"Between the World and Me" by Ta-Nehisi Coates is a book, a personal narrative by the Author of some sorts which paints the picture of his mental liberation due to a his experience at a place he called "Mecca".
In the book, Coates refers to Howard University as his Mecca. Perhaps this is a subtle way of depicting Islam as is religion. His experience at his "Mecca" changed forever the way he saw black people.
In his own words he states:
"The Mecca—is a machine, crafted to capture and concentrate the dark energy of all African peoples and inject it directly into the student body. The Mecca derives its power from the heritage of Howard University, which in Jim Crow days enjoyed a near-monopoly on black talent. And whereas most other historically black schools were scattered like forts in the great wilderness of the old Confederacy, Howard was in Washington, D.C.—Chocolate City—and thus in proximity to both federal power and black power. I first witnessed this power out on the Yard, that communal green space in the center of the campus where the students gathered and I saw everything I knew of my black self multiplied out into seemingly endless variations. There were the scions of Nigerian aristocrats in their business suits giving dap to bald-headed Qs in purple windbreakers and tan Timbs. There were the high-yellow progeny of A.M.E. preachers debating the clerics of Ausar-Set. There were California girls turned Muslim, born anew, in hijab and long skirt. There were Ponzi schemers and Christian cultists, Tabernacle fanatics and mathematical geniuses. It was like listening to a hundred different renditions of “Redemption Song,” each in a different color and key. And overlaying all of this was the history of Howard itself. I knew that I was literally walking in the footsteps of all the Toni Morrisons and Zora Neale Hurstons, of all the Sterling Browns and Kenneth Clarks, who’d come before."
He celebrates the progress made thus far by everyone of whose skin is black. Progress because the pigmentation had become a global brand for everything inferior. Yet, the black people had come this far, reinventing themselves into a superior people who were unique and would not be bowed by the psychology of slavery.
Coates states and I quote:
"They made us into a race. We made ourselves into a people...but not all of us"
There were those who had been liberated the stigma of the black skin. There was those who were yet to be.
Cheers!
