If I, Haley Burton, a 20-year-old white female college student said, "My favorite class is African Studies", what would be your initial reaction?
The reactions I have gotten when making that statement overwhelmingly go something like this: "Hahahaha, WHAT?!?! You're joking right?! Are you the only white person in the class? Are there a lot of football players in there?"
Hmmm. We constantly tell ourselves that we are past racism because "it's 2015". But are we?
As I walked into my African Studies 236 class for the first time during sophomore year, the thoughts swirling through my head were no different than thoughts that swirl through my head when I enter any class on the very first day. Awkwardly open the door, frantically look around the room to see if I know anyone, sprint to the seat next to them OR sprint to a seat in the back if I don't and think, "I wonder if this professor is gonna be cool" or "Please let us out early!" Wondering how many blacks there would be didn't cross my mind.
Turns out, my professor for African Studies, Dr. Amadou Sall, was about to change my life in ways I never imagined.
At first, I was skeptical and intimidated when he announced that the class was based around group work and that we would be doing "everything" with our group. Honestly, no college student wants to have the burden of meeting up with their group in order to complete every assignment because college students are busy enough! Although this was an anticipated inconvenience, the concept behind group work was to reflect the idea that we must work together and stay together as a group in order to achieve success, and that focusing on the goal individually and selfishly was not the answer.
The recent reprehensible attack on Charleston, South Carolina has sparked a nationwide conversation about the undeniable racism in our country and that we cannot keep sweeping this issue under the rug. The fact that something as sinister as this finally provoked us to recognize the problem is a problem itself.
News on racism in the Greek community has surfaced recently, too. Who can forget a few short months ago when a brother of Sigma Alpha Epsilon was taped making a racist chant on a bus with his fraternity brothers. We were all disgusted by it, but truth be told, couldn't that have just as easily been someone you know, or even you or me? In this instance as part of the group, this guy was pressured to do something bad, when in fact it was a contradiction to who he was. Turns out he is a respectful young man from a good family and he did the right thing and took ownership for his actions and genuinely apologized.
Maybe Dr. Sall's concept of working together to attain success parallels how we should approach the ongoing problem of racism that is still prevalent in our country. Remaining as a bystander to this obvious issue, or worse yet, partaking in it just because it's what our brothers and sisters are doing, only causes us to take two steps backward. As a generation of change, shouldn't we, the Greek community lead the charge to unite against racism? In doing so, like the Sigma Alpha Epsilon member, we must first take responsibility, admit our own prejudices, and then take positive action to promote race equality.
We must face the TRUTH and DO SOMETHING about it. If we don't, WHO will?
