[Emailed 5.31.16]
Dear all: Thank you for open access to the museums. I've Metroed up from NYC for Yale's remarkable collections now and then, to thrill in the work. I am disappointed, however, that Yale is racist, promotes racism, aggressively stands by racist personages who shame the U.S. How else to interpret naming a building after Calhoun. This action is wrong; plain-out, straight-ahead wrong. Not especially because New Haven is a town with many Black people, although that fact doesn't strengthen Peter Salovey's immoral decision. I don't threaten but I do my part to objcct to this Trumpish celebratory sneering at this country's attempts to pursue the experiment of equality. Two articles. (1) James Baldwin's NYT review of Roots; 1976. (2) James W. Loewen's "10 Questions for Yale's President." My reason for the latter needs no explanation. As for Baldwin - he informs Salovey that Salovey "need[s] the moral authority of ... former slaves, who are the only people in the world who know anything about ... [Salovey] and who may be, indeed, the only people in the world who really care anything about [him]." I suggest no person of merit or discernment gives a crap about Salovey. Me? I very much dislike shoddy thinkers. True, I'm no one of any importance and have minus-zero wealth. But I do not want anyone I love to have more struggle in their life for any reason and certainly not because a "leader" with lackluster thinking skills is willing to cause harm because he doesn't understand what harm is. I ask you to resist naming so much as a shed after a man who caused so much pain. We don't erase Calhouns from history but we don't celebrate them.
Dear all: Thank you for open access to the museums. I've Metroed up from NYC for Yale's remarkable collections now and then, to thrill in the work. I am disappointed, however, that Yale is racist, promotes racism, aggressively stands by racist personages who shame the U.S. How else to interpret naming a building after Calhoun. This action is wrong; plain-out, straight-ahead wrong. Not especially because New Haven is a town with many Black people, although that fact doesn't strengthen Peter Salovey's immoral decision. I don't threaten but I do my part to objcct to this Trumpish celebratory sneering at this country's attempts to pursue the experiment of equality. Two articles. (1) James Baldwin's NYT review of Roots; 1976. (2) James W. Loewen's "10 Questions for Yale's President." My reason for the latter needs no explanation. As for Baldwin - he informs Salovey that Salovey "need[s] the moral authority of ... former slaves, who are the only people in the world who know anything about ... [Salovey] and who may be, indeed, the only people in the world who really care anything about [him]." I suggest no person of merit or discernment gives a crap about Salovey. Me? I very much dislike shoddy thinkers. True, I'm no one of any importance and have minus-zero wealth. But I do not want anyone I love to have more struggle in their life for any reason and certainly not because a "leader" with lackluster thinking skills is willing to cause harm because he doesn't understand what harm is. I ask you to resist naming so much as a shed after a man who caused so much pain. We don't erase Calhouns from history but we don't celebrate them.
Most sincerely,
Sarah Sarai
emailed 5.31.16
to: (many are in charge of helping to organize "gifts" to Yale)
| ziba.kashef@yale.edu, karen.peart@yale.edu, james.shelton@yale.edu, elizabeth.connollymartell@yale.edu, michael.cummings@yale.edu, william.hathaway@yale.edu, joan.oneill@yale.edu, lynn.andrewsen@yale.edu, julie.braverman@yale.edu, donna.consolini@yale.edu, martha.woodcock@yale.edu, margo.tucker@yale.edu, patricia.pedersen@yale.edu, cynthia.mariani@yale.edu, ellen.lewis@yale.edu, melissa.rollenhagen.cristal@yale.edu, anthony.violano@yale.edu, james.hackney@yale.edu, gail.briggs@yale.edu, james.ebert@yale.edu, pamela.wesley@yale.edu, jill.westgard@yale.edu, jonathan.holloway@yale.edu, peter.salovey@yale.edu |
The above illustration is one of the less heart- and gut-wrenching visuals of slavery.
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