Observations on Kwanzaa

I have never experienced the mixture of uncomfortableness and absolute pleasure I had this past Sunday, when I crashed a Kwanzaa celebration in the basement of the Maysles theater in Harlem. To be the unexpected white observer of an exclusively black ceremony provided me with enough insights to fill an undergraduate anthropology paper, but I'll go for the basics here.
I had come up to Harlem with my roommate Joe to see Pressure, the first film to detail the lives of Caribbean immigrants in England. It was playing at a wonderful theater located in an old brownstone, with a small screening room and fold-up chairs emphasizing its ad-hoc, "grassroots" nature. This provided a wonderful contrast with the kind of glossy, overpriced, big-budget theaters most Americans are used to seeing movies in.
The movie itself was mostly good - better on its "slice of life" insights into the experiences of blacks in England than when it attempted to lecture us. Afterward we went downstairs to the basement of the theater, where we heard there was to be a Kwanzaa party.
Crowded with people, the dim lights revealing stacks of books, artwork, and dvd cases, we strolled through people dancing to reggae to set up a position near a bar. Everywhere were women and children, all black and all having a good time. Even though we stood out, I certainly did not feel that we weren't welcome. Me and Joe commenced to discuss the movie we had just seen. Just then a middle-aged lady came up to us and thanked us for coming - the party, she explained, was partly for Kwanzaa and partly a benefit for her son, who had been beaten by the police four months ago. As usual, social and cultural issues are never far apart. We were considering leaving at this point (we didnt' want to get home too late) but she urged us to stay for the Kwanzaa celebration proper. Of course, we opted to remain where we were to see what happened.
I was already somewhat giddy, a privileged "outside" observer to a ritual most white folk have only read about (if that). Then the music stopped, and the ceremony began. An old man intoned words in Swahili (I assume) while invoking the names of Karenga, Marcus Garvey, and other legends of African-American activism. Following this a lady, reading from a printed-out sheet, discussed the history and meaning of kwanzaa. Invented in 1966 by a university professor, Kwanzaa derived its name from a Kenyan harvest celebration, and is meant to serve as a unifying ritual common to all-African Americans, facilitating black culture, community, and activism. Religion plays a very small part here (reflective, I feel, in the secular-oriented context of its birth).
As I read this I felt myself tensing up, looking straight at her as she looked (it seems) straight at me. I wanted her to understand that I agreed with the premise of this ritual, that I had the utmost sympathy for her peoples' struggle - but there was no way for her to know this. I nodded my head furiously as she explained Kwanzaa's detailed set of rituals and relics, trying to signify that I both understood and approved. Above all, I did not want my presence to affect her descriptions and analysis of the holiday in any way. At the same time, though, I did feel particularly out of place and almost selfish - here I was, a white man, intruding into a professed "black" religion purely for my own curiosity and pleasure. Surrounding me were those for whom racism and discrimination were truly truly defining features of their world-view, and who bestowed upon Kwanzaa an importance I could never truly comprehend.
Nonetheless, as the candles were extinguished (by hand) and the spirits of African-American history were invoked, such as MLK and Touissant L'Overture, I felt more than ever that I had done the right thing by staying. I had become sensitized to a "religion" most of my friends and family had little knowledge of, and I had even more respect for a people who, in the face of such adversity, had carved out a space where they can maintain their own identities and agency. Finally, as the head of the service invoked Barack Obama and the strains of "its a long time coming" came out of the speakers, I sang along and felt, for the first time, a part of the ceremony. In the end, we are all inseparably one - while it is important to take pride in one or another groups' unique identity, what signifies "progress" to my mind is a world where people emphasize what unites them as opposes to what divides them. At its heart, Kwanzaa is about celebrating social justice in the face of adversity - a message everyone can identify with and share.

what I learned in Grad school pt. 1 of many

Things I learned in Grad school
I am writing this after my last "official" day in grad school. Without accessing notes, just off the top of my head, here are some of my impressions on what I have learned about history, graduate school, and quite possibly myself (throws up).
First of all, I was te youngest person in my cohort. nobody else went straight from undergrad to graduate school - they had experience in the"Real world", getting full time jobs and marrying before coming here. This both intimidated and inspired me - intimidated, because i was surrounded by such mature, articulate scholars, and I was just a novice whose every word sounded, compared to theirs so much less informed (as it seemed to me). Inspired, because I realized just how much I actually knew while being 20 or even 30 years younger then these people, and how much potential for growth I still had. The experience of working and talking with them was easily the highlight of my semester.
While I didn't' get to know a lot of my cohort that well outside of class (shamefully I still don't' know much of their names), I managed to become good friends with three of them - Josh Martino, John Blanton, and Peter Alguer. All of them are blazingly intelligent, funny, mature individuals, and I can't wait to see them over the winter break. I might not have had time to see my G-school friends as much as I was able to see my Rampo friends back in undergrad, but since I should be seeing them for the next 8 years, I have plenty more time to get to know them.
My teachers are - quite a range of thoughts on this one, actually. I was expecting wise sages, and I got that in spades for sure. But they didn't seem as personable as the folks at Ramapo. Perhaps it is because they are so pressed for time, torn between different campuses, teaching responsibilites, research work, book signings, etc. It is flattering that I am simply in the same room as some of these peopel, but it also hurts when I am brushed off, again and again, because the professor has other priorites. For example, I tried to keep showing one professor my paper after each draft, and by the third draft he was visibly annoyed. Perhas I shouldn't have kept coming to him, but my insecurities drove me to it - and I never had the experience of a teaher directly begrudging the possibility of heling a student. A the same time, this same professor (who shall remain namless) truly is brilliant, and the discussions we've had in class I will always remember. Our other professors are equally intimidiatng/brilinat. I remember getting in a conversation with one about Slumdog Millionaire and being blown away by her analysis - and this from a polish sociologist! Hopefully as I keep taking courses with them in the future I willo begin to see them as partners as opposed to gatekeepers, whon whose every word my fate is determined.
What did I learn? Well, it depends on the class (of course). IN my seminar each o fus basically worked on our own individual papers, with little time for in-class "lessons". Still, it was wonderful delving into my topic for this seminar, bicycling in New York. Our literature of American history course was quite useful in getting me up to speed in terms of my pre-1865 history, and a few of the texts I took out I hope to buy over the winter (I didn't buy a SINGLE BOOK for ANY of my courses this semester, relying on New York's amazing library system to get me everything I needed. w00t. ) Comparative history opened my eyes to an enormous range of critical theories which I want to incorporate into my future work, including transfer hsitory, histoire crossee, entangled histories, and various other methodologies. Out of all my classes, however, it was definitely Philosophy of History that shaped the way I think the most. The free-wheeling discussions we had about life, fat,e, the value of capitalism and democracy, man's responsibility to man, etc were quite stirring, and will form the basis of many a future blog post. I was particularly struck by the philosophies of Reinhold Niebuhr, a brilliant and compassionate theologian of the mid-20th century who urged mankind to refrain from the kind of idealistic, yet ultimately futile attempts to bend history to their will, whether through fascism, communism, or the spread of so-called "universal" values such as Liberalism. While I don't see myself becoming an intellectual philosopher, what I learned in this class has undoubtedly made me a more perceptive, more compassionate human being. That has to count for something.