- Good evening. Thank you for coming out.
Is it still 70 degrees out?
I was sure it was.
My name is Evelynn Ellis. I'm a member of the
Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Junior
Celebration Committee.
I'm also the Vice President of Institutional Diversity
and Equity here at Dartmouth.
It is a pleasure that I get to open this evening
of celebration, of reflection, and growth for us all.
But before we start I want to thank,
and I want you to help me thank,
the Martin Luther King Junior Celebration Committee.
They're scattered throughout the audience
if you could help me thank them
for all the incredible work that they do.
We always open the celebration with
a student speaker or a student leader.
And this year, our student speaker is Chinedum Nwaigw.
She's originally from Newark, New Jersey.
And she's the daughter of Nigerian immigrants.
Chinedum is a senior at Dartmouth
majoring in Film & Media Studies,
and African and African American Studies.
She holds a variety of student
leadership positions on campus,
including President of the Afro-American Society,
and Vice President
of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated,
Xi Lambda Chapter.
As a filmmaker and storyteller, it is her goal
to center the Black experience in her work,
and show Black people just how
multi-dimensional we are.
Please welcome her to the podium.
(Applause)
- Thank you all for coming out
to this evening's celebration of
Doctor Martin Luther King Junior.
And thank you to Evelynn Ellis and the
Office of Institutional Diversity and Equity
for inviting me to deliver these opening remarks.
I am Chinedum Nwaigw and it is
and honor to be here with you this evening.
Four years ago, during my freshman winter,
I sat in these seats listening to Kristina Williams,
a former senior, speak about Dartmouth's failure
to better the lives of its students of color,
women, lower class, and queer community.
This morning, anticipating the moment
I would be called to give the same speech,
I called K-Will, my friend, sister, and mentor,
to tell her that the Dartmouth she
had spoken so bravely about four years ago
is still the same, if not worse.
I told her that the administration
she called out four years ago for
failing to protect women in fraternity basements
is the same administration facing a
$70 million dollar lawsuit for looking the other way
when women in the Psychological and
Brain Sciences Department came forward
about their professors' rampant sexual abuse.
If, in four years, I cannot pinpoint a single instance
of meaningful progress at Dartmouth, how then
can I celebrate 250 years of its existence?
Much like my Native and African American peers
who do not have the privilege of
looking back nostalgically at the past,
I cannot bring myself to celebrate
Dartmouth's 250th anniversary.
The Abenaki, the tribe whose land Dartmouth is
built on, will not let me.
And Brister, Exeter, Chloe, Caesar,
Lavinia, Archelaus, Peggy, and the enslaved child
on whose Black bodies this college was built
would anguish at the sight of such dishonesty.
In preparing for this year's keynote address,
I repeated the theme of this year's commemorations,
Standing At the Threshold, hoping that it
would inspire some powerful message
to share with you all,
but all I could think about was
how long we have been standing at this threshold.
Standing on the cusp of something new.
I stand before you today to affirm
that it is not enough to stand
at the threshold of greatness,
and willingly choose to remain there
with no sign of forward progression.
It is about time that we tipped the scales
and seized this moment of change.
(Applause) Thank you.
(Applause)
Black people's experiences at Dartmouth and beyond
are too often shaped by our need to survive.
In fact, Dartmouth first introduced
me to the concept of a survivor.
I remember April 14, 2016 as clear as day.
It was 9:00 p.m. and I was heading back
to my dorm in the Choates when I received
an alert from the Women of Color Collective
reminding people that they were hosting
a forum for survivors at the
Center for Gender and Student Engagement,
known by most as the CGSE.
I had assumed this was going to be an
inspirational talk hosted by upperclassmen
who had persevered at Dartmouth despite obstacles.
It was that, for the most part, but the obstacles
survived in this case were not the obstacles
of poverty, fear, or self-doubt that most
college students experience.
That night, the common obstacle was the
rape and sexual assault that women of color had
experienced on this very campus.
That night, I sat in a circle with all of the
women of color I admired as they each took turns
sharing how they survived assault on this campus.
Ever since then, the term survivor has been repeated
over and over and over again like a mantra.
