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Remembering Resistance, Chronicling Community Recap

Thirteen people braved the cold to participate in “Remembering Resistance, Chronicling Community” at Girard College on the evening of January 31. The event was held in connection with the 50th anniversary of the desegregation of Girard College. Attendees were able to tour the historic spaces of Girard’s main building and see artifacts from its history, including materials related to desegregation.

Afterwards, attendees enjoyed dinner and participated in story circles in small groups. Everyone had been invited to bring an object, image, or other material as a way of sharing a brief story of their own experience with resistance. Some attendees shared experiences about acts of resistance they had participated in, such as the protests to integrate Girard College or exposing the history of environmental racism and health threats in their neighborhood through research and blogging. Others in attendance talked about other people in their families who demonstrated resistance and how that inspires the work they do now. Attendees also responded to the resistance stories they heard.

Themes which emerged from the circles and conversations included:

  • Mothers as models of resistance
  • How civil rights era assassinations catalyzed individuals
  • How easy it is for stories to be lost
  • The desire for stories to be passed down
  • How resistance can be inspired by the acts of others.
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Thinking Partners Meeting 10.09.2018

Note: To make information on our website easier to find, we’ve moved meeting summaries to our blog and deleted the “Discover” page. You’ll find all Thinking Partner meeting summaries under the “Project Updates,” “Meeting Summaries,” and “What We’ve Learned” categories.

A number of thinking partners and steering committee members gathered at the Athenaeum of Philadelphia for the first in our series of conversations. The conversation focused on the two major goals of this project: documenting current resistance, and inviting people to see themselves in resistance narratives that are kept in archives/libraries/special collections.

Several themes became apparent as part of the conversation. One was that we need to rethink common knowledge about what stories are known, as some stories may seem “hidden” but will be told by people if they are asked what history is important to them.

We also discussed the importance of personal and individual stories, and of people stepping up when systems are failing. Many people doing radical things may not identify themselves as resistors, so how can they be reached?

There was also debate among those in attendance about what the best way to preserve stories can be. It is important to determine where people consider their stories safe, and to be sure that such places, and places where people trust their stories to be told, have resources. But there is also potentially value in “canonizing” stories by talking about them in traditionally-elite institutions, as long as this is done in a way that centers the experience of the groups in question. It is always important to insist upon the inclusion of people who may not be obvious in records.

On a practical level, it was suggested that having a short, written form that people can fill out to give feedback is helpful in collecting information. In order for this to work well, it is necessary to have a specific question or hook, even if action items are still pending.

Implemented Action(s) Following Meeting: The steering committee developed three central open-response questions related to the project goals and created a Google form and 5×7 response card to receive public replies.