Before Rosa, there was Claudette
I’m not sure how to incorporate this part of Planet Andrea - into Planet Andrea, except to just do it.
I started a post here a bit ago and then it got swallowed up.
But here’s what I just posted on my Facebook wall - plus an extra link at the bottom for anyone interested in the rest of the story.
And maybe that’s the connection here - that this is also about telling stories. And influence happening through the telling of selective stories.
Read down the NPR page for an excerpt of the book about Claudette - to hear how it really was. And the NPR audio interview to hear a couple of other things -
- what she sounded like and remembered telling the story at 69
(including a nod to privilege that exists among blacks - that made Rosa Parks a more likely to succeed choice - but also notice there’s just matter-of-factness in her recounting of it, not this weird guilt and fragility nonsense that’s being touted now ... happy to open that can of worms anytime)
- how the NPR reporter crafts the story itself - shows how, even with the best of intentions, history is really just one big game of telephone spoken through whoever is telling it 🙃
My FB post -
It’s possibly interesting to consider that even “well reported” black history, that’s taught in schools is a version that was selectively being represented and crafted to be told even as it was happening. By civil rights leaders.
https://www.npr.org/2009/03/15/101719889/before-rosa-parks-there-was-claudette-colvin
History is always snapshots of the real story. And who is telling it is, of course, important to include in the telling of it.
Including who’s writing the books that’re being taught from - and also the lens of the teacher who’s doing the teaching is seeing life through.
Even the simplest details are easy to get wrong - for example - where on the bus was Rosa Parks sitting?
In the white section? Or the black section?
Even the NPR interviewer/reporter botched this and they had to do a (small print) correction/retraction on the article.
Here’s the ‘suitable for history class’ and influence of future minds cleaned-up version of what went down.
https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/rosa-parks-ignites-bus-boycot
But if you want the full(er) context, listen and also read the book excerpt on the first link - that offers how it really was living it.
PS. who else didn’t realize that Rev Martin Luther King was only 26 at the time. 🤔
————
And here’s the extra link - sharing more of Rosa Park’s (after) story.
https://www.history.com/news/rosa-parks-later-years-aftermath
It wasn’t Rosa Parks who laid in honor in the US Capitol - it was the idea that was sparked that one day on the bus.
Claudette, btw is still living. She’s 81.