Good afternoon, everyone. I am Associate Dean Adrian Wing. I’m Associate Dean. At the University of Iowa College of Law. In the field of international and comparative law programs. It is my pleasure on behalf of the college and Dean Kevin Washburn to welcome you to this Black History Month event.
The event today is co-sponsored by the College of Law. Balsa and the University of Iowa’s Center for Human Rights. Uichr, I’m, I am the current director of that organization. And we will put a recording of this event on the UI CHR website.
The topic today will be the art of black. Liberation to Talk on this very important event. We are blessed to have 2 of our wonderful alums. The first speaker is going to be Dr. Alex Lodge. He practices intellectual property law. In the greater Madison was Wisconsin area.
For the Cargill Corporation. Prior to joining the corporation, he was an associate at Foley and Lardner, law firm. While he was a student. He was a research assistant for Professor Jason Rantanan. He was also a member of the Journal of Corporation law, the Black Law Student Association.
Phi Alpha Delta and the Intellectual Property Law Society. He graduated in 2016. Dr. Lodge holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry from Grambling University and a PhD in organic chemistry. From the University of Iowa. And in 2020 he was an alumni award recipient.
And he got the emerging leader award. So we’re very happy to have Dr. Lodge with us. He is joined by or he he is co-teaching as an adjunct professor. The University of Iowa College of Law. With his co-speaker today. Crystal Crystal. Pound. And so they together teach a very innovative course.
That’s called justice 101. Street Law Fundamentals. This is a course credited by the American Bar Association designed to immerse law students in justice one on one’s Fourth Amendment curriculum. Now I’m going to also introduce you to Crystal Pound. As I said, she’s also a member of the class of 2016.
And she’s currently an attorney at JD Legal Planning in Fargo, North Dakota. And she has a specialty in elder law. Estate planning probate litigation and trust law practice. She previously worked at Simmons Parine, Moyer Bergman and Cedar Rapids, Iowa. And O’keefe O’brien Lyson attorneys in Fargo. Since joining the practice of law.
She has been recognized by her peers as a super lawyer rising star. For the years, 2,018 to 2022. She received her bachelor’s degree from Minnesota State University at Morland majoring in English and mass communications.
At the University of Iowa College of Law. She was a wonderful research assistant for me. As well as active in the equal justice foundation, the Black Law Student Association, and owls, which is our women’s law group.
Upon graduation, she received the Boyds Service Award for her commitment to community service and the Philip G. Hubbard Human Rights Award as well. Continuing with her volunteer efforts, she currently serves as president and co-founder of Justice 101.
Which is a 501 c 3 not for profit organization offering education on Fourth Amendment rights. With particular emphasis on educating students and young persons of color. With the goal of making such persons aware of their constitutional rights. After our 2 speakers do their presentation. We will have time for questions from the audience.
You can at any point during this preservation put your questions in the Q&A. In the question session I will go through the questions and hopefully be able to answer all of them. And then we will adjourn. Promptly at 1 45. So with no further ado, I’d like to turn it over.
To my former student. And wonderful alum. Dr. Alex Lodge. Alright, thank you Dean Wing for the very warm welcome and speaking on behalf of myself and My co presenter today, Professor Crystal Pound, we’re really excited to come and share with you.
Our our you know on today’s Black History Month program I I find Black History Month to be one of the times where I get a chance to celebrate like the rich history and culture of African-americans in this country really connecting to the lived experiences and how important that history is to American history.
And so this year’s national theme of African-americans in the arts was inspiration for our talk today. The art of black liberation. And really looking at how artistic expression has played a very critical role in the way.
We have told our stories, we’ve experienced the world as African Americans throughout the United States history and even prior to. One as Dean Wing mentioned, both Professor Pound and myself. Are the co-founders of Justice 101 and in our 3, year this began as also students.
Doing some of that pro bono work that Dean Wing talked about, in through our Boyd service hours as well as independent study and helping to educate our community and particularly vulnerable communities in the Iowa City area about their fourth amendment rights and so I’m really glad that we get to come and collaborate again to have this discussion with you today.
I will give you a quick overview of how we’re approaching the subject for today. Which is the top a bit first about the art of storytelling and why it’s been such a powerful tool.
An artistic expression when it comes to black liberation as well as looking at the sounds of liberation and how we have captured that through the artistic expressions of music and various sound art forms that incorporate sound as a means for liberation, liberation.
