‘I thought of my grandmothers’: Students celebrate Black joy in third annual Black Voices Symposium

In kitchens, in Michael Jackson’s “Rock with You,” in turtles, in deepest failures. These are some of the places students from the Spokane area encounter Black joy, as they shared at Thursday night’s Black Voices Symposium Northwest Passages event.

Students recited poetry, essays and other forms of art with a captivated audience at the event, which coincided with the relaunch of The Black Lens newspaper and the first day of Black History Month. The theme for the event was “Black Joy: An Aspirational Mindset,” thought up by The Black Lens contributor April Eberhardt.

“I thought of my grandmothers, I thought of those who came before me and my own family. And I know that life was hard; who knows life is hard?” Eberhardt asked the audience, who nodded in understanding. “But I know that they made it through, so I said, we’re going to celebrate Black joy because we made it through, we carried over. We’re still here. And every day, there’s something to celebrate.”

The commanding stomps of Cheney High School’s step team kicked off the program. Like a thunderstorm, echos from ten pairs of feet marching in rhythmic synchronicity filled Gonzaga University’s Myrtle Woldson Performing Arts Center, hypnotizing those in attendance.

Rogers High School junior TaeZhanae Hays-Cormier shared an original poem in which she personified Black Joy, initially elusive but discovered when she looks inward.

“I breathe with the same nose, My Father’s Family has shared for generations,” she read. “When I brush my hair, She’s combed in there too.”

An aspiring Broadway actress, Hays-Cormier spoke naturally and comfortably on the stage.

“I see myself on stages somewhere,” she said, though ultimately hoping to return to Spokane and open her own theater.

Persevering and overcoming, finding jubilation despite animosity, is where Melissa Pirie, Rogers sophomore, encounters Black joy.

“Black Joy is watching your siblings who look like you and are around you learn what you learned around their age, that their identity is Black joy and can be discriminated against but not taken away for good, and not without a fight,” Pirie read, her younger brother seated in the front row, beaming.

Family is a critical source of Pirie’s Black joy.

“My siblings mean the world to me,” Pirie said. “Just, like, the little things we do and laugh at, and just goof around at Walmart and just things like that, and just representing ourselves and our happiness and letting that affect those in the most positive way.”

Sibling trio Sian, Thomas and Aisa Armstrong’s paintings were on display in the foyer at the event. The three are Ferris High School Students.

“Life now is just so complicated that you just need time to enjoy the little things in life,” Sian said of her painting of a sun descending into a blue ocean. The colors in the painting – black, purple, reds and yellows – she said are meant to represent the many shades present in the Black community.

Rogers senior Alima Tambwe shared a poem about Black beauty.

“Watching the older generation be withered from their beauty empowers our generation to embrace mothers nature’s charm and live their life to the fullest,” Tambwe read from her poem.

Tambwe came to Spokane eight years ago from Burundi, a country in east Africa. She recalled hair straightener and skin bleach as common products in her household – products damaging to skin and hair, used to pursue a Eurocentric standard of beauty that made her feel like her features were less-than. She found Black joy in embracing her hair in protective styles and the color of her skin.

“I had straight hair all through middle school … and I just no longer had the desire to bleach my skin or straighten my hair,” Tambwe said. “I just wanted to be myself.”

The first edition of the Black Lens’ relaunch will be available in Sunday’s copy of The Spokesman-Review.