-price-of-the-ticket-collected-nonfiction-1948-1985">James Baldwin said of this history</a>, “We carry it within us, are unconsciously controlled by it in many ways, and history is literally present in all that we do.”</p>
<p>Science provides validation of the problem of microaggressions: <a href="https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000172">They are real, harmful</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s12552-020-09298-w">associated with racial bias</a>, whether the perpetrator is aware of it or not. Improving awareness of this bias is hard but important work. If Americans want to advance toward a more racially just society, identifying effective ways to reduce microaggressions will be necessary, and this research is just beginning.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/145894/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jonathan Kanter does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>White people are often defensive when they’re called out for these subtle snubs and insults. But researchers have found that microaggressions correlate with racial bias.Jonathan Kanter, Director of the Center for the Science of Social Connection, University of WashingtonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1447082020-09-10T11:47:07Z2020-09-10T11:47:07ZCommunity land trusts could help heal segregated cities<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/355598/original/file-20200831-22-1t2intn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=11%2C0%2C3882%2C2627&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Efforts to build wealth for Black Americans could focus on property ownership.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/resident-tiffany-jessup-poses-for-a-portrait-at-savannah-news-photo/1173047316">Matt McClain/The Washington Post via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>American cities represent part of the nation’s long and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/06/24/magazine/reparations-slavery.html">grim history of discrimination and oppression</a> against Black people. They can also be part of the recovery from all that harm.</p>
<p>Some cities’ work can be symbolically important, such as removing public monuments that honor oppression. But as professors of <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=HSr3W8AAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">urban sustainability</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=aSSRcJkAAAAJ">community development</a> at Arizona State University, we see that <a href="https://www.worldcat.org/title/toward-sustainable-communities-solutions-for-citizens-and-their-governments/oclc/782101048">cities can do much more</a> to address inequality, starting with an area that was key to past discrimination: how land is used.</p>
<p>Zoning rules, including requirements that prohibit duplexes or anything other than <a href="https://www.shareable.net/zoned-apart-how-the-us-failed-to-share-land-but-should-start-today/">single-family homes on residential lots</a>, have helped maintain class and racial segregation. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0096144203029004002">Lending practices</a> like <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0096144203029004002">redlining</a> that discriminate mostly against people of color in specific urban neighborhoods have <a href="https://upittpress.org/books/9780822959397/">entrenched poverty and inequality</a> in U.S. cities. </p>
<p>One result is that the average Black family with children in the U.S. has just <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F2378023120916616">one cent of wealth for every dollar</a> held by the average white family with children.</p>
<p>Some calls to resolve these inequalities have <a href="https://centerforneweconomics.org/publications/proposal-for-a-black-commons/">raised an idea</a> with century-old roots: community land trusts to assemble land for the <a href="https://theconversation.com/land-loss-has-plagued-black-america-since-emancipation-is-it-time-to-look-again-at-black-commons-and-collective-ownership-140514">benefit of Black Americans</a>.</p>
<h2>Cities consider compensation</h2>
<p>Some cities are already looking at ways to promote racial equality. In July, the Asheville, North Carolina, city council <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/live-updates-protests-for-racial-justice/2020/07/15/891700076/asheville-n-c-approves-steps-toward-reparations-for-black-residents">unanimously passed</a> a resolution directing the city manager “to <a href="https://www.scribd.com/document/468725433/Reparations-for-Black-Asheville">boost economic mobility and opportunity</a> in the Black community.”</p>
<p>Also in July, the <a href="https://www.providenceri.gov/mayor-jorge-elorza-announces-truth-telling-reconciliation-municipal-reparations-process/">mayor of Providence, Rhode Island</a> issued an executive order “<a href="https://www.providenceri.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/Mayors-Executive-Order-2020-13-1.pdf">committing the City to a process of truth, reconciliation and municipal reparations</a> for Black, Indigenous (Indian) People, and People of Color in Providence.”</p>
<p>To carry out these lofty goals, they could take a page from history.</p>
<h2>A new kind of land ownership</h2>
<p>In the 1960s, civil rights organizers recognized that denying property rights was a key method of reinforcing white supremacy in the U.S., blocking people from putting down roots in a community, limiting their political power as well as wealth.</p>
<p>They devised a system called a “<a href="http://cltroots.org">community land trust</a>” as a way for <a href="https://community-wealth.org/strategies/panel/clts/index.html">African American farmers to work rural land</a> for their own benefit. This was in stark contrast to the sharecropping system prevalent after the Civil War, where black families would rent small plots of land, or shares, to work themselves and in return give a <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/sharecropping">portion of their crop to the landowner</a> at the end of the year. </p>
<p>The first community land trust in rural Georgia in 1970 was established on land purchased by a small group of individuals with some federal grant assistance and became <a href="https://www.newcommunitiesinc.com/about.html">the largest single piece of land in the country owned by African Americans</a>, who got to keep all the proceeds from their labor. Although the trust, <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-29/alternative-homeownership-land-trusts-and-co-ops">New Communities Inc.</a>, was beset by drought and discrimination from the start and was forced to close by the late 1980s, it helped inspire people to create similar organizations across the country.</p>
<p>Community land trusts today are more often focused on housing. They are <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-29/alternative-homeownership-land-trusts-and-co-ops">community-run, nonprofit landholding organizations</a> that aim to help low-income buyers obtain homes. Trust land can be purchased or donated. The model allows community ownership of the land with individual ownership of houses. </p>
<p>With this model, a buyer can get into a home for less money than elsewhere in the local market, because they aren’t paying for the land – just the building. This makes homes more affordable, especially for low-income families who often can get down-payment assistance and low-interest mortgages from the trust as well. </p>
<p>The residents, who become members of the trust, elect board members to govern the organization and guide its development and investments to meet community needs and priorities.</p>
<p>Community land trusts are a form of <a href="http://www.smallhousingbc.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/PAH-report_final.pdf">permanently affordable housing</a> based on <a href="https://groundedsolutions.org/shared-equity-housing-numbers">shared equity</a>. The trust retains ownership of the land and maintains it for the benefit of homeowners present and future and the community as a whole. The homeowner leases the land but owns the building and pays for improvements. </p>
<p>The land lease sets out terms for any future sale of the property, letting the homeowner build equity through appreciation in value, while <a href="https://www.houstonclt.org/">ensuring the home remains affordable for future limited-income buyers</a>. This sort of shared-equity model may not appeal to people who can afford open-market housing. But for those otherwise priced out of the housing market, it is an opportunity to build equity and wealth, and establish credit and financial stability.</p>
<p>These <a href="https://housingmatters.urban.org/articles/three-ways-community-land-trusts-support-renters">trusts also serve renters</a> by providing long-term leases with limits on rent prices, as well as by investing in housing in communities where others won’t. They also can give a more formal voice to tenants, who otherwise are often ignored by local officials.</p>
<p>There are now between 225 and 280 community land trusts in the U.S., which together have <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-29/alternative-homeownership-land-trusts-and-co-ops">around 15,000 home ownership units and 20,000 rental units</a>. </p>
<p>To encourage more of this type of development, <a href="https://citylimits.org/2017/12/20/council-to-vote-on-key-housing-bills-at-busy-last-meeting/">New York City passed a bill</a> in 2017 exempting community land trusts from certain taxes. <a href="https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/City-plan-to-expand-affordable-housing-will-rely-13656027.php">Houston</a> in 2019 announced a plan to use a <a href="https://www.houstonclt.org/">community land trust</a> to develop 1,000 affordable units.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/355603/original/file-20200831-16-1bec9e9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Seattle's Fire Station 6" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/355603/original/file-20200831-16-1bec9e9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/355603/original/file-20200831-16-1bec9e9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/355603/original/file-20200831-16-1bec9e9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/355603/original/file-20200831-16-1bec9e9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/355603/original/file-20200831-16-1bec9e9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/355603/original/file-20200831-16-1bec9e9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/355603/original/file-20200831-16-1bec9e9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This decommissioned fire station in central Seattle is slated to be turned over to a community land trust to benefit people of African descent in the area.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://frontporch.seattle.gov/2020/06/12/city-of-seattle-will-transfer-fire-station-6-to-community/">Joe Mabel/City of Seattle</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A history of working together</h2>
<p>Local governments have formed several kinds of partnerships with community land trusts. In June, the city of Seattle announced it would transfer a decommissioned fire station to the Africatown Community Land Trust, saying “<a href="https://frontporch.seattle.gov/2020/06/12/city-of-seattle-will-transfer-fire-station-6-to-community/">we understand the urgency behind making bold investments in the Black community</a> and increasing community ownership of land.” Community members hope the site will play a key role in a <a href="http://www.seattle.gov/Documents/Departments/OPCD/OngoingInitiatives/SeattlesComprehensivePlan/EDIImpPlan042916final.pdf">city development plan that highlights Black entrepreneurs</a>. It’s one of several proposals in the region for <a href="https://www.kingcountyequitynow.com">Black-led community organizations to acquire underutilized public property</a>.</p>
<p>Cities have also used municipal zoning powers to require larger developers to donate a portion of new development to community land trusts or related entities such as <a href="https://www.localhousingsolutions.org/act/housing-policy-library/housing-trust-funds-overview/housing-trust-funds/">housing trust funds</a> for permanently affordable housing.</p>
<p>Partnerships between cities and community land trusts are a promising way to provide affordable housing and help low-income and minority families. As cities reflect on their roles in perpetuating institutional racism and what they can do to relieve it, they can use their zoning laws and negotiating power to support community land trusts, as one way to keep housing affordable and benefit minority communities.</p>