Both prior to the Revolutionary War and then even today how we used music and musical expression as ways to to champion. Justice and social justice. And then lastly, and of course, certainly not least, how we engage with the art with art forms and seeing freedom essentially.
How you know fine arts and different artistic works whether that’s through murals, paintings, statues, monuments, how those are different expressions in ways that we capture, not only the stories of liberation, but also how we continue to champion and lend voice to social justice and protest movement.
So with that said, I am going to. Handed over to professor Who is on mute.
That’s a good way to help. Yeah, if you can hear me. So even though we have it split into 3 acts, all 3 acts kind of start or have the same route, which is that at its root, storytelling is really where the arts I guess how they’re used, you know, because Like as you learn in law school, there’s so many ways to express yourself.
And really the question is what are you trying to express? What what kind of thing you’re trying to get out there and a lot a lot of times when it comes to African Americans it’s How do they figure out a way to get their story told in a way that is true and not just true, you know, maybe in the way that other people at the time would have, you know, considered it true, but their own
Personal story and how do you get that? How do you get to be able to be a truth teller? And the barriers between that. And so, you know, if you’re looking at like, at the very beginning when you’re talking about.
The ability to tell the truth. Maybe it’s not actual written word, you know, it starts with songs, songs that are That can be.
Revised from maybe the way that it would have been that that now it’s able to be sung and being able to be said in a way that even though it means something to another audience, when the people that know what the story means that they know what those words mean.
That they’re able to then. Essentially get that story through the masses. And those stories.
Exist and they continue to propagate. And as lawyers as you go forward you see that a lot of the things that you do going forward is also about storytelling and being able to tell the truth and how do you tell the truth and what is the truth and how do you protect that truth?
Like I personally worked at a law firm for several years and bad things happened and at the end of that, you know, when we’re talking about what happens as a result of this, the question is how important is the truth?
And like for me, I said, you know, I’m not willing to sign something that would otherwise keep me from being able to tell the truth.
And a lot of times that’s when you’re when you’re thinking of Black history, it’s who was able to tell the story and is it true to that person’s story?
And so you can think of if you’re looking at literature, you can think of things if you’re thinking more contemporary, you could think of we were 8 years in power. You know, that is Tallahassee Coates ability to say, you know, in his perspective from his perspective.
What were those 8 years about and what really does it, what was a accomplished in that 8 years? What do the things that happened during those 8 years? What does it say about society and where we are now and what is what is reality.
You know, because at the end of the day, people are gonna have disagreements over what is the truth. And Black History Month is about being able to say this is my truth. This is what happened and maybe hopefully having people believe in that truth and seeing it for the truth that it is.
And so, I know I’ve said it really the same thing many times, but At the end of the day, think about how is it that people are able to really get in into a place where their story gets told and it has an impact on the people around them.
And so when it comes to Dr. Carter, Woodson, his question was, okay, how do we get that story out there? And in 1,926 it starts as Negro History Week, you know, small, but again, that’s kind of how you have to start.
You start where you you start where you’re at and you move forward. And so, you know. In a big, it takes time, it eventually becomes a month long celebration. And why February? Like what is so important about February? So if you look at the bottom, you have Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln.
So one interesting thing about Frederick Douglass’s birthday is they don’t exactly know when it was. They know he was born in February, but other than that. It’s it’s a question and why?
Because at the time of his birth you know, that truth didn’t matter. And so it wasn’t, it wasn’t memorialized in any way.
And think about that. Just think about how much of who you are as a person is based on fact that you weren’t there to learn them at the time like someone had to tell you that story.
Had to be told to you so your own life in in itself is a story you’re telling a story. I was born on this day. This is my name. These are my parents. This is how I grew up.
And so if you take that away, if you take away in a person that’s ability to tell their story to decide who they are, then someone else gets to decide for them. And so really storytelling is I’m saying who I am. I’m saying what my truth is.
And then because of that, when more people listen and celebrate and so then throughout, you know, the US throughout Canada, the UK. There’s this idea that maybe just for this one month, we’re gonna focus on these people that in the other aspects of our lives and the other.
Arenas that you may be in where maybe these people’s stories have kind of been washed out of history. We can re-insert them and maybe they don’t get inserted every time anyone’s talking about those stories because there’s lots of people that have been pushed off to the side.
But every month or every year for one month. We look we look towards this particular group of people and we get to see and actually acknowledge and celebrate the things that they were able to do.
