Bernice
Reagon Urges Graduates to Throw Themselves "Against
Those Things in Life That Should Not Be"
New
York, N.Y., May 15, 2001- Bernice Reagon, a folklorist
and founder of the musical group Sweet Honey in
the Rock, charmed 540 graduating Barnard students
with snatches of a gospel tune, and then urged
them to "throw yourselves against things in life
that should not be."
Reagon,
who was awarded the Barnard Medal of Distinction,
one of the College's highest honors, spoke before
an audience of 3,000 packed onto Lehman Lawn and
Altschul Plaza for Barnard's 109th commencement
ceremony.
Reagon began by singing softly, with gathering
strength, a gospel melody beginning: "I'm your
child, remember me... Lord, remember me," and
soon had the audience joining in. To be remembered,
she urged, "live your life in such a way that
your actions transform the space you operate in.
It's about throwing yourself against those things
in life that should not be."
For
example, she said, Malawi is an African nation
of 10 million and 1 million AIDS victims; the
President wants to drill for oil in protected
areas; and we live in a culture "where one of
the first things a female learns is to be afraid
because she is female and is preyed on by other
members of the species."
Reagon
said she loved teaching 19th-century American
history because it was the period in which "slavery
was ripped out of the country." That, she said,
occurred because "some thought there was something
corrupting about having, in a country that talked
about freedom, some people own other people."
"The
world is reshaped by people who actually offer
their lives in the space and place of those things
that should not be experienced," she said. "You
sit on a mountain of humanity, you are the living
archeological evidence of people who came before
you," she said, adding that their success means
"that you can do the same for somebody else."
And,
she said, there is plenty of reshaping to do in
what she described as "a young country" in which
people of her color historically couldn't get
a glass of Coke at a lunch counter. "We haven't
even reached teen-age - and do you remember what
that was like!"
She
concluded: "I'm suggesting that you have to try
to create things that are not here. The things
we face in this society are waiting for you to
visualize how we can begin to address them."
Also receiving the Barnard Medal of Distinction
were:
- Maxine
Greene '38, Wm. F. Russell Professor Emerita
of Teachers College and a prolific American
philosopher of education and aesthetics;
- Morris
Dees, Chief Trial Counsel of The Southern Poverty
Law Center, a civil rights lawyer who has committed
his life to putting hate crimes on trial;
- And
Susan Hendrickson, famed diver and dinosaur
hunter, who discovered the largest fossilized
Tyrannosaurus Rex ever found - a find that was
later named "Tyrannosaurus Sue" in her honor.
Barnard's
ceremony is officially called the Presentation
of Degree candidates. The graduates will formally
receive their degrees, signed by Barnard President
Shapiro and Columbia University President George
Rupp, on Wednesday, May 16 at the Columbia University
Commencement.
Shapiro
praised the Class of 2001 as "particularly innovative,
creative and energetic. You have thrived at Barnard
-- a pretty good indicator for the future... you
are challenging, hard-working and risk-taking
learners, qualities that you share with generations
of Barnard women (and that certainly keep the
faculty on their toes - and make teaching here
a joy) and attributes that bode well for your
success." [click here for the full text of President
Shapiro's speech]
Shapiro urged the graduates to embrace the possibility
of the occasional failure on the way to success.
"You may have had some inkling by now that success
does not happen without taking some risks... and
that you can't take a risk without the possibility
of a little failure."
Provost
and Dean of the Faculty Elizabeth Boylan told
graduates that they were part of "a very privileged
minority with a whole lot of understanding and
learning and vision to offer the world." If the
world's population were shrunk to 100 people,
she noted, only 1 would have a college education.
[click here for the full text of Provost
Boylan's speech]
Erin
E. Fredrick, president of the senior class, told
her classmates they had arrived on Morningside
Heights "the day Seinfeld went off the air" and
witnessed a President impeached and a First Lady
elected. "We may be unsure of what directions
our lives will take after Barnard, but we can
be confident that we are prepared ... and as a
good friend said to me, I don't really want to
think about a life after Barnard, but I'm excited
to carry my Barnard bag there."
