In my research study I have to take a deeper look into a global perspective on racial inequalitites that are acknowledged within music.
The music of choice comes from countries such as Great Britain, Ireland, Jamaica and even Original Music. There are several thought provoking ideas that are touched within these songs and it results in a message of equality for all or diagnoses the issues that lie within society. This issue is one that is very important to me personally due to how present it is in my everyday life. Sending messages against the hate that society introduces into the world in racist ways is one of the most powerful ways to combat it. Songs that touch on this issue are more difficult to come by as it is a subject in which is hard to touch, but when a song comes out relating to the issue it becomes very heard by the public. There are multiple examples from our country in which musicians touch upon racism especially from an African American perspective, but my focus will be based upon multiple perspectives seen around the globe to see a holistic perspective. With the examples of these songs, I’m going to go deeper into the meaning and play guitar along with them to show and experience real examples of the effect of this music. The goal with this is to incorporate the audience with the actual sound of the music and put them into an environment where they can understand the feel of it in real time. Every year around the globe we come closer and closer to ending racism as a whole and there are multiple groups that go out of their way to try and prevent these acts of hate from happening in the first place. One of the most prominent and most out reaching groups that have an impact on this would be an organization called Together For Humanity. Together For Humanity is an Australian group who specializes in uniting several different races. The goal is simple, they plan on uniting the people for activities and events to breed similarities between races and cultures to drive out any hate as, “It runs interfaith forums and professional learning courses to provide students with opportunities to meet people of different backgrounds and religions” (Liebowitz). One of the major players, Rafi Felthun was one of the first participants to engage in the program at Sydney’s St Ives North Public School when it started back in 2002. Upon putting the organization into effect between the time she last visited, she had noticed “Not even a year had passed since the September 11 event that changed the world and many of Felthun’s peers were trying to make sense of racist and religious tensions circulating” (Liebowitz). Even in moments like these, she notices how engaged people became with each other in hard situations and it really took a stand against racism even when it is so easy to do so in hard times. Organizations who have this ability to unite people are ones that have extreme morals and human integrity and it is something that more people need to move toward. Another group who tries to achieve the same message of saying no to racism would be All Together Now. This organization is one that takes a different approach toward how they interact with people. They reach out toward people using social media platforms under a certain hashtag or profile. Their goal is to influence people when actively participating in their daily routine of social media. It is such a huge part of people’s daily practice and to engage people in such a thing as spreading love through set examples, it really has the ability to encapsulate people with the positive message. “We’ve found that one of the biggest barriers towards equality is denial. By creating an atmosphere where people can have a laugh, but also understand the point-of-view of the performer who are predominately People of Colour, we can break down barriers and make this experience accessible for everyone” (Liebowitz).Both of these organizations are making huge strides in modern society as they implement their resources and idealisms into our culture. There are selective groups of people who believe that racism is something that we will never full eliminate from society and this argument has stood around for quite some time. If you take a deeper look into the past though, you can see as a total, humans have made leaps and bounds from where we have been even as recently as a few decades ago. Racism may not be be eradicated as a whole, but with every movement towards accepting everybody as equal humans, we come closer and closer to making racism not tolerated in any regard. On top of this information some people may make the argument that race is simply genetics and that in itself is something that makes us different. There are facts behind this, but it lies only within one gene located within our genetic code. It relates to the release of melatonin within our pigments corresponding to how much our bodies are exposed to the sun. The one thing that has given life to all things has also created a boundary for humans that relates to nothing other than how much exposure the person and their ancestors had to it. “People who moved to northern climates needed more UV-B rays to make vitamin D, so they produce less melanin. And over time that has gotten ingrained into the genome so northerners typically have less dark skin” (Ajayi). It almost is ironic that people get conflicted with something such as skin color when being associated with a darker color is something that is a desirable trait by many. It goes to show how irrelevant racism could be because we are all humans living on the same Earth.
One of my favorite Excerpts from Kathryn Stockett:
“Once upon a time they was two girls,” I say. “one girl had black skin, one girl had white.”
Mae Mobley look up at me. She listening.
“Little colored girl say to little white girl, ‘How come your skin be so pale?’ White girl say, ‘I don’t know. How come your skin be so black? What you think that mean?’
“But neither one a them little girls knew. So little white girl say, ‘Well, let’s see. You got hair, I got hair.'”I gives Mae Mobley a little tousle on her head.
“Little colored girl say ‘I got a nose, you got a nose.'”I gives her little snout a tweak. She got to reach up and do the same to me.
“Little white girl say, ‘I got toes, you got toes.’ And I do the little thing with her toes, but she can’t get to mine cause I got my white work shoes on.
“‘So we’s the same. Just a different color’, say that little colored girl. The little white girl she agreed and they was friends. The End.”
