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MLK DAY 2018

A theme explores resistance to and through education

By Bates College

January 19^th, 2018

'at this point, I often wonder whether or not education is filling its purpose.'

Photographs by Phyllis Graber Jensen and Theophil Syslo of the Bates Communications Office portray moments from the college’s 2018 MLK Day observance as the campus community and guests from near and far explored the theme “Power, Politics, and Privilege: Resistance to/through Education.”

THE REV. DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. INTERFAITH SERVICE

There was togetherness in Gomes Chapel on Sunday night. The Bates and Lewiston-Auburn community heard a recording of Martin Luther King, Jr. and spoke his words during a call-and-response. The Gospelaires sang Tasha Cobbs' "Break Every Chain." Bates Hillel and members of Auburn's Temple Shalom Synagogue-Center sang a prayer for the well-being of all. Grace Ingabire '18 danced. The community lit candles as a demonstration of unity.

In his sermon, Jamil Drake, assistant professor of religion at Florida State University and a former Bates visiting faculty member, reminded the gathering not to divorce King's messages of nonviolence and unity from "the past, historical, adversarial King." Unity meant little without social and economic reform, without the opportunity for each person to reach their full potential.

THE MLK DAY KEYNOTE

The theme of the Bates MLK Day observance — Power, Politics, and Privilege: Resistance to/through Education — “captures a core conundrum of education,” said keynote speaker and education researcher Na’ilah Suad Nasir: “that it can be both a site of social reproduction and a site of resistance.

“To my mind, education is key to building and creating the kind of society that we need…ensuring that society will have citizens that have the capacity to reason using evidence, to listen to each other, and to create socially just policy and structures,” she said.

Morning workshops

"Change doesn't come when you're old," said 17-year-old Shukri Abdirahman, an Edward Little High School senior who attended a workshop on understanding cultural differences."Change comes when you're ready."

People of all ages used the morning workshops to explore how to work for justice in their own lives, and explain how they already have — from 86-year-old Don Robitaille, who asked a question at a workshop on the idea of "post-colorblindness," to the Lewiston High School students who explained how they created a system of restorative justice at their school, to the children who read books from Bates' Diverse Book Collection with their caregivers.

BOOK DISCUSSION AND 'BATES VOICES' HONORING DR. KING

At midday, Bates faculty, staff, and students gathered in the Fireplace Lounge in Commons. They honored King’s work by sharing both short original writings addressing his legacy and excerpted texts that inspired their readers. Upstairs, more gathered around tables to discuss “Choosing a School for My Daughter in a Segregated City” an article by Nikole Hannah-Jones.

Emilio Valadez '18 of San Antonio, Texas, improvises on the Fireplace Lounge piano in Commons as part of the "Bates Voices" presentation.

afternoon workshops

How can athletes be activists? How does playing squash break down barriers? What are the barriers to getting into college, and how do we overcome them? How do people of color succeed in STEM fields at Bates?

The afternoon workshops tackled issues with implications both for a nation that debates the right way to protest, and for a campus and community that is growing ever more diverse.

the rev. Dr. benjamin Elijah Mays, class of 1920, debate

In the traditional Benjamin Mays Debate, student debaters from Bates and Morehouse argued the motion: "This house supports racially homogenous schools."

SANKOFA PRESENTS ‘try, try again'

Each year, Bates students produce Sankofa, which celebrates the African diaspora through music, dance, and theater. This year's Sankofa performance, "Try, Try Again," was written and directed by Michael Hogue ’20 of Chicago. Hogue drew from his own experiences — as well as music by Kendrick Lamar, Lauryn Hill, and Londrelle, and spoken-word pieces by Prentice Powell and Saul Williams — to create and play the character V, a high school student whose love for the people around him is misunderstood and rejected, but ultimately triumphant.

the rev. dr. martin luther king jr. read-in

It's a long-standing MLK Day tradition: Bates students, staff, and community members read books to students at Martel Elementary School in Lewiston, later donating the books to the students' classrooms. The sixth-graders heard something more: 94-year-old James Reese, father of Associate Dean of Students for International Student Programs James Reese, called in to talk his experience at the 1963 March on Washington, where King delivered his "I Have a Dream" speech.