What it means to be `black'

More than 50 students came together last night at W.E.B. DuBois College House for an informal discussion entitled "Degrees of Blackness." The talk, co-sponsored by PennTalks and the DuBois College House Council, lasted nearly two hours and dealt with what it means to be black and African American, among other topics. "Each of the black people here on Penn's campus [comes from] different communities, different areas around the globe," DuBois Council representative and Wharton junior K. J. Mills said prior to the event. "It's just a way to bring everybody together, to understand where everybody's coming from," Mills added. DuBois Graduate Associate Alton Strange, who moderated the event, opened the evening by praising freshmen for attending, and encouraging more to do so. The discussion began with every student in the room providing the rest of the group with his or her definition of what it means to be black. "I don't think there is one single way to be black," Pennsylvania Current Managing Editor Sandy Smith said. The idea of the unity of the black community was touched on several times during the evening. "I do believe that there is a commonality with black people," College sophomore Jason Frazer said. As for the word "black," Frazer said "it's a social and political term." He explained that the term black also refers to the "oppression" of black and African-American people. Wharton junior Nicholas Scott raised the question of how the black community across the globe views itself. It's important that "we view ourselves more as a diaspora," Scott said. Dean of Dubois College House Sonia Elliott said that her race and gender helped define her as a human being. "I am a black woman first," Elliott said. Elliott spoke about working as the associate director for minority recruitment in the Penn admissions office, remembering that students would say that they "don't know how to be black at a place like Penn." Near the end of the night, Frazer challenged those students who said they felt people do not adequately reach out to them to "reach out to someone for yourself."

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