Baby Girl just look at me. Law, that was a sorry story if I ever heard one. Wasn’t even no plot to it. But Mae Mobley, she smile and say, “Tell it again.”
Within the past several weeks I have greatly expanded my knowledge on the topic at hand by doing several events. At my school (Moravian College), I have participated in an event called Infocus: Town Hall, in which many students met up within our community to discuss pressing issues that needed to be discussed within our society as a whole. The whole body of students broke up into smaller groups, each bringing with them all of our research related to the topics on the table. Each of us had a block of time to lay out all of our research and talk about our viewpoint relating to the topic. After this, we all discussed our ideas about our own topics and contributed to others. Within our group, we found a very common theme that outlined all of our ideas and this was inequality. Our group had a sense of urgency to acknowledge these problems and we had no struggle understanding where the others rationale came from. This group session really made each individual dive deeper into what we already knew and it had inspired us to take action upon what we had to know. This applied to me in a large way because it drove me to make a powerpoint presentation where I could shine light upon it.
Link: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/13XSDudXAubZtypYiTob72Q4U3XKgbrVpEddE3XwiXAM/edit#slide=id.p )
My presentation acknowledged the music that was powerful in nature when racial inequality was demonstrated in our society. I am a musician myself who plays the guitar and the keyboard so incorporating real music within my research would really make it all come to life and the time I presented it really got people involved with the subject which was relieving to see. People really enjoyed the music and the interaction that came with it so my ideas and presentation really made a impact on the people who I was presenting to. I included music such as Imagine by The Beatles, Buffalo Soldier by Bob Marley, and Take Me to Church by Hozier. Along with these song, I also played one of my favorites because of the song itself and the message it carries was Blackbird by the Beatles. In the link below I included a video of me playing it.
Blackbird – Michael Marchese:
Here’s a Quote from Paul McCartney about the Musical Meaning –
‘I had in mind a black woman, rather than a bird. Those were the days of the civil rights movement, which all of us cared passionately about, so this was really a song from me to a black woman, experiencing these problems in the States: “Let me encourage you to keep trying, to keep your faith; there is hope.”
All of these songs made my presentation come to life and incorporated people in a way that made the issues very apparent and real. The music carried the message in a way that drove people to make change about it due to the way it explains these problems in a way that simple words cannot. On top of this research and the insight that I have gained from the Town Hall event, I have made my own initiative to create a piece of music that touches on aspects of inequality and the changing world that we all live in. This song was one that I had put all of my effort and heart into and it turned into something that can make a statement in our world. My singer. Songwriter and friend Grace Kindt, helped me make lyrics and flow to the song and it turned into something we both loved.
We are currently in a state of time where racism should be major thing of the past and we should have no tolerance toward it as a society. As we progress as a species, we need to realize that our genetics are all internally the same and that skin color is nothing more than a visual boundary that masks our internal being. Music and other social media sources, such as major celebrities and organizations have massive cultural influence when it comes to the opinion of the everyday citizen and their opinion on the issue. As a community and society, every step we take to accepting other races of people as one whole species of human is one step closer to a more loving and caring world. It is something that we have dealt with for as long as humans have been on Earth, but with every passing year it seems like we come closer and closer to eliminating inequalities and this is something that is very positive to see in our society today. All of this research can relate to a common goal that could apply to every person in the world. Racism and Inequality is something that every person should acknowledge as a problem within a world and it will stay apparent until the day that we all decide to make action about it holistically.
Works Cited
Ajayi, Luvvie, and Luvvie Ajayi. “Why We Need to Call out Casual Racism.” Ideas.ted.com, Ideas.ted.com, 8 Feb. 2018, ideas.ted.com/why-we-need-to-call-out-casual-racism/.
Canton, John P. “Behind the Music: The True Story of Bob Marley’s ‘Buffalo Soldier.’” Marketwire, 23 May 2013, http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/behind-the-music-the-true-story-of-bob-marleys-buffalo-soldier-1794212.htm
Finch, Candi. “The Message Behind Hozier’s ‘Take Me To Church.’” Biblical Woman, 9 Dec. 2014, biblicalwoman.com/message-behind-hoziers-take-church/.
Leibowitz, Amie. “5 Aussie Organisations That Say No to Racism.” Topics, 7 Mar. 2017, http://www.sbs.com.au/topics/life/culture/article/2017/03/07/5-aussie-organisations-say-no-racism
Lennon, John “Meaning of ‘Imagine’.” Song Meanings and Facts, 1 Jan. 2019, http://www.songmeaningsandfacts.com/imagine-by-john-lennon/Staff, Genius. “But My Hand Was Made Strong / By the Hand of the Almighty.” Genius, Genius Media Group Inc., 1 Jan. 1979, genius.com/570684.
Human Rights, Music, & Resistance 