Minority leadership has been a topic that I have so much more interest in as I have gotten older and can finally have a better grasp on many different concepts that I may not have understood when I was younger.
\nOn Jan. 21, we remembered a monumental figure in the Civil Rights movement, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.<\/p>\n
Growing up, learning about Dr. King was always something that I looked forward to. I have long considered him to be one of my heroes. The way he used cognitive dissonance within his \u201cI Have a Dream\u201d speech to invoke thought and to make people uncomfortable fascinates me. This year, like every year, we were given Martin Luther King Day off from classes. The following day, on Jan. 22, chapel\u2019s theme focused on Dr. King. Though it was a well- thought-out chapel, it just did not sit well with me. Since we were talking about a figure that was so prominent for the rights of minorities, it would\u2019ve been a good time to show strong minority leadership on campus.
\nThere are strong African American leaders on campus that could have spoken during that time in chapel. Having an African American speak on Dr. King\u2019s impact could have created a different atmosphere, and more people might have paid attention to the message.<\/p>\n
I am not trying to say that people who aren\u2019t African American can\u2019t speak about Dr. King. In the setting of chapel on Martin Luther King Day, however, I felt it would\u2019ve been more appropriate to display minority leadership. I think it would\u2019ve been better to have shown minority leadership because Dr. King was a strong minority leader during the movement. Having a strong minority leader on stage giving his perspective on the topic would\u2019ve shown what great strides King made.<\/p>\n
Additionally, throughout the chapel talk, the speaker used the word \u201cnegro\u201d repeatedly.
\nEven though it was used in direct quotes, I personally felt that there were words he could\u2019ve used in place of \u201cnegro.\u201dTo me, the word represents decades of oppression, and hearing it from someone who would have not been oppressed during the time took away from the message a bit.<\/p>\n
I also wish that chapel wasn\u2019t just focused on how the speech \u201cI Have a Dream\u201d was used as a sermon, but also on how it was equally used for political purposes.
\nTo me, the true importance of the speech comes from its political meaning because at the time it was given, race seemed to be largely a political topic. There were things African American citizens could not do that their Caucasian counterparts could. African Americans could not vote, had separate schools, drank from segregated water fountains and weren\u2019t treated like basic human beings. Thus, the speech was as much a political statement as a religious one.<\/p>\n
I feel that chapel would\u2019ve been a little bit stronger if it had incorporated these aspects, which I felt weren\u2019t represented.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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