<p>[<em>The Conversation’s science, health and technology editors pick their favorite stories.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/science-editors-picks-71/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=science-favorite">Weekly on Wednesdays</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/144708/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mark Roseland has received funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), Canada. He is affiliated with the American Planning Association, the Canadian Institute of Planners, and RAIL Community Development Corporation in Mesa, Arizona. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher Boone receives funding from the US National Science Foundation and the Wells Fargo Foundation. He is affiliated with the Global Consortium for Science and the Environment and the Alliance of Sustainability and Environmental Academic Leaders. </span></em></p>Some calls to resolve racial inequities in the US have raised an idea with roots more than a century old: community land trusts to assemble property for the benefit of Black Americans.Mark Roseland, Professor of Community Resources and Development, Arizona State UniversityChristopher Boone, Dean and Professor of Sustainability, Arizona State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1394302020-06-10T18:54:35Z2020-06-10T18:54:35ZCOVID-19 is deadlier for black Brazilians, a legacy of structural racism that dates back to slavery<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340716/original/file-20200609-21230-1ojep5e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C16%2C3741%2C2469&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Protesters in São Paulo declare 'Black Lives Matter' at a June 7 protest spurred by both U.S. anti-racist protests and the coronavirus's heavy toll on black Brazilians. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/protestors-hold-a-banner-during-a-protest-against-brazilian-news-photo/1218336349?adppopup=true">Marcello Zambrana/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The United States and Brazil have much in common when it comes to the coronavirus. </p>
<p>Both are among the world’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/world/americas/brazil-coronavirus-cases.html">hardest-hit countries</a>, where hundreds die daily. Their like-minded presidents, Donald Trump and Jair Bolsonaro, have both been <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2020/3/14/21177509/coronavirus-trump-covid-19-pandemic-response">widely criticized</a> for their <a href="https://theconversation.com/brazil-jair-bolsonaros-strategy-of-chaos-hinders-coronavirus-response-136590">poor handling</a> of the pandemic. </p>
<p>And in both countries the virus is <a href="https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/race/news/2020/03/27/482337/coronavirus-compounds-inequality-endangers-communities-color/">disproportionately affecting black people</a>, the result of structural racism that dates back to slavery. </p>
<h2>Legacy of slavery</h2>
<p>Brazil forcibly brought some 4 million enslaved Africans into the country over three centuries, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-30413525">more than anywhere else in the Americas</a>. About <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-15766840">half its 209 million people are black</a> – the world’s second largest African-descendant population after Nigeria. </p>
<p>Modern Brazil never had legalized racial discrimination like Jim Crow, but race-based inequalities are deeply entrenched. Despite a <a href="https://theconversation.com/assassination-in-brazil-unmasks-the-deadly-racism-of-a-country-that-would-rather-ignore-it-94389">persistent myth</a> of Brazil as an integrated “racial democracy,” <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3863696/">employment discrimination and residential segregation</a> limit opportunity for black people. </p>
<p>These and other factors translate into <a href="https://www.amazon.com.br/Solid%C3%A3o-Ensaios-Desigualdades-Raciais-Brasil/dp/8581922481">lower life expectancy, education and standards of living</a> for <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0021934704264003">Afro-Brazilians</a>. Black Brazilians live, on average, 73 years – three years less than white Brazilians, according to the <a href="https://www.nexojornal.com.br/grafico/2019/06/10/A-expectativa-de-vida-no-Brasil-por-g%C3%AAnero-ra%C3%A7a-ou-cor-e-estado">2017 National Household Survey</a>. The U.S. has a <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/2017/015.pdf">nearly identical life expectancy gap between races</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340727/original/file-20200609-21226-3a9ocg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340727/original/file-20200609-21226-3a9ocg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340727/original/file-20200609-21226-3a9ocg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340727/original/file-20200609-21226-3a9ocg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340727/original/file-20200609-21226-3a9ocg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=399&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340727/original/file-20200609-21226-3a9ocg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340727/original/file-20200609-21226-3a9ocg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340727/original/file-20200609-21226-3a9ocg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Residents of the Aglomerado da Serra favela, or slum settlement, register for food aid, June 4, 2020, Belo Horizonte.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/poor-residents-of-the-aglomerado-da-serra-favela-register-news-photo/1247238628?adppopup=true">Pedro Vilela/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Because government data in Brazil is not automatically collected by race or ethnicity, though, the health impacts of racism can be hard to measure. Bolsonaro’s administration did not require the <a href="https://noticias.uol.com.br/saude/ultimas-noticias/redacao/2020/05/04/justica-determina-coleta-de-registros-de-raca-e-etnia-em-casos-de-covid.htm">collection of COVID-19 racial data</a> until late April, well into the pandemic, after much pressure. It has yet to release that information. </p>
<p>Regardless, by April the <a href="https://g1.globo.com/bemestar/coronavirus/noticia/2020/04/11/coronavirus-e-mais-letal-entre-negros-no-brasil-apontam-dados-do-ministerio-da-saude.ghtml">Brazilian Health Ministry</a> had already flagged high COVID-19 death rates among Afro-Brazilians, a category that includes people who identify as “black” or “brown” in the census. Officials in <a href="https://www.prefeitura.sp.gov.br/cidade/secretarias/upload/saude/PMSP_SMS_COVID19_Boletim%20Quinzenal_20200430.pdf?fbclid=IwAR0mNVdNtmO7ODqPCAqH0QfkzsX1hpMKNkvmgySqi1k2XD42E3F8vjz2OjU">hard-hit São Paulo</a> had also announced that mortality rates among COVID-19 patients were higher among black residents. </p>
<p>Now, <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1tSU7mV4OPnLRFMMY47JIXZgzkklvkydO/view">data collected in May</a> by outside researchers for over 5,500 municipalities shows that 55% of Afro-Brazilian patients hospitalized with severe COVID-19 died, compared to 34% of white COVID-19 patients. </p>
<h2>Health and racism</h2>
<p>We are health researchers – one American, one Brazilian – who for many years have <a href="https://www.ethndis.org/edonline/index.php/ethndis/article/view/878">studied</a> how <a href="https://www.scopus.com/scopus/inward/record.url?partnerID=10&rel=3.0.0&view=basic&eid=2-s2.0-85035756709&md5=329eac49bd35f8a77849586b7daae38b">racial disparities</a> in Brazil affect black people, looking at everything from sickle cell anemia to reproductive health. </p>
<p>Our research over the past two months finds <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277953617304410">structural racism</a> – in the form of high-risk working conditions, unequal access to health and worse housing conditions – is a major factor shaping Brazil’s COVID-19 pandemic.</p>
<p>For over a decade, black activists and public health researchers have been pointing out that <a href="https://www.scielo.br/pdf/sausoc/v25n3/1984-0470-sausoc-25-03-00535.pdf">institutional racism</a> creates <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277953617304410">worse health outcomes for Brazil’s black population</a>. Black Brazilians experience higher rates of <a href="http://portalarquivos2.saude.gov.br/images/pdf/2019/julho/25/vigitel-brasil-2018.pdf">chronic illnesses</a> like diabetes, high blood pressure, and respiratory and kidney problems due to food insecurity, inadequate access to medicine and <a href="https://ethndis.org/edonline/index.php/ethndis/article/view/878/1199">unaffordable prescriptions</a>.</p>
<p>Racism itself also takes a severe physical toll on black people. Studies in the United States demonstrate that daily experiences of racism and discrimination can lead to <a href="https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-deaths-and-those-of-george-floyd-and-ahmaud-arbery-have-something-in-common-racism-139264">dangerously high stress hormones and diminish the body’s ability to fight disease</a>. <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/2020/04/coronavirus-disproportionately-impacts-african-americans/">Racial bias from medical professionals</a> then compounds poor outcomes for black patients. </p>
<p>Unlike the U.S., Brazil has free, universal health care. But its public hospitals have been <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/13/brazil-approves-social-spending-freeze-austerity-package">woefully underfunded since a deep recession that began in 2015</a>. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0102-311X2020000500101">Intensive care beds are now in short supply</a> at public hospitals in several cities fighting coronavirus outbreaks. This is especially detrimental to black COVID-19 patients, since Afro-Brazilians rely more <a href="https://nacoesunidas.org/quase-80-da-populacao-brasileira-que-depende-do-sus-se-autodeclara-negra/">heavily on the public health system</a> than white Brazilians, who often have private health insurance through their jobs.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340729/original/file-20200609-21238-1plqfsn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340729/original/file-20200609-21238-1plqfsn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340729/original/file-20200609-21238-1plqfsn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340729/original/file-20200609-21238-1plqfsn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340729/original/file-20200609-21238-1plqfsn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340729/original/file-20200609-21238-1plqfsn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340729/original/file-20200609-21238-1plqfsn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340729/original/file-20200609-21238-1plqfsn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The intensive care unit of the Gilberto Novaes Municipal Field Hospital in Manaus, Brazil, June 4, 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/june-2020-brazil-manaus-view-into-the-intensive-care-unit-news-photo/1217563284?adppopup=true">Lucas Silva/picture alliance via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Poverty and exposure</h2>
<p>Extreme economic inequality is another critical factor <a href="https://temas.folha.uol.com.br/global-inequality/brazil/brazils-super-rich-lead-global-income-concentration.shtml">shaping the general health of Afro-Brazilians</a>. With the top 10% of the population earning 55% of domestic income, Brazil trails only Qatar in concentration of wealth, according to a 2019 <a href="https://nacoesunidas.org/relatorio-de-desenvolvimento-humano-do-pnud-destaca-altos-indices-de-desigualdade-no-brasil/">United Nations report</a>. </p>
<p>Few, if any, Afro-Brazilians rank among Brazil’s super-rich. <a href="https://biblioteca.ibge.gov.br/visualizacao/livros/liv101681_informativo.pdf">National household survey data</a> shows that black and brown Brazilians make far less money than white Brazilians, even with equivalent educational background. The racial wage gap in Brazil actually <a href="https://biblioteca.ibge.gov.br/visualizacao/livros/liv101681_informativo.pdf">outweighs the gender wage gap</a>: White women earn up to 74% more than black men. </p>
