not <\/em>deliver.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nDavis\u2019 long pause has stuck with Sonja Hyde-Moyer \u201991, a Canadian at the time who is now a U.S. citizen. She realized that a major American moment was unfolding. \u201cI remember feeling like I was part of an American conversation that night.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A few in the audience clapped with appreciation as Davis jettisoned her original talk in favor of helping the Bates audience make sense of what was unfolding in the Middle East. \u201cI remember the anger and fear about the situation unfolding,\u201d says Johnson. \u201cIt seemed so fortuitous to have a leader like Angela Davis on campus that evening.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the final 16 minutes of her 1991 talk at Bates, Angela Davis offers lessons about collective action, inclusion, and the difference between racial autonomy and racial separatism.<\/em><\/span> <\/p>\n\n\n\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t<\/lite-youtube>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\tMuskie Archives and Special Collections Library<\/figcaption>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\nThe original title of Davis\u2019 talk was \u201cRace, Gender, and Class.” Instead, she used those lenses to dissect the new war. She shared how, minutes before, she\u2019d been in her Bates guest room watching TV, and saw the first official notification of the attack from White House press secretary Marlin Fitzwater. Reading a statement from President Bush, Fitzwater said, “The liberation of Kuwait has begun.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As she settled at the lectern, Davis admitted feeling \u201crather bizarre.\u201d The day before, she\u2019d been more than 3,000 miles away, acting in solidarity with some 6,000 other protesters in San Francisco. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The throng had shut down the Federal Building and blocked the Bay Bridge. The next day, the San Francisco Examiner<\/em>\u2019s headline screamed \u201cOn the Brink,\u201d a reference to the United Nation\u2019s deadline for Iraq to pull its troops out of Kuwait, or else face military action.<\/p>\n\n\n\nNow Davis was in Lewiston, Maine, light years from the West Coast epicenter of American protest. \u201cThis is a very frightening period,\u201d she said. \u201cWith perhaps one exception, I don\u2019t ever remember feeling the way I feel now. That one exception would be the invasion of Cambodia during the Vietnam War.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Vietnam-war era saw Davis begin to acquire notoriety \u2014 as well as the dawning recognition by many that she had been unjustly treated. When Coretta Scott King gave the 1971 Bates Commencement address, she spoke about Davis, who was then in jail, enduring a 16-month incarceration (that would end in her acquittal on felony charges in 1972).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cRacism is repression, and the repressive clouds that now hang over our country have become heavier in the weeks that Miss Angela Davis has languished in jail,\u201d King said. \u201cWhile I sharply disagree with the politics of Miss Davis, I must say that if her Blackness, her politics, and her womanhood are being judged, and not the crime, then all Americans will lose some of their liberties along with her.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now in 1991, Davis was forthright in telling her audience she felt disconnected by being in Maine. \u201cBecause as I was saying before, I felt really out of place. What am I doing, sitting in a guest house\u201d at Bates College? The cure to feeling alone and \u201creally out of place,\u201d she said, was to \u201cto feel a community with you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nCoretta Scott King gave the 1971 Bates Commencement address, she spoke about Angela Davis, who was then in prison. (Muskie Archives and Special Collections Library)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nAnd that\u2019s what Davis would create at Bates over the next few hours: connection with the Bates community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI remember her talking about how people she knew who had enlisted in the military \u2014 some of whom were her own students \u2014 had done so because there simply was no other way for them to get out of poverty, to get an education,\u201d recalls Hyde-Moyer. \u201cAnd now, they were going to have to risk their lives halfway around the world for a war that had no relevance to them, that wasn\u2019t about freedom, however the politicians were trying to spin it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It would not be enough, Davis told her audience, including many students already skilled at activism, and champing at the bit to take to the streets in protest \u2014 to simply oppose \u201cwar.\u201d True, she said, \u201cthere will be those who will demonstrate against the war because they are morally opposed to war.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As you think about the need to go out there and express your opposition to the war, remember that there is a lot of business that you have to take care of in your own backyard, in your own living room.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
But, she said, \u201cI think we should go much further. We need to understand the significance of this war, its implications, not only with respect to the people of the Middle East, but its implications with respect to people here at home. And we should recognize that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That meant focusing on race, gender, and class in our understanding of American events. From her talk, here are three samples of how Davis spoke to those issues:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Having examined the history of this country in which I live \u2014 this country which my ancestors, kidnapped from the shores of Africa, have been responsible for creating with their labor and their sweat and their blood\u2014 I can say that this war underway in the Persian Gulf is situated on a continuum of historical imperialism, exercised by generations of U.S. governments…. <\/em>And it seems that F-15 fighter bombers…have taken off from the bases in Saudi Arabia, each carrying 12 500-pound bombs. It also seems that cruise missiles, Tomahawk missiles \u2014 and isn’t it amazing the way in which the legacy of the indigenous people of this country has been violated by the U.S. military when you consider the name of Apache helicopters, Tomahawk missiles?”