So picking up from that point. You know, we think then about what it what did truth telling look like? What did storytelling look like for black people then? To Professor Pound’s point about the work of Dr.
Carter G. Woodson. It’s indeed combating that erasure of black stories and black contribution to the founding of this country. The goal with Negro History Week at the time that he founded it was really to center it around certain themes.
So even in this year’s theme, which is African-american in the arts, every black history, we every Negro history week in every Black History Month. Since it’s inception in 1926 has centered around a specific theme because the thought was that we had to have focused conversations.
We had to have very specific points and where we highlight what is happening, who is doing the work, and where we’ve made pivotal contributions to the advancement of arts, science, humanities, politics and moving the needles.
And so we see that in the past what did did this look like? You know, we have always had truth tellers throughout the story of African-americans in this country and whether we’re talking about cartoji Woodson or WB.
Du Bois, I to be Wells, Timothy, Thomas Fortune, Mary Church torail, or journalists telling the lives and stories of black people throughout that time.
And as we’ll talk about a little bit later in. In this presentation is that we didn’t always have the opportunity to write and to publish our works and to talk about our stories through the written form and through novels.
And so being able to capture and memorialize these stories have been incredibly important in the history of black people in America.
And you have the work of writers like Langston Hughes, Zurich, and of course, Frederick Douglass telling his own personal narratives and a craft who is the very first African-american woman and believed to be the very first black person to ever write a novel.
Which is based on while it’s fictional. It is very much so based on her lived experience as an enslaved woman and having to navigate her pathway to freedom.
We look at then the work at present times we look at the right work of civil rights activists goes past the present various filmmakers throughout modern history and in the use of film to tell these unapologetic stories.
You, have news makers like when I, and Solid that O’brien and Nope, Nicole Hannah Jones, Mark Lamont Hill, we’re doing both the journalistic work but are also doing the work of representation in front of.
As part of the news media. And then, you know, moving forward, what we have now are people who are on the forefront of telling our stories who aren’t necessarily, you know, we always think when we think of the future of black storytelling, we would always, we, we almost want to go back to people like, you know.
Authors and painters and filmmakers but it’s truly our librarians our bibliographers, our preservationists and historians, the people who support. Are making sure that we’re preserving these stories for the next generation who are fighting truly to make sure that these aren’t washed away.
And we are rolling back some of the gains that we’ve had over the last few years. Anthropologists like Zoro-mirghurst, of the gains that we’ve had over the last few years, anthropologists like Zoro-mirrosten who immersed herself in studying black culture in writing about it because of her ability to have access to black culture and black
Communities. And then of course, you you know the work of Henry Lewis Gates in doing genealogical work which has you know really changed the landscape of how we tell the stories of African-americans in this country and not only the systemic erasure of culture and family lineage that happened during trans-Atlantic slavery.
But now allowing us to piece together those roots. And that all is then coming together in projects like the National Museum for African-american History and Culture, which is the nineteenth Smithsonian Museum that can be visited in national mall.
One, like all other Smithsonian museums, it’s one that’s established by Congress and it’s a public institution, it gives us an opportunity to really immerse ourselves in the history of black history in particular in culture and tell those stories unapologetically.
And so it does 2 things when it comes to black storytelling. It preserves the history and narratives of Black people. Throughout our history here in the United States and prior to even the founding of this country but then it also gives a place for us to grow and build.
In telling these stories and creating kind of a stewardship around what the American experience is through the black lens. And when we think about liberation, that has always been a challenge for black people in America is being heard.
And our stories being told. Being credited for the contributions that we’ve made throughout history. And so, part of what they’ve been able to do is find is to centralize that and to become a place where we can be unapologetic about the history that that we have unapologetic about the stories that we’ve had for many years, but it’s also validating in a way.
When you hear that story from someone who’s not a historian or it’s passed down through family, we can almost discredit it as lore that has no substance, but in places like the National Museum of African-american History and Culture and the the many African-american history museums and civil rights museums around the country.
That have done all of the deep work it has taken to put the evidence to validate all of these stories and narratives that it gives a lot of validation.
To many other people who’ve experienced these things sometimes it can be hurtful. Many of these stories can be uncomfortable, but I think absolutely important to tell these stories and preserve them for the next generation.
So we see in 2,016 we finally have a national history. African American history museum that is encapsulates all of those things.
And, you know, because of the national theme of African-american, African-americans in the arts are now doing some of that work in providing platforms to learn about black art and how we’ve used art as a means for social justice.