<p>Generally speaking, the higher the salary, the less likely Afro-Brazilians are to have a job. Many work in the informal and service sectors, as <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-brazils-raging-pandemic-domestic-workers-fear-for-their-lives-and-their-jobs-138163">house cleaners</a> or street vendors. Others are self-employed or unemployed. </p>
<p>During the pandemic, this economic insecurity severely lessens Afro-Brazilians’ ability to <a href="https://www.hypeness.com.br/2020/03/coronavirus-e-a-inabilidade-social-do-governo-ameacam-negros-e-pobres/">socially distance</a> and makes them highly dependent on staying in their jobs despite the health threat. </p>
<p>Maids, for example – most of whom are black women – are proving to <a href="https://theconversation.com/in-brazils-raging-pandemic-domestic-workers-fear-for-their-lives-and-their-jobs-138163">be a high-risk group</a>. Domestic workers were among Brazil’s <a href="https://g1.globo.com/rj/sul-do-rio-costa-verde/noticia/2020/03/17/idosa-de-63-anos-morre-por-suspeita-coronavirus-em-miguel-pereira-diz-secretaria-municipal.ghtml">first COVID-19 deaths</a>.</p>
<h2>Neighborhood risks</h2>
<p>Brazil’s coronavirus outbreak originated in wealthy neighborhoods whose residents had traveled to Europe, but the disease is now <a href="https://nacla.org/news/2020/03/31/brazil-favelas-covid19">spreading fastest</a> in its poor, dense, long-neglected urban neighborhoods. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340730/original/file-20200609-21230-1e1ti2t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340730/original/file-20200609-21230-1e1ti2t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/340730/original/file-20200609-21230-1e1ti2t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340730/original/file-20200609-21230-1e1ti2t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340730/original/file-20200609-21230-1e1ti2t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340730/original/file-20200609-21230-1e1ti2t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340730/original/file-20200609-21230-1e1ti2t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/340730/original/file-20200609-21230-1e1ti2t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A protest sign reading, ‘They say to wash your hands, but how to do that without water?’ on May 18, 2020.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/residents-of-paraisopolis-one-of-the-citys-largest-slums-news-photo/1213517036?adppopup=true">Miguel SCHINCARIOL / AFP via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Just over 12 million Brazilians, most of them black, live in such informal urban settlements, from Rio de Janeiro’s favelas to the “peripheries” of São Paulo. These areas have inadequate access to <a href="https://theconversation.com/megacity-slums-are-incubators-of-disease-but-coronavirus-response-isnt-helping-the-billion-people-who-live-in-them-138092">water and sanitation</a>, making it difficult to follow basic hygiene recommendations like washing one’s hands with soap. </p>
<p>So while the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jun/09/enormous-disparities-coronavirus-death-rates-expose-brazils-deep-racial-inequalities?emci=94d478d2-52aa-ea11-9b05-00155d039e74&emdi=45829873-54aa-ea11-9b05-00155d039e74&ceid=4606001">disparate impact of COVID-19</a> on black Brazilians was not inevitable, our research explains why it’s unsurprising. </p>
<p>The racism that pervades nearly every facet of Brazilian society increases black people’s exposure to the virus – then reduces their ability to get to quality care. </p>
<p>[<em>You need to understand the coronavirus pandemic, and we can help.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=upper-coronavirus-help">Read The Conversation’s newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/139430/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>In Brazil, black COVID-19 patients are dying at higher rates than white patients. Worse housing quality, working conditions and health care help to explain the pandemic’s racially disparate toll.Kia Lilly Caldwell, Professor, African, African American, and Diaspora Studies, University of North Carolina at Chapel HillEdna Maria de Araújo, Professor of Public Health and Epidemiology, Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana (UEFS)Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1397522020-06-01T19:29:12Z2020-06-01T19:29:12ZThe fury in US cities is rooted in a long history of racist policing, violence and inequality<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/338777/original/file-20200601-83282-1nw6i4z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Omer Messinger/Sipa USA</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The protests that have engulfed American cities in the past week are rooted in decades of frustrations. Racist policing, legal and extra-legal discrimination, exclusion from the major avenues of wealth creation and vicious stereotyping have long histories and endure today. </p>
<p>African Americans have protested against these injustices going back as far as the post-Civil War days in the 1870s. Throughout the 20th century, there were significant uprisings in Chicago (1919), New York City’s Harlem neighbourhood (1935), Detroit (1943) and Los Angeles (1943, 1965, 1992). </p>
<p>And in what became known as the “<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long,_hot_summer_of_1967">long, hot summer of 1967</a>”, anger in America’s cities boiled over. The <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/black-history/civil-rights-act">Civil Rights Act</a> of 1964 had ended segregation, but not brought equality. Racial injustice at the hands of police remained. Protesters took to the streets in <a href="https://theweek.com/captured/712838/long-hot-summer-1967">more than 150 cities</a>, leading to violent clashes between black residents and largely white police forces. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/as-minneapolis-burns-trumps-presidency-is-sinking-deeper-into-crisis-and-yet-he-may-still-be-re-elected-139739">As Minneapolis burns, Trump's presidency is sinking deeper into crisis. And yet, he may still be re-elected</a>
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<p>White moderates condemned these armed rebellions as the antithesis of the famed nonviolent protests of civil rights activists. But Martin Luther King, Jr., himself, recognised that the success of nonviolence lay in the ever-present threat of violence. </p>
<p>He <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9sw4LbYLcQ/">noted</a>, too, that riots “do not develop out of thin air.” </p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/S9sw4LbYLcQ?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>Policing practices a trigger for unrest</h2>
<p>The trigger for African-American uprisings in the US has almost always been acts by police forces, such as the <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/derek-chauvin-knee-george-floyds-neck-minutes-complaint/story?id=70961042">recent death of George Floyd</a> in Minneapolis. </p>
<p>Sometimes, unrest has broken out when police have refused to act on behalf of black residents. When an African-American teenager drifted into the “white” part of Lake Michigan in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/03/opinion/how-a-brutal-race-riot-shaped-modern-chicago.html?auth=login-email&login=email">Chicago in 1919</a>, for instance, a white man on the banks threw rocks at him and he drowned. A policeman <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2019/07/27/744130358/red-summer-in-chicago-100-years-after-the-race-riots">did nothing</a> to stop the assailants, nor did he arrest them.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/338791/original/file-20200601-95042-1vow0k0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/338791/original/file-20200601-95042-1vow0k0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=343&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338791/original/file-20200601-95042-1vow0k0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=343&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338791/original/file-20200601-95042-1vow0k0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=343&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338791/original/file-20200601-95042-1vow0k0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338791/original/file-20200601-95042-1vow0k0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338791/original/file-20200601-95042-1vow0k0.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=431&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A family leaving a damaged home after the 1919 Chicago race riot.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>From the perspective of those targeted and traumatised by police and discriminated against by society at large, property damage and looting were justified.</p>
<p>In the century after slavery ended in 1865, white Americans had established new ways to exploit <a href="https://www.pbs.org/tpt/slavery-by-another-name/themes/sharecropping/">black people’s labour</a> and keep African Americans impoverished. These methods ranged from legislation governing <a href="https://www.pbs.org/tpt/slavery-by-another-name/themes/black-codes/">work contracts and mobility</a> to <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-herald-suns-serena-williams-cartoon-draws-on-a-long-and-damaging-history-of-racist-caricature-102982">racist stereotyping</a>.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/why-cellphone-videos-of-black-peoples-deaths-should-be-considered-sacred-like-lynching-photographs-139252">Why cellphone videos of Black people's deaths should be considered sacred, like lynching photographs</a>
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<hr>
<p>Such laws and customs were all underpinned by violence, including murder. From the late 1800s until 1950, more than <a href="https://lynchinginamerica.eji.org/">4,000 African Americans</a> were victims of lynchings. They were so acceptable they were sometimes advertised in the press in advance. These were extra-judicial killings, but often included the police (or they would at least turn a blind eye to the proceedings). </p>
<p>Black Americans who sought better lives in northern cities found racism there, too. White landlords had a captive market in segregated neighbourhoods, such as New York’s Harlem and Chicago’s South Side, which caused them to become increasingly crowded and rundown. </p>
<p>African Americans were often kept out of nicer neighbourhoods in cities nationwide, either through violent acts perpetrated by white residents or even by police officers themselves. The houses of middle-class black Americans in the Birmingham, Alabama, suburb where political activist and philosopher Angela Davis grew up were bombed so often the area was nicknamed “<a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/07/06/197342590/remembering-birminghams-dynamite-hill-neighborhood">Dynamite Hill</a>”. </p>
<p>Even the presence of <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/28/nyregion/the-story-of-new-yorks-first-black-police-officer-told-with-the-help-of-langston-hughes.html">black officers</a> in the police forces of northern cities could not alter the fundamentally racist operations of police forces.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/338792/original/file-20200601-95013-15qa1wl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/338792/original/file-20200601-95013-15qa1wl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=354&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338792/original/file-20200601-95013-15qa1wl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=354&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338792/original/file-20200601-95013-15qa1wl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=354&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338792/original/file-20200601-95013-15qa1wl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=445&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338792/original/file-20200601-95013-15qa1wl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=445&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338792/original/file-20200601-95013-15qa1wl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=445&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The 1893 public lynching of a black teenager in Texas.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Wikimedia Commons</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The expanding wealth gap</h2>
<p>The protests of the 1960s were driven in part by police brutality, but also by the exclusion of African Americans from full civic participation. </p>
