Continuing the Legacy: Black Women of Cornell
Ezinwa Osuoha
Continuing the Legacy: Black Women of Cornell
I had the pleasure of speaking with Moriah Adeghe and Amber Haywood for my podcast, Continuing the Legacy: Black Women of Cornell. As two prominent black women leading community-based efforts on campus, Moriah and Amber were wonderful to speak to about Cornell’s politics and how it intersects with the black experience on campus. I reached out to Moriah, the Co-Director of Elections for the Student Assembly, to interview as a result of the recent turmoil surrounding Resolution #11 (a proposal that would support the disarmament of the Cornell University Police Department). Amber is the Co-Founder of Do Better Cornell, a coalition of Cornell students and alumni advocating for change in the university’s social policies and administration. I found it especially enriching to talk to both of them because of their different styles of advocacy and leadership, yet similarity in goals for the Black Cornell community.
I wanted my podcast to focus on how both of them rose to their positions in leadership, what leadership means to them, and things that they see lacking in our campus’ leadership. We also spoke about their past experiences with leadership, the positions that they hold now, and what they mean to them. This then led us into how their identities as Black women impact their political positions on campus. Both of them spoke about the need for more black women in leadership on Cornell’s campus. Moriah spoke about how there has been an increase in black women representatives in the Student Assembly, yet this number is still small. Amber spoke about how “we are seeing black women doing the majority of the work for the black community”, yet we still need to see “more black women in administration, more black women in our deans, more black women in deans councils… there’s just not enough of us there and black women have done SO much for our campus”. This reminded me of the discussion we had in class when we spoke about the essentiality of black women in social movements yet the lack of acknowledgment they receive. Specifically, it relates to our lectures on the co-founders of the Black Lives Matter Movement, Winnie Mandela, etc. yet adds a community-level analysis of these common themes.
All in all, this podcast so was interesting and enlightening to record. I learned more about the history of Student Assembly issues as well as was given insight into how campus politics is experienced by some of the prominent black women who advocate for our community. In the future, I would love to speak to more black women on campus in similar positions about their experience and what they would like to see added to campus leadership. In addition, I think it would also be very beneficial to talk to black women alumni who were in these positions in past years to see if/how the political environment on campus has shifted. Within the past ten years, much has changed concerning black sociopolitical movements as well as women empowerment movements. It would be really interesting to interview black women Cornell alumni who were in political positions during their time on campus and compare it to experiences like Amber and Moriah’s.
References
“Cornell University.” Data USA, datausa.io/profile/university/Cornell-university.
Fels, written by Tony, and Published by Quillette Magazine. The Fog of Youth: The Cornell Student Takeover, 50 Years On. 5 July 2019, quillette.com/2019/06/25/the-fog-of-youth-the-cornell-student-takeover-50-years-on/.
“Inside Higher Ed.” Cornell Students Revive Debate on Whom Colleges Should Count as a Black Student, www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2017/10/09/cornell-students-revive-debate-whom-colleges-should-count-black.
Richardson, Riche. Reflections on the Occupation of Willard Straight Hall, 50 Years Later. 13 May 2019, as.cornell.edu/news/reflections-occupation-willard-straight-hall-50-years-later.
Makaih Beats. “New Front”. https://freemusicarchive.org/genre/Soul-RB
Photos – obtained from Amber and Moriah themselves