On
December 20, 2017, two confederate statues were removed from parks that were previously public in Memphis. This is an event that is clearly relevant to our course's focus on
Civil Rights in Memphis. It would be reasonable to question the timing in
removing these statues. The 50th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther
King’s assassination is looming and it will bring a national attention to the
city of Memphis that it may not have seen since the actual assassination. Is
the city of Memphis worried that high profile speakers will choose to
illuminate the ways in which this city has yet to achieve equality? The
confederate statues were a physical representation of a less than progressive
city. The imagery of confederate statues that have continued to hold a
prominent position on public property in a majority African American city is a
powerful and troubling one. The legal loophole utilized to rid the city of
Memphis of these hateful figures did not miraculously appear in the same year
as the MLK50.
One
force leading the movement to have these statues taken down was “Take ‘Em Down
901”, led by the activist Tami Sawyer. Sawyer was interviewed for the Memphis
Flyer a few months before the statues were finally taken down, and her
interview is a reminder of the ways in which the grassroots activism that
fiercely advocates for progress is often overshadowed. In one question, Sawyer
was asked to describe the importance of advocating for a “symbolic” change in
the city instead of using her energy to strive for “real” change. Sawyer’s responds:
“It's not just symbolic if we are able to
continue a movement out of this. If we're able to change conversations and make
them about what social, racial, and economic justice really looks like. It's
not more than symbolic if the statues come down and everyone goes home and says
‘racism is solved in Memphis’, which is my fear. It's more than symbolic
because you're in a 65% black City with a founder of the KKK, or Grand Wizard,
or whatever big man he was in the early days of the Ku Klux Klan. And we’ve also
got Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy. I can tell you all the
stories about what they said or what they did, but the bottom line is, they
felt they were superior to black people and their treatment of black people was
odious at best, no matter what Nathan Bedford Forrest did when he got dementia.
Don't Give A fuck, and you can print that. I don't care what you renounce at
85, or whatever.”
The
argument that bringing down these statues erases the history of southerners
operates from the assumption that the history of the south should be shaped and
understood primarily through the perspective of white southerners. The presence of these statues contributed to a
narrative of southern history that focused primarily on the triumphs of white
supremacy. The movement toward “real” change includes taking a critical look at
the representations that shape the historical narrative of the city of Memphis.
Symbolism matters.
Relevant
Articles:
It is unfortunate that it took so long for the removal of the confederate statues in Memphis, yet it still marks are joyous day of triumph for the black community. I appreciated your ideas on symbolism. Although, arguments that stated that the statues were a representation of history, they were still a symbol of racism. The statues were a reminder of the white supremacist history of the City of Memphis and hatred that has left remnants in the city. Although, the statues have been removed, there is still work to be done in Memphis to dismantle the racist institutions that work to promote white supremacy.
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