Jyoti
Menon, president of the Student Government Association,
recalled a widening circle of experience, in libraries,
at internships, at the Metropolitan Museum of
Art and the Museo del Bario, and in the audience
at Blue Man Group and Rent. "The culture of empowerment
at Barnard encouraged us to challenge ourselves,"
she said.
In her Academic Reflections, given by the winner
of a speaking competition, Colleen D. O'Meara
recounted her experience preparing and performing
a solo dance piece. She had practiced many times,
but to her surprise, just before the performance,
her instructor, Associate Professor of dance Donlin
Foreman told her to face the back wall and, "when
you have something to say, turn and begin."
O'Meara
realized Foreman was pushing her to a new level
of performance and that "he wanted me to actually
feel the dance rather than simply execute it ...
I was paralyzed and but also invigorated by my
fear ... So, I turned around .... And I danced - for
the first time."
"I
urge each graduate to embrace her moments. These
moments move you, because they originate from
deep within the mind and body. Trust this movement,
allow it to take you to the next stage of life.
Remember how Barnard made these moments possible
for you. But, more significantly, remember that
Barnard provided you with the confidence and knowledge
to prosper between the moments."
Bernice
Johnson Reagon
Presenting the Barnard Medal of Distinction to
Bernice Johnson Reagon, Lauren Porsch '01 told
her: "The impact of both the music and the lyrics
on a worldwide audience can hardly be overestimated,
for Sweet Honey chronicles each new social blight,
exhorting, empowering, and, as Alice Walker once
said, inoculating "against disease of racist and
sexist selfishness, envy, and greed." [Click here
to read the full citation for Reagon's
Barnard Medal of Distinction]
Reagon,
famed composer and singer in the 19th century
southern tradition, founded Sweet Honey in The
Rock, a world-renowned African-American women's
a cappella ensemble, in 1973. A historian and
scholar, Reagon is a distinguished professor of
history at American University and a Curator Emeritus
at the Smithsonian Institution, the National Museum
of American History, where she served for 20 years.
Reagon
has served as a music consultant, composer, and
performer for several award-winning film and video
projects; in 1989, she was awarded a MacArthur
Fellowship for her work as an artist and scholar
of African-American culture. She researched, produced
and hosted the groundbreaking Smithsonian Institution
and National Public Radio series, Wade in The
Water: African American Sacred Music Traditions,
which began broadcast in 1994 and won a Peabody
Award. Reagon specializes in the African-American
oral, performance, and protest traditions. After
an extraordinary three decades, Reagon remains
the driving force of Sweet Honey in the Rock.
The much-acclaimed group draws from the rich tradition
of African-American choral music, beginning in
slavery when Africans worked in the plantations,
singing to the rhythm of their forced labor. These
basic work songs formed the beginning of gospel
music. As a solo singer, Reagon describes herself
as a "song leader in the nineteenth century African-American
choral tradition in search of a congregation."
In the 1960s, during the Civil Rights Movement,
Reagon was a member of the original SNCC (Student
Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) Freedom Singers.
The Freedom Singers traveled the country, attending
meetings and protests and were often arrested.
The spirit of the Freedom Singers lives on in
Sweet Honey in the Rock. Reagon's group has toured
internationally throughout the years; their song
'Emergency' was nominated for a Grammy in 1988.
In reviews of Sweet Honey's performances, the
words "mesmerizing" and "overwhelming" appear
frequently. The Sydney Morning Herald wrote of
Sweet Honey's concert in Australia in 1990: "[They]
radiate strength and beauty...in more than 20
years of reviewing concerts, I have never been
so deeply moved and so elated by a performance."
