Four Northwestern professors in various fields discussed how the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s vision of an equal society could be applied to today’s problems at a teach-in Monday on the Evanston Campus.
Associated Student Government sponsored the event — featuring philosophy lecturer Mark Sheldon, communication studies Prof. David Zarefsky, history lecturer Lane Fenrich and sociology Prof. Aldon Morris — after passing a legislation at the student Senate’s Jan. 12 meeting.
“Each of us has been touched by and affected by the efforts of King,” Sheldon told the crowd of about 40 people. “The problem is that we don’t embrace diversity in fact.”
Sheldon described his childhood and college experiences with segregation. He recalled that at a Quaker camp in Pennsylvania in the 1950s there was only one black boy who was admitted to the camp and only because he was the son of a famous United Nations official.
“I grew up as a typical youth, thinking primarily about girls and sex, I admit,” Sheldon said.
He said it was only when he entered college that he started to think about issues of race and equality.
“The point of my talk is that the only true diversity I experienced was in the military,” Sheldon said.
The professors offered their perspectives on how King’s visions manifest themselves in today’s society.
Zarefsky discussed how current cases of discrimination are more complicated than ever.
“The world has shrunk,” Zarefsky said, “and we (have) found it necessary to come into contact with people different from ourselves.”
Zarefsky described King as a “radical” because he wanted integration in a way that would change the values of American society to include all races.
“Dr. King grounded his aspiration and vision in the American Dream,” he said. “He challenged it to live up to its ideals.”
Morris challenged King’s dream in contemporary society.
“When we think of King, we should think of what kind of questions he would raise today, ” he said. “Why is it that a third of blacks live in poverty? Why are there more blacks in jail than there are in college? What is the relationship between poverty in the U.S. and spending millions of dollars on killing Iraqis?”
Morris also discussed diversity at NU. He said he feels “lucky” when he sees two or three blacks in one of his classes and “extremely lucky” when one of them is male.
“It’s hard to find an African American here (at NU),” Morris said.
Fenrich, a professor of gay and lesbian history, compared the struggles of the civil rights movement to that of gays and lesbians. He argued that King was an important leader for civil rights for minorities, but he ignored the rights of gays and lesbians.
Fenrich noted that Bayard Rustin, one of King’s associates in the civil rights movement, was an advocate for gays’ and lesbians’ rights, but King did not support him.
“In private King was certainly rejecting that kind of animus,” he said.
Citing King’s famous letter from a Birmingham, Ala., jail, Fenrich said just as the Civil Rights Movement could not wait, gay and lesbian rights must be addressed.
“Gay families are being rejected just as blacks were during the civil rights movement,” Fenrich added. “It’s the same struggle.”
Reach Ilya Bunimovich at [email protected].