So how have we developed it and as we mentioned we did not always as African-americans did not always have the access to read and write. And to share our stories. In ways that other, that, that so many other cultures within America may have had the ability to do.
Particularly prior to the, the end of the Civil War. And so a lot of what storytelling became and it’s an African tradition across the African diaspora is telling our stories through sound.
And whether that’s through song, whether that’s through performance. We’ve used All forms of art to tell our stories in so many different ways.
But beyond that, we’ve used art as a tool for liberation. So for many of you who have not heard of the story of the St10 rebellion, but you may have heard of African-americans not being able to read and write.
And there’s a reason for that. And that’s the St10 rebellion. And the Negro act of 1730 1740 and so i’ll play a short clip by one of the news makers we highlighted, some of that, O’brien that talks a bit about the rebellion.
Welcome back to matter of fact a little-known piece of history is coming to life on stage the Stono rebellion of 1739 in South Carolina was one of the largest slave revolts in our nation an estimated 35 to 50 slaves were killed That bitter tragedy gave rise to a resilient and glorious sound that can still be heard in modern music today.
That story is being told as part of a touring production called Drum Folk. Here’s our special correspondent Joey Chan with a preview.
Deep in the marsh grass you can almost hear it. Here where the Stono River runs down to the Edisto is where a group of Africans enslaved by British colonists fought for their freedom. In the largest uprising of colonial times, the Stono rebellion of 1739.
The Sterno rebellion was not the biggest rebellion. It may not have been the first of enslaved people. I enslaved to Africans. But you’re arguing that it really changed America. Yeah, I will say it really did change America.
So to me, the Solomon 1 million is an amazing piece of history in terms of Africans fighting against institutions, the institution of slavery. Now nearly 3 centuries later, what happened at St10 serves as inspiration. The for Brian Willams new production, Drumpoke.
And in every move of the dance company he founded Step Africa. We visited the company in rehearsal and met 2 artists for whom the work touches close to home Dustin Prilo plays the lead, Jemmy.
It’s about where I’m from. Being from there, I really feel a sense of responsibility just to portray the scenarios in the right light. He and company dancer Jonathan Mcclinton Smith are native South Carolinians and may even have had ancestors in the low country.
When the Stono rebellion took place. But it’s a history they didn’t learn about in school. You learn talking points or you learn a very whitewashed and happy version of history, but I didn’t learn something like this, something that predates the Civil War by over 100 years.
The short version, Jemmy, an enslaved African, let others in a failed attempt to reach freedom in Spanish held Florida. In the aftermath of their courageous bid for freedom, directly because of it came a draconian clampdown. The Negro Act of 1740. What did that Negro act a 1740 prohibit?
Africans could no longer learn to read. They can no longer learn to write. They could not work clothing above their stature and Africans lost the right to use the drum. The drum was And, and a legal weapon, if you will. The drum? The drum.
Was made illegal? Made illegal. Silenced in an effort to keep the Africans from communicating and organizing. Just imagine how devastating it was to lose their social network. So if you were to take phones or Facebook or any social media platform away from the masses.
People would be at a pause, they wouldn’t know what to do, similar to the way that the drums were taken away. They had to regroup and figure out something else. That’s something else was a way to keep the beat alive.
Using their own bodies as instruments. So these are one of the first workings of this inward percussive element. And so you’ll say took the drums away. Right, they took them away, but we still found ways to put them inside of everything we did as well.
The beach? Yes, yes. The beat never stopped. It pulsed through the ring shout, first performed in black churches of the Sea Islands. Later to the Hambone and the Juba. It’s echoed in tap dancing. Even in today’s beatboxing. Thank you.
And in the precision of stepping. The percussive dance tradition of historically black fraternities and sororities. To these artists the Stoner rebellion and the colonists fierce retribution marked the moment when the enslaved Africans created a new culture.
In America. Delayed the foundation of what would become. African Americans and African American culture. And the foundation of a legacy that steps forward to this day. For a matter of fact, I’m Joey Chen in Bethesda, Maryland.
So one of the things that we learned through this video is that for enslaved black people, at, at the time, well before the, the Civil War, even before the founding of the country that you know, not only didn’t say black people fight for freedom, but we use every pool available to it and art became one of those things that the ability to use drum as a form of communication when written
Word or when language was a general general barrier to communicate. Particularly in, in a time where, You were stolen away from Africa.
