September 28, 2016 - 22:11
i feel like i'm in a participant-observer situation. i am here to learn, but i tune out the presenters and watch audience members instead. i watch the elderly Black woman run her hand over the skills in the Morton collection which are placed at the front of the auditorium // i watch what a (college student?) girl chooses to jot down in her notes // i watch slide after slide show the same theme of decrepit "African" children in tattered clothes with relation to sickle cell anemia, then malaria, then ... // i watch an Indian girl, a Penn senior, who is presenting read a bunch of definitions about biomedicine from a powerpoint // i watch how she was sandwiched by two white women presenters // i don't see much more after that
i wonder what the rest of the audience is thinking when this happens:
a Black man says: "when a Black baby is born and he is light skinned, family members tell you not to worry because he will grow darker with age. you mentioned mixed ancestry - do you mean biracial by that? because i think we're all from mixed ancestry"
the white presenter replies: "i believe we're all African, after all"
the man agrees and is finished with his question. he walks back to his seat and another hand raises. i leave soon after.