Alumni Stories: Black Lives Matter Yesterday, Today and Always

Paris was very different from Chicago, yet still familiar in many ways. I had read James Baldwin’s writings from Paris, as well as the works of Franz Fanon, both men for whom “La France” was a special place. So my heart was in Paris, long before my body arrived. Once in Paris I was introduced to Simone De Beauvoir’s philosophy of existentialism. My passion for writing was unearthed by The Women’s Room author Marilyn French when she wrote: “I have opened all the doors in my head. I have opened all the pores in my body, but only the tide rolls in.” Paris was a city for love and of love: the love of art, the love of history, and the love of life, all in which I became quickly immersed.

When I went to meet the French family with whom I was to live my first semester, the French mistress was taken aback when she opened the door to find “une noire” standing tall, yet very tentative, uncertain of what response I should expect. The first time she called me “une noire” I wasn’t certain if I should be insulted or if that was like being called a Negro. I didn’t complain because as an African American, I had been called other names that were far more painful and degrading. Besides, the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s new Rainbow Push coalition was using the term African American, as Black and Negro were now passé terms. So there I found myself, une noire in Paris, the City of Love, in 1977, the age of the TV series Roots, and a peanut famer named Jimmy Carter. It was also the year Star Wars hit the big screen. I had moved past the Age of Aquarius to the age of No Justice for Just Us!

When my fellow African American student, Gina Poitier, arrived in the Spring of 1978, I was ecstatic to have a compatriot join me during my Parisian sojourn, especially une autre noire. Shortly before leaving home, Gina had broken her leg in a fall. However, determined to make her way to Paris, she did not allow a heavy plaster cast and an unsteadying metal crutch to derail her travel plans. Despite Gina’s injury, Gina and I often strolled the cobblestone streets of Paris eating sorbet and eyeing the beautiful sights, both architectural and human. And as I stroll down memory lane, I am reminded of what a beautiful experience it was for a young Black girl to fulfill her dreams of sitting in a café on the Champs Elysee, watching life and love evolve. It was indeed a life-changing experience.

However, when I fast-forward to 2020, and find myself sitting in a Zoom meeting of the Black and Abroad students of The American University of Paris, I am again reminded that today, 43 years later, there is still No Justice for Just Us. Black lives matter today just as they did yesterday. I am sadly reminded that in the City of Love, a city built on love and for love, une noire can remain unloved despite being surrounded by an urbane metropolis filled with history and decadent beauty. In 1977, I found love for a city I will forever cherish, but my love affairs abruptly halted, my fond memories tarnished by the cries and shouts of Black lives matter! I had opened all the pores in my body to feel the love! And I opened all the doors in my head trying to understand why just us? But as I hear the cries “I can’t breathe” and “hands up,” I am reminded, despite the hate-filled racial epitaphs that seek to envelope and mute my spirit, that Black lives matter.

And I am reminded of Fanon’s Black Skin, White Masks: “I am black, not because of a curse, but because my skin has been able to capture all the cosmic effluvia. I am truly a drop of sun under the earth.” Then I smile because I know Baldwin’s response might be that people often find themselves trapped in their own history, but “from my point of view, no label…no skin color, and indeed no religion is more important than the human being.” And still for Baldwin, the greatest significance of each generation is that it is through them that the view of the subjugated is inexorably expressed. And so as I amble through the words of all les noires whose hearts stroll beside mine down cobblestone streets of memories long past, the spirit of my generation and this next compel me to shout: “Black lives matter, yesterday, today and always!” They just do!