You were mixed together and mixing with tribes who did necessarily speak your native dialect. And language you were also in a country where you’re learning a new word and not particularly being talked in a way that was intended to help.
You communicate effectively, but still being able to utilize the tools and usually in this in this sense using art as in the art of drumming as a as a form of liberation as a way to communicate a way to lay out plans and as a way to to drive this particular rebellion and although it failed it was understood to have it was understood by the enslaved enslavers and the colonialists of that time how much power was in
Those art forms and enough to create laws that would outlaw it and outlaw their use which continued and you would see many of those practices being intended to quash those opportunities to quash those types of uprising and continue to ensure that inside black people remain subservient.
In these moments. And then of course one of the traditions that came out of that though was of course, stepping, which, you know, for anyone who’s our member of one of the 9, historically black fraternities in Sororities, you know, being able to then share in those traditions I myself, many of my family members are members of these.
Historically black fraternities and sororities. There are so many on the campus of the University of Iowa where I was a chapter advisor of Capa Fasai, which is my fraternity, and passing on that tradition and that history that dates all the way back to 1739 and the Stone over 1 billion and and how enslaved black people use those percussive movements even in the
Absence of drums and even under under the risk of what those might tell, might cause you if you are caught, or if it was deemed to have been activities that led to rebellion amongst enslaved black people of that time.
And so it’s important to understand that and to educate about these histories. And so that as you see them in more modern culture, we see these things in movies and films and it can often be kind of put aside as just kind of some fun thing black that’s part of black culture, but there is often and always a very rich and deep history that’s part of black culture, but there is often and always a
Very rich, rich and deep history that comes with those things and that is often and always a very rich and deep history that comes with those things and particularly when it comes to art because this is art and deep history that comes with those things and and deep history that comes with those things and particularly when it comes to art, that comes with those things and particularly when it comes to art because this is art and culture and liberation are often intertwined when it comes to the black American
Experience. And we see that when we come to then, you know, using the art form of music and what we have early on are then Negro spirituals which served a dual purpose. So here’s a, if you’re not a familiar with the genre of Negro spirituals.
This comes from West African singing and harmonization and styling that are are hearkening to those cultures that enslaved Africans brought. From West Africa to the United States in the Caribbean during transatlantic slavery, but also how it was adapted given the communicate the barriers in communicating that we mentioned earlier.
As well as serving as a way to conceal. Plans for again liberation and Negro spirituals often serve that dual purpose in being able to hide behind you know christian and worship so a song that sounded very much so, like a song of, a reverence and worship was indeed often played in an additional role as communicating certain certain Plans whether it’s a plan to escape whether
It’s communicating the temperament of a slave owner or an overseer or as a warning to other slaves there were there is it was a purpose in everything that enslaved people did and while these creations are beautiful in the sounds that they have, that they were also tools of liberation as well.
And so you hear that in this song. Role Jordan role Went down to the river Jordan We’re John baptized 3. Where I walked the devil in here says Johnny baptized me. I say, My soul, Well, some say John was a bathroom thing. Some say John was a Jew.
But I say John was a preacher called my Bible sister too. Roll, jet, roll! My solo rising every Lord for the year and Jordan.
So if you’ve not seen 12 years of slave, I’ll say that it is a movie that is you know very hard to watch but I think it’s one that intends to capture the experience of enslaved black people.
At that time, the story. Which was told of 12 years of slaves tells the story of of the main character who had and who was free and was captured who was stolen kidnapped.
From freedom and then enslaved. You have his story, there’s a story, the, the main person in the book suite, the sweet taste of liberty, talks about a black woman who was reinslaved after she was granted freedom in Ohio, kidnapped and reinslaved and remained enslaved even 2 years after the Civil War ended and 2 years after the the field order down in
Galveston, Texas that I announced to those enslaved in Texas that they were free. And so, and who also had the amazing story of suing her enslaver.
And winning in federal court. And being one of the very few stories of it enslaved person who was you know who received some form of reparations after being enslaved immediately after slavery.
And so again, that storytelling is quite important when we hear things like the Negro spirituals here and 12 years a slave that the song if you listen intently to the words of the song.
There it sounds beautiful and it sounds very reverent and they’re talking about characters in the Bible, but one of the first lines, one of the earlier lines says that I have not been baptized by John and we’re going to roll and that was assigned to say we’re going to run.
We are going to leave this place. The Jordan River often just rivers were often ways in which slaves enslaved black people follow their way to freedom.
