By Charon Baya, AFROPUNK Contributor
My answer stayed the same every time, I realised that the more I tried to change it the more I was lying to myself. No, it wasn’t the sisterhood. I didn’t come to Spelman with knowledge of this sisterhood or brotherhood or tradition and I can fairly say that I didn’t really fully grasp that unbelievable experience until I got there. I went to Spelman with an open-mind. To be truthful I didn’t really know what to expect of it, but having now been I can say that there is no place like it. As soon as I found out what Spelman was, I wanted to go. The thought of going to this all black women’s college in America (and being in Atlanta!) that was made to support, educate and uplift black women was unreal and exciting. I felt like I fit some kind of criteria; I’m black, I’m somewhat aware of America and it’s history and most importantly I’m black so it was going to be fine. This was where I imagined that I could “fit” in America, and I wanted to go to Atlanta and bask in itsBlack Hollywood. Anyway, in my first few weeks I was slightly alienated and othered that I began to grow frustrated and embarrassed at being me, and getting a sense of doubt of my own blackness and my experience from others..
I went on a journey at Spelman, I changed physically (natural hair and all that good stuff) and I grew even more passionate and conscious of myself. This mainly came from being the British girl and wanting to be so much more than that.
.
There were many things that were new to me when I arrived – the Atlanta heat! Having a roommate. Driving on the opposite side of the road. Same sex dorms. An all women’s campus. Living in catered style halls. Then there were other things: Being around so many black people on a campus. Having black professors. Having a black curriculum. Seeing so many black women with natural hair. Meeting the black middle-class in America. And never being the ‘only black person’ in anything, ever. Well, until I spoke. Then I became the only Black British person. Some of those conversations were filled with questions and statements like this:
.
“Do you identify as black?”
.
“HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHARON! Wait, they do say happy birthday in England right?”
.
“I just didn’t know there were black people in England.”
.
“So do you experience racism there?”
.
“Why do you talk like that? Are you from up north or something? I’ve never seen someone like you who talks like that.”
.
“I’ve never been with a foreign chick.”
.
“Say that again. Please just one more time.”
.
“So do you know who Kanye West is?”
Initially my frustration and confusion grew as I found it difficult to imagine how and why people would ask me such questions. I became sceptical of people, especially the guys who I felt might be talking to me not for a real conversation but just for the sake of hearing my accent and glamourising my “foreignness”. I experienced different encounters with many people being in the AUC (Atlanta University Centre); I don’t mean to write some of those quotes as a means to ridicule or belittle the people who didn’t know much about London, or England or being Black in England too. To be honest, the longer I spent in America the more I could see why one might fall into this American bubble – apart from the country being huge, it’s also so easy to just stay there and close your eyes to people who look like you across the world because of all the struggles you face in your community just up the road. Anyway, these are merely some of the comments and questions that surprised me the most and stay with me all three months after leaving Spelman (sob). I was initially surprised at the dynamic of African American culture and how black people across the sea in the UK can be perceived as so far and out of sync/existence with the black experience in the US. Then there are other moments where I’m able to unite with my Black American sisters and brothers through our predominantly western ideals and our ethnic minority status in our country of residence and birth. We can nod and share stories of challenging stereotypes or experiencing predominantly white spaces. When my Caribbean friend refers to a collection of women in the canteen as fat I can completely relate to the shock and horror felt at addressing others openly with such a “taboo” word. When my Zimbabwean friend tells me Wow! You’ve gained weight! I turn to my American friends in discomfort and embarrassment, knowing that she meant no harm.
.
It’s fair to say that being black in America, whether you are Black British or Black American (let’s say African American, due to its complex blend of both ethnicity and nationality), white Americans will still say weird uncomfortable racially inclined things around you. Maybe I was smiled at more because of my accent but that didn’t stop a white girl bursting into uncomfortable perceived-to-be African American vernacular around me although earlier speaking to me without this “performance”. I’m talking “oh heyyyy what’sup giiiirlfrannddd” kind of thing – I was so confused and cringing at how uncomfortable she came to be. Basically looking black on the outside but sounding British in America I learnt is more likely to attract white Americans complimenting me on how well spoken and proper I sound unlike the “others” or just making them stop dead in their tracks confused and asking me if I’m from Ethiopia or something.
.
So back to Spelman, it changed my life. My conversations at Spelman informed my conversations at home. My experience informed my social media profiles, it informed my love for self-preservation, and it reminded me to always value and appreciate the significant people I have in my life. I won’t doubt that it took a while to get used to, to find people who I really connected with (who I found were international/exchange students or first years in the first few weeks, since we’re all new and outsiders etc.) and to just openly adjust and enjoy myself. I was majorly overwhelmed by the formalities, the lifestyle and wealth of some of the students, seeing black middle-class people, the food in the south, the twerking to songs that I might buss-a-whine too and the traditions and rules at Spelman.
