ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM Tuesday, January 19, 2016
Ann Arbor, Michigan
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Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968) KEYNOTE
Naomi Tutu talks social awareness in address At Hill Auditorium, activist challenges audience to become involved By ALYSSA BRANODN and LARA MOEHLMAN Daily News Editor and Daily Staff Reporter
Nontombi Naomi Tutu, South African race and gender activist and daughter of archbishop Desmond Tutu, joined the ranks of renowned social activists who have delivered the University’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. Symposium keynote memorial lecture Monday afternoon. Addressing a packed audience at Hill Auditorium, Tutu charged the audience to hold themselves individually responsible for taking action against the injustices they see in the world. The 30th annual Martin Luther King Jr. symposium, which featured multiple events across campus including Tutu’s keynote address, aimed to engage the University community in dialogues about King’s legacy. This year’s theme is #WhoWillBeNext, which seeks to prompt the campus
community to consider both who will fall victim to and who will lead the escape from hatred in the world, according to the sympoisum’s website. For Tutu however, this theme was problematic. She began her remarks by challenging the University’s theme, criticizing the theme for highlighting the negative associated with Martin Luther King Jr. She said she was told by the University the theme would be in the context of both “who would be the next to lead?” in addition to “who would be the next to suffer the injustice of racism by being killed?” Tutu said she prefers to focus on the positive potential of the future, instead encouraging audience members to take a more proactive approach to injustice, challenging them to consider themselves the next generation of social activist leaders. “Maybe what we should be saying is ‘We are all next, and we refuse to allow anyone else to be next,” Tutu said. Veering from praising only Martin Luther King Jr., she emphasized instead that like all great leaders, King was no different from any person sitting in the audience. See KEYNOTE, Page 3A
CAMPUS LIFE
GRANT HARDY/Daily Shermin Kruse, author of Butterfly Stitching, discusses why the public is less responsive to mass killings than individual ones in South Hall Monday.
RITA MORRIS/Daily Artist Walter Lacy leads a creative expression workshop with local children during the MLK Children and Youth Program in the Modern Languages Building Monday.
University hosts 30th annual campus-wide symposium By BRANDON SUMMERSMILLER Daily Staff Reporter DAVID SONG/Daily
Naomi Tutu, race activist and daughter of Desmond Tutu, speaks at the Keynote Memorial lecture for the MLK Symposium Monday at Hill Auditorium.
ALLISON FARRAND/Daily Protestors chant outside Gov. Rick Synder’s Main Street condo at a march on Monday. Demonstrators marched from Rackham Auditorium calling for the arrest of Gov. Snyder in response to the Flint water crisis.
DETROIT
Grace Boggs remembered in discussion Students and faculty reflect on legacy of local activist By JACKIE CHARNIGA Daily News Editor
At the School of Social Work Building Monday afternoon, more than 100 students and faculty convene to discuss one of the most influential activists of the 20th century, Grace Lee Boggs. Boggs, who died last year, was an activist, writer and speaker with seven decades of experience advocating for civil and women’s rights. The event was part of the University’s Martin Luther King Jr. symposium. Stephen Ward, professor of Afroamerican and African Studies, is writing a dual biography of Boggs and her husband James, titled “In Love and Struggle: The Revolutionary Lives of James and Grace Lee Boggs,” is a board member of the James and Grace Lee Boggs Center to Nurture Community
WEATHER TOMORROW
Leadership and helped to organize the event. Ward said the language used to describe Boggs’ activism doesn’t give a full picture of her work because she doesn’t fit into traditional classifications of an activist. “In some ways most of those are only partially accurate, or there’s some ambiguity there,” Ward said. “Grace doesn’t seem to fit our own categories.” In particular, Ward said an Asian American woman was anomalous in the civil rights movement when Boggs began her work, and it would be more fitting to refer to her as a human rights activist. He said those who call Boggs a revolutionary would hit closer to the truth, but are no closer to identifying her. “I think in the use of ‘civil rights’ we sometimes lazily use to describe Black people or other types of struggles without properly recognizing what it takes to make a movement,” Ward said. Raina LaGrand, a School of Social Work alum, is a member of their People of Color Collective, a group which aims to create a See BOGGS, Page 3A
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Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. honored with events
The University hosted a series of events across campus for the annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day symposium Monday to honor the life and social activism of Martin Luther King Jr. Monday. In its 30th year, the 2015 symposium was titled “#WhoWillBeNext,” and focused on addressing modern day racism, generating proactive social attitudes and encouraging racial inclusion. The symposium featured a variety of events outside of the annual keynote memorial speech in Hill Auditorium, including the annual Youth Day, campus-wide watch parties, the Circle of Unity, West Quad’s Connector Forum and the Law School’s symposium event titled “#YourLifeMatters.” While the events were unique in what they offered their audiences, each posed questions of modern incarnations of racism and shared sentiments of social justice, collective responsibility and community awareness.
