4 Ways Black People Celebrate Thanksgiving Without Celebrating Colonialism
Black people have used Thanksgiving as opportunities to celebrate communion, togetherness, and bonds that aren’t as readily accessible as they are needed. This essay contains discussions of genocide, anti-indigenous sentiments/violence, and mentions r/pe By Gloria Oladipo As a Black person and someone who
Black and Indigenous American Solidarity is Crucial to Ending Settler Colonialism
Indigenous communities can offer support to Black Americans by doing our own reckoning while honoring the space they deserve to tell the truth about their history. By Angelina Newsom Last Week The New York Times released a ground-breaking enterprise called The 1619
El Paso Shooter Represents White America And Its White Supremacist, Settler-Colonial Roots
The El Paso shooting should spur white Americans to reckon with their legacy of violence. Without it, white nationalists will continue onwards. By Anuhya Bobba Another day, another mass shooting. 22 people massacred in the crowded Walmart of Cielo Vista Mall in
Yandy’s Native American Costumes Perpetuate Violence Against Indigenous Women
Our society can never really eradicate patriarchy or sexual violence when we permit violence against Indigenous women. By Dani M. Every year, Indigenous peoples become fatigued by the cycle of genocide. Each stereotype a reminder of the endless violation of consent upon
Words Mean Things: Understanding Colonialism
Colonization is the act of forcefully stripping sovereignty of a country through acquisition of land, resources, raw material, and governmental structures.
My turn to state an equation: colonization = “thing-ification.” - Aimé CésaireThe use of social media as a powerful tool for free education on various topics continually rises, with definitions, experiential narratives, and resources being shared through Twitter threads, short videos, Facebook statuses, and even memes. And while this is a mostly positive phenomena, there seems to be a trend of words, and thus words’ associated theories, being used misguidedly. Often, this is a simple case of fighting character limits and the loss of nuance that occurs through online mediums, and other times it seems a phenomena of genuine miseducation and confusion. Words like intersectionality, decolonize, imperialism, socialism, and other loaded terms that come with decades of jargon are at times applied to everything, and their actual meaning is lost. Observing this pattern is what lead me to the idea of an article series titled “Words Mean Things,” wherein each month I choose a different word and discuss the theories, uses, theorists, examples, applications, and praxis surrounding it. The goal is to do this as concisely as possible and, understanding these will never be wholly conclusive of all definitions, applications, and examples of certain words, to deliver small primers that exist as resources to lead readers to study deeper. I often say that words mean everything, and then anything, just before meaning nothing.