Saturday, November 27, 2010

From here to…

We spent time recently creating our first radio program "EmergentVoice" (a project of the EmergentSee Collective) discussing the topic of cultural appropriation. The discussion was lively and dynamic! It will air on Alverno Free Radio (we'll keep you posted on the date/time). I went to sleep with numerous ideas (the origin of 'whiteness', cultural appropriation, guilt, pain, white supremacy, healing and reparations, etc.) buzzing through my mind! When I woke-up, these thoughts had crystallized...

From here to…

Life gives us the opportunity to develop our collective humanity. We are invited to notice discomfort in its mildest form and ultimately pain. We are invited throughout our lives to tune in and first notice pain, then move through it.

White supremacy and racial oppression dulls the human capacity to notice, wonder, ask, listen, and allow. It’s very premise requires numbness to pain (comfort) and denial of collective suffering. This is its own trauma. A trauma of the human spirit to see itself, know itself, remember itself and love itself.

Moving through pain is a skill developed through life’s offering itself to us.

When waking up to racial oppression, like through cultural appropriation, we are invited to notice the pain, like guilt.

This feeling of guilt is an indicator that work/exploration need to take place. To move through the guilt, we must grieve. Grief is a process, not a destination. Getting stuck in grief ensures that others will be responsible for the healing action. Grieving can be the never-ending spiral abyss of “poor me”. It is easy to get lost in the ego feeding frenzy! It is easy to get others to buy into our smallness and victimization. This co-dependent sharing of pain will feed our ego, not our soul. It will nourish our smallness, not our humanity. It will stimulate addictions, not our humility

We must flow through guilt while expanding our awareness of our oneness. This is an essential step on the healing journey. The gift of life is the capacity to move through pain. This brings us closer to our humanity.

From Guilt ….exploration/wonder/research

Through Grief….questions/listening

To Action…allowing

Repairing Racial Harm….Letting Love Be.

Yvette Murrell

November 27, 2010

Friday, October 1, 2010

THE GRACE AND WHAT-NOT OF SILENCE

Listeners of NPR know that All Things Considered host Michele Norris has just published a memoir, THE GRACE OF SILENCE, and is currently touring. Last night I attended her talk in Milwaukee.

I was torn about attending because the ticket price, which included her book, was steep, and I have long held mixed feelings about Norris. On one hand she is an extremely capable, smooth, insightful journalist. On the other hand, is this enough?

I admit I hold white people and people of color up to different standards. This is because we hold different levels of status in USA society. Study this site to understand what I mean. Because of historic oppression, people of color continue to experience disadvantages, even though Jim Crow is technically over.

Michele Norris is a successful African American woman in the overwhelmingly white culture of public radio. As such I expect much of her and can’t help being disappointed when she doesn’t deliver. Not only do I expect her to bring national attention to issues of race (which she does to some degree), but also to help transform NPR to truly reflect the nation’s demographics, and to leverage her power to dismantle racism/white supremacy.

I hold Obama up to that standard as well, so like many people of color, am disappointed that he isn’t doing more to actively dismantle racism/white supremacy. On the other hand, I know what he is up against in Washington: the embodiment of white supremacy which is the top echelon of our government. I recognize how hard it is for people of color to claw to the top when their parents were not able to provide the advantages that upper class whites have long held close. And when these individuals do climb to the top of their field, it’s often at the expense of alienating themselves from other people of color, by serving as the exception, the token.

Last night I found myself getting extremely restless. Norris’s talk was interesting, painting a portrait of racism/white supremacy in the USA in the 1940s-1960s for her parents and grandparents. But the problem with such discussions is that they gloss over the fact that racism/white supremacy continues. In fact, in the 21st century, “white supremacy” is a bigger issue than “racism” because the former assumes a system, while the latter implies personal actions of bigotry.

We’ve all been trained to be polite and to act justly in personal affairs, but how successful have we been in dismantling centuries of economic, educational, and political injustice? Milwaukee’s poverty rate has just soared to 27%. 4 out of 10 children in our city live in poverty, and these children are overwhelmingly African American. Can anyone look me in the eye and claim we do not live in a system of racism/white supremacy?

Personal stories like Norris’s are important for informing us about the depth of racism/white supremacy in our nation, but as she stood up there center stage—beautiful, eloquent, light skinned and straight haired—like the symbol of Obama, she made us feel like the work had been done. She made us feel self-congratulatory: “Oh, those black people, and what they’ve been through…Thank God, it’s over….” And now we are off the hook.

If Norris was dark-skinned with curly hair and a body shape more like Gabby Sidibe, would she have been hired by ABC News? If she had grown up in a working class black neighborhood and her speech more Ebonics-tinged, would she have been hired by NPR? Her appearance and upbringing in White society gave her enormous privilege, which she never acknowledged during the talk or Q/A. The mostly white audience, like the listeners of NPR, felt at ease with her.

But facing racism/white supremacy should make us uneasy. Confronting injustice should make our hearts race. Ongoing systems of privilege that disenfranchise millions should bring us to our feet, should be intolerable and unbearable.

I know, I know, Michele Norris cannot do it all, and neither can Obama. But WE must step up to the task. WE must compile our own family stories. We must understand the role racism/white supremacy has played in our own lives, then actively dismantle these systems.

