Jessica Cuneo | The Metropolitan

Carlotta Walls LaNier and Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons talk about their contributions in the civil rights movement at the Black World Conference Feb. 16 in the Tivoli Turnhalle

The 29th annual Black World Conference evoked a powerful dialogue drawn from the experience of women who fought first hand for the abolition of Jim Crow Laws.

“We really wanted to manifest a sankofic approach using the cultural technology of storytelling,” said Dr. Elle Marie Ray, associate professor at Metro and coordinator for the conference. The “technology” Ray is referring to is the ability to orally communicate one’s life experience and story.

Sankofa is a West African word from the Akan language that roughly translates to “go back and fetch it,” where the ‘it’ is one’s history and culture.

The conference’s theme, “Black Women’s Contributions to the Civil Rights Movement,” showcased the often overlooked characters pivotal to the civil rights movement. It highlighted women freedom fighters Carlotta Walls LaNier of the Little Rock Nine, and Judy Richardson and Zoharah Simmons of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.

This year’s conference gave attendees the opportunity to think about the civil rights movement from the perspective of average people making extraordinary contributions, explained Ray.

“Certain figures, particularly Dr. King, have come to dominate the narrative so much that when you make an effort to look at things from the ground up … you almost automatically have to deal with the work of women organizers,” said Dr. Winston Grady-Willis, chair of the department of African and African-American studies.

The conference brought attention to the efforts of those who made substantial sacrifices.

“We decided to look at women in the civil rights movement who were committed, who made sacrifices, for whom being in the movement cost them and their families a tremendous amount,” Ray said.

The conference featured a Q&A and dialogue between LaNier, Richardson and Simmons.

The event also featured a performance by National Poetry Slam champion Dominique Ashed.

Photo courtesy of Dominique Ashed

National Poetry Slam champion, Dominique Ashed, performs a spoken word piece.

Ashed performed various spoken word and slam pieces. She wrote a piece specifically for the event.

For Ashed, using slam poetry and spoken word is a powerful way convey the importance of celebrating the efforts of those who came before, as well as to draw the audience into the subject matter.

“It’s not abstract, it’s not clinical. It’s not this far away and scholarly thing that people feel like they can’t touch or that is not relative to them. Every line is about the stuff between us as human beings,” Ashed said. “Slam facilitates the conversation in a way that makes it easy for people to understand what the connective tissue [between us] is.”

Students from Rangeview High School and Highline Academy Charter School also attended the event, bringing nearly 80 participants to the conference, according to Grady-Willis.

“There was a moment in which I was almost moved to the point of tears during the (Q&A) session,” Grady-Willis said. “Here, you actually had this living moment where young people were really curious, were giving these women their due and thanking them, but also just asking really interesting questions that constructed a bridge between what was happening in the fifties and sixties to what’s happening now in 2012.”

Tags: 29th annual Black World Conference, African American studies, Black History Month, Black Women’s Contributions to the Civil Rights Movement, Jim Crow Laws, Little Rock Nine, slam poetry, Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, top

People: Carlotta Walls LaNier, Dominique Ashed, Elle Marie Ray, Judy Richardson, Zoharah Simmons