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#SAYTHEIRNAME SERIES: Part THREE
DEVALUING NAMES
Racial discrimination is quite prevalent in the United States. Communities impacted by marginalization often endure and resist multiple forms of racism, including systemic, institutional, and socially normalized racism in everyday interactions. Characteristics that humanize Black bodies and people are often unadopted by society. We see these trends on the news when Black people are murdered by the police and all of America, including their families are forced to watch the footage repeatedly.
According to the article, “Say Their Names” History & Sociology Special Lecture, close to 3,000 people, 90 percent of whom were Black, were lynched in the American South between 1882 and 1930. According to The Washington Post, 951 people have been shot and killed by the police within the past year. It was reported that half of the people shot and killed by the police are white. Yet, while Black people represent less than 13 percent of the United States population, they are two times more likely to be killed by the police than white people. Black people and Latinx people are shot at a disproportionate rate.