<p>Even if African Americans could accumulate the capital to acquire a mortgage, a system of laws known as “<a href="https://www.zinnedproject.org/materials/how-red-lines-built-white-wealth-color-of-law-lesson">redlining</a>” prevented them from purchasing property. </p>
<p>That, in turn, thwarted black families’ efforts to accumulate wealth at the same rate of white families. African Americans lived, therefore, in neighbourhoods that were poorer. Those communities had worse sanitation, no green spaces, grocery stores with high prices and poorly resourced schools. </p>
<p>All the while, it was African Americans who continued to work in low paid domestic and service labour jobs that propped up a booming economy that disproportionately benefited white Americans. It’s no wonder the writer <a href="https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a23960/james-baldwin-cool-it/">James Baldwin</a> said in 1968, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>After all, you’re accusing a captive population who has been robbed of everything of looting. I think [that accusation] is obscene. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>The effects of those policies are still in evidence today – and play a significant role in the discrimination and disenfranchisement of many African Americans. </p>
<p>Black families and individuals enjoy a <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2020/02/27/examining-the-black-white-wealth-gap/">drastically lower median level of wealth</a> than whites or Asian Americans. This is true even among African Americans with high levels of education and high salaries. Generations of discrimination have left their mark as black Americans have been <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/14/magazine/racial-wealth-gap.html">denied the gradual accumulation</a> of largely untaxed wealth in housing and inheritance. </p>
<p>Echoing Baldwin, the comic <a href="https://www.facebook.com/thedailyshow/videos/271504123969416/">Trevor Noah</a> observed this week, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>If you felt unease watching that Target being looted, try to imagine how it must feel for black Americans when they watch themselves being looted every single day. Police in America are looting black bodies.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/338794/original/file-20200601-95032-2ncxyb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/338794/original/file-20200601-95032-2ncxyb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=371&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338794/original/file-20200601-95032-2ncxyb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=371&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338794/original/file-20200601-95032-2ncxyb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=371&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338794/original/file-20200601-95032-2ncxyb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338794/original/file-20200601-95032-2ncxyb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/338794/original/file-20200601-95032-2ncxyb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=466&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Protesters rally at the Minnesota State Capitol during the sixth day of protests over the arrest of George Floyd.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">CRAIG LASSIG/EPA</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The ‘war on crime’ and mass incarcerations</h2>
<p>In the wake of the 1967 unrest, federal policies shifted under President Lyndon Johnson from the “War on Poverty” to the “<a href="https://time.com/3746059/war-on-crime-history/">War on Crime</a>”. African Americans were increasingly targeted in the expanding “law and order” and <a href="https://humanitiesny.org/making-mass-incarceration/">mass incarceration</a> machine. </p>
<p>Today, black Americans, especially men, remain the overwhelming targets for police forces. Young black men are killed by police at a rate of <a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/deadly-force-in-black-and-white">21 times</a> that of young white men. <a href="https://www.aclu.org/blog/criminal-law-reform/reforming-police/say-her-name-recognizing-police-brutality-against-black">African American women</a>, too, are vulnerable, as several recent high-profile incidents prove.</p>
<p>African Americans are also more likely to be <a href="https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/un-report-on-racial-disparities/">arrested, charged with crimes, convicted and sentenced than white Americans</a>. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/100-years-ago-african-americans-marched-down-5th-avenue-to-declare-that-black-lives-matter-81427">100 years ago African-Americans marched down 5th Avenue to declare that black lives matter</a>
</strong>
</em>
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<p>All the while, police have been trained and equipped in ways that have <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2020/05/george-floyd-protests-minnesota-urban-warfare/612421/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share">blurred the line</a> between civilian police and military forces. The violence of these police forces is becoming more difficult to justify, hence Slate running an article in the last week with the title “<a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/05/george-floyd-protests-police-violence.amp?">Police Erupt in Nationwide Violence</a>”. </p>
<p>As a result, more and more <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/may/31/the-answer-to-police-violence-is-not-reform-its-defunding-heres-why?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Tweet">grassroots groups</a> are calling for police forces to be defunded, localised and radically demilitarised. Activists will also continue to remind us that <a href="https://blacklivesmatter.com/">black lives matter</a>. </p>
<p>Until then, as civil rights lawyer <a href="https://www.msnbc.com/andrea-mitchell-reports/watch/sherrilyn-ifill-scenes-from-streets-of-minneapolis-show-lack-of-faith-in-the-justice-system-84086341831">Sherrilyn Ifill</a> said this week, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>if the rule of law is to prevail, then the people have to see some justice. If it always produces a result that is unjust, then how can we tell people to have faith in the justice system.</p>
</blockquote><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/139752/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Clare Corbould has previously received funding from the Australian Research Council. She is a member of the Australian Greens.</span></em></p>African Americans have long taken to the streets to protest against racial injustice. While some progress has been made, police violence remains an ever-present reality.Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Deakin UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1312702020-04-10T12:14:11Z2020-04-10T12:14:11ZThe unintended consequences of marijuana decriminalization<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315541/original/file-20200214-11005-178rr6m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Marijuana decriminalization won't end arrests.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/photos/marijuana-decriminalization?license=rf&agreements=pa:77130&family=creative&phrase=marijuana%20decriminalization&sort=best#license">Gleti/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>America’s decades-long war on drugs disproportionately harmed minorities. Now, it seems that decriminalization of marijuana hasn’t leveled the playing field.</p>
<p>Black men are <a href="https://www.ibtimes.com/white-men-vs-black-men-prison-statistics-2016-why-are-more-african-american-males-2426793">12 times more likely than white men</a> to spend time incarcerated in the United States. College enrollment for black men <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2019/05/war-drugs-made-it-harder-black-men-attend-college/588724/">has declined</a> since <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/99th-congress/house-bill/5484">the 1986 Anti-Drug Abuse Act</a> went into effect.</p>
<p>I am <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Nikolay_Anguelov">a scholar of public policy</a>. In my book, “<a href="https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asin=B07NTXQ9JF&tag=bing08-20&linkCode=kpp&reshareId=1Q40ND0MZ3J04P3Y29BJ&reshareChannel=system">From Criminalizing to Decriminalizing Marijuana: The Politics of Social Control</a>,” I aim to provide a historic overview of marijuana legislation and its impact on minorities.</p>
<h2>Unequal easing</h2>
<p>Some drug laws related to marijuana are easing. As of this writing in early 2020, twenty-five states have introduced decriminalization reforms, with <a href="https://norml.org/aboutmarijuana/item/states-that-have-decriminalized">11 states allowing adult recreational use</a>. Such reforms directly impact adults 21 years of age and older, but they also have indirect effect on younger Americans. </p>
<p>Even though marijuana is still illegal for people under 21, evidence is emerging that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.addbeh.2019.106212">decriminalization is increasing the number of kids</a> who <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00952990.2019.1599381">consume weed illegally</a>.</p>
<p>As I wrote in my book, young people have always been the main buyers of marijuana. Smoking marijuana has become an important part of growing up for many U.S. teenagers, a fact not acknowledged by any marijuana reform advocacy analysis.</p>
<p>Additionally, <a href="https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2014/crime-in-the-u.s.-2014/persons-arrested/main">crime data show</a> that even in the most permissive legal environments, <a href="https://www.aclu.org/files/assets/aclu-thewaronmarijuana-rel2.pdf">minority youth continue to be disproportionately arrested</a> and convicted on marijuana charges.</p>
<h2>Youth using marijuana</h2>
<p>From 2000 to 2014, self-reported <a href="https://www.datafiles.samhsa.gov/study/national-survey-drug-use-and-health-nsduh-2014-nid13618">usage rates in Americans 15 years of age and older doubled</a>. These rates include teens and those under 21, for whom marijuana use continues to be and most likely will continue to be illegal. </p>
<p>Those who advocate for marijuana reform ignore the fact that looser laws promote more marijuana use, especially by young and marginalized Americans who buy the drug in illegal markets.</p>
<p>For example, arrest <a href="https://cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/6470551/Colorado_arrest_report.0.pdf">data show that in Colorado</a>, legalizing recreational use for anyone 21 and over caused a significant increase in the arrest rates of African Americans and Hispanics under that legal age limit. At the same time, arrests for underage whites decreased.</p>
<p>In Washington state, arrests on all marijuana charges fell by 90% between 2008 and 2014, but “hazard rates” for African Americans remained unchanged. This means they were still twice as likely as whites to be arrested on marijuana charges.</p>
<p>In other words, decriminalization has done little to change historical patterns in <a href="https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/cius-2016/topic-pages/persons-arrested?55">national marijuana arrest trends</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315539/original/file-20200214-11044-7d5o4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/315539/original/file-20200214-11044-7d5o4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315539/original/file-20200214-11044-7d5o4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315539/original/file-20200214-11044-7d5o4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315539/original/file-20200214-11044-7d5o4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=506&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315539/original/file-20200214-11044-7d5o4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=506&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/315539/original/file-20200214-11044-7d5o4b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=506&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Adults age 21 and over can buy marijuana for recreational use as of December in Michigan.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Marijuana-Michigan-Illinois/2616f524cbb94065b86a0d976ca968d3/18/0">AP Photo/David Eggert</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What drives reform?</h2>
<p>Liberal Americans <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/11/14/americans-support-marijuana-legalization/">tend to believe marijuana legalization</a> drives reform.</p>