And this is just one facet of survival
in an ecosystem and legacy built on pain.
Over the course of four years, we have had to
give up several things in order to
survive on this campus.
In the name of a Dartmouth degree,
we have relinquished the study
of our own histories, as our Ethnic
Studies Department ceased to exist.
In the name of a Dartmouth degree,
we have given up learning from
people who look like us as they flee
to more supportive institutions.
In the name of a Dartmouth degree,
we have lost our sense of collectivity in that
so much of Dartmouth is built on
the success of the individual.
In the name of a Dartmouth degree,
we have given up friendships formed
through joy in favor of bonds formed through struggle.
In the name of a Dartmouth degree,
we have given up our mental health
with no chance of recovery due to
under staffing at centers like
Opal, Collis, and Dick's House.
In the name of a Dartmouth degree,
we have given up our safety as
women's residences have been attacked
with impunity as recently as the Spring of 2017.
In the name of a Dartmouth degree,
we have given up maintaining our
relationships with home,
afraid that our families will know how we suffer.
Survival is still not enough.
King himself did not survive.
There will always be those who sacrifice,
but it is those who stand in inaction
that keep survivors at the threshold
waiting for that moment of change.
The time is up.
Black women, women of color, poor people,
queer and trans people deserve
more than survival.
Survival is just living on the edge.
It does nothing for liberation.
As I reflect on the enduring legacy of Dr. King,
I am reminded of how he envisioned
a life beyond survival.
One that included safety, voting rights,
financial freedom, and individual liberty.
He was willing to take unpopular stances,
and go to great lengths to hold
his political leaders and friends accountable.
For those who stand inactive and
force survival as a mode of existence,
afraid to put themselves on the line,
let us remember the address that Dr. King gave
at Spelman College in April of 1960.
"Keep moving. For it may well be that
the greatest song has not yet been sung.
The greatest book has not been written.
The highest mountain has not been climbed.
Life for none of us has been a crystal stair,
but we must keep moving.
If you can't fly, run.
If you can't run, walk.
If you can't walk, crawl.
But by all means, keep moving."
At this 250th year mark, we are stuck
at the threshold between human
compassion and indifference.
While many of us struggle to push beyond survival,
we carry the weight of those who remain stagnant,
attempting to drag our peers and communities to freedom.
So, the only question I have today is:
Will you stand, or will you move?
Thank you, and please welcome
Evelynn Ellis back to the stage.
(Applause and cheers)
- These are not normal times.
These are not normal circumstances.
These are not normal political actions
that we are witnessing on a daily basis.
I start our 2019 celebration by reminding
us all that this country is possibly
in the worst state of repair that
we have seen for a while.
And definitely a worse state than
when I talked to you in January of 2018.
I wish I had better news, but better
a truth we can challenge and aggressively
respond to than a lie that encourages us
to put our heads under the sand,
when the waves of hostility wash away
every ounce of integrity, courage,
and moral responsibility this nation has ever had.
If you never had any intention of
joining the call to action to reverse
the direction of your country,
now might be the time to develop
focus, intention, and internal fortitude.
I fear imagining where we will be next year
if we do not make our voices heard,
and our actions reflective of our voices.
It is possible that we are more divided
as a country now than we were
during the American Civil War.
As bad as that war was, at least
there was some sense of purpose.
Even though the purpose was misguided.
My opinion of those times always left me thinking
that the warring parties felt that
they were protecting something
beyond the capitalism of slavery,
the privileged lifestyles of plantation owners,
and northerners who benefited from those plantations.
While we can look back now and
see all the errors in their logic,
not even to mention the moral conflicts
with human bondage.
Somehow the accepted hate manifesting
itself today, a voice any connection
to conviction to anything beyond
capitalism and hate.
My worries might sound harsh to you,
but honestly rarely is covered
with sweet sentiments that leave
us feeling comfortable.
We have gathered to relight candles of hope.
And you and your family, your community, and in our nation
lighting candles at this time means
voting for people you know have some
sense of commitment to all living things.
Vote with your dollar.
Avoid companies that contribute to
modern slavery and servitude.
Vote with your feet.
Avoiding places in this country that
do more to harm humans than help them.
