As a young black woman living in America, I am constantly exposed to harmful imagery and situations that attack both my race and womanhood, two very important parts of my identity. The struggles that we face as a community include but are not limited to, dehumanization and general disregard for our lives (Aiyana Stanley Jones, Sandra Bland, Rekia Boyd, and the countless other black wo(men) who were victims of police brutality), Mysogenoir (ie. oversexualization of our bodies, the 'welfare queens epithet, our natural hair being deemed 'unprofessional' in the workforce), cultural appropriation, everyday microaggressions, and so on. The effects of these situations on our subconscious and conscious minds sparked my desire to soothe the effects of the blatant and systematic oppression affecting us and triggered my social and intellectual awakening. My Firsthand experience of these problems fueled my search for information on the origins, historical significance, and evolution of systematic oppression and modern day racism and what I could do personally to alleviate the issue and get others involved.
Growing up in a predominantly black neighborhood where the dreams were big but, the opportunities to achieve them were few, there was always a lingering melancholic …show more content…
I also worked in collaboration with student activists at Rutgers University (Newark), helping spread the word among my school's student body whenever projects were being facilitated on their campus or around the city. As part of a Black Arts Movement (BAM) class, we put on a performance involving different forms of media, visual art, dance, poetry, skits, etc; all of them representing our struggles as POC, and comparing and contrasting the experiences of our ancestors to our
Growing up in a predominantly black neighborhood where the dreams were big but, the opportunities to achieve them were few, there was always a lingering melancholic …show more content…
I also worked in collaboration with student activists at Rutgers University (Newark), helping spread the word among my school's student body whenever projects were being facilitated on their campus or around the city. As part of a Black Arts Movement (BAM) class, we put on a performance involving different forms of media, visual art, dance, poetry, skits, etc; all of them representing our struggles as POC, and comparing and contrasting the experiences of our ancestors to our