And so when we think about the stories and how they use song, how they use the the this art form as a way to communicate escape and liberation and rebellion again tells the story of the the black American experience and that continues in the traditions of the civil rights movement and we think about sound and song and and rhythm as ways that have driven liberation in protest as well.
Oh Okay. Founded in 1,962 by 4 organizers from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee or SNCC. The Freedom Singers would travel across the country performing what became the soundtrack. Of civil rights marches and rallies raising desperately needed funds to support SNCS operations and civil rights work.
One of those singers was 21 year old Rutha May Harris. What was the relationship? Between the freedom songs you were singing. In the songs from the church. Well, the freedom songs were taken from gospel, congregational hymns.
Only thing we had to do was change the lyrics to fifth the occasion, whatever it was. Like, I woke up this morning with my mind. Stayed on Jesus. The only thing we had to change was I woke up this morning with my mind stayed on freedom.
How important do you think your music was to the success of the civil rights movement? Personally, I feel that with Dr. Songs of the civil rights movement, there wouldn’t have been a movement because the song kept us from being afraid.
So you’re walking down the street doing a march and this does police will tell you you’re gonna be hit or whatever. You start saying it ain’t gonna let nobody turn me right. Not even the chief of police. Not even a billy club. Not even a billy club.
So we see here. How music has evolved, right? Negro spirituals, there wasn’t this changing of the words, it was cold and keeping rebellion and protest and in revolution in cold and in secret to conceal those plans and to conceal what the enslaved black people were thinking and planning.
And we get to the civil rights movement and that still connection to the religious institution of and and for the most part when it comes to black Americans it’s a religious institution of Christianity.
But using those spaces and there, I continue to be intertwined that protest. And song and particularly religious songs in this instance gospel songs being ones that are tied to revolution.
You can hear what here they what was mentioned is that you know we just took the songs that everybody knew from church and changed the lyrics to fit the occasion and that occasion was always freedom right and so you hear songs like I ain’t gonna let nobody turn me around right and if you can imagine kind of the same kind of
The same experience someone might have in a religious awakening is one that protesters use during civil rights movement and we get then to 2 songs like lift every voice and sing which was pinned by James Wellldon Johnson.
And for many who, don’t know the history of the song, as well the Johnson was quite young and he attended a memorial or reading of the Emancipation Proclamation and honoring Abraham Lincoln in that time.
And that the words of that speech and the words of the Emancipate, of Abraham Lincoln speech then had filled them up with so much pride and spirit and that he thought immediately of these words.
And wrote down the lift every voice and scene which for many black Americans became the black national anthem for those who have never heard the song before, or maybe don’t understand the controversy that happened during the most recent Super Bowl.
You’re here now being sung more often as sporting events and that now being kind of part of that tradition.
But the words are one that are truly tied to the American history, particularly when we come to the the civil civil war in the emancipation proclamation for Abraham Lincoln for those who may not have any familiarity with the song right it it’s Lift every voice and sing To like that, Bring with the Oh, only.
Hello, rejoice, sings, rise, high as the lips, mean skies, let it reason. Well, Linky. So you hear those songs and that’s not the whole first part of the song. There’s a whole lot more to it. But you think about those words that’s all about freedom and liberty.
It’s one that was intended to be inclusive of every person of every American. Which is an often, how many black Americans have felt about a lot of our anthems over the years that you know many the Revolutionary War was not one that gave freedom to black people.
Particularly enslaved black people. And so when we think about our anthem, the mini songs that we’ve had as, our anthems as a as a country over the years that this song then became very close to black people because it could apply to just about anybody. In in America.
And then now we think about music as an art form. And particularly how music has been important and integral to the black experience in America.
You talk about the Jim Crow and we start with things like mistress roles which was a mockery of the things that we talked about, Negro spirituals and blues and things that black people were singing as their experiences experiences of sorrow, experiences of of grief and pain and those things and it being somewhat made a mockery of but became popular music in America through the form of minstrel shows, the character Jim
Crow. Which was which was created by a wide actor who painted itself in blackface and for for white audiences made a careicature out of black culture at that time in black people or wet white perceptions of the black of black people were at that time.
But we see that those art forms were were taken and black people again. To build on our histories and we get into art forms like blues and jazz and gospel.
Which were you know are now canonized as truly American art forms in our in music and then we get 2 things like rhythm and blues, which started off, in New Orleans.
