Curating Inclusivity: Reflecting on Reckoning and Representation

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     This week we had our final presentations and discussion for our group projects. I found all of the presentations very interesting and I loved how each group created a cohesive narrative around their topic. One aspect of the presentations that I found particularly interesting was how I saw some major connections in the curations between the different groups. For example, The Women and Gender Activism Group and the Inclusion and Diversity group each highlighted Harlene Marley (pictured above), who was the first woman to be a tenured professor at Kenyon. I also really appreciated the Inclusion and Diversity Group's curation. It is truly such a broad topic and it was really impressive to see all of the stories they were able to tell given the limited amount of sources we were given. I also really enjoyed our final class discussion. The general consensus was that the hardest part of this project was picking specific narratives to focus on in our curations, since we all seemed to have multiple sources we wanted to include but couldn't. I feel that there were many parts of our discussion that related to our reading for this week.

    This week's reading was once again from "The Struggle for The People's King". In chapter 6, Yazdiha discusses the #MeToo movement and how black feminism has historically been a widely unrecognized yet essential foundation for this movement. With this, Yazdiha also discusses the concepts of reckoning, restoration, and reconciliation. These terms encompass the process of recognizing the unjust exclusion of prominent Black Women from the feminist movement in the past (reckoning) in order to give due recognition and the appropriate stage and respect to these women now (resolution). One example Yazdiha gave of this was when many prominent, white celebrities brought activists, who are woman of color, to a red carpet in order to highlight them and give them the well-deserved stage to speak about their causes on. Michelle Williams was accompanied by the founder of the #MeToo movement, Tarana Burke, who is undoubtedly one of the most influential feminist activists of this generation. This process of reckoning and restoration is something Yazdiha coins as "Queenmaking", where black women are given proper credit and recognition for their groundbreaking work in the feminist movement, much like the process of "Kingmaking" for the civil rights movement leaders.

    I believe the ideas portrayed in this chapter have a lot of relevance to many different movements and histories. It emphasized, above all, a word of caution and vigilance in how we portray certain histories and who we are choosing to highlight in our tellings of them. I feel that this is especially important when creating curations like the ones we did. Excluding certain perspectives on the history we are portraying can completely change the narrative of a project like this. One part of our discussion that I really appreciated was the reflection of The Women and Gender Activism Group. They talked about how their display centered mostly around white women and while they did recognize women of color in their presentation, they wished there had been more artifacts about women of color to include in their curation. If anything, I feel like the lack of these types of sources speaks to what Yazdiha emphasizes in her book. While women of color have always been present and advancing gender inclusivity, along with other activist movements, they have historically not been prioritized in the history of many institutions, which is apparent in the lack of preserved sources about them. Overall, I feel like this book has been really helpful in my understanding of our project and has made me more aware of my own college and activism that I am a part of.    

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