You’ve got to know how to fight for your rights!
The Brooklyn Historical Society will help activists brace for the incoming Trump administration by looking at the organizing tactics of civil rights leaders of the past. One organizer of “Civic Responsibility Then and Now: A View from the Archives,” on Jan. 11, says that the discussion was prompted both by the upcoming presidential inauguration and by Martin Luther King Day, just four days after the talk.
“This was kind of in the works before, but once the election happened we felt there was no way we could not do this before Martin Luther King Day to address the implication for Dr. King’s legacy and the inauguration,” said Zaheer Ali, an oral historian at Brooklyn Historical Society.
The conversations and concerns of activists have vastly changed since the election of Donald Trump, said Ali.
“There are many reasons to be concerned especially when you look at the issue of immigration,” he said. “We know that the language about immigration has been toxic this year, and how we talked about immigration in October 2016 is different from how we’re going to talk about it in January 2017 — the stakes are different.”
Ali and the Society’s director of public history, Julie Golia, will lead a discussion about how past activists in Brooklyn have prepared and organized protests, and will show off archival photographs and videos to give people a model.
“We will be looking at documents we think help people put it into perspective,” he said. “We need a greater understanding of being engaged as Brooklynites because we have long history of people who have always stood up, and it’s important to understand organizing.”
The discussion will be one of many addressing activism and civic engagement in 2017. Ali hopes the conversations will help mobilize people to find others interested in activism.
“This just the beginning,” he said. “And it help us think as an institution about what our community wants to hear from us, and helps us engage with the community. It’s important for people to express what concerns they have and find other like-minded people.”
Civic Responsibility Then and Now” at the Brooklyn Historical Society [128 Pierrepont St. at Clinton Street in Brooklyn Heights, (718) 222–4111, www.brook
