Question: What inspires you to do what you do?
Harris-Lacewell: I couldn’t do anything else. The truth is I’m in a certain way very lazy. I’m not particularly capable of doing work that I don’t find interesting, so I do what I find engages my mind and my ideas. But part of it is I really, really like Black people. I like us when we’re making bad decisions. I like us when we’re listening to misogynist music. I like us when we’re paying our bills on time and we’re not. I like us when we get married and have these beautiful ceremonies and jump over brooms. And I also like us when we’re bold and brave enough to raise children on our own. I like the men who write to me from prison and, you know, use all their jailhouse lingo and tell me about the political world. I also like the, you know, little conservative girls who sit in my class and argue with me sort of the Black conservative line. I’m engaged by us. I’m fascinated by us. I’m always trying to figure out what would make life for Black people as equal, as democratic, as real, and as possible for the full capacity of human fulfillment as it is for other people. I think that Black people are the American promise. I believe that it is our struggle around questions of race which makes our country great; that if we did not have those struggles; that if we did not fight to figure out how to be inclusive, and democratic, and deliberative across racial inequality, then we would never get to be a better country. And so I just wanna be a part of that because I actually think it’s at the center of what we are.
Discuss
Mark Hensley on April 30, 2009, 9:19 PM
On a more personal note, I believe that inspiration is the basic ingredient to maintain one’s dignity particularly in these trying times. Inspiration does not have to be a huge event, it can be a subtle nuance, privately touching your heart by a distant yet sweet memory. For me, inspiration comes from a distant memory; a memory of Grandma McNeely sitting me on her lap as a child. That memory! The one that rose from beneath the shadows of a long time ago giving me a reflection today, of a precious moment in my childhood more than 30 years ago. It’s like looking into space and understanding the concept of light years away. And with a child-like fervor, I can hear this little boy’s voice say, Grandma, “I love you to the moon.”
Then I pause for the moment, and I think how “Grandmamas baby” has grown up. She would be so proud and happy to know, her grandson was raised to be a gentleman and he still is. She emphasized reading and writing, even penmanship, boy, would she marvel at my words today. I think on those things, and it gives me a new oxygen in the room, a deep purposeful inhalation to get on with it. To do my best everyday. If I fall or fail, I am not defined by either, but to get up and try again. I need that breath of fresh air every “now and again.” Tomorrow, I must somehow create new memories and pass it on to Daddy’s baby girl.
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