Dear Friends,
I recently traveled to Atlanta, GA with 24 Mississippi State honors students for our annual Presidential Scholar Spring Trip. On our first evening in Atlanta, we screened the movie Harriet, a biopic portraying the life of abolitionist, freedom fighter and Underground Railroad conductor, Harriet Tubman. Our guest speaker for the evening, Professor Illya Davis of Morehouse College in Atlanta, challenged us to engage Tubman’s legacy not only as an important historical figure but also as someone whose example represents a personal call to action. We talked about social change, about the inexorable albeit gradual movement of America toward the realization of its promise of “liberty and justice for all.” And for a powerful moment, beneath the throng of public banners proclaiming “Black Lives Matter,” and in the midst of Atlanta’s incredible diversity, we were cautiously optimistic about the possibility for positive social change. We were moved by the story of Morehouse College in Atlanta and the pivotal role it played in the African American Civil Rights movement. We were inspired to read the histories of marginalized peoples in America. We made reading lists, and the students even organized a critical reading group, right there on the spot. Our first titles, Kiese Laymon’s Heavy and Azar Nafisi’s Reading Lolita in Tehran.
On March 16th, just two days after our Atlanta trip, a series of mass shootings at three local Spas in Atlanta claimed the lives of eight people, six of whom were Asian American women. In the weeks following this national tragedy, discussions have centered on the motive of the gunman who murdered eight people. For those of us who witnessed the growing xenophobia and anti-Asian rhetoric of the past year, the motive behind this heinous crime against humanity could not be clearer. Our brothers and sisters in the Asian American and Pacific Islander community have been victims of racist rhetoric that has frequently resulted in violence. Asian American women have been subjected to a toxic mixture of racism, sexism, and misogyny. A recent report by Stop AAPI Hate revealed 3,795 racially motivated attacks against Asian Americans from March of last year to February of this year. This violence and the violence that occurred on March 16th must be understood in the context of anti-Asian racism and xenophobia.
Therefore, we the faculty of African American Studies at Mississippi State University call for greater awareness and advocacy around the endemic problem of racism and xenophobia affecting our brothers and sisters in the AAPI communities across our Nation. We are committed to engaging this problem in our scholarship and in our teaching. To all our students, especially those in the AAPI community, we offer our support to you. And to my students who accompanied me to Atlanta, I hope you will take to head and heart our conversations that evening as we considered the enduring legacy of Harriet Tubman. If ever there were a time to apply those lessons, it is certainly now.
Sincerely,
Don Shaffer
Director of African American Studies