I’m a was raised in Louisiana. So in many of these art forms have were originated in black communities in black culture in the South. To now where we see hip hop music which is in general response whose origins were a response to social and economic injustice.
And it talked about how for the black experience and particularly not just the black experience, but anyone who was living in economic oppression which had a substantial disproportionate impact on black and brown communities throughout the United States that we were able to capture those experience through art through the art form of rap and hip hop.
And telling these narratives and so we see this starting from the beginning of this talk about storytelling that it’s hip hop has now become the very essence of storytelling and the marriage of just the spoken word into musical art form as well.
And it’s carrying along these long traditions of black people from slavery to freedom and into our future, even today continuing to fight for justice. It’s continuing to fight for equity and inclusiveness. And, equality in this country.
And so we can move in to other art forms and how we see. How we use our eyes then to capture protest and capture social justice. Justice. I’ll hand it over then to Professor Pound. Just let me know when to start the videos.
Yeah, so when it comes to visual representations, part of it goes back to this idea of like representation. You know, it part of it is what you see, what you hear, you know, and does that reflect the truth, you know, the truth of your story.
And so like through the truth of different people’s stories and seeing that hearing that engaging with that, that’s how you create a community. I mean, because if you’re telling a story into the abyss and no one’s actually looking at it, no one’s watching it, no one’s taking notice of it.
Like does it really have much of an impact? But also, so when you’re looking at artistic endeavors, especially visual art.
I can’t remember the exact cause I feel like it’s a copyright thing that Alex could remember more, but there’s certain protections that you get for art, like the the law, the world, everyone kind of has this acknowledgement that art even though it’s something that doesn’t have utility in the same way as other things.
You know, it’s not it’s not creating heat. It’s not feeding you. It’s not necessarily getting your shelter. There’s an innate value in art being able to express the art and having other people see that art and see themselves within it.
So in all of these forms of art, whether it’s literature, whether it’s music, whether it’s visual, a visual medium.
By being able to have artists that, you know, are able to create art that reflects their story that reflects their truth, even when that truth is painful, even when that truth is dark, even when that truth makes other people uncomfortable.
So like, you know, your thinking about 2020 and the protests, you know, George Floyd and creating, you know, turning that into art. Like, what does that mean? What is it saying about people? And so art isn’t this static.
Thing that you can take in a vacuum and like remove it from everything else you have to look at it in correlation to the other things.
Going on in that time. Because you know as the slides here show you know George Floyd that is speaking to a specific point in time like a split of a specific flash point you know if there had been things about you know Ferguson everything that happened in Ferguson it’s specific to that time it tells about not just what’s going on in Ferguson, but it talks about, you know, it would reflect
What’s going on in general, you know, that little, the little black girl and where is she going? Why is she going there? What’s going on in society that that is what that has to be?
And so when it comes to art. It’s not just showing the people of the time when you create the art. That this is what I’m feeling, but it perpetuates into time, you know, that it’s something that can’t be so long as the art exists.
Or you know some facsimile of it exists. Then that truth can’t be erased and people cannot actually pretend as though it didn’t happen. So by being able to make long-lasting impacts on the world around them. Through this creation of art, that is how.
Black history has been able to propagate because it’s been so easy if you just you know if you’re looking at one particular thing you take away the drums. You know, with the idea being if they’re not able to communicate, if they can’t tell their story, then we can disempower them.
And instead of just saying, okay, fine, I guess we’re done. It’s finding different mediums and different ways to express those stories express that truth.
So that no matter what at the end of the day people can’t pretend as though African-americans weren’t here and that the the contributions that they made that they made those contributions, even if you take the effort, make these efforts to, you know, extract.
What they’ve done when the art remains. The art is enough that even if someone, you know, in a hundred years, if they don’t know exactly what this is.
There’s feeling that you can evoke from people with the way that you create art. You know, with, you know, if you’re looking at that center picture, you know, it’s not just the little girl in the white dress.
It’s the men around her. It’s the things on the walls. It’s it’s the word in the back. You know, it’s all of those things that unless you actually like can, you know, plot people can entirely out of the timeline.
This exists. And it tells the other people that you exist too. And you can do this too. Maybe you’re not gonna do this, but you can do something. That that cements your place in history and that. That other people down the line can use.
To teach other people. Cause here’s the thing in my mind anyway. You have black history and you have what it means to a black Americans that that is their history. Right. I grew up in a very, very white household. I grew up in northern Minnesota with very, very little connection.
