{"id":36313,"date":"2024-03-02T15:39:28","date_gmt":"2024-03-02T23:39:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=36313"},"modified":"2024-03-02T15:39:28","modified_gmt":"2024-03-02T23:39:28","slug":"sankofa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/sankofa\/","title":{"rendered":"Sankofa"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><em>Sankofa<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0is an African word from the Akan tribe in Ghana. The literal translation of the word and the symbol is\u00a0<strong><em>\u201c<\/em><\/strong><em>it is not taboo to fetch\u00a0what is\u00a0at risk of being left behind.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The\u00a0word is derived from the words:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>SAN<\/strong>\u00a0 (return)<\/li>\n<li><strong>KO<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0(go)<\/li>\n<li><strong>FA<\/strong>\u00a0(look, seek and take)<a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftn1\" name=\"_ftnref1\">[1]<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400\">\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400\">In my early career, at North Park University in Chicago, IL, I took on a deep dive into trying to understand race reconciliation and how to be an ally.\u00a0 It was hard, I encountered it in my work in the residence halls and in participating in a trip called \u201cSankofa\u201d.\u00a0 We translated the word as \u201clooking back, to move ahead\u201d but I also like the translation above, \u201cit is not taboo to fetch what is at risk of being left behind.\u201d\u00a0 When speaking on race and identity politics, what do we risk leaving behind?<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400\">In this class, we paired white students and staff with African American students and staff and met a few times in class and then we all boarded onto a grayhound bus, watched movies like Amistad and American History X as we traveled from Chicago to places like Atlanta, visiting MLK Jr.\u2019s museum and church (Life changing to sit in the pews and hear him preach on a recording).\u00a0 We visited Birmingham where the church was bombed and 4 girls died, Nashville where MLK, Jr was assassinated, we visited a lynching exhibit and a working plantation.\u00a0 At this plantation is where I stepped through a threshold learning experience: The white tour guide spoke to our group about the slaves in the cotton fields and were \u201chappy and singing\u201d.\u00a0 As you can imagine this set off the group in a way that I will never forget.\u00a0 This poor woman doing her job and no idea what she had just stepped into, but I don\u2019t think she\u2019ll ever forget it!<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400\">Kenan Malik, in his book \u201c<em>Not So Black and White: A History of Race from White Supremacy to Identity Politics<\/em>\u201d, takes on the task of \u201clooking back\u201d, in order to ask the question\u2026How did we get here?\u00a0 This book was heavy, both physically (not a light book) but in content.\u00a0 How could it not be heavy in content, it is a very complicated conversation.\u00a0 I struggled with trying to read this book, wether is was the topic or just the time of year.\u00a0 I am 2 days late writing this blog.\u00a0 I normally need some sort of space to find mental energy around it.\u00a0 I apologize to my cohort for the late post.<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400\">I watched a lecture by Malik to try to gain understanding of what he was talking a about in this book.\u00a0 He gave a detailed account of how our understanding of race has changed in the last century.\u00a0 In summation, he makes note that the concept of race started as a way to justify behavior, so what in history was a class system became a race system.<a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftn2\" name=\"_ftnref2\">[2]<\/a>\u00a0 He spoke in his book and in this lecture to the barbarianism of humans.\u00a0 He spoke of this through the Nazi German atrocities in the 20<sup>th<\/sup> century.\u00a0 He notes, and it\u2019s hard to process, that \u201cThere was no Nazi atrocity\u2014concentration camps, wholesale maiming and murder, defilement of women or Ghastly\u00a0 blasphemy of childhood\u2014which the Christian Civilization of Europe had not long been practicing against colored folk in all parts of the world in the name of and for the defence of a Superior Race born to rule the World\u201d.<a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftn3\" name=\"_ftnref3\">[3]<\/a> Humans can be responsible of the most beautiful moments and the absolute worst.\u00a0 Malik makes the point that Nazi\u2019s were indeed human and that their barbarianism is human.\u00a0 We tend to want to dehumanize barbaric acts because it\u2019s painful to think that humans can be responsible for such evil.\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cFor evil to endure it is said all that is required is to stand back and do nothing\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0 Malik quotes\u00a0 \u201cRoman playwright Terrence\u2019s \u00a0celebrated line <em>Homo nihil a me alienum puto\u2014<\/em>\u201cI am human, and I think nothing human is alien to me\u201d\u2014it is difficult not to imagine Auschwitz as completely alien to the human experience. The savagery of the Nazi\u2019s, and the final solution, seems beyond the grasp of humanness.\u00a0 Yet, not only were Nazis human, but so was their barbarism.\u201d<a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftn4\" name=\"_ftnref4\">[4]<\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400\">What are we to do?<\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400\">In Malik\u2019s lecture, he quoted an author with the name France, \u201cmy black skin is not the wrapping of specific values. My solidarity is not\u00a0 with those who share this identity, but with all those who share his ideals\u201d.<a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftn5\" name=\"_ftnref5\">[5]<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It is in this that we not only find ways to move forward with ideologies of peace, of justice and Mercy, but it also means we must be Sankofa.\u00a0 We must \u201creturn, go, take and see\u201d.\u00a0 It is not taboo to go back and get what is in danger of being left behind!\u00a0 All humans are imago dei.\u00a0 We cannot abandon, or sit by and do nothing, when another\u2019s dignity is being destroyed or left behind.\u00a0 This is our call!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftnref1\" name=\"_ftn1\">[1]<\/a> https:\/\/www.berea.edu\/centers\/carter-g-woodson-center-for-interracial-education\/the-power-of-sankofa<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftnref2\" name=\"_ftn2\">[2]<\/a> https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/live\/zqeMka48Dj0?si=d9tlXDV0h-jNmykZ<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftnref3\" name=\"_ftn3\">[3]<\/a> Malik, Kenan. <em>Not So Black and White: A History of Race from White Supremacy to Identity Politics.<\/em> (London, C. Hurstand Co., 2023) 117.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftnref4\" name=\"_ftn4\">[4]<\/a> \u00a0Malik, 138.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"\/\/34E25E9E-0360-49DF-94DF-C399762BAAEF#_ftnref5\" name=\"_ftn5\">[5]<\/a> https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/live\/zqeMka48Dj0?si=d9tlXDV0h-jNmykZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sankofa\u00a0is an African word from the Akan tribe in Ghana. The literal translation of the word and the symbol is\u00a0\u201cit is not taboo to fetch\u00a0what is\u00a0at risk of being left behind.\u201d The\u00a0word is derived from the words: SAN\u00a0 (return) KO\u00a0\u00a0(go) FA\u00a0(look, seek and take)[1] In my early career, at North Park University in Chicago, IL, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":187,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2489,3049,3086],"class_list":["post-36313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dlgp02","tag-malik","tag-sankofa","cohort-dlgp02"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/187"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36313"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36313\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36314,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36313\/revisions\/36314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}