<p>There are three distinctly different categories of marijuana policy reform – decriminalization of possessing a small amount of marijuana, legalizing medical marijuana and decriminalizing recreational use.</p>
<p>The reform diffusion trend picked impetus in 2000, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2000/06/15/us/hawaii-becomes-first-state-to-approve-medical-marijuana-bill.html">when Hawaii</a> and <a href="https://norml.org/news/2001/06/07/nevada-defelonizes-pot-possessionstate-eliminates-jail-criminal-record-for-minor-offenders-legalizes-medical-marijuana-for-seriously-ill">Nevada</a> legalized medical marijuana through their state legislatures.</p>
<p>This signaled the beginning of the political normalization of marijuana reform. Previously, medical marijuana laws were reformed largely by <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20080503160619/http://norml.com/index.cfm?Group_ID=3391">ballot initiatives</a> in states with constitutions that have a direct democracy measure.</p>
<p>In my book, I analyzed the political, economic and demographic predictors of each type of policy reform from 2000 to 2014. The results indicate that rising marijuana usage rates, a ballot initiative allowing voters a say in the matter and the experience of neighboring states are <a href="https://www.datafiles.samhsa.gov/info/browse-studies-nid3454">the main factors driving decriminalization in general</a>.</p>
<p>In all three cases of reform, usage rates were the strongest predictive factor. They had remained largely unchanged until the wave of decriminalization started two decades ago. As state laws reformed, usage rates started to marginally, yet steadily increase. Since 2000 they have doubled nationally.</p>
<p>The strongest spikes are in states that are known as leaders in not just decriminalization, but which are relatively more permissive in terms of possession, access and oversight <a href="https://www.alternet.org/2016/03/10-most-marijuana-enthused-states/">like Washington and Vermont</a>.</p>
<p>States with a relatively large African American population, such as Mississippi, North Carolina and New York, <a href="https://read.amazon.com/kp/embed?asin=B07NTXQ9JF&tag=bing08-20&linkCode=kpp&reshareId=1Q40ND0MZ3J04P3Y29BJ&reshareChannel=system">were more likely to decriminalize small amount possession first</a>, possibly in an attempt to tackle social injustice.</p>
<p>States such as <a href="https://www.medicalmarijuanainc.com/maryland-marijuana-laws/">Maryland</a>, <a href="https://www.marijuanabreak.com/how-to-get-medical-marijuana-in-virginia">Virginia</a> and <a href="https://www.medicalmarijuanainc.com/rhode-island-marijuana-laws/">Rhode Island</a> have legalized medical use without previously decriminalizing small amount possession.</p>
<p>Decriminalizing recreational use occurred <a href="https://nsduhweb.rti.org/respweb/homepage.cfm">mainly as a function of high marijuana usage rates</a> in states like Massachusetts, Oregon and Colorado.</p>
<h2>The consequences</h2>
<p>Reports regarding the arrest rates for youths may indicate unintended consequences of decriminalization.</p>
<p>These consequences include increased police discretion, providing incentives for youth consumption in illegal markets and exacerbating racial problems in juvenile justice.</p>
<p>If reform advocates want to address the historical wrongs of the war on drugs, they have to figure out how to tackle the cultural promotion of marijuana use which goes hand in hand with the political promotion of decriminalization. </p>
<p>[<em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/131270/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nikolay Anguelov does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Decriminalizing medical and recreational marijuana may exacerbate racial inequality within the criminal justice system, among other things.Nikolay Anguelov, Associate Professor of Public Policy, UMass DartmouthLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/850652017-10-05T21:56:51Z2017-10-05T21:56:51ZHistory shows Sidney Crosby could have stood up to racial injustice<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189676/original/file-20171010-17691-kxfpdp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">blank</span> </figcaption></figure><p>A champion athlete, who is both white and not American, has the chance, at some personal cost, to protest racial injustice in the United States. Should he avoid taking a stand or lend support to a protest that doesn’t directly affect him?</p>
<p>The question has been asked of Sidney Crosby. Crosby and the Stanley Cup-winning Pittsburgh Penguins visited the White House, and his <a href="http://www.sportsnet.ca/hockey/nhl/sidney-crosby-supports-penguins-decision-go-white-house/">statement in advance of the visit that it was “a great honour”</a> came amid a <a href="http://www.dw.com/en/nba-star-curry-and-golden-state-warriors-nix-white-house-visit/a-40655345">boycott of the White House by the NBA champion Golden State Warriors</a>, and Trump’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/25/opinion/columnists/trump-race-nfl-nba.html">racist criticisms of NFL players’ taking a knee to protest police brutality against black Americans</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"912019957243883520"}"></div></p>
<p>Almost 50 years ago, the question was asked of another white non-American: Australian sprinter <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2006/oct/05/guardianobituaries.australia">Peter Norman</a>. The two athletes’ starkly different responses to similar situations of racial tension highlight the extent to which Crosby, the Penguins and the NHL — in the face of profound injustice — failed to rise to the occasion.</p>
<h2>A lasting image of protest</h2>
<p>The photo of African-American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos on the podium at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, heads bowed, each raising a black-gloved fist in a Black Power salute, taking a stand for racial equality and human rights, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/09/24/they-didnt-takeaknee-the-black-power-protest-salute-that-shook-the-world-in-1968/">remains an iconic image</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188416/original/file-20171002-12107-hzxobq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188416/original/file-20171002-12107-hzxobq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=863&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188416/original/file-20171002-12107-hzxobq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=863&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188416/original/file-20171002-12107-hzxobq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=863&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188416/original/file-20171002-12107-hzxobq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1084&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188416/original/file-20171002-12107-hzxobq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1084&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188416/original/file-20171002-12107-hzxobq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1084&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Australian Peter Norman, left, supported the Black Power protests of U.S. athletes Tommie Smith, centre, and John Carlos during the medal ceremonies for the 200 metre sprint at the 1968 Olympics.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Norman, the silver medallist, is the guy standing next to them on the podium. He’s wearing an Olympic Project for Human Rights patch, borrowed from an American rower to show solidarity with Carlos and Smith. (Incidentally, Norman was also responsible for suggesting that Smith and Carlos share a single pair of gloves after Carlos forgot his, back at the Olympic Village.)</p>
<p>Norman, like Crosby, was in a privileged position to do something. Or he could have used his non-Americanness, or his whiteness, as an excuse to stay out of a domestic U.S. racial struggle, as Crosby did.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189665/original/file-20171010-17667-1fv85y9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/189665/original/file-20171010-17667-1fv85y9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189665/original/file-20171010-17667-1fv85y9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189665/original/file-20171010-17667-1fv85y9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189665/original/file-20171010-17667-1fv85y9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=517&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189665/original/file-20171010-17667-1fv85y9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=517&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/189665/original/file-20171010-17667-1fv85y9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=517&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">President Donald Trump speaks during a ceremony to honour the 2017 NHL Stanley Cup Champion Pittsburgh Penguins on Oct. 10, 2017, at the White House.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Susan Walsh)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Instead, Norman played a crucial supporting role in what has become a legendary stand for human rights.</p>
<p>When Smith and Carlos told Norman what they were going to do, they asked him if he believed in human rights. Norman, driven by his strong Salvation Army faith, <a href="https://empirerunnersblog.org/2016/05/01/who-was-peter-norman-part-2-by-brad-zanetti/">said he did</a>. His ultimate response, which should be taught in schools worldwide, was the opposite of Crosby’s: “I will stand with you.”</p>
<h2>The price of taking a stand</h2>
<p>Norman did so despite the palpable threat of assassination in the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/observer/gallery/2008/jan/17/1">violent summer of 1968</a>. He faced the threat of repercussions from a controversy-averse International Olympic Committee and a home country still operating under an <a href="https://theconversation.com/australian-politics-explainer-the-white-australia-policy-74084">overtly racist White Australia immigration policy</a>.</p>
<p>He did so because he believed deeply in human equality. As Carlos remarks in the excellent Norman-focused documentary, <a href="http://salutethemovie.com/"><em>Salute</em></a>: “Peter didn’t have to take that button. Peter wasn’t from the United States. Peter was not a Black man. Peter didn’t have to feel what I felt. But he was a man.” That was enough.</p>
<p>Norman, like Smith and Carlos, paid an enormous price for his stand. For wearing that patch, Australia blacklisted him from the 1972 Olympics despite being the fifth-fastest sprinter in the world at the time (he continues to hold the Australian 200 metre record). He was not even invited to take part in the 2000 Sydney Olympics, attending instead as the guest of an appreciative U.S. Track and Field Federation. </p>
<p>Long after the U.S. recognized Carlos and Smith as heroes (as their <a href="http://www.espn.com/olympics/story/_/id/17664885/olympic-sprinters-tommie-smith-john-carlos-support-colin-kaepernick-anthem-protests">spiritual successor, former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick</a> will be, in time), Norman remained a pariah: <a href="https://theconversation.com/i-will-stand-with-you-finally-an-apology-to-peter-norman-10107">the Australian government only apologized for Australia’s treatment of him in 2012, six years after his death</a>.</p>
<h2>No regrets</h2>
<p>Despite the hardship, Norman did not regret his actions. For him, doing the right thing took precedence over doing the easy thing.</p>
<p>Crosby’s and the Penguins’ actions fall short of Norman’s example. What’s more, in trying not to choose sides — between African-Americans who fear for their lives around police and a president who finds it hard to condemn neo-Nazis — they’ve implicitly revealed what they’re prepared to tolerate. As Lt.-General David Morrison, the former Australian Chief of Army, <a href="https://youtu.be/QaqpoeVgr8U">noted in a similar context</a>, “The standard you walk past, is the standard you accept.”</p>
<p>And yet, while it is profoundly disappointing that Crosby, the Penguins and the NHL have missed their Peter Norman moment, Norman himself probably would not have judged them too harshly. As he remarked in <em>Salute</em>: “In a victory ceremony for the Olympics, there’s three guys that stand up there. Each one’s been given about a square metre of God’s earth to stand on. And what any one of the three choose to do with his little square metre of earth at that stage is entirely up to them.”</p>