[This] is a racist war because it is an imperialist effort conducted against a people of color. The liberation of Kuwait? Since when has the U.S. been interested in the liberation of any people of color anywhere in the world?… I don’t remember having heard any talk of a deadline with respect to apartheid in South Africa…. <\/em><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\nDavis also spoke about the need to address racism on the Bates campus, asking that \u201cas you think about the need to go out there and express your opposition to the war, remember that there is a lot of business that you have to take care of in your own backyard, in your own living room.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf you don’t begin to try to work out some of these problems that stem from racism on this campus, then how are you going to build a movement against that war?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She challenged the college to create spaces for Black students. \u201cI know there is this notion that we are all equal, and yes, we should be. But historically some of us have been marginalized and oppressed to a greater extent than others of us. And sometimes we need <\/em>a space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n“She did then as she does now, call for self-reflection, respectful political allyship, and collective action.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
The desire \u201cis not a separatism,\u201d she said, but a drive toward \u201cautonomy. As an African-American woman, there are times when I only want to meet with my African-American sisters, because there are issues that I can discuss only in that space. But that isn’t to say that I am opposed to working with African-American men. That isn’t to say that I’m opposed to working with European-American women or men.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As a college student, Davis studied at the University of Frankfurt in West Germany, with the philosopher Herbert Marcuse. She has said that he taught her \u201cthat it was possible to be an academic, an activist, a scholar, and a revolutionary.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And that\u2019s what Professor of Politics Emerita Leslie Hill, saw that night: a powerful and effective \u201chistorian, political analyst, and an organizer. She did then as she does now, call for self-reflection, respectful political allyship, and collective action.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As a Black professor in only her third year on the Bates faculty at that point, Hill felt \u201cpride and affirmation,\u201d that night in the chapel, \u201csomething that did not come often in my life on campus.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hill felt \u201cpride in the power of a Black woman speaking truth to power: national, institutional, socially privileged power. Affirmation for an analytical approach that recognizes the significance and consequences of gender and racial politics. And inspiration to keep doing that work in ways that call forth collaboration and community-building.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hill also felt enormous respect for Davis, and not just for her famous track record of activism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn 1972, when I first heard her speak, she did not \u2014 in fact, refused to \u2014 identify herself as a feminist,\u201d says Hill. \u201cIn this 1991 speech, she clearly saw herself as a Black feminist. How often do we see public intellectuals \u2018course correct,\u2019 reveal their own altered thinking and changes of mind? We can all learn and grow. That was the message: so rich.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nIn the days following the start of the Persian Gulf War in January 1991, a sheet hangs, likely in Chase Hall, offering community members the chance to write the names of people they know in the Middle East. In addition to anti-war sentiment, students also rallied support for the war as “Supporters of Allied Action.” (Bates Communications)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nPrior to the talk backstage, Liz Tobin recalls a brief and polite conversation with the famous radical. “While I was nervously awestruck, she was preparing like all other professional speakers: The revolutionary becomes academic.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But as Davis offered a fiery, radical opposition to war and racism and explained the connections between the two, Tobin saw that Davis had “remained supremely charismatic.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After speaking extensively about issues of race, gender, and class with respect to the new foreign war, Davis ended with a pep talk, as it were.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cAs you attempt on this campus to create the strongest possible opposition [to the war], do not think that you are isolated,\u201d she said. \u201cAt this moment, there are people in gatherings like this and out in the street and in churches not only in this country, but all over the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSo reflect upon your membership in that larger community, as you work here in Maine. Some of you are probably going to want to take off and go somewhere else where the action is, but you have to create action here<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nHer final words: \u201cFight the power!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And if Davis yet again confirmed her bona fides as a public intellectual during her chapel talk, what came next, her talent for inspiring collective action, was equally dazzling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Celeste asked, \u2018Why do you think the march will go downtown?\u2019 I said, \u2018Because Angela Davis just announced it from the podium.\u2019\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
