In this post: A powerful anecdote by the amazing Audre Lorde about the consequences of staying silent in a society that already silences many.
Category: Black in America
Ramiah Recommended?
Yes. It's a brief source of inspiration from an iconic writer. What more could you want?
Happy Black History Month, Reminders! What better way to begin than with a piece from Ms. Lorde.
This essay begins with Lorde learning about a chest tumor doctors thought to be malignant. As she waits for the diagnosis (ultimately benign), she reflects on her life, and her silence stood out to her most.
Silence to Lorde was dishorning herself. Silence prevented her early on from living her life freely as a Black lesbian woman. Silence inhibited her from uplifting voices of other identities facing struggle. Silence prevented her from pursuing truth.
My silence had not protected me. Your silence will not protect you.
Lorde breaks down silence as a manifestation of fear. Fear of judgment, change, censure. Fear of being wrong or doing wrong. But through her words over these few pages, Lorde affirms herself and readers that being who you are is not wrong. It can never be wrong.
I've been dealing with the consequences of silence recently, especially when I reflect on how I show up in different environments - personally and professionally. Code-switching is something I was never intentional about, but in recent years, I realized that lack of intention stemmed from the act becoming second-nature.
Code-switching is silencing part of ourselves to suit the people we're interacting within a particular environment. And that silence is exhausting. That silence is suffocating. That silence is inauthentic.
Lorde encourages readers to break the silences that immobilize us. The silence will not protect us.
So let's get to breaking.
Ramiah Reflects
My New Favorite Life Quotes:
(see the quote above!)
Questions to Ask Yourself (and answer!):
"What are the words you do not yet have?"
"What do you need to say?"
"What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own, until you will sicken and die of them, still in silence?"
Food for Thought:
I just love the point Lorde makes in this paragraph: "[Do] not hide behind the mockeries of separations that have been imposed upon us and which so often we accept as our own. For instance, 'I can't possibly teach Black women's writing - their experience is so different from mine.' Yet how many years have you spent teaching Plato and Shakespeare and Proust?"
Ramiah's Re-read When
Re-read when:
You're battling between speaking and staying silent
You need a quick dose of inspiration
You need to uplift others' voices
(No notes this time, folks!)
Check out my other posts and book notes here.
Until next time!
Montana Houston
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