Black History Month is one of February’s long celebrated moments of remembrance. Since 1976 we have made it an American practice to “seize the opportunity to honor the too-often neglected accomplishments of Black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history.” As a non black person of color I cannot speak on the Black experience, nor can I imagine what one month in the year to recognize the contributions and legacies of Black America means. Certainly, I can agree that 28 days is not enough time to honor how much of America’s fabric has been woven by Blackness. And certainly, I can agree that then and now reparations are due. Much like land acknowledgements, Black History Month statements seem futile without action – that is to say, without the active and determined reallocation of funds, assets and resources.
Pease Park Conservancy is working to center narratives, prioritize experiences, and most importantly to restructuralize how public land is cultivated and shared. When considering the Black experience in relation to a park conservancy, naturally I thought about Carolyn Finney’s “Black Faces, White Spaces: Reimagining the Relationship of African Americans to the Great Outdoors”. A prerequisite text for anyone seeking to connect to the natural world in an intentional way and “examine how the natural environment has been understood, commodified, and represented by both white and black Americans.” While we should all read Finney’s book on our own time and give it the care and attention it requires - I want to share a piece of it captured through excerpts from the interview Race and Parks, between Carolyn Finney, Audrey Peterman, and Wairimũ Njambi, moderated by William O’Brien and published by The Library of American Landscape History.
William O’Brien: What do you see as the most significant hurdles and opportunities in overcoming the racial gap in park visitation?
Carolyn Finney: Statistics do a great job of giving us a sense of what we see and don’t see with respect to park visitation. And this is important. But what they don’t do is draw attention to the historical context that informs these numbers—visitation or lack thereof does not happen in a vacuum. What does it mean to feel you have ownership over the parks when you are part of a constituency that has never been allowed to have ownership over public spaces because of segregation and disenfranchisement? How does one imagine oneself in these spaces when there may be few people who look like you in leadership or staff positions within the park? I believe these numbers offer an opportunity for environmental and conservation organizations that are responsible for managing public lands to get to know diverse communities by building relationships of reciprocity. This is not about “outreach,” which signifies a one-directional relationship that seldom acknowledges the experiences and knowledge base that all people possess. Instead, this is about a potential restructuring of the way organizations do the work of defining and creating greater access for all people. Doing the same thing you’ve always done in hopes of having a different outcome is not going to get you there.
William O’Brien: How does the connection between landscape and memory inform your work?
Carolyn Finney: I often tell audiences the story of how my parents visited me when I lived in Atlanta in 2005. I took them to the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historical Park in downtown Atlanta. As part of the park, we visited Ebenezer Baptist Church (where Dr. King preached), the house that Dr. King grew up in, and the visitors center, which was filled with images and sounds of the 1950s and ’60s. You heard the sound of Dr. King’s voice over a loud- speaker while looking at images of black and white peo- ple protesting or suffering indignities. As I stood with my father, he suddenly and very uncharacteristically grabbed my arm. I nervously looked at him and saw that his face had blanched, and I thought he was having a heart attack. But a moment later, he regained his composure, laughed nervously, and pointed at one of the photographs. It was an image of a “Whites Only” sign. My father said, “I saw this sign and for a moment, I thought we weren’t sup- posed to be here.” His memory brought him back to a time in his life that his mobility and access were limited by mean-spirited and small-minded thinking. When I think about land, I think we need to remember who we’ve been, both to the land and to each other, so that we can represent those truths, reconcile the consequences of our actions, and revolutionize the way we love ourselves and each other in this place we call home.
As February comes to a close, I urge us all to continue to ask ourselves, in the words of Carolyn Finney:
“Who becomes invisible, forgotten and erased in the stories about land and belonging? When we think about contemporary issues relating to race and, more broadly, difference, how does the work of remembering empower us to do this work better?”
-Camila Restrepo,
Community Engagement Coordinator