Reagon
is the author and editor of several books, including:
If You Don't Go, Don't Hinder Me: The African
American Sacred Song Tradition (2000); How
I Got Over: Clara Ward and the World Famous Ward
Singers (1997); We'll Understand it Better
by and by: Pioneering African American Gospel
Composers (1993); We Who Believe in Freedom:
Sweet Honey in the Rock: Still on the Journey
(1993); and Black American Culture and Scholarship
(1985). Reagon also produced the landmark documentary
anthology, Voices of the Civil Rights Movement:
Black American Freedom Songs 1960-1965, a three-record
collection with accompanying booklet for the Smithsonian
Collection of Classic Recordings.
Publisher's
Weekly wrote of Reagon's anthology, We'll
Understand It Better by and by: Pioneering African
American Gospel Composers: "Reagon presents
a superb collection of essays--by academics who
are also gospel performers or record producers
-- that focus on major figures in black gospel
music: Charles A. Tindley, Lucie Campbell Williams,
Thomas A. Dorsey, William H. Brewster Sr., Roberta
Martin and Kenneth Morris."
Maxine
Greene '38
Presenting
the Barnard Medal of Distinction to Maxine Greene
'38, Dr. Susan R. Sacks, Senior Lecturer and Director
of Barnard's Education Program, told her: "you
exemplify your own belief that freedom means accepting
responsibility both for one's experience of the
world and for the others who share this world."
[[Click here to read the full citation for Greene's
Barnard Medal of Distinction]
Greene, prolific author and the William F. Russell
Professor Emeritus of Philosophy and Education
at Teachers College, has achieved numerous honors
and distinctions in the field of education. After
graduating Phi Beta Kappa from Barnard College
in 1938, Greene went on to earn both an M.A. and
a Ph.D. in education from New York University.
Greene was awarded the Fulbright Fellowship in
1991 to study in New Zealand, and has received
various honorary degrees from such institutions
as Lehigh and Hofstra Universities as well as
from Bank Street College.
Greene
was the recipient of two Educator of the Year
Awards from Columbia University in 1973 and from
Ohio State University in 1978. In 1988, Barnard
College presented Greene with its Woman of Achievement
Award. Dr. Greene was also president of the Philosophy
Society of America and is a former president of
the American Educational Studies Association.
Dr.
Greene is well known for the landmark achievement
of becoming the first tenured female faculty member
at Teachers College, where she has been a professor
since 1965. Greene holds a strong interest in
aesthetic education, a topic she frequently covers
in her lectures. In 1998, she donated over 200
art, philosophy and education-related books and
publications to the Teachers College Milbank Memorial
Library.
Dr.
Greene's most recent published works include:
A Light in Dark Times: Maxine Greene and the Unfinished
Conversation (1998); Releasing the Imagination:
Essays on Education, the Arts, and Social Change
(1995); Retrieving the Language of Compassion:
The Education Professor in Search of Community
(1990); and The Dialectic of Freedom (1987).
Susan
Hendrickson
Nan
Rothschild, Professor of Anthropology, in presenting
the Barnard Medal of Distinction to Susan Hendrickson,
told her: "You have always valued scientific knowledge
above personal gain, and have given researchers
and museums access to whatever you discover. We
are privileged to count you as a true member of
the academy." [Click here to read the full citation
for Hendrickson's Barnard
Medal of Distinction]
Hendrickson,
famed diver and fossil hunter, emerged as a key
player in the world of archeological exploration
in 1990 with her discovery of a 65-million-year-old
Tyrannosaurus Rex in the badlands of South Dakota.
It is the largest and most complete T. Rex of
the 22 ever found; her discovery was unveiled
to the public on May 17, 2000, at Chicago's Field
Museum of Natural History.
Hendrickson
describes her reaction at the time of the T. Rex
discovery by saying, "It was like I was a sculptor
- the feeling is that you are creating her from
the rock, almost bringing her to life. You feel
like she waited for you....it's a thrill that
defies description. It's chemical, physical, emotional
- it's a body experience." Another significant
feature of this remarkable discovery is its gender;
the T. Rex uncovered by Hendrickson is a female,
while the majority of T. Rexes have tended to
be males. The recently revealed dinosaur has been
titled "Tyrannosaurus Sue," named after Hendrickson.
