Till the White Day is Done

Till the White Day is Done is a holistic journey involving a multi-dimensional and interactive experience through the interdisciplinary arts, education, and entertainment. It includes an anthology, curriculum guide, documentary, and national “town hall” style tour. Elements of the project are in collaboration with Eradicating Racism, an initiative of 1+1+1=ONE, a 501(c)3 Brooklyn based non-profit.

This project includes the voices of Game-Changers, Paradigm-Shifters, Wisdom-Callers: Sonia Sanchez, Talib Kweli and his father, Dr. Perry Green, April Silver, Rosa Clemente, Danny Hoch, Inga Musico, Jeff Chang, Tim Wise, Suheir Hammad, M1, Esther Armah, Baba Israel, Chuck D, MC Serch, Marcella Runell-Hall and many more.

Excerpts

“…The problem is, when you leave your white community at home bereft of any thought provoking culture and activism, then your community grows up and becomes soldiers and senators and congressmen and even presidents. And they wind up making policy for us in New York and Los Angeles and San Francisco. And then you complain and you rail about the right wing but the right wing is there because you left. That’s why the right wing is there. So you’re a hypocrite to sit in New York City with your Obama button at your Obama party and your Obama rally voting for Obama in New York State when Obama is already gonna get elected here without you. But it’s not glamorous to go to Colorado and try to get your community to vote for Obama. It’s not glamorous to stay in Wisconsin and get your white community to vote for Obama. As a matter of fact it’s dangerous. -Danny Hoch, interview, Till the White Day is Done

“While millions of white folks are committed to—if not chomping at the bit for—a “post-racism” time, few seem willing to see our own racism, how it operates inside our hearts and the difficult work that is required in order to uproot it. I know there are many kinds of racism and hatreds, and whites are not the only folks who choose to engage with the world in this way. However, and this is a big however, white folks, whether consciously or not, inherit a life in the dominant culture and if that is not reckoned with, white racism will continue as if has for the past 500 years in the Americas.” -Inga Musico, essay, Till the White Day is Done

“It was in junior high school where cops went from being people who looked like they could help you, to them looking at me with suspicion. I remember that feeling. All through my life, teachers had real problems with my name. I remember being told by educators that, with my name, I would never be able to have a real position in America. I remember people telling me, when I had my first son, named Amani Fela, that I shouldn’t have named him an African name because he could never be president with an African name.” -Talib Kweli, interview, Till the White Day is Done

Resources

Below are a few resources to get you started on your journey. There is so much more out there and I encourage you to add to the dialogue by voicing your opinion, sharing resources and ideas, and fully engaging through your actions.

READ

Essays

• Robert Jensen (click here)
• Peggy McIntosh (click here)

Books

• George Lipsitz, The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics
• Paula S. Rothenberg, White Privilege
• Robert Jensen, The Heart of Whiteness: Confronting Race, Racism and White Privilege
• Theodore W. Allen, The Invention of the White Race (Volume One: Racial Oppression and Social Control)
• Michelle Fine, Lois Weis, Linda Powell Pruitt, April Burns, Off White
• Mark D. Naison, White Boy: A Memoir
• Tim Wise, White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son
• Inga Muscio, Autobiography of a Blue-Eyed Devil: My Life and Times in a Racist, Imperialist Society

ENGAGE

Follow these blogs/websites/videos

• Adia Harvey (click here)
• Addicted to Race (http://www.addictedtorace.com)
• Anarchist People of Color (http://illvox.org/articles)
• Anti-Racist Parent (http://www.antiracistparent.com)
• Ariel Luckey’s (www.freelandproject.com)
• Colours of Resistance (click here)
• JLove Calderon (click here)
• Kendall Clark (click here)
• Mary Mitchell (click here)
• Open Letter to White Anti-Racists (click here)
• The Pathology of White Privilege – http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3812249801848706206

ACT

Get Involved

• Attend the White Privileged Conference (http://www.uccs.edu/~wpc)
• Attend the Unmasking Whiteness Institute by the Alliance of White Anti Racist Everywhere (http://awarela.wordpress.com)
• Attend the Anne Braden Anti-Racist Training Program by the Catalyst Project (http://collectiveliberation.org)
• National Conference on Race and Ethnicity (http://www.ncore.ou.edu)
• National Association for Multicultural Education (http://www.nameorg.org)
• PBS presents RACE: The Power of Illusion (click here)

*Resource List composed by JLove Calderon, Terrell Davis and Marcella Runell Hall