<p>Ultimately, what Crosby and his fellow Penguins choose to do with their square metre is a matter for their own consciences. For others, graced with the opportunity to stand with the victims of injustice, Peter Norman offers a shining example of what moral courage looks like.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188868/original/file-20171004-31295-juvszj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/188868/original/file-20171004-31295-juvszj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=458&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188868/original/file-20171004-31295-juvszj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=458&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188868/original/file-20171004-31295-juvszj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=458&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188868/original/file-20171004-31295-juvszj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=575&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188868/original/file-20171004-31295-juvszj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=575&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/188868/original/file-20171004-31295-juvszj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=575&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Tommie Smith, left, and John Carlos, right, who gave the historic Black Power salutes at the 1968 Olympics, reunite for the final time with the third man on the podium that year as they as they act as pallbearers for Peter Norman at his funeral in Melbourne, Australia in 2006.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/85065/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Blayne Haggart does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Almost 50 years ago, a white, non-American athlete supported Black athletes protesting racial injustice. Peter Norman paid a price for taking a stand. Canada’s Sidney Crosby is no Peter Norman.Blayne Haggart, Associate Professor of Political Science, Brock UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/847062017-10-02T16:49:32Z2017-10-02T16:49:32ZWhy the dream of a prosperous, united nation continues to elude South Africa<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187576/original/file-20170926-19571-1we1vpx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Violent service delivery riot near Soweto, Johannesburg.Millions of poor South Africans live in shacks.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">EPA/Nic Bothma</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The goal of one united South African nation living prosperously under a constitutional democracy remains elusive. This is in spite of the constitution boldly <a href="https://www.gov.za/documents/constitution-republic-south-africa-1996-preamble">declaring that</a></p>
<blockquote>
<p>South Africa belongs to all who live in it, both black and white, united in our diversity.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The central issue raised by the struggle against <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/history-apartheid-south-africa">racial injustice</a>, <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/history-slavery-and-early-colonisation-south-africa">colonialism</a> and <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/imperialism-and-socialism-context-africa">imperialism</a> – what is referred to in South Africa as the <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/national-question-post-94-south-africa-discussion-paper-preparation-50th-national-conference">National Question</a> - reemerged dramatically three years ago. It started as a demand for the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/mar/16/the-real-meaning-of-rhodes-must-fall">removal of the statue</a> of arch imperialist and colonialist, <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/cecil-john-rhodes">Cecil John Rhodes</a>, from a prominent position at the University of Cape Town. It rapidly grew into a powerful movement in support of <a href="https://theconversation.com/africa/topics/decolonisation-17372">decolonisation</a>. The National Question, it appears, remains highly relevant and unresolved.</p>
<p>In a new book, <a href="http://witspress.co.za/catalogue/the-unresolved-national-question-in-south-africa/">The Unresolved National Question: left thought under apartheid</a> a number of authors set out the multifaceted origins of the idea.</p>
<h2>Political traditions</h2>
<p>Four main contested political traditions have shaped this debate. </p>
<p>The first is the <a href="https://marxistleninist.wordpress.com/study-guide/">Marxist-Leninist</a> tradition, which goes back to the <a href="http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Soviet_Union">Soviet Union</a> in the 1920s and the debates between <a href="http://www.notablebiographies.com/Ki-Lo/Lenin-Vladimir.html">Lenin</a>, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Joseph-Stalin">Stalin</a> and <a href="https://www.marxists.org/archive/roy/index.htm">Manabendra Nath Roy of India</a>. </p>
<p>At the centre of these debates was the idea of two distinct stages in the struggle for national liberation, a <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/omalley/index.php/site/q/03lv02424/04lv02730/05lv03005/06lv03132/07lv03140/08lv03145.htm">national democratic stage</a> and then a <a href="https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1905/dec/31.htm">socialist stage</a>. This strategic approach was <a href="http://www.sacp.org.za/main.php?ID=2638">adopted</a> by the Communist Party of South Africa - now the South African Communist Party (SACP), in 1928/1929. It later developed into the idea of South Africa as a <a href="http://www.anc.org.za/content/apartheid-south-africa-colonialism-special-type">colonialism of a special type</a>.</p>
<p>The second is the Congress tradition, associated with the African National Congress <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/organisations/african-national-congress-anc">(ANC)</a> and its iconic leaders, <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/chief-albert-john-mvumbi-luthuli">Albert Luthuli</a>, <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/people/oliver-reginald-kaizana-tambo">Oliver Tambo</a> and <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/content/page/biography">Nelson Mandela</a>. At the heart of this tradition is the idea of one <a href="http://witspress.co.za/catalogue/the-origins-of-non-racialism/">non-racial nation</a>. Historian Luli Callinicos shows how Mandela and Tambo steadily widened their concept of the nation to include all races.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187791/original/file-20170927-24173-15rxnsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187791/original/file-20170927-24173-15rxnsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=435&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187791/original/file-20170927-24173-15rxnsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=435&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187791/original/file-20170927-24173-15rxnsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=435&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187791/original/file-20170927-24173-15rxnsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=546&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187791/original/file-20170927-24173-15rxnsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=546&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187791/original/file-20170927-24173-15rxnsy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=546&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Life-long friends and ANC leaders Nelson Mandela and Oliver Tambo.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Professor Robbie van Niekerk, a South African expert on social policy, traces the roots of the ANC’s economic and social thought to the 1943 <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/archive/africans-claims-south-africa-adopted-anc-1943-annual-conference">Bill of Rights of African Claims</a> and the 1955 <a href="http://scnc.ukzn.ac.za/doc/HIST/freedomchart/freedomch.html">Freedom Charter</a>. In these documents “the nation” can only be fully realised through the universal extension and provision of public goods by a democratic state. Or, as Luthuli <a href="http://witspress.co.za/catalogue/the-unresolved-national-question-in-south-africa/">put it</a>, the new government should have as its objective the creation of a democratic welfare state with redistributive social policies in health, education and welfare.</p>
<p>The third is the <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/65974.Leon_Trotsky">Trotskyite</a> tradition. This goes back to the thirties in the Western and Eastern Cape and is associated with the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/organisations/non-european-unity-movement-neum">Unity Movement</a>. This approach is developed in the book by the late Marxist historian and then activist <a href="http://www.historicalstudies.uct.ac.za/hst/news/martin-legassick-has-passed-away">Martin Leggasick</a>. Leggasick and his colleagues were to form the <a href="https://eng.ichacha.net/zaoju/marxist%20workers%20tendency%20of%20the%20anc.html">Marxist Worker Tendency</a> of the ANC developing Trotsky’s notion of the <a href="http://www.redletterpress.org/Permanent%20Revolution.html">“permanent revolution”</a>. Revolution, they argued, developed continuously and unevenly on a world scale, rather than proceeding through discrete chronological stages. Legassick was eventually expelled from the ANC.</p>
<p>Finally, there is the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/sites/default/files/DC/Acn1964.0001.9976.000.019.Oct1964.7/Acn1964.0001.9976.000.019.Oct1964.7.pdf">Africanist tradition</a> identified with <a href="https://theconversation.com/sobukwes-pan-africanist-dream-an-elusive-idea-that-refuses-to-die-52601">Robert Sobukwe</a> and the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/article/pan-africanism">(PAC)</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187790/original/file-20170927-24188-1akg7hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187790/original/file-20170927-24188-1akg7hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187790/original/file-20170927-24188-1akg7hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187790/original/file-20170927-24188-1akg7hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187790/original/file-20170927-24188-1akg7hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187790/original/file-20170927-24188-1akg7hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187790/original/file-20170927-24188-1akg7hx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Sobukwe, founder of the Pan Africanist Congress.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As political scientist Siphamandla Zondi makes clear, Africanism is a much broader tradition than the PAC. For the Africanists, the nation state is a product of Western modernity and colonialism. At the centre of the tradition is the notion of “epistemic disobedience”. The decolonisation of knowledge and its production are seen as a “rebellion against the neocolonised order of things”</p>
<h2>Continuity and rupture</h2>
<p>In the book, we discuss the debates that emerged after the banning of South Africa’s national liberation movements in 1960. We suggest that a process of continuity and rupture takes place. On the one hand, movements emerge that attempt to break with the past. These include:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>the ethnic nationalism promoted by the apartheid government through its <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/dated-event/first-bantustans-or-homelands-comes-existence-when-transkei-regional-authority-institute">Bantustan policy</a>, </p></li>
<li><p>the <a href="http://www.sahistory.org.za/archive/definition-black-consciousness-bantu-stephen-biko-december-1971-south-africa">black consciousness movement</a> associated with Steve Biko, </p></li>
<li><p>the emergence of a strong feminist movement, </p></li>
<li><p>the creation of a powerful workers’ movement with an emphasis on the primacy of the working class, and</p></li>
<li><p>a surprising outcome of the national democratic struggle - a “liberal” constitution. </p></li>
</ul>