The video of the talk concludes as two students speak from the lectern, announcing a protest march starting at Chase Hall. The audience streams out, and the video stops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But folks there that night remember Davis, at some point after the conclusion of her talk, making a call for action herself, saying that the student protesters should march downtown, and not just around campus. \u201cI distinctly recall AD saying, \u2018We\u2019re going to march \u2014 downtown!<\/em>\u201d recalls longtime student dean James Reese.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\u201cI also distinctly recall going to the custodian\u2019s closet in the chapel hallway, where there was a phone, and calling Celeste [Branham, then dean of students] and mentioning that students would be marching downtown. Celeste asked, \u2018Why do you think the march will go downtown?\u2019 I said, \u2018Because Angela Davis just announced it from the podium.\u2019\u201d (During the march, Lewiston police provided safe passage downtown.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Reflecting on Davis\u2019 call for a downtown march, Reese wonders if she did it to \u201cperhaps emphasize to the students that \u2018you must go bigger.\u2019 It seemed she thought it would work. When it did work, it suggested to me that her confidence was from years of experiences that taught or informed her that taking control as much as you can is the best way your goals can be achieved.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Bates Student<\/em> described the march, with Davis joining, as starting at Chase and heading toward Merrill Gymnasium, then past Olin Art Center, and to President Harward’s house. There, Don and Ann Harward met briefly with students, inviting those who wished to come inside to discuss the event and share thoughts.<\/p>\n\n\n\nFrom there, the crowd marched to Kennedy Park. Johnson recalls the \u201csnow and cold; we were marching through the snow. I carried a citronella patio candle that Mrs. Harward had given to me; she was marching next to me.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At Kennedy Park, the group heard speeches from the park gazebo, the one John Kennedy spoke from on Nov. 6, 1960. Elise Berkman recalls Professor of Rhetoric Robert Branham speaking, as well as Celeste. \u201cI vividly remember Professor Branham stating that President Bush was \u2018pleased as punch\u2019 in declaring war.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\nPublished in The Bates Student<\/em> on Jan. 18, 1991, this photo carried the caption, “Students march along Main Street in reaction to the announcement that the U.S. had commenced bombing in Iraq.” (The Bates Student \/ Marlan Proctor ’91)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nPeter Carey \u201891 remembers many, including Davis, returning to Frye Street Union for a reception that was also a TV news watching party. \u201cShe was in the front \u2018row,\u2019 on a couch, just in front of me,\u201d he recalls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe stood shoulder to shoulder,\u201d recalls Kirk Read, professor of French and francophone studies. It was his first year on the faculty as an instructor, and he had anticipated Davis\u2019 visit \u201clike a rock star was coming to campus.\u201d Now he didn\u2019t know where to look, at “George Bush announcing the \u2018liberation\u2019 of Kuwait or at Angela Davis, whose commentary we were hanging on. Her grace, experience, steadfastness, and commitment were an anchor in an enraging and confusing time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The next day, Reese drove Davis back to the Portland Jetport, along with two exchange students from Russia, who were flying from Portland to a conference. \u201cThey sat in the back seat and smiled the whole time, knowing they were riding with America’s most well-known Communist,\u201d Reese recalls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The roads were salty wet after the overnight snow, and he’d run out of windshield washer fluid in his vehicle. The windshield was becoming covered in salt, so he kept close to the vehicle in front to take advantage of the tire spray onto his windshield.<\/p>\n\n\n\nPam Batchelder Johnson ’91 still has this copy of the schedule of events for Bates’ MLK Day events in 1991, five days after the beginning of the Gulf War on Jan. 16, reflecting the faculty’s decision to cancel classes to offer a teach-in.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n\u201cI think \u2018AD\u2019 noticed, but we talked about support on campus and support for Russians. I thought it was some damn good driving and conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
What happened next is well-recorded Bates history. On Friday, Jan. 18, the faculty voted to cancel classes on Martin Luther King Jr. Day and hold a day-long teach-in. And by the mid-1990s, MLK Day at Bates had become what we know today, a full teach-in day in lieu of traditional classes, with talks, workshops, readings, and screenings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Bates folks recall when the iconic activist, intellectual, and scholar Angela Davis \u2014 this year’s MLK Day speaker \u2014 addressed a huge gathering in the chapel on Jan. 16, 1991, the night the bombs began falling in Baghdad.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":104,"featured_media":130085,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_ai_chatbot":false,"_ai_chatbot_style":"","associated_faculty":[],"_Page_Specific_Css":"","_bates_restrict_mod":false,"_table_of_contents_display":false,"_table_of_contents_location":"","_table_of_contents_disableSticky":false,"_is_featured":false,"footnotes":"","_bates_seo_meta_description":"","_bates_seo_block_robots":false,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_id":0,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_twitter_id":0,"_bates_seo_share_title":"","_bates_seo_canonical_overwrite":"","_bates_seo_twitter_template":""},"categories":[4,14],"tags":[5709],"class_list":["post-137846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academic-life","category-faculty-staff","tag-martin-luther-king-jr-day"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/104"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137846"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137846\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":137931,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137846\/revisions\/137931"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/130085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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