Me? I’m struggling to find the ways. I run a nonprofit yoga school to bring wellness to underserved communities. I am teaching 2 new classes at Alverno on Repairing Racial Harm and Healing Collective Trauma. I’m working on building a yoga/organic farming/housing cooperative in the working class, mixed race neighborhood where I live. I’m giving away as much money as I can. I help run EmergentSee Racial Reconciliation Dialogues. It’s not enough, not nearly enough. But we must find the ways, creatively, joyfully, to dismantle injustice in our communities, and uplift the children of our city so that 0 out of 10 tolerate poverty.

At some point, silence is no longer graceful.

Peggy Hong
1 October 2010

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Race and Sex: 6 Word Poems

Hi all,
We've been having some deep, intense discussions on race and sex the past 2 months. At our last session we did a brief writing exercise. The results were so moving and startling that I asked participants if I could put their poems on our blog. The assignment was to write a 6-word poem responding to the question: "What process do Black men use to lovingly connect with their humanity within a community that fears their power? How do they reveal their power effectively?"

vulnerable self recalls mother's love unyielding
--Shelly Roder

Black
mindfully man
breath be
me
--Yvette Mitchell

patriarch under
heel
love freely
--Ava Hernandez

deliberate stillness informing
determined action
persuades
--David Menees

realized ability
conspicuous civility
awareness
shared
--Keith Knox

Digest poison,
Allow lovingkindness,
Unfold yourself.
--James Murrell

survive beyond
forced identity
loving within
--Heidi Matera

its hard. dont stop. attempt again.
--Kelly Knoke

shunned but not feared
i'm stumped
--Peggy Hong

Thursday, February 25, 2010

Movie and Dinner at UWM: "Who Killed Vincent Chin?"

Come and watch this important film and meet the filmmaker, Curtis Chin! EmergentSee facilitator Marcia Lee makes an appearance in this film.

MCSC Proudly Presents:
Award-winning author and producer Curtis Chin and his documentary
A film screening and talk on Thursday, March 4, 2010, 6:00 p.m., UWM Union Fireside Lounge
In 1982, Vincent Chin was murdered in Detroit by two white autoworkers at the height of anti-Japanese sentiments. For the first time, Asian America ns around the country galvanized to form a real community and movement. This documentary features interviews with the key players at the time, as well as a whole new generation of activists. "Vincent Who?" asks how far Asian Americans have come since then and how far we have yet to go.

This event is sponsored by the Multicultural Student Coalition and co-sponsored by the Hmong Diaspora Studies, Union Sociocultural Programming, LGBT Resource Center, Academic Affairs, and the Organization of Chinese Americans-Wisconsin Chapter.
Contact: Kathy Vang, President of MCSC at vang22@uwm.edu for questions!
FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

Also the public is invited to:
Sun., Feb. 28 - Milwaukee
6:30 pm - Rice Palace dinner, National Ave.

Thurs., March 4 - Milwaukee
8:00 pm - dinner with students

Sunday, January 24, 2010

OK, Let's Get Talking: Race and Sex

• Do you long for open, authentic discussions about race but have difficulty finding others equally interested?

• Do people tell you that you're "just too sensitive" when you bring up topics of race?

• Do you read at least one article each week on the topic of race?

• Do you wish you could do more to repair racial harm than just talk about it?

If you answered, yes, yes, yes, and YES, then EmergentSee Dialogues is for you!
We meet monthly to have deep, honest discussions about race with the goal of racial reconciliation and reparation. We look at institutionalized racism and white privilege, observe our roles in them, take personal responsibility, and work to dismantle these systems.


Spring 2010 Theme: Race and Sex
Join us on the third Thursday of each month from 6:30-9pm: February 18, March 18, April 15

Suggested donation for refreshments, handouts, and EmergentSee Racial Reparations Fund:
$20 for 3-session series

Location: 3038 N. Cambridge Ave, Milwaukee, WI (home of Peggy Hong)

We encourage all attendees to bring along a friend whom you talk with about race.

Questions? Contact emergentsee@gmail.com or 414-975-7382
http://emergentseedialogues.blogspot.com/



Our Mission: The multi-racial EmergentSee Collective formed in 2008 to reveal and correct white privilege and racial oppression. In our work with individuals and groups, participants learn to recognize their roles in systems of oppression and institutionalized racism. As individuals take personal and social responsibility, they experience the humility and contrition required to repair racial harm. EmergentSee Collective inspires and supports individuals to make personal reparations and work toward institutional reparations.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
SPRING 2010 REGISTRATION FORM
Complete this form and email to emergentsee@gmail.com or send to 3038 N Cambridge Ave, Milwaukee, 53211.

Name:___________________email:___________________________________Phone:_____________
Race: Asian/Pacific Islander__ Black__ White__ Latino/Hispanic__ Native American__ Other______
Age: under 20___ 21-30___ 31-40____ 41-50___ 51-60___ 61-70___ 71+___

Do you have book, film, or article recommendations regarding this topic? ________________________ __________________________________________________________________________________
Do you have questions or concerns you would like addressed in these dialogues? ___________________________________________________________________________________