<p>But in spite of these new ideologies and movements, there is a great deal of continuity with past political traditions. Two examples illustrate this process of continuity and rupture. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187788/original/file-20170927-24149-mpv4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/187788/original/file-20170927-24149-mpv4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=711&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187788/original/file-20170927-24149-mpv4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=711&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187788/original/file-20170927-24149-mpv4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=711&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187788/original/file-20170927-24149-mpv4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=894&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187788/original/file-20170927-24149-mpv4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=894&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/187788/original/file-20170927-24149-mpv4mz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=894&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Steve Biko, leader of the Black Consciousness Movement.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The first one is the championing of ethnic nationalism and the endorsement of traditional <a href="http://overcomingapartheid.msu.edu/multimedia.php?id=65-259-7">Bantustan</a> leaders after 1994. </p>
<p>We introduce the idea of the ethnic nation in the book through a chapter by Dunbar Moodie. He examines the debates that took place in the <a href="https://www.nelsonmandela.org/omalley/index.php/site/q/03lv02424/04lv02730/05lv03188/06lv03190.htm">Afrikaner Broederbond</a>. These show how liberal Afrikaner nationalist intellectuals, such as <a href="http://www.tafelberg.com/authors/330">NP Van Wyk Louw</a>, argued that Afrikaners cannot deny Africans what they claim for themselves, namely the right to self determination. Hence apartheid architect Hendrik Verwoerd envisioned the idea of the Bantustans culminating in a federation of “independent ethnic nations” in southern Africa.</p>
<p>The chiefs and tribal authorities that were created by apartheid were authoritarian, deeply undemocratic, and often corrupt. Yet they survived into the post-apartheid era. </p>
<p>The second example is the constitution and its Bill of Rights. There are those who believe that these rights, especially the socio-economic rights, such as the right to education and housing, provide the key to resolving the National Question.</p>
<p>Indeed, Jeremy Cronin and Alex Mashile, from the SACP, argue that under Thabo Mbeki the National Question was reduced to the deracialisation of monopoly capitalism. The goal of the national democratic revolution became the consolidation of a capitalist democracy by opening up South Africa to global markets and promoting a black capitalist class.</p>
<h2>Resolving the National Question</h2>
<p>What became clear in our conversations about the book that the National Question cannot be resolved solely through the country’s constitution. Much as it contains the potential for a far more radical transformative project than traditional liberalism, it cannot resolve the National Question.</p>
<p>The resolution of the National Question will require the resolution of what has been called the “social question”. This is a historic demand for the redistribution of wealth and the right of all citizens to education, health and welfare. Without addressing the legacy of land dispossession, economic exclusion, long term unemployment and racialised inequality, the National Question will remain unresolved.</p>
<p><em>The article is drawn from a recently published volume of research based essays titled <a href="http://witspress.co.za/catalogue/the-unresolved-national-question-in-south-africa/">The Unresolved National Question: left thought under apartheid</a>. It was edited by Edward Webster and Karin Pampallis and published by Wits University Press</em>.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/84706/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Edward Webster does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The National Question cannot be resolved solely through South Africa’s constitution. There’s potential for a far more radical transformative project than traditional liberalism.Edward Webster, Professor Emeritus, Society, Work and Development Institute, University of the WitwatersrandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/780202017-06-05T01:03:54Z2017-06-05T01:03:54ZWhy taking down Confederate memorials is only a first step<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/172057/original/file-20170602-20605-97655i.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee is removed on Friday, May 19, 2017, from Lee Circle in New Orleans.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Scott Threlkeld</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Recently the city of New Orleans <a href="http://www.npr.org/2017/05/20/529232823/with-lee-statues-removal-another-battle-of-new-orleans-comes-to-a-close">removed several Confederate monuments</a> from a prominent, downtown location. The decision to remove these memorials has <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/05/29/politics/baltimore-mayor-catherine-pugh-confederate-monuments/">touched off a debate</a> throughout several other major U.S. cities who have memorials dedicated to the Confederacy. While critics of the removal say <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/are-removing-confederate-monuments-erasing-history-n750526">the effort erases history</a>, <a href="http://thefederalist.com/2017/04/25/new-orleans-wrong-remove-confederate-monuments/">supporters argue</a> that these memorials celebrate racism and memorialize white supremacy. </p>
<p>We are scholars of memory and cultural landscape. Our work shows that challenging Confederate symbols that legitimize white supremacy is certainly the right thing to do because of the historic legacies of racism they represent. However, taking down Confederate symbols cannot just be a feel-good moment or a substitute for the hard work of racial reconciliation and understanding to advance justice. </p>
<h2>Symbols of Jim Crow era</h2>
<p>Monuments and other commemorative sites <a href="http://sundown.tougaloo.edu/liesacrossamerica.php">tell at least two stories</a>, according to sociologist <a href="http://sundown.tougaloo.edu/">James Loewen</a>. The first is the story of the people and events commemorated by the memorial. The other is a deeper tale of how the monument was created, by whom and for what political purpose. </p>
<p>Memorials, thus, are shaped by a broad range of political, economic and social relationships. For example, the contested Confederate memorials of New Orleans, along with those in many other cities, were dedicated during a Jim Crow era in which <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/04/the-stubborn-persistence-of-confederate-monuments/479751/">whites actively discriminated</a> against African-Americans.</p>
<p>In this respect, the monuments to the Confederacy in New Orleans and many other cities are doubly problematic. They not only publicly honor the Confederacy, but also are a symbol of an era that saw the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/maghis/18.2.7">continuation of institutionalized racism</a> and black disenfranchisement. During the era of segregation white elites employed these statues to take advantage of the racial anxieties of poor whites and to remind civil rights-seeking black communities of who really mattered and belonged (and who did not) in the city. </p>
<p>As New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/05/23/read_mitch_landrieu_s_confederate_monuments_speech.html">recently stated in a speech</a>: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Can you look into that young [African-American] girl’s eyes and convince her that Robert E. Lee is there to encourage her? Do you think she will feel inspired and hopeful by that story? Do these monuments help her see a future with limitless potential? Have you ever thought that if her potential is limited, yours and mine are too? We all know the answer to these very simple questions. When you look into this child’s eyes is the moment when the searing truth comes into focus for us. This is the moment when we know what is right and what we must do. We can’t walk away from this truth.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>What Mitch Landrieu recognizes is a fact that many contemporary scholars have known for some time: Memorials can and do <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1467-8306.9303008">exact a painful toll</a> on the sense of belonging and place of African-Americans in the American landscape. Simply taking down the memorials to the Confederacy is not the same as creating a society in which all people – regardless of color, religion, gender or sexuality – are able to live out their limitless potential.</p>
<h2>Building a community’s capacity</h2>
<p>Our own work suggests that <a href="http://doi.org/10.1353/sgo.2016.0003">“memory work,”</a> the necessary labor of coming to grips with the stories of past traumas like racism and its wounds, is a key component of healing. </p>
<p>Memory work is building the capacity of a community to recover from past injustices. This capacity-building needs to recognize not only those injustices but also how they continue to have an impact on inequality today. Scholar <a href="https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/people/karen-till">Karen Till</a> argues that it needs to be <a href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0962629811001806">rooted in activities</a> such as truth commissions, collecting oral histories, museum exhibitions, or public performances and art that help connect a community’s history to contemporary inequality. So, the removal of the Confederate memorials is an important first step, but it cannot end there. </p>
<p>Memory work also means that addressing racial injustices takes sustained heavy lifting. And the removal of Confederate monuments cannot be mistaken for a solution for longstanding racial inequality. To understand, let’s look more closely at New Orleans – which brings together two cities – <a href="http://cfed.org/assets/pdfs/Racial_Wealth_Divide_in_New_Orleans_RWDI.pdf">one white and one black</a>. </p>
<p>The white city is relatively wealthy, while in the African-American city 30 percent of black households are under the poverty line (compared to 4.9 percent of white households). In addition, these disparities have led to gentrification and the <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02723638.2014.961359">disappearing of many black communities</a>. This is changing not only the historic makeup of the city, but also its cultural landscape. As Geographer <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/41412796?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">Clyde Woods</a> notes, the civil rights movement is <a href="http://www.ugapress.org/index.php/books/index/development_drowned_and_reborn">“unfinished business”</a> in New Orleans. This is true for the rest of United States as well. </p>
<h2>Truth and reconciliation commission</h2>
<p>Bringing about commemorative reform without beginning this broader work of remembering and recovering from white supremacy runs a great risk of <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/214306">perpetuating the tradition of manipulating memorial symbols</a> for political advantage and expediency. </p>
<p>We suggest that cities such as New Orleans follow the lead of a growing number of cities in organizing a <a href="https://theconversation.com/dealing-with-hate-can-americas-truth-and-reconciliation-commissions-help-73170">truth and reconciliation commission</a> to examine the material, social and symbolic consequences of the reality of racism and racial inequality. </p>
<p>These commissions would help engage in memory work and the healing of historic wounds – something much-needed today.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/78020/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Monuments to the Confederacy in New Orleans and many other cities are problematic. But a mere erasure will not address the issues around racism and racial inequality.Joshua F.J. Inwood, Associate Professor of Geography Senior Research Associate in the Rock Ethics Institute, Penn StateDerek H. Alderman, Professor of Geography, University of TennesseeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/731852017-02-24T02:06:53Z2017-02-24T02:06:53ZHidden figures: How black women preachers spoke truth to power<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158161/original/image-20170223-32718-1dleovy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Sojourner Truth Memorial in Florence, Massachusetts.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/masstravel/13943933590/in/photolist-nfbiE7-fA3eGa-7eXAM3-8EitT3-8rwTDn-cjcw8G-6jjvuQ-aujo3H-5xuE3L-8P6YFS-5xqgGr-8EfjTc-6jjtrQ-7cZHed-6jfoDT-6jfohX-6jfkhP-dkKzXm-6jjvVm-6jfcTT-6jfmQK-6jfpQe-6jfnQ8-6jfEJX-6jjs7f-6jfev4-6jjrgb-6jjwqS-6jjwXN-6jjJUC-kGvtF5-6jjQWo-6jfoYZ-6jfpoe-6jjsJm-8EfjFx-6jfF9K-5xqgpV-kGucSV-edpMem-ETLbH-ETLbV-pbRDdk-6fkPN8-QRN7By-6ixS5N-9pNct7-pB24Hd-azmgsm-2C8VGB">Lynne Graves</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Each semester I greet the students who file into my preaching class at <a href="http://divinity.howard.edu/">Howard University</a> with a standard talk. The talk is not an overview of the basics – techniques of sermon preparation or sermon delivery, as one might expect. Outlining the basics is not particularly difficult.</p>