Hendrickson
is best known for allowing scientists and museums
full access to the materials she finds. She is
not formally trained and does not hold a Ph.D.,
but she has become highly respected within her
field nonetheless. Hendrickson received an honorary
degree in May of 2000 from the University of Illinois
at Chicago for her "expansion of knowledge and
performance of exemplary service" with regard
to teaching, service and research, according to
Professor David Sokol. Professor Donald Marshall
described Hendrickson as "a determined person
with a passion for learning and a willingness
to pursue her passion."
Hendrickson's
intellectual passion is clearly demonstrated in
her future plans for an expedition to Alexandria,
Egypt. There she plans to explore its royal port,
the remains of Cleopatra's palace, Marc Antony's
home, the temple of Poseidon and a shipwreck.
Hendrickson says that she would ideally love to
find "a family of T. Rexes buried together" on
her next archeological adventure.
Morris
Dees
Presenting
the Barnard Medal of Distinction to Morris Dees,
Judith Kaye '58, Chief Justice of the New York
State Court of Appeals, told him: "You enlighten
by example, and despite ruthless attacks on your
person and your character, you retain an ardent
belief in the viability of universal justice and
equality for all groups and individuals." [[Click
here to read the full citation for Dees's
Barnard Medal of Distinction]
Dees,
a pioneering civil rights lawyer and activist,
is the Cofounder and Chief Trial Counsel of the
Southern Poverty Law Center. Born in Shorter,
Alabama, Dees attended the University of Alabama
and graduated from the University of Alabama School
of Law in 1960. He was finance director for Democratic
presidential nominee George McGovern in 1972,
served as former President Carter's national finance
director in 1976, and as national finance chairman
for Senator Kennedy's 1980 presidential campaign.
He originated the idea of a Civil Rights Memorial
that was dedicated in Montgomery, Alabama in 1989.
In the 1990s, he concentrated on suing white supremacist
groups. Dees' autobiography, A Season For Justice
(1991), was made into a television special
in 1992.
Dees
has made his life's work bringing hatemongers
and racists to justice. He has excelled in convincing
juries that racist leaders should be held financially
accountable for their hate crimes, and in the
process bankrupted them. Now 64, Dees' life has
been threatened many times, but he continues to
fight for the poor and disenfranchised. Dees'
office was firebombed in 1983 and gunmen have
been spotted on the grounds of his home several
times. He has even been challenged to a duel "to
the death" by a Klansman. Dees wrote in his 1991
autobiography, A Season For Justice, "It
struck me I didn't have to count sheep to fall
asleep. I could count potential assassins."
His
second book, Hate on Trial: The Case Against
America's Most Dangerous Neo-Nazi, was published
in 1993. It chronicles the trial and $12.5 million
judgment against white supremacist Tom Metzger
and his White Aryan Resistance group for their
responsibility in the beating death by Skinheads
of a young black student in Portland, Oregon.
His latest book, Gathering Storm: America's
Militia Threat (1996), exposes the danger
posed by today's domestic terrorist groups.
Though
known as a civil rights lawyer, Dees feels he
is not a spokesperson for any single group. He
once said: "I'm not for blacks or whites. I'm
for a fair shot."
Barnard
College, founded in 1889, is a highly selective
independent college for women affiliated with
Columbia University in New York City. Barnard,
whose mission is to support the talent, vision,
and spirit of all women throughout their academic,
social, and professional lives, has a long-standing
tradition of graduating women who become leaders
in business, medicine, government, science, education,
public service and the arts.
Contact:
Petra Tuomi, Public Affairs, 212-854-7907
Lucas Held, Public Affairs, 212-854-7583
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