Beginning Monday’s events was the 18th Annual Children and Youth Day, hosted by the University of Michigan School of Education as a part of the Martin Luther King Jr. Symposium. In an interview, Molly Green, a graduate student in the School of Public Health and an event organizer, said the event aims to educate about the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. “This is a day of service and to come together as a community,” Green said. “It’s a chance to think more about civil rights and equality.” Throughout the day, local youth from schools and churches in the Washtenaw County area participated in small group activities and workshops, such as musical chairs to teach inclusion and fairness, civil rights poetry readings, open discussions about equality and justice and a viewing of King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. The event included remarks from Elizabeth James, program assistant for the Department of Afroamerican and African Studies, as well as performances from the Detroit School of Arts’ Ladies Achievers Ensemble, Detroit’s Reverend Jones, acapella group 58 Greene and more. See EVENTS, Page 5A
FLINT
STINA PERKINS/Daily Jim Toy, UM alum and co-founder of the UM Spectrum Center, reflects on the legacy of community activist Grace Lee Boggs in a panel hosted by the School of Social Work and the Multicultural and Gender Affairs Committee on Monday.
MICHIGAN IN COLOR
An open letter to my mother about why my natural hair is beautiful By KRISTEN SWOPE Michigan in Color Contributor
I will be completely honest in saying that this is one of the hardest things I’ve had to write — mainly because I know that, as my mother, you are my biggest supporter and encourager. I can always count on you to be my number one fan — except when it comes to my natural curls. From the age of 10, I can remember only negative comments from you when I tried to wear my
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hair in its natural state — without any chemicals, heat or manipulation. I admire your simplicity when it comes to beauty, which is why I wonder why there seems to be so much distaste toward my natural hair. But as I’ve grown to recognize that the negativity surrounding Black women and natural hair has to do with race and many underlying historical reasons, I have gained a better understanding of the inherent racism that drives us as Black
women to desire the universal standard of beauty — which is that of the European aesthetic. I wonder, though, if you understand that? I wonder if you understand the underlying teachings of self-hate toward our own race that have been inflicted on both you and me growing up. Because this is what America teaches us — that we must conform to the ideal image of the white race or else we are not considered “beautiful.” I remember when See MIC, Page 3A
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INDEX
Protesters hold rally in A2 calling for Snyder’s arrest State residents hold governer responsible for Flint water crisis By MARLEE BREAKSTONE Daily Staff Reporter A group of Michigan residents from across the state gathered in Ann Arbor on Monday to call for the arrest of Gov. Rick Snyder, one of wave of Monday protests held in past weeks over the Flint water crisis. In April 2014, the state of Michigan decided to temporarily switch the supply of Flint’s water from Lake Uron to the Flint River as a way to save money. However, lead from the service lines in Flint began to leak into the water supply. As a result of the switch, researchers warned city and state officials of the toxic lead in the water, when the city changed the water source in October 2015 — 18 months later — and Snyder declared a state of emergency on
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Jan. 5. President Barack Obama also issued a federal emergency declaration in response to the Flint water crisis Saturday, allocating $5 million in federal aid to immediately assist the city. Several democratic canidates for president highlighted Flint during Sunday night’s debate, calling the situation deplorable. Novi resident Colleen Crossey, alum of the University School of Social Work and co-organizer of the protest, said she chose to hold the march on Martin Luther King Jr. Day to coincide with the University’s annual symposium aimed at highlighting modern-day social justice. “Many of the speakers on this day will encourage their audience members to organize and fight back against the unethical activities that oppress others,” Crossey said. “This rally and march will give them the opportunity to do just that.” Protesters marched from
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