.
– Can I just say that the food was a huge surprise and I still feel uncomfortable about the idea of grits, experiencing a love and hate relationship with fried chicken Wednesdays but peach cobbler was a blessing to my tastebuds and heart –
.
I was frustrated some more at these restrictions, I felt boxed up by visitation and guilty for wanting to interrogate these rules as an outsider who didn’t really know as much about Spelman as some students who were “granddaughters” or people who had saved and prayed their whole lives to come to Spelman College.
.
At the same time it was intimidating, I was scared of the passion and drive that many people possessed for success. There were endless conversations I had that left me comparing my own lack of direction to their drive and life goals.
.
I found myself trying new things all the time, PR, Journalism, Double-dutch, reading more just to articulate what I may want to do with this random English and Drama degree that I’m trying to get. I phoned friends and my mum crying and stressing about how clueless I was on what I was going to do after Uni. Eventually, with the support of my Professor, friends and family I had to learn to just get comfortable with uncertainty and to keep exercising my passions and interests. (Thanks guys, those were some stressful times!)
.
As days and weeks and months passed at Spelman, Homecoming came and went and I did the whole Thanksgiving thing and travelled some, I grew aware and deeply interested in this notion of the Spelman Woman. I’d met so many different women I tried to understand her as she chimed inside me too. She is studious and driven, she is also beautiful and natural. She is an advocate for social justice. She is confident and powerful. She is also shy and timid. She drinks, smokes and twerks at parties. She is the Divine Nine. She is an excellent networker and has secured internships every summer. She has a Morehouse brother who buys her stuff and drives her places. She has a Morehouse brother that she never speaks to. She is an activist with pierced nipples and a septum. She is in a relationship. She is single. She is loud. She is quiet. She wears a white dress on Founders Day. She wears white trousers on Founders Day. She is the epitome of feminine and she is also queer or gender neutral. She is the legacy and she is also the first generation. She is the southern belle and the DMV. She is East Coast, she is West Coast, she is Ivory Coast. She is so much at once.
.
You become who you surround yourself with and being encompassed by all these successful, wonderfully driven, strong, social justice advocates pushed me off the edge and forced me to catch and carry myself, there and then.
.
I found it was initially the people who began to make it easier for me, finding students who too interrogated some of the attitudes of Spelman and feeling that it was okay to do so. Though I love Spelman and have so much respect for all of its traditions and historical context, I am still able to love and admire something with a critical mind. It was meeting other open-minded, liberal, free-spirited women and men who lifted me off my feet and pulled me into their whirl of spiritual freedom. People who literally cuddled me, and listened and talked out of interest, and drank with me, and laughed with me and travelled with me and just let me love them that made it so much better. It was then the classes that pushed me, and opened my eyes to new perspectives and new ways of learning and being taught. It was discovering new resources and writing and talking to strangers. It was the exposure to a predominantly black curriculum, and courses about black women and hip-hop and African-American poets doing amazing things. It was Dr. Rice teasing me about my J.Cole obsession and Dr. Hill supporting our work for Palestine and Dr. Lockett openly challenging me with questions about myself likeWho are you? What do you stand for? What is it that makes you you? That I never really asked. It was seeing my friends and their close relationships with professors, and edging into the Women’s Centre, and Cuban twist hair reflecting my energy and three-day long sleepovers and drunk Friday nights, and sober Saturdays with tea and facemasks and Tami’s apartment even without Tami and wash days and off-campus work days in Barnes&Noble and natural hair tips and 7am boot camp and deconstructing Morehouse men and dining dollars and free uber rides and brunch on Sundays and running 5K and asking for no oil in my stir-fry and trips to Chick-Fil-A and kissing at the Spelman gate. There was so much magic.
.
So back to the fundamental question – what is it like to be Black and British at an American Historically Black College/University?
.
I wish I could summarise it in one sentence.
.
It can be difficult and frustrating yet wonderful and enlightening. Particularly because there aren’t institutions like Spelman College and HBCUs in general that exist in England. It builds bridges between cultures, western habits, friends and music. It allowed me to shed light on my own experience, to educate people and to learn from them. It was bridging the gap between our slang. It was paving a way from Harlesden Road to Spelman Lane. It was assumptions of “fruity” European men and the admiration and distinction of London accents. It was where half seven meets seven thirty in hip-hop class. It was five hours ahead and tears about Cancer at the shuttle stop. The truth is, I feel so much more care-free-unapologetic-black-girl-magic radiating off me, and I feel lucky to now call Spelman a part of my life. (Can you imagine I was going to go to Georgia tech LOL).
.
Love love love,
Charon ☼
xx
.
* This article was originally published on Charon Baya’s personal blog: https://charonchapter2.wordpress.com/
Photo credit: Ebyan Abdirahman