<p>The greatest challenge, in fact, is helping learners to stretch their theology: namely, how they perceive who God is and convey what God is like in their sermons. This becomes particularly important for <a href="http://www.abingdonpress.com/product/9781501818943">African-American preachers</a>, especially African-American women preachers, because most come from church contexts that overuse exclusively masculine language for God and humanity.</p>
<p>African-American women comprise more than 70 percent of the active membership of generally any <a href="http://www.palgrave.com/us/book/9781137552877">African-American congregation</a> one might attend today. According to one Pew study, African-American women are among the most <a href="http://www.pewforum.org/2009/01/30/a-religious-portrait-of-african-americans/">religiously committed of the Protestant</a> demographic – eight in 10 say that religion is important to them.</p>
<p>Yet, America’s Christian pulpits, especially African-American pulpits, remain male-dominated spaces. Still today, eyebrows raise, churches split, pews empty and recommendation letters get lost at a woman’s mention that God has <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=African%20American%20Preaching%20an%20Introduction">called her to preach</a>.</p>
<p>The deciding factor for women desiring to pastor and be accorded respect equal to their male counterparts generally whittles down to one question: Can she preach?</p>
<p>The fact is that African-American women have preached, formed congregations and confronted many racial injustices since the slavery era.</p>
<h2>Here’s the history</h2>
<p>The earliest black female preacher was a Methodist woman simply known as <a href="http://diverseeducation.com/article/8493/">Elizabeth</a>. She held her first prayer meeting in Baltimore in 1808 and preached for about 50 years before retiring to Philadelphia to live among the <a href="http://www.quakers.org">Quakers</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158162/original/image-20170223-32692-1jt2c80.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158162/original/image-20170223-32692-1jt2c80.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158162/original/image-20170223-32692-1jt2c80.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158162/original/image-20170223-32692-1jt2c80.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158162/original/image-20170223-32692-1jt2c80.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158162/original/image-20170223-32692-1jt2c80.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158162/original/image-20170223-32692-1jt2c80.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">First African-American church, founded by Rev. Richard Allen.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/dfsmith/6990618379/in/photolist-iuHAEG-iqCokx-jKgd2h-hYcuBE-iuJZrb-bDJKi6">D Smith</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/">CC BY-NC</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>An unbroken legacy of African-American women preachers persisted even long after Elizabeth. <a href="http://www.blackpast.org/aah/lee-jarena-1783">Reverend Jarena Lee</a> became the first African-American woman to preach at the <a href="https://www.ame-church.com">African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church</a>. She had started even before the church was officially formed in the city of Philadelphia in 1816. But, she faced considerable opposition.</p>
<p>AME Bishop <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part3/3p97.html">Richard Allen</a>, who founded the AME Church, had initially refused Lee’s request to preach. It was only upon hearing her speak, presumably, from the floor, during a worship service, that he permitted her to give a sermon.</p>
<p><a href="http://books.wwnorton.com/books/Preaching-with-Sacred-Fire/">Lee reported</a> that Bishop Allen,</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“rose up in the assembly, and related that [she] had called upon him eight years before, asking to be permitted to preach, and that he had put [her] off; but that he now as much believed that [she] was called to that work, as any of the preachers present.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Lee was much like her Colonial-era contemporary, the famed women’s rights activist <a href="http://www.biography.com/people/sojourner-truth-9511284">Sojourner Truth</a>. Truth had escaped John Dumont’s slave plantation in 1828 and landed in New York City, where she became an itinerant preacher active in the abolition and woman’s suffrage movements.</p>
<h2>Fighting the gender narratives</h2>
<p>For centuries now, the Holy Bible has been used to <a href="http://biblehub.com/1_timothy/2-12.htm">suppress women’s voices</a>. These early female black preachers reinterpreted the Bible to liberate women.</p>
<p>Truth, for example, is most remembered for her captivating topical sermon <a href="http://www.blackpast.org/1851-sojourner-truth-arnt-i-woman">"Ar’nt I A Woman?</a>,” delivered at the <a href="https://www.nps.gov/wori/learn/historyculture/more-womens-rights-conventions.htm">Woman’s Rights National Convention</a> on May 29, 1851 in Akron, Ohio.</p>
<p>In a skillful historical interpretation of the scriptures, in her convention address, Truth used the Bible to liberate and set the record straight about women’s rights. She <a href="http://www.sojournertruth.com/p/aint-i-woman.html">professed</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Then that little man in black there, he says women can’t have as much rights as men, because Christ wasn’t a woman! Where did your Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him.” </p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158164/original/image-20170223-21964-vvstda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/158164/original/image-20170223-21964-vvstda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=840&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158164/original/image-20170223-21964-vvstda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=840&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158164/original/image-20170223-21964-vvstda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=840&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158164/original/image-20170223-21964-vvstda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1056&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158164/original/image-20170223-21964-vvstda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1056&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/158164/original/image-20170223-21964-vvstda.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1056&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Jarena Lee.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/tradingcardsnpsyahoocom/7222590166/in/photolist-c1eEqE-c1eEt1-dHhvYD-99Cw6A-99zin4-99zgcc-99CwGW-99Cr5s-99zhTx-99zkva-99Cu3w-99zhaB-99zhDt-99Ct1s-99CshA-99zkeT-99zjLe-99zmjF-99zkLD-99zgVx-99zmPx-99ywgr-99zj4p-99zgqB-8QQ7Rb-99znRD-99zAQg-99zAj4-99CrN7-99CK7u-99Cvyq-99CuAj-99CHPG-99CsvC-99zyJk-99zgET-jYZFwf-99zzhv-99CwwU-99zzMx-99CJmu-99zz2c-99zxWF-99CGeW-5Z9Mr2-99CJSj-99zBAM-99zomH-99zn62-99Crzm">TradingCardsNPS</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
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<p>Like Truth, Jarena Lee spoke truth to power and paved the way for other mid- to late 19th-century black female preachers to achieve validation as pulpit leaders, although neither she nor Truth received official clerical appointments.</p>
<p>The first woman to achieve this validation was <a href="http://www.hallofgovernors.ny.gov/wh/Julia-A-J-Foote">Julia A. J. Foote</a>. In 1884, she became the first woman ordained a deacon in the African Methodist Episcopal Zion <a href="http://www.amez.org/">AMEZ</a> Church. Shortly after followed the ordinations of AME evangelist <a href="http://articles.mcall.com/1995-07-13/features/3054687_1_mrs-baker-religious-leaders-harriet-cole">Harriet A. Baker</a>, who in 1889 was perhaps the first black woman to receive a pastoral appointment. <a href="http://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/30036/jesus-jobs-and-justice-by-bettye-collier-thomas/">Mary J. Small</a> became the first woman to achieve “elder ordination” status, which permitted her to preach, teach and administer the sacraments and Holy Communion.</p>
<p>Historian <a href="http://www.cla.temple.edu/history/faculty/bettye-collier-thomas/">Bettye Collier-Thomas</a> maintains that the goal for most black women seeking ordination in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was simply a matter of gender inclusion, not necessarily pursuing the need to transform the patriarchal church.</p>
<h2>Preaching justice</h2>
<p>An important voice was that of Rev. Florence Spearing Randolph. In her role as reformer, suffragist, evangelist and pastor, she daringly advanced the cause of freedom and justice within the churches she served and even beyond during the period of the <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/great-migration">Great Migration</a> of 20th century.</p>
<p>In my book, <a href="http://baylorpr.es/sGilbert">“A Pursued Justice: Black Preaching from the Great Migration to Civil Rights</a>,” I trace the clerical legacy of <a href="http://www.njwomenshistory.org/discover/biographies/florence-spearing-randolph/">Rev. Randolph</a> and describe how her prophetic sermons spoke to the spiritual, social and industrial conditions of her African-American listeners before and during <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/great-migration">the largest internal migration</a> in the United States.</p>
<p>In her sermons she brought criticism to the broken promises of American democracy, the deceptive ideology of black inferiority and other chronic injustices.</p>
<p>Randolph’s sermon “If I Were White,” preached on Race Relations Sunday, Feb. 1, 1941, reminded her listeners of their self-worth. It emphasized that America’s whites who claim to be defending democracy in wartime have an obligation to all American citizens.</p>
<p>Randolph spoke in concrete language. She argued that the refusal of whites to act justly toward blacks, domestically and abroad, embraced sin rather than Christ. That, she said, revealed a realistic picture of America’s race problem.</p>
<p>She also spoke about gender discrimination. Randolph’s carefully crafted sermon in 1909 “Antipathy to Women Preachers,” for example, highlights several heroic women in the Bible. From her interpretation of their scriptural legacy, she argued that gender discrimination in Christian pulpits illustrated a misreading of scripture.</p>
<p>Randolph used her position as preacher to effect social change. She was a member and organizer for the <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/womens-history/womans-christian-temperance-union">Woman’s Christian Temperance Union</a> (WCTU), which led in the work to pass the <a href="http://constitution.laws.com/american-history/constitution/constitutional-amendments/18th-amendment">18th Amendment</a>, which made prohibition of the production, sale and transport of alcoholic beverages illegal in the United States. Her affiliation with the WCTU earned her the title “militant herald of temperance and righteousness.”</p>
<p>Today, several respected African-American women preachers and teachers of preachers proudly stand on Lee’s, Small’s and Randolph’s shoulders raising their prophetic voices.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/73185/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>I have not received any funding for this research. </span></em></p>Since the 19th century, a long line of black women preachers set in motion a tradition that spoke against injustices and questioned patriarchal attitudes. Here’s their story.Kenyatta R. Gilbert, Associate Professor of Homiletics, Howard UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.