Voices of Our Foremothers

Our African American foremothers have played a significant role in our lives.  What they have done and taught has been passed down and helped shaped the way current African American women grow and develop.  In her younger years, Birney didn’t have the access to this leadership and establishment with her white parents.  As a result she felt “motherless”.  While in college she found her long lost mother.  Her professors impacted her life with their close relationship, their caring nature, and ability to allow Birney to become an independent thinker.  Since they helped her enhance her knowledge, she was inspired to do the same for the black community.  “My professors modeled not just exemplary teaching, but also a commitment that uplifted and helped transform myself, and in turn, the African American community” (Birney 50).  It is imperative to be a leader for others, yet it is essential to be a servant for others as well.  One cannot act as if they are better than others, but be on the same level.  This goes along with the relationship between a teacher and their student.  Together they should grow and learn from each other.  Knowledge is more than repeating and memorizing facts.  Learning is being able to expand your mind and think for yourself.  Birney believes that her college professors have given her that opportunity to do so. 

Birney goes on to describe how our foremothers carried the torch of education. Black women have a history of having schools and organizations that implement the importance of education, and teaching children in a way that affects the mind, body, and spirit. For Birney, this type of excellence encouraged her to believe that noting is impossible. Not only was it encouragement for her, but also permission to do the same for generations to come. These foremothers have served as mother to children who seemed motherless by providing education that focused on multiple literacies. They understood conquering oppression, belittlement, and dehumanization through a connected and unified way. They interlocked and created a power that has provided opportunity for Black women to lead and teach in the same manner. Birney's life has been impacted on a great deal because of the women that stood before us. Their strength to teach and learn from one another gave Black women a torch to carry on.

Birney, Sunny-Marie. "Voices of Our Foremothers:Celebrating the Legacy of African-American Women Educators." Readers of the Quilt. ED. Joanne Kilgour Dowdy. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton P., Inc., 2005. Print.

Voices of Our Foremothers

     In the first part of Birney's passage, she gives background of her childhood, of how she was adopted. She explains how she felt like a "motherless child" who is "a long way from home" (Birney, 49). Birney explains how she was adopted by two people of European descent and couldn't quite find a connection between herself and them. It wasn't until she began her undergraduate education at the College of Wooster did she find a connection between herself and a woman of color. There were three, Black, female professors that Birney encountered that influenced her to become a teacher and develop the "power of caring" (Birney, 50) towards others. She describes the relationship between herself and the professors as a maternal one. They were her mothers who "cared not only about [her] academic work and the adjustments [she] was making at the collegiate level, but they were overall with [her] mind, body, and spirit, past, present, and future" (Birney, 50). Birney continued with a connection to the Diaspora and history by saying that she "celebrates in the lives of African-American women educators who came before [her]" (Birney, 51).

    Service described by Birney is in the same sense as the servants of Jesus Christ. Meaning that a person is best at serving others than leading others, "such beliefs, are the very elements that distinguish true teaching as an art of service" (Birney, 51). Therefore, a teacher must use what she knows to "present information in such a way that students can verbally express themselves and become intrinsically empowered..."(Birney, 51). The collaboration between student and teachers is significant because it creates authentic thinking, meaning that with the assitance of the teacher, the student can think critically on their own.

     There are many important Black women who came before us and Birney explains how significant they were especially in her life, by "establishing independent schools, church-affliated Sabbath schools, and/or teaching in schools supported by Black and White philanthropic groups" (Birney, 53). Also, she describes that without the hard work in education by Mary Church Terrell, Anna Julia Cooper, Mary McLeod Bethune, Emma Wilson and many more, opportunites would be limited.

    Providing an chance and place for generations to come is highly important. Birney evaluated the contributions Black, female educators have made an impression on her life. From feeling like a motherless child to become a doctoral student, Birney has been through it all but with the help and support of the Black women before her. Everyone is a role model, regardless of if they think they are or not. Be a leader and provide those younger a great and positive example to follow.

   

Leesons From Down Under

This reading was about an African Amereican woman, Bessie House-Soremekun, growing up in Lanett, Alabama and learning different forms of literacy after the Civil rights Movement. She starts off talking about literacy being impacted by written and unwritten rules of behavior from behavior in Southern Society. Then she starts talking about the Civil Rights Movement and the events that took place were only the beginning of possibilities that were on their way to come. For example, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which later led to Affirmative Action which resulted in the opportunity for minorities, women and disabled to work. 

Also, since her childhood part of her literacy was interwoven with religion being that she grew up in the Methodist Church. She grew up learning how to read and understand the Bible and helped her understand issues regarding morality and what a morally constituted life should be growing up in the 1960s and 1970s. She was also ahead of her class but because of her mother's refusal to let her skip a grade she remained with the kids in her age group, because her mother believed "a child's intellectual and emotional development would proceed at an appropriate pace."
Ms. Bessie then goes on to talk about Formal and informal literacy which is "the various types of knowledge and knowing that is acquired through formal educational modes and activities." This section of the reading talks about integrating the schools and how black education was very much inferior to that of white. Blacks were ignored and were not considered worthy of inclusion. This had a negative impact on the attitude and self esteem of African American people. All they had to really call their own were the stories that were passed on from generation to generation.
Last but not least, Bessie talked about the Race Rules. This instituted the seperate but equal or Jim Crow Laws. Blacks had seperate restrooms and were not able to dine in public places. Also, whites did not have respect for blacks in the community. Whites insisted blacks call address them by Mr. or Mrs. but no matter the age of the black person, the whites addressed them by their first name. Even experiencing these events Bessie never gave up she still went on a quest to find her literacy.


Bessie House-Soremekun

None of this is new to me but it still triggers some feelings and empathy for those African Americans in that time period. Also, my empathy goes out to those going through such discrimation and hatred today because I know such behaviors still exist today. I know that in order to go through events such as the Civil Rights movement and slavery you have to be a strong person and because we as African Americans have lived through it and is still able to come out and tell our just stories shows how powerful we truly are. We are not as illiterate and inferior as we were made out to be.