To, you know, my black past, but by having things that like I can look to later, then that makes it so that I can then connect to a history connect to a heritage that if I’m just asking my like immediate family it’s not there.
But all of this art, it’s it’s a way that people like myself and maybe if it’s not even your history you can then connect back to it and see how it is that it impacted maybe not even your life but like the lives of the people around you.
So we are gonna take some time for questions. We want to thank everyone. For for being patient and listening with us so far Okay. Oh, and also Alex, you do have a beautiful singing voice. I think everyone has to agree with that.
Okay. Thank you. Both of you very much. We can take down, stop sharing your screen and the 3 of us. Yes, we’ll be on. And I agree, Dr. Lodge, you, you have an amazing voice. Yeah. And I hope you won’t leave the law. We only, we only have time. For one question.
And so I’m gonna throw this question to both of you, but you can only take like a minute or 2. To answer it. You have given a brilliant overview. Of black history and the role of of art.
And you brought us up to the present. So the future. These are very difficult times we’re in as a group of people. We’re under attack. In many different ways that may resemble the past eras and so it would be wonderful.
To just hear very briefly from each of you what you think about the future for art as part of black liberation and I realise you could each do an hour lecture on this, but if you could give us each your brief comments on how you see our near future.
At least. So. Go ahead. My, I’ll be as brief as we can, but I think the future of. Black art. In every form that it takes. Is being unapologetic and open to all. And I mean that to say that it is art that is accessible to everyone.
And not. Set in ways where people are where it’s being removed and we’re seeing again that erasure. Of art because we’re gonna continue to keep telling our stories. We’re gonna continue to keep.
Trying to shed light on history and knowledge that often gets, you know. Set aside or completely erased or in or revised in a revisionist view that is intended to you know undermine the truth of it what it is and we see that a lot in the laws that are being enacted state by state.
So when those laws don’t exist, I think that’s the future, right? We have that unabridged and unfettered access to black stories, black history, black contributions, and they’re all being held to the same level that it’s not just black history in terms of the fact that it centers black people.
But it’s American history. It’s our history collectively. And once we get Once we attain that ubiquitousness that, you know, history, it’s just history at the end of the day. That’s the future. And Thank you, Dr. Modge. Go ahead. Last word, Professor Pound.
I would say I’m largely, I would agree with that. I would say I agree with that entirely. The only thing I would add is. It is like an acceptance, an acceptance of a truth that maybe doesn’t match the truth of someone else.
That just because like if someone’s talking about an institution or a place or something, if that’s not their personal interaction with that.
Like for instance, the thing that comes to mind for whatever reason is blood at the root. It’s a book by Patrick Phillips who’s a white man, but he talks a lot in that book about forsiff.
I think that’s how you say it, Georgia, which is a county that I think in the late 19 hundreds. They essentially evicted all black people from the county. And it’s one of those things that when I first saw the book, I thought, my God, this can’t be true.
And I think that’s a lot of times when you hear things about really awful things that have happened, like your first gut reaction is that can’t possibly be true.
And I think in the future, like when you hear things that maybe you’re, you know, your gut at your, oh that couldn’t have happened is like instead making space for it and thinking okay. How does that, how does that truth? How can that coexist with the truth that I personally hold?
Like where is the space in which both of these things can be true or both I see the count the country or whatever in whatever particular way I see it, but I can make space for this other person’s truth and see how that could have also happened even if my reality is real that it doesn’t have to be one or the others so people can figure out how to coexist.
Even with all of this uncomfortable stuff between us. I’d like to thank both of our wonderful speakers. Professor Lodge and Professor Pound. For their wonderful presentation. We are very proud of you as alums. And you’re early still in your careers and we have no doubt you have very, very bright futures.
Ahead of you and I hope I’m around for quite a while to see you as you do wonderful things. I’d also like to thank our tech guru for today. Who is the University of Iowa College of Law Staff person Leslie Gannon.
We appreciate your efforts to make this webinar happen. And I’d like to close with a future event. On this Wednesday February, the 20 eighth. We’re going to have a hybrid event. It will be live in the levitt order territorium of the College of Law and there will also be a Zoom option.
It will feature Harvard Law School Professor, G, Urelle Charles. And he is going to speak. On the constitution of difference. So we hope to see a lot of you. Live, hopefully, at that event.
And if not by Zoom. And please everyone including our speakers have a good rest of your day and a very good week. Take care. Bye.
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