And vote with your voice.
Open your mouth when you witness
things that are wrong even if you might lose a friend,
might lose the support of your colleagues,
might even lose your job.
However you choose to vote, do it now.
In our case, waiting until tomorrow
is having unrepairable damage
on the lives of millions of people
across the country and across the world
and damage on this planet we live on.
For right now, we're definitely standing at a threshold.
Tonight, we're gonna do some critical thinking.
We're gonna do some healing.
No, don't laugh.
And we brought just the right person
to take us on that journey.
Francesca Ramsey is a social justice advocate,
a comedian, an actress, a writer, a video blogger.
She's a sought-after speaker, and the host
of the award-winning MTV series, Decoded.
She has been featured on NPR, Anderson Live, CNN, the BBC.
She's been in the New York Times,
a former writer and a correspondent for Comedy Central's
The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore.
She has also written for BET's
Black Girls Rock, the award show,
and she currently has multiple
television projects in development.
Her first book, Well, That Escalated Quickly,
was published last year.
Please help me welcome Francesca Ramsey.
(Applause)
- I like to talk about social issues
in different creative ways that
can hopefully reach lots of people.
And while this is an animated video
about a caterpillar and a snail,
it's also a video about privilege.
And privilege is that word that
people get really uncomfortable
the minute that you say it.
And I like to use this illustration
because it says look, we all have privilege.
Every single one of us.
We're all different, and we have to
actually acknowledge those privileges
in order to be sympathetic to
the experiences of others.
So, for example, I am an able-bodied person.
That means I can probably use any
restroom on this campus without any problem.
It is not my fault that there are not
many accessible bathrooms on campus.
But in order to be sensitive to
the fact that we need more accessibility on campus,
I have to say, you know what,
that's not something I actually think about
in my daily life because I'm an able-bodied person.
So, this is the way that I try
to introduce those topics throughout my content.
- I think Dartmouth is a place where
a lot of people come from privileged backgrounds,
and like, so for people at this school
that are sitting in this audience
that have sort of taken off the blinders,
how do you think those people should
positively change the way they interact
with the world to sort of,
positively influence their new understanding?
- Yeah, there's an analogy that I use
in my book and in my work a lot about allyship.
And the analogy is that I think
allyship is a lot like Destiny's Child;
there's only one Beyonce.
And I think that allyship means
sometimes you gotta step back, and you have to let
somebody else have the mic.
And I think that when you are ready to
acknowledge your privilege and realize
that you want to be somebody that's
an agent of change, you have to also
realize that you can't center your voice all of the time.
And I think, unfortunately, that happens
across all identities.
Where you have people who are like I'll tell you
what it's like for the gays.
And you're just like, you're not gay, shutup.
Move out of the way and let somebody
else talk about their own experience.
And I think we just need to do more of that.
And I think especially now on a college campus
where you are exposed to so many different identities,
there are so many different groups or organizations
that you could either partner with
or you can become a member of,
or even reaching out to their leadership
and saying what is it that you need,
how is it that I can support you?
Rather than barging in and saying I'm here to help,
I'm asking what is it that you need?
Especially because there are spaces that
you have access to that I don't.
And I think, especially when it comes to
having those difficult conversations,
I think, it's really easy to have them on campus
in the safety of more liberal spaces.
It's a lot harder to have those conversations at home.
And I think that often times people, it's very easy,
especially because of social media,
to have this very performative allyship
where you can change your Facebook profile picture,
or you can share all these articles, and it's like, okay.
The thing that really bothered me after the election
was people making these broad Facebook posts that were like,
if you voted for Trump I wanna tell--
I'm like, you know who it was, like, why are you
writing this vague Facebook post, talk to them. Right?
There's a lot of stuff that,
There's a lot of work that needs to be done
that no one is actually going to see you do
and no one is going to be there
to congratulate you or thank you for.
And I think you have to be willing
to do that work behind closed doors
and be okay with not getting a cookie for that work.
You have to be willing to bake your own cookies,
and it can be whatever kind of cookie you want.
I think not centering yourself,
having those difficult conversations,
and uplifting the voices of people that
don't normally get a chance to have
the spotlight or have the mic.