We Rise, We Resist, We Raise Our Voices
Edited by Wade Hudson & Cheryl Willis Hudson
This book was compiled by the Hudsons after the 2016 election to answer the question, “What shall we tell you [our children] when our world sometimes seems dark and uninviting?” The editors were born in the Jim Crow South, and they explain what it was like growing up there in their introduction (“a segregated but unequal system”). Their dedication evokes their purpose: “to advocate for and pursue a just society and basic human rights for all people.”
I am writing this shortly after learning the results of the 2020 election. But truthfully, in this moment, I feel great sadness about the fact that the vote was so close, and what that reveals about the state of this country. I was not optimistic that there was going to be radical change, which for me would entail a serious addressing of racial, social and economic inequality; systemic racism; gun control; climate change; a complete overhaul of our health care system; truth and reconciliation hearings about American history; and reparations to Black Americans, to just begin the list of items that I think need to be confronted for America to emerge as a moral world leader. But this election – no matter the winner – reveals that almost half the population of this country was willing to vote for someone who fearlessly used blatantly misogynist, racist and anti-immigrant rhetoric; who lied to us about the dangers of Covid, and took no responsibility for nearly a quarter million deaths from this world-wide pandemic; and who continuously argued that there are “good people on both sides.” Sometimes lines have to be drawn in the sand. My line has always been racism, and this initiative is my tiny attempt to do something to affect the next generation – to bring some light into a world that “sometimes seems dark and uninviting.”
Middle readers are a tough group to categorize. If one looks at how publishers slot this book, it ranges between grades 3-5 and grades 6-8, and ages 8-12. We have put it in our upper middle readers category (11-14/ Middle School), because we really wanted kids to read this one on their own and share what they learn with their parents, instead of the other way around.
The Hudsons put out a call to 50 famous Black children authors and illustrators to help answer their question and to offer advice to our new generation. Please read about the amazing work they are doing through their publishing company, Justusbooks. We Rise, We Resist, We Raise Our Voices reminds me a little of editors Maria Popova and Claudia Bedrick’s compilation, A Velocity of Being: Letters to a Young Reader, with its intent to speak to a younger generation about the value of reading. As someone who is a true believer in reading as an act of resistance, books like these resonate with me. This book is an artists’ call to action. You will recognize many of the writers names as ones we have already featured, like Kwame Alexander, Jacqueline Woodson, Tony Medina, Marilyn Wilson, Zetta Elliott, Innosanto Nagara.
I will address in detail just a few of the many pieces included in this book:
Jacqueline Woodson’s submission is a letter to her kids, just as James Baldwin wrote a letter to his nephew, and Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote a letter to his son. Such writing is the desire of an older generation to somehow pass on some wisdom they have garnered over the course of their lives, perhaps to offer some hope of change. In Popova’s A Velocity of Being, the first letter to a young reader is also by Jacqueline Woodson. In it she writes of the sanctity of the time devoted to reading to her son:
As the child of a single working mom, I didn’t have this moment. There were four of us and at the end of a long workday, my mother was exhausted. Sometimes, my older sister read out loud to all of us and those are some of my deepest memories. Hans Brinker, or the Silver Skates, The House on Pooh Corner, Harriet the Spy. While I never read any of those books to my own children – preferring to read from books where their young brown selves were/ are represented on the page – my sister’s stories in my ear put me on a journey toward my own stories. I wanted to see myself in books, wanted to know that I existed. . . fully . . . out the in the world…
[I] try not to think that this moment of my youngest child beside me, the two of us inside one story, won’t always be here. This now is what matters, young reader. The moment we’re all living is is what counts – how will this moment, and the stories we’re living inside of change us… forever?” (16)
Cheryl Willis Hudson’s contribution is a picture of a story quilt based on the song “Get on Board” from The Story of the Jubilee Singers with Their Songs. The tradition of quilting in Black American culture is elaborated on further in this article and includes pictures of some truly beautiful quilts, including this one.
Get On Board
You can read more about the song “Get On Board,” and see both the original lyrics, and how they were modified during the civil rights movement. Paul Robeson, one of my heroes, sang this beautiful version on Ballad For America:
Here is a writing exercise you can do together with your kids: Look at the photo on page 31 of Martin Luther King, Jr., Joan Baez, Reverend Andrew Young, and Reverend Hosea Williams. Take 5 minutes and just do a stream of consciousness reflective writing on what this picture brings up for you. Do these people mean anything to you? to your kids?
You can do the same type of exercise looking at a picture like this of Ruby Bridges. What is happening here? Who do you think of when you hear about civil rights heroes? Do you have any contemporary civil rights heroes? Bryan Stevenson, who started the Equal Rights Initiative, is one of mine.
I loved Sharon Flake’s letter because it listed so many young people who spoke their truth and became leaders, like Malala Yousafzai, who won the Nobel Peace Prize at 17. Ask your kids to tell you about who their heroes are, who they think is out there right now really doing activist work. I posted links to many youth leaders in the write-up on Rise Up! The Art of Resistance. Our hope is that as you build your racially conscious libraries with these books, more and more of these names will become familiar to your kids. For example, How many of you know the story of Claudette Colvin? A few years ago, I was incredibly lucky to take a road-trip with my husband and visit many civil rights era sites, including the school in New Orleans that Ruby Bridges integrated, the Edmund Pettus Bridge, and the Lorraine Motel. I bought Philip Hoose’s Claudette Colvin: Twice Towards Justice on that trip.
Eleanor Tate’s piece on dark-browned skin made me think of two extraordinary Black actresses: Lupita Nyong’o, who calls “colourism the daughter of racism,” and Viola Davis, who was featured on this extraordinary cover of Vanity Fair’s July/August 2020 issue. Here is Davis’ take on the Black female experience in Hollywood.
Zetta Elliott’s poem, “You Too Can Fly,” affirms the trope of flying in African-American culture, as exemplified in folk tales like Virginia Hamilton’s The People Could Fly, which will also be featured by us, and by Toni Morrison in Song of Solomon. Here’s another take on the theme by a young poet:
Fly
by Gary Jackson
Still dark, my baby girl leaps out
the window to greet the rising sun.
I stand below ready to catch her,
but every time she takes off
without fail, her laughter calling
to the orioles, calling
to my shame that had I the choice,
I would have never taught her to fly.
Somewhere there is a man with a gun
who will take pleasure in seeing her
skin against the pure blue sky—
and shooting her down.
My own mother did not flinch
when I first raised my arms
and lifted my feet off the ground,
above her head.
She only said you better hope
bulletproof skin comes with that
gift. Years later I found out it did.
I encourage all of you to read the authors’ descriptions at the end of this book. The Hudsons have put together quite a compilation, and you can expect to see many of these authors featured by Good Trouble For Kids.