Happy Friday. History is personal.
One of the funniest anecdotes I ever collected while reporting on civil rights was from Joanne Bland, then the founder of a small voting rights museum in Selma, Ala. In 1965, she was among a group of young children being prepped to join the many protests planned against the state violence now known as Bloody Sunday. “King is coming!” Their families were told, which the adults understood to mean Martin Luther. “But us kids thought it was King, this dog, who was on tv,” she recalled, referring to a popular show about a crime-fighting Alaskan malamute. They were thrilled. Then a preacher showed up. No longer thrilled. Luckily, the good reverend brought along some friends. “We all knew who Harry Belafonte was,” she said with a big smile.
Harry Belafonte, the trailblazing singer, actor, and civil rights icon, died this week at 96.
He was a steady voice for justice who could be counted on to unflinchingly and presciently raise issues with urgency and directness. “A river of blood that washes the streets of our nation flows mostly from the bodies of our Black children,” Belafonte said when accepting an NAACP Image Award in 2013. “Yet, as the great debate emerges on the question of the gun, white America discusses the constitutional issue of ownership, while no one speaks of the consequences of our racial carnage.”
There is much to unpack about his remarkable career, but let’s focus on Belafonte’s origin story.
In 1956, nine years before he thrilled the activist kids of Selma, Belafonte became the first-ever Black artist to hit number one on the Billboard top-albums chart, where he stayed for an unprecedented 31 weeks. The album was Calypso, a joyful collection of songs that showcased his remarkable voice and roots in Jamaica and Martinique. The album, which contained an irrepressibly catchy song about exhausted and oppressed banana boat workers—oh, you know the one—also became the first by any artist to reach the million-seller mark. He went on to an outstanding film career. He became the first-ever African American television producer. He became the first African American to win an Emmy. His list of firsts is staggering.
Yes, everyone knew Harry Belafonte. He was welcome atop record players nationwide, a glamourous figure everyone admired. He made people happy, and then he made them think.
But don’t let his lighthearted early hits fool you, cautions music writer Jason Heller. “He didn’t have to sing overtly about politics; his very existence as a chart-topping pop artist (and, let’s not forget, a universal sex symbol) who happened to be Black was, at the time, a statement in and of itself,” he says.
And his choice of calypso music was a snitch. “It was Revolution you could limbo to,” writes Heller. The 1950s and ’60s were a time of great change across the Caribbean states, a quest for post-colonial and economic justice that mirrored the U.S. “Belafonte’s renewal of traditional African-Caribbean ballads and work songs didn’t just evoke an earthy, homespun past. They broadened Black consciousness and inspired hope for the future.”
History may be personal, but so is hope. As the Belafonte tributes, stories, and memories pour in, let’s celebrate the light he shone as he held doors open for others. And I don’t know about you, but a little limbo with friends sounds like a fine way to throw a revolution. More joy, please.
Ellen McGirt
@ellmcgirt
[email protected]
This edition of raceAhead was edited by Ruth Umoh.
On Point
Let's discuss 'diversity dishonesty'
It’s when companies talk a good game about their diversity goals, then abandon their “diverse” employees when push comes to shove. “It’s hiring a ton of diverse people, putting diverse people on company photographs and advertising assets, but not valuing them in the organization and then gaslighting when the issue is raised,” says Tricia Callender, head of diversity, equity, and inclusion at Thinx Inc.
Stylist
Wisconsin uses an algorithm that identifies Black students as high risk
The model predicts whether a middle school student will graduate high school on time. A new investigation claims it relies on biased assumptions and stigmatizes students of color.
The Markup
Tech recruiter lists 'whites only' job description
Arthur Grand Technologies, a Virginia-based staffing firm, rushed to shutter its website and social media after someone amended a job posting for a business analyst position to the following: “Only Born US citizens [White] who are local within 60 miles of Dallas, TX.” The company says it's taking legal action against the now-former employee who changed the post.
Vice
Does A.I. Have an anti-Palestine bias?
Yes, says Palestinian-American artist Ameera Kawash. Using a text-to-image generator tool, Kawash created a series of images of a cat wearing a Palestinian keffiyeh headdress in front of holy sites in Jerusalem. Kawash notes the A.I. Had trouble rendering the intricate pattern on keffiyeh. But it also, when prompted with a Jewish holy site, transformed the keffiyeh scarf worn normally wrapped on the head or around the neck into a knitted skullcap. “The adoption of popular generative A.I. Tools means keeping track of and contesting new biases, discriminatory practices, and forms of erasure in an already skewed online landscape,” says Kawash.
972 Magazine
On Background
Somewhere in the dream, we had an epiphany. Now we right the wrongs in history
If you want a memorable musical metaphor for allyship—or just looking for an excuse to listen to another beautiful song—take a few moments to enjoy this extraordinary performance of the Oscar-winning song “Glory” from the Ava DuVernay film Selma. John Legend and Common, who wrote the song, also won Best Original Song at the 2015 Golden Globe Awards But the staged version, which the duo performed at the Oscar ceremony, offers a subtle lesson on offering grace in a racial partnership that’s easy to miss. As the “marchers” fill the stage to sing during the dramatic finale, the white performers march shoulder to shoulder with the Black ones—but stand in silent solidarity. The glory is in the details.
Glory at the Oscars
Parting Words
“Here was a song about struggle, about Black people in a colonized life doing the most grueling work. And I took that song and honed it into an anthem that the world loved. And Paul Robeson once said to me—when he heard me in my earliest years—said, 'Get them to sing your song, and they will want to know who you are.' And I woke up one day, and the whole world was singing ‘Banana Boat.’ And I didn't really understand how powerful I was until I stood before an audience of 50,000 Japanese